law and order bent. He was also suspicious of labor unions if I recall correctly. I think he appreciated RFK’s efforts against Hoffa and the Teamsters, also parallel efforts against the UMW and UAW.

MSGHoofan also, though, disliked what he thought were welfare cheats and “race hustlers” like (in his opinion, not mine) Sharpton, while not himself having a racist bone in his body. With Kennedy’s outreach to the black community AND his support for anti-poverty provisions of Johnson’s Great Society, you’d think there would be a cognitive dissonance there, but he felt the RFK assassination was the great tragedy and the “sliding doors” (to use a UK phrase) moment in American history.

Perhaps he had some of that in common with your dad.