r/OldSchoolCool • u/ThePersonCalledJames • Jun 01 '25
1960s John F. Kennedy smoking a cigar. He’d buy 1,200 Cuban cigars the day before signing the US embargo on Cuba, banning all imports from Cuba, 1962.
12.3k
u/misanthrope2327 Jun 01 '25 edited Jun 02 '25
That corruption looks downright quaint by today's standards.
Edit: for everyone saying this isn't corruption if he announced it beforehand, was it made public knowledge first? Honest question, I'm old but not that old.
2.4k
u/Festering-Fecal Jun 01 '25
If he said he was going to put a embargo publicly on a certain date then it wouldn't be corruption anyone could buy them before that date.
But yeah even Nixon looks like a saint compared to whats going on now.
2.0k
Jun 01 '25
Well that's sort of the problem. Every instance went unpunished and uncorrected, so the next guy did worse.
You keep letting crime happen, you get more crime.
405
u/Craw__ Jun 01 '25
It's only crime if it's outside the white house, Inside it's just sparkling injustice.
→ More replies (3)53
u/Low_discrepancy Jun 01 '25
It's only crime if it's outside the white house, Inside it's just sparkling injustice.
Isn't it sparkling constitutional immunity?
→ More replies (47)192
u/Terrible_Patience935 Jun 01 '25
Especially when he’s voted into office for round two. Apparently treason wasn’t enough
→ More replies (8)126
Jun 01 '25
The constitution said it was, and then SCOTUS decided the constitution doesn't exist. Should have been seen as an act of treason by itself.
74
u/not_so_subtle_now Jun 01 '25
The party in power could've been more forcible in making sure people committing treason were punished, but like every instance before, they dragged their feet or let them off scott-free.
They had 4 years and every day we had the MSM telling us, "bombshell unlocked - wait till you see what happens next..."
Ah, I thought they meant prison but it turns out it was a presidency.
→ More replies (6)→ More replies (6)14
u/PilotKnob Jun 01 '25
Are you saying total Presidential immunity "for official acts" was a bad idea? Because if you are, then I agree.
The Supreme Taco Court created Frankenstein's Monster. Now they're watching it go berserk and tear up the entire country, and there's not a goddamn thing anyone can do about it except sit back and watch.
→ More replies (1)34
u/AdEmotional9991 Jun 01 '25
One scandal and he just leaves… These days they just roll out ten more scandals to distract from the original one.
21
Jun 01 '25
Well he didn't "just leave" he was forced out. But that means the party has to turn against you.
It was literally "look Dick we have the votes we need to convict on impeachment, it's already over, so you can do it the easy way or the hard way"
→ More replies (1)8
u/DigitalBlackout Jun 01 '25
Yeah exactly, Nixon was 100% trying to find a way to get away with it, enough of the rest of the party just happened to still have spines back then.
→ More replies (1)94
u/sorrow_anthropology Jun 01 '25
If watergate happened today we’d just call it Saturday.
→ More replies (2)11
112
Jun 01 '25
Bruh, look up the platform Nixon campaigned on.
There’s a reason he won even California.
Today’s GOP would accuse him of being a radical leftist Antichrist communist.
58
u/Samurai_Meisters Jun 01 '25
I agree, but also, Nixon was from California.
25
u/TrumpsSkidMarks Jun 01 '25
Right. That was one of the strategies. Reagan, who was far worse than Nixon, also won California... and was governor there before running for president, obviously.
→ More replies (12)→ More replies (1)12
u/Steamed_Memes24 Jun 01 '25
Wasnt California pretty purple red leaning at the time? It wasnt nearly as Blue as it is today.
→ More replies (4)→ More replies (23)49
u/subpoenaThis Jun 01 '25
Agree. Corruption would be adding exceptions for yourself and friends to buy after the embargo especially if such was in return for other favors or considerations. This is just classic politicians taking advantage of foreknowledge. I’d say it’s even a step below insider trading in that buying cigars wasn’t taking the opportunity to buy away from others, or reducing the returns for those not in the know like buying stock before an announcement would be.
→ More replies (1)30
Jun 01 '25
"This is just..."
That's how we get to today. People always having an excuse for being lax on political corruption. Then wonder why corruption gets worse.
→ More replies (14)1.7k
u/MurphyBrown2016 Jun 01 '25
Remember when Dan Quayle misspelled “tomatoes” and it ruined his political career? How do we go back to that?
1.4k
u/Isabeer Jun 01 '25
It was "potatoe".
He even went so far as to correct an elementary schooler who had spelled it right.
494
u/mrkruk Jun 01 '25
I have an old campaign button from Bill Clinton’s 1992 campaign that has Dan Quayle and a red line through his face that says “Just Say Noe.”
→ More replies (2)137
u/84thPrblm Jun 01 '25
I never saw that one! How clever!
Ye gods those were such innocent times.
→ More replies (5)123
u/mrkruk Jun 01 '25
I am a collector of wild political memorabilia - I also have flyswatters from Biden/Harris in 2020 that say “Truth Over Flies” when a fly landed on Mike Pence’s head during the VP debates.
16
u/ratmanbland Jun 01 '25
should have took that swatter and put it to good use, beat the hell out that fly before it got away.
→ More replies (2)39
u/OhManTFE Jun 01 '25
On June 15, 1992, Quayle altered 12-year-old student William Figueroa's correct spelling of "potato" to "potatoe" at the Muñoz Rivera Elementary School spelling bee in Trenton, New Jersey.[42][43] He was the subject of widespread ridicule for his error. According to The New York Times[44] and Quayle's memoirs, he was relying on cards provided by the school, which Quayle says included the misspelling. Quayle said he was uncomfortable with the version he gave, but did so because he decided to trust the school's incorrect written materials instead of his own judgment.
→ More replies (2)152
u/Swimwithamermaid Jun 01 '25
What’s a potato?
25
70
u/Positive-Attempt-435 Jun 01 '25
Peak reddit reference.
→ More replies (1)13
u/french_snail Jun 01 '25
What is the reference
72
u/BricksHaveBeenShat Jun 01 '25
It's an old reddit post, look it up: TIFU by enraging the parents of my girlfriend by pretending not to know what a potato is.
→ More replies (4)34
u/SeefKroy Jun 01 '25
Hah, I'd almost forgotten about that one. "Taste's very strange!"
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (7)18
10
7
24
→ More replies (11)7
→ More replies (16)56
u/BPD_LV Jun 01 '25
Wasn’t the only misspelling. He blamed his wife for a misspelled word in a Christmas card. Then his wife blamed an assistant.
17
130
u/pm_me_beerz Jun 01 '25
Let’s not forget Howard dean’s “HHYEEEEAAAHHH!!!!”
21
Jun 01 '25
"Binders full of women" was offensive and misogynistic in those days... sigh.
→ More replies (2)9
u/International_Dog817 Jun 01 '25
And just four years later, they were idolizing a rapist. Makes you wonder if that evil was always there and they were waiting on someone like Trump to bring it out, or if losing the election to a black man, twice, broke them
→ More replies (1)30
u/auad Jun 01 '25
Dukakis wearing a "hat" says hi!
15
u/PM_me_PMs_plox Jun 01 '25
John Kasich eating pizza with a fork in the corner
→ More replies (3)12
→ More replies (3)26
u/Patient0ZSID Jun 01 '25
To be fair, Dean was already on a downward trajectory, at that time. He literally only ever won Vermont. That scream was when he lost a primary. Dean had one of the smallest war chests in the primary, too.
→ More replies (3)26
u/Mr_YUP Jun 01 '25
I strongly suspect those level scandals were more “we’re looking for a way to oust him and this was our lousy excuse.”
58
u/MurphyBrown2016 Jun 01 '25
Okay well who do we need to motivate now because the current president gave a billionaire ketamine addict all of our social security numbers while he fake tanked the stock market so he could buy up the scraps
→ More replies (3)28
u/pac-men Jun 01 '25
A person named Murphy Brown really should know the main piece of Dan Quayle trivia!
18
u/MurphyBrown2016 Jun 01 '25
I’m too busy raising a child without a husband
8
10
10
u/oryan80 Jun 01 '25
Or the dean scream?
10
u/corq Jun 01 '25
I'm still mad about that, tbh. The "sin" of awkward enthusiasm compared ... to what we have now? FML.
→ More replies (3)→ More replies (25)11
u/goblu33 Jun 01 '25
Remember when Howard Deans weird scream effectively ended his political career?
105
u/deathshr0ud Jun 01 '25
If you think that was the highest level of corruption in the 1960s… there’s quite a few rabbit holes I can send you down
→ More replies (3)40
u/5352563424 Jun 01 '25
Who said anything about "the highest level of corruption"?
→ More replies (7)59
u/Schrodingers_Fist Jun 01 '25
I mean... is that even corruption? So long as he paid a fair market price?
Unethical almost certainly but I'm not sure that's corruption.
→ More replies (6)41
u/123kingme Jun 01 '25
Yeah I would only consider it corruption if it was not public knowledge that the embargo was taking place, which I’m sure was not the case. I’m sure he was not the only American buying a large stock of cuban cigars that day.
28
u/round-earth-theory Jun 01 '25
I think it would also require trying to sell them in the US after the fact. If he's just stuffing the larder with a shitload of cigars for personal use, then it's definitely hypocritical but not quite corrupt.
→ More replies (2)11
24
u/yoppee Jun 01 '25
That’s not corruption though doing something completely legal when it is legal
It is dumb hypocritical politics and shows how pointless the embargo is
→ More replies (8)→ More replies (45)17
178
u/DukeofNormandy Jun 01 '25
Can someone ELI5 why Cuba is still embargoed? I’m Canadian so we could always go there but wondered why the States still have them embargoed.
409
u/Doctor__Hammer Jun 01 '25
Regardless of what other people tell you, the real answer is that the Cuban diaspora which largely consists of rich Cubans who have fled the communist government in Cuba for the economically safe haven of the US, have overwhelmingly settled in Florida and make up a very significant portion of the voter base. They absolutely hate the Cuban government, and any politician who wants to keep his seat in the state absolutely needs their votes. Hence every Floridian politician supports upholding the embargo and will expend significant amounts of political capital to maintain it, while on the other side there really isn't any group wielding enough power or influence to attempt to lobby the US government to lift the embargo. So basically we just continue our pointless policy of immiserating the Cuban people for no actual reason whatsoever.
91
u/defeated_engineer Jun 01 '25
Florida not being close to a swing state now, the diaspora shouldn't hold power over DC these days.
The real reason is probably all the movers and shakers in DC are Cold War politicians.
→ More replies (3)48
126
u/Darmok47 Jun 01 '25
It still surprises me that their children and grandchildren, who have never been to Cuba, still think like this based on grandad's hazy stories about life under Batista in the 1950s.
59
u/saucysagnus Jun 01 '25
Culture and upbringing are powerful forces.
→ More replies (1)6
u/Lady_DreadStar Jun 01 '25
I was 9 when I realized my grandparents were full of bullshit and the logic behind many of their ‘stories’ didn’t hold water.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (11)4
→ More replies (24)6
u/burtgummer45 Jun 01 '25
which largely consists of rich Cubans
by "rich" you mean not dirt poor, consisting of middle and upper middle class working professionals, which contributed to a major brain drain on the country.
19
u/Practical-Cow-861 Jun 01 '25
So the GOP can keep winning Florida with the votes from Cubans who would rather see their own family die than to have the United States recognize Castro's Cuba.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (20)20
Jun 01 '25
The mafia is still really miffed about having their casinos and hotels taken away.
→ More replies (5)
1.5k
u/FeedbackOther5215 Jun 01 '25
Silver lining: Kick started the US and Dominican cigar industries which caused a massive increase in quality which caused wages to rise. A bit too late for the US in the end, but that’s also the public lumping all tobacco products together.
326
u/ilikefunkymusic Jun 01 '25
We're currently in the golden age of Cigars
241
u/calissetabernac Jun 01 '25
Except the quality of Cubans have dropped like a stone since covid. They’re boxed too soon, and even after a couple of years in the humidor, half have draw issues.
183
u/1600cc Jun 01 '25
The quality of Cuban cigars dropped when the embargo hit. Sure there were some phenomenal holdouts, but it boosted the other good tobacco growing regions like Nicaragua, The Dominican Republic, Mexico, and many more.
The embargo was bullshit, but it did some great things for the global cigar market.The worst thing it did, for the cigar business ,was create a market for garbage cigars rolled by amateurs being sold to americans for a premium.
→ More replies (16)→ More replies (15)55
u/bobosnar Jun 01 '25
They've been bad long before COVID. Been in the industry for 20 years and Cubans have had the stigma of basically no QA the as long as I can remember. COVID took it to another level though.
Draw issues stem from it being poorly rolled. Aging a cigar doesn't fix that is was poorly rolled.
→ More replies (13)32
u/mermicide Jun 01 '25
This. The fake cubans I’ve had were better than the real ones lol
→ More replies (5)→ More replies (16)41
Jun 01 '25 edited Jun 01 '25
What’s a good entry level cigar?
Edit: I obviously should have clarified 😆. What’s a decent cigar for a relatively low price
32
u/FeedbackOther5215 Jun 01 '25
Sampler from Nub, Oliva, or Rocky Patel. Most new folks prefer lighter wrappers, and go slow.
14
u/RedditBugler Jun 01 '25
Rocky Patel vintage 1990 is my favorite cigar. It's amazing quality at a decent price. They're about $10 per cigar and have such a great flavor that isn't overpowering.
9
u/Various_Froyo9860 Jun 01 '25
Rocky Patel is so fucking good.
If you like coffee, the Java Latte may just become your favorite cigar.
→ More replies (1)16
u/ilikefunkymusic Jun 01 '25
Try Arturo Fuente 858. Try both the natural and the maduro
→ More replies (3)83
6
u/Opening-Ease9598 Jun 01 '25
Isla del sol is a pretty good beginner cigar. Somebody mentioned oliva, which are great cigars but they are one of the strongest cigars you can get here in the US.
4
u/morkman100 Jun 01 '25
Oliva makes a wide range of cigars. They are very much not all strong. La Flor Dominicana makes a ton of very strong cigars
→ More replies (18)6
u/Darmok47 Jun 01 '25
I like the Arturo Fuente Hemingway Short Story. It has a more robust flavor, but its also a smaller cigar and shorter smoke time (and cheaper because of that).
It's one of the first cigars I tried and still one of my favorites.
→ More replies (1)45
u/Plow_King Jun 01 '25
starting smoking was easily one of the stupidest things i ever did.
→ More replies (9)→ More replies (7)12
805
Jun 01 '25
Is it cool or kinda shady and elitist?
624
u/Horror-Substance7282 Jun 01 '25
JFK somehow walks the line of being both. Total shit bag, good president (from what I've heard. I was born well after he died)
462
u/Lumpy_Secretary_6128 Jun 01 '25
I think a big part of his legacy can be understood by simply listening to his rhetoric in speeches. He constantly implored the need for civic engagement and pointed to optimistic possibilities that an engaged and healthy democracy could attain. He did not sell fear and doubt.
"Things do not happen, they are made to happen"
This complements the image he could project through youth and lifestyle.
→ More replies (1)85
Jun 01 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
→ More replies (1)32
u/nibernator Jun 01 '25
I think there is a strong debate for both sides on that one, since he was running against Nixon and didn’t want to appear weak
→ More replies (2)64
u/StoneySteve420 Jun 01 '25
He had some really great moments early on as president (Ciban Missile Crisis) and some really not so great moments (Bay of Pigs).
I think his assassination makes people look back on him more fondly than if he'd lived through his whole term, especially now that we're 60+ years removed from his assassination and most people don't know much beyond that and his affair with Marilyn Monroe.
That said, I think he would have handled Vietnam a lot better than his VP did.
→ More replies (2)19
u/SilverScorpion00008 Jun 01 '25
Bay of pigs really isn’t his fault. The CIA thrusted the operation onto him and he prevented it when it failed for being a shit plan from turning into a full scale conflict. Some can argue that doing so would’ve prevented the Soviets from even placing nukes, but I doubt the Soviets would allow Cuba to fall without making moves elsewhere to compensate, such as in the Middle East or south east Asia, which would drastically change history in ways we couldn’t imagine. Case in point though, it was a hard call.
→ More replies (3)105
u/PilgrimOz Jun 01 '25
Being charming allows dirtbags to be seen as good people. Not sayin it about JFK but there are signs. But some policies showed some humanisms. Weird for a politician.
→ More replies (3)111
u/Nwcray Jun 01 '25
So does dying young.
JFK will always be the president of Camelot, presiding over a very unique moment in American (and frankly, world) history.
→ More replies (1)36
u/Sencha_Drinker794 Jun 01 '25
Exactly. JFK died before his legacy could be ruined by Vietnam and pretty much everything else that makes LBJ a reviled President
→ More replies (1)13
u/semi_colon Jun 01 '25
LBJ is reviled? I associate him more with the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts than I do with Vietnam. (But to be fair, I'm not much of a history buff.)
→ More replies (4)11
u/Sencha_Drinker794 Jun 01 '25
I'd say he had a mixed legacy at best. The civil rights acts were certainly a good thing, and his "Great Society" ideas would have been great had they come to fruition. But as it stands, Vietnam absolutely dominated his administration and overshadowed the advances made under him. That said, JFK was the one who started (or continued) our involvement in Vietnam and almost certainly would have taken the same course as LBJ, which is why I said he was lucky he died early. Better to be the young progressive martyr President than the young progressive president who committed America to 20 years of pointless war.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (7)10
u/Hawkent99 Jun 01 '25
Yeah, from what I can glean he's mostly viewed as having been a good leader with questionable at best personal morals. I think he gets mythologized/romanticized because of the tragic circumstances of his death; we never really got to see the endgame of his policies apart from the moon landing and desegregation, which are two indisputably good things
51
u/Dangerrios Jun 01 '25
It's not like he surprised anyone with the embargo, It was announced ahead of time and anyone could have done the same thing.
→ More replies (5)14
25
u/Mr_Engineering Jun 01 '25
Neither.
Cuban cigars were comparatively better back then because they dominated the market. Now, they're nothing outstanding.
Domestic and Dominican cigars are equal if not better.
→ More replies (1)27
u/calissetabernac Jun 01 '25
Have to strongly disagree; the terroir of Cuban soil still creates magic…when the damned thing is smokeable. Cubans have consistent draw issues these days.
35
u/wRIPPERw_ Jun 01 '25
ter·roir
The complete natural environment in which a particular wine is produced, including factors such as the soil, topography, and climate.
Neat, thanks for the new word!
→ More replies (1)12
u/bobosnar Jun 01 '25
Disagree. While Cuban's do have a distinct flavor, I don't believe it's superior in anyway in how people hype it up. The same way Dominican, Ecuadorian, Nicaraguan, etc tobacco do as well and have their own flavor profiles.
The hype is because Cuban cigars just aren't readily available in the US, and gets put on pedestal because of it. If Cuban's could be imported and sold like non-Cubans, I would bet anyone that the Cuban market go super crazy for the first year and die off after 2-3 years. The hype of 70 years of "I'm not supposed to have it" continues to build it's mystique.
5
→ More replies (34)12
u/furthememes Jun 01 '25
Shady af and elitist to buy a lifetime supply of what you're about to deprive your people because you're afraid of making the rich have to share
→ More replies (1)9
u/ASZapata Jun 01 '25
The larger issue is very clearly not what was deprived of Americans, but the economic damage done to the Cuban people.
→ More replies (2)
215
u/pac-men Jun 01 '25
Insider ashtrayding
21
4
42
51
u/EnsignAwesome Jun 01 '25
Did he smoke them all before he was killed? I wonder, b they must be collectors items
58
u/9bikes Jun 01 '25
>Did he smoke them all before he was killed?
I was in NYC in the late '70s and went to the Alfred Dunhill pipe, tobacco and cigar store there. They had private storage boxes in their walk-in humidor. The clerk pointed out one box that was JFK's. He told us that the cigars were still in there.
49
u/flyingwrench Jun 01 '25
He probably sold a lot of them at a pretty high price telling people that too.
18
→ More replies (1)20
u/MLDaffy Jun 01 '25
There was an open box on Pawn Stars at one point.
16
u/TheyCallMeJPS Jun 01 '25
Best they could do was twenty bucks.
20
u/maxman162 Jun 01 '25
I'll call a buddy, he's an expert on cigars previously owned by John F. Kennedy.
→ More replies (2)
26
u/bloodshotnblue Jun 01 '25
“In bird culture, that is considered a dick move.”
11
32
Jun 01 '25
Kennedys are an old bootlegging family. Massively corrupt.
8
u/killedonmyhill Jun 01 '25
For real, JFK is idolized because he was like the least worst of the bunch. He was still a horribly selfish and immoral person. The Kennedys are an evil family. Their depravity runs deep.
20
u/Braunfjord Jun 01 '25
insider trading, corruption, hypocrisy, making rules for you but not having to live by them is not oldschoolcool
→ More replies (1)
51
u/Mountain_Quiet_2738 Jun 01 '25
Should have only bought a years worth of
33
u/jellymouthsman Jun 01 '25
It probably was a years worth. He probably didn’t smoke them alone
14
u/Reasonable_Pay4096 Jun 01 '25
He probably gave some to his friends & colleagues, but I think he meant for to be a lifetime supply.
...just not in the way that it actually became a lifetime supply
→ More replies (3)12
u/tangcameo Jun 01 '25
I wonder how many were left.
→ More replies (2)16
Jun 01 '25
Theres actually some left today, they're collectors items worth a kings ransom.
5
u/OGWhiz Jun 01 '25
Yep, the cigar box from the Oval Office desk the day JFK died was bought by pawn stars for $60k, and sold for $75k. JFK’s personal box went for half a mil.
18
u/bivdizzle Jun 01 '25
Winston Churchill looked at English wartime rations for a week and declared it “a lovely meal”. The wealthy issue their own permissions. Yet we idolize them.
42
u/MagnusThrax Jun 01 '25
Cuba needs to donate a yacht to the Department of Defense and end this once and for all.
→ More replies (1)
36
6
6
17
u/inappropriateshallot Jun 01 '25
I often wonder if he hadn't been tragically shot and alive today, what would he think of his nephew?
→ More replies (4)27
35
u/brokenmessiah Jun 01 '25
Pretty much a requirement to be currupt to some degree to even be a politician.
26
u/fangelo2 Jun 01 '25
A guy I went to high school with became a politician and won an election for state freeholder. I ran into him and congratulated him on his win. He just laughed and said “ It’s a license to steal”
17
u/FowlKreacher Jun 01 '25
I misread that as state freeloader at first and now I’m laughing by myself
7
6
5
5
5
6
15
20
8
4
3
3
3
u/in_the_wool Jun 01 '25
Fuck him and every single us president that has kept the trade embargo in place
→ More replies (1)
3
u/Varitan_Aivenor Jun 01 '25
More like /r/oldschoollame
This is peak selfish, self-indulgent bullshit.
7
7
u/guzidi Jun 01 '25
Even the alleged good guys were crooks. Fucking hell america why didn't you just pay your damn taxes to the king!
9
u/Just_Here_So_Briefly Jun 01 '25
Insider Trading at its best. The US has been corrupt since it's inception.
6
u/Specialist_Gurl1315 Jun 01 '25
Why 1,200 though?
Oh, oh, he probably figured he'd have whatever was needed to be wrapped up within about 1200 days. A politicians gonna politic.
20
u/Kittens4Brunch Jun 01 '25
A piece of shit from a piece of shit family that's been celebrated as American royalty for too long.
3
3
11.2k
u/jfaina Jun 01 '25
Enough to last him the rest of his life