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Free online lectures: Explore a world of ideas

Funding provided by:
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John F. Kennedy Library Foundation

The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum is dedicated to the memory of our nation's thirty-fifth president and to all those who through the art of politics seek a new and better world. Our purpose is to advance the study and understanding of President Kennedy's life and career and the times in which he lived; and to promote a greater appreciation of America's political and cultural heritage, the process of governing and the importance of public service. We accomplish our mission by: preserving and making accessible the records of President Kennedy and his times; promoting open discourse on critical issues of our own time; and educating and encouraging citizens to contribute, through public and community service, to shaping our nation's future.break

http://www.jfklibrary.org

  • Brian Williams leads former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, former US Secretary of State Alexander Haig, President Kennedy's special counsel Theodore Sorensen, and President Johnson's special assistant Jack Valenti in a discussion about the Vietnam War. This lecture comes from "Vietnam and the Presidency", a national conference where leading historians, key policymakers of the Vietnam War era, and journalists who covered the war examine the antecedents of the war, presidential decision-making, media coverage, public opinion, lessons learned and the influence of the Vietnam War experience on subsequent US foreign policy. The Vietnam War was the longest and most controversial war that the United States ever fought. It claimed the lives of more than 58,000 Americans and over three million Vietnamese. From the arrival of the first US military advisors in the 1950s to the fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975, US involvement in Viet Nam was central to the Cold War foreign policies of Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Ford. The war has continued to affect the policies of subsequent presidents, and its legacy is particularly relevant today during America's war on terror.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • A panel discuss strategies to help eliminate the spread of disease and hunger in the developing world. Panelists include Paul Farmer, who for the last 20 years has worked in Haiti with poor communities to combat infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS, Amartya Sen, a Harvard economist who has won a Noble Prize for his work on world poverty, and Lincoln Chen, director of Harvard's Center for Global Poverty. **Paul Farmer**, a medical anthropologist and physician has dedicated his life to treating some of the world's poorest populations, in the process helping to raise the standard of health care in underdeveloped areas of the world. A founding director of Partners In Health, an international charity organization that provides direct health care services and undertakes research and advocacy activities on behalf of those who are sick and living in poverty, Dr Farmer and his colleagues have successfully challenged the policy makers and critics who claim that quality health care is impossible to deliver in resource-poor areas. With colleagues in Haiti and Peru, Farmer has helped lead the international response to mutlidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), later found to be endemic in the former Soviet Union, by establishing pilot MDR-TB treatment programs and organizing effective delivery systems for medications. Working closely with the Open Society Institute, he has participated in evaluations of TB treatment programs in Russia, Peru, Azerbaijan, Latvia, Kazakhstan, with a special interest in TB among prison populations. Dr Farmer was instrumental in establishing the World Health Organization's Working Group on MDR-TB and has been a member of DOTS-Plus Working Group for the Global Tuberculosis Program of the World Health Organization; chief advisor of tuberculosis programs of the Open Society Institute; chief medical consultant for the Tuberculosis Treatment Project in the Prisons of Tomsk (Siberia); and a member of the Scientific Committee of the WHO Working Group on DOTS-Plus for MDR-TB. He has served on the Scientific Review board of ten of the last international conferences on AIDS, and has been a leading voice on behalf of HIV/AIDS and MDR-TB patients across the world. Listen to a complementary [interview with Amartya Sen](http://thoughtcast.org/casts/economist-amartya-sen-on-identity-and-violence) on Thoughcast.org, a podcast and public radio interview program on authors, academics and intellectuals.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • Senator Edward Kennedy presents Senator John Kerry with a bronze bust of President Kennedy in recognition of Kerry's lifelong commitment to public service, a career that includes service in the United States Navy (1966-1969) during which he was decorated for combat in Vietnam War; assistant district attorney for Middlesex County, MA (1977-1982); lieutenant governor of Massachusetts (1982-1984); US senator representing Massachusetts since 1984; and Democratic candidate for US president in 2004. The Kennedy Library Foundation's Distinguished American series invites men and women who have played significant roles in American public affairs to share their insights and experiences with the public and to be recognized for honoring President Kennedy's call for public service and his belief that one person can make a difference and every person should try. Past recipients of the Distinguished American Award include President George H. W. Bush, President Bill Clinton, Harry Belafonte, James Farmer, Helen Thomas, Congressman John Lewis, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, former Secretary of State James Baker, Daniel Schorr, John Kenneth Galbraith, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., Douglas Dillon, Mary McGrory, Betty Freidan, Tom Wicker, Ben Bradlee, Dorothy Height, George Reedy, Liz Carpenter, Myer Feldman, Nicholas Katzenbach, McGeorge Bundy, David Broder, Stewart Udall, Archibald Cox, Marian Wright Edelman, Congressman Joe Moakley, Diane Nash, Sargent Shriver, and Kenneth Feinberg.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • George Stevens Jr. introduces and discusses D-Day to Berlin, the Emmy Award winning documentary he made using color footage that his father, acclaimed director George Stevens, filmed across Europe at the end of World War II. In 1943, Stevens Sr. was assigned to follow the invasion of Normandy with the 6th Army for the purpose of recording their operations for army archives. With footage discovered only after his death, the documentary captures "home" movies of George Stevens and the crew as they followed the Allied Army across Europe. This forum is moderated by Mark Feeney of *The Boston Globe*, and is the third in a series honoring America's Veterans as our nation celebrates the 60th Anniversary of the end of World War II.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • Dick Keresey, Paul "Red" Fay, and Bill "Bitter" Battle share their stories of serving on PT Boats in the Solomon Islands at the same time as John F. Kennedy during World War II. The torpedo craft (PT) USS PT 109, which was commanded by Lieutenant, Junior Grade, John Kennedy, was struck by the Japanese warship Amagiri in August of 1943, and sunk to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean off the Solomon Islands. This forum is the fourth in a series honoring America's Veterans as our nation celebrates the 60th Anniversary of the end of World War II. In conjunction with this forum series, the Museum at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library is featuring an exhibit, "JFK in World War II", which focuses on John F. Kennedy's military service in the US Navy in the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific, including his service on PT 109.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum hosts a special tribute to Sargent Shriver. Family members and close associates honor Ambassador Shriver with a forum to discuss the many contributions he has made to the United States from the Peace Corps to the War on Poverty.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • Former United States Senator George Mitchell analyzes the primary issues involved in resolving the conflicts in Northern Ireland and the Middle East. The forum is moderated by Kevin Cullen of the Boston Globe.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • Former National Public Radio correspondent Sarah Chayes, who has been living in the former Taliban stronghold of Kandahar, and award-winning journalist Sebastian Junger, who has covered Afghanistan for ABC News and other publications, discuss efforts to help reconstruct Afghanistan after 9/11. Jessica Stern, an expert on terrorism who teaches at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government, moderates.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • US Senator Barack Obama, D-IL discusses his book, *The Audacity of Hope*, and his views on American politics with New York Times columnist Bob Herbert.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation
  • Brian Williams leads former CBS News anchor Dan Rather, former ABC News correspondent Steve Bell, and Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Frances Fitzgerald in a discussion about the Vietnam War. This lecture comes from "Vietnam and the Presidency", a national conference where leading historians, key policymakers of the Vietnam War era, and journalists who covered the war examine the antecedents of the war, presidential decision-making, media coverage, public opinion, lessons learned and the influence of the Vietnam War experience on subsequent US foreign policy. The Vietnam War was the longest and most controversial war that the United States ever fought. It claimed the lives of more than 58,000 Americans and over three million Vietnamese. From the arrival of the first US military advisors in the 1950s to the fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975, US involvement in Viet Nam was central to the Cold War foreign policies of Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Ford. The war has continued to affect the policies of subsequent presidents, and its legacy is particularly relevant today during America's war on terror.
    Partner:
    John F. Kennedy Library Foundation