General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Justice for JFK [View all]Mc Mike
(9,115 posts)As I said, I like your posts / angle on the issue, so I don't want to leave the mis-impression stand. I'm not obtaining and reading the WC report, even if 'stop' really really wants me to prove my worthiness on the issue by doing that. I never use the sarcasm icon, so sometimes the atonality of the typed word makes my statements come off wrong or unclear.
I think the country was always governed by consensus among power class ruling elite, who put together a coalition or team to get 'in charge' of the top democratically elected position. We're pretty much always two party, so high-level servant class members of the big financial / power groups angle to field a winning team for one of two parties.
Kennedy didn't make a mistake in assessing the power structure, he pushed to make it different. He pissed off enough members of the power structure to allow a consensus to be built that killed him. All the power groups weren't in on the consensus, but they had a hand in covering it up. That bumped president down a notch on the gov power structure chain of command, but I don't fault subsequent Dem prez's for taking office and doing what they can.
Kennedy died a couple of years before I was born, so all my thinking on him is based on after the fact study. He struck me as a very wealthy servant-class member who tried to back all the things that are good which the Dem party stands for. Reign in the war machine, big steel, big oil, reckless speculators (Hunt family attempt to corner the world silver market comes to mind). Hip and different from the old '50's militarism, not a beatnik but suave and international like Peter Sellers. Didn't understand the poor, but tried to figure them out and make things better for them (which is what his super wealthy brother Ted did in the Senate for decades, service to the nation.) Joe and Jack had to visit MLK's dad to get support from him for the '60 run, because Catholics were more 'beyond the pale' than old line black Protestants, but Kennedy didn't like the repug Catholic bishops. Not on the forefront of Civil rights, but did what he could federally to promote them. Backed labor. Actually liked women, not like the scurrilous scandals the repugs are always floating about his 'womanizing'. Fought geopolitically against the communists, but wanted a detente that would mean progress for humanity and the world. Looked for some way there could be a bigger aim for humanity, though you could construe the tax dollars for NASA as a pay-off to those corporations, the money wasn't going into bombs and armaments, and the aim wasn't war. Promoted Rachel Carson's environmentalism. Attacked the most virulent right wing parts of organized crime (Thus the hatred from Chicago, Marcello, some FL elements), though he didn't target the whole shebang; his dad had been a rum-runner. (I loved reading about how the brothers dropped Marcello off in Guatemala, ('Says he's not from there.'), funny as hell.) Peace Corp. Camelot.
Of course, those efforts attracted a great deal of negative attention from right-wing 1%ers. The right-wing, pro-nazi, anti-minority, anti-women, anti-labor, pro-war, anti-environment, pro-corporate, anti-regulation, pro-hate crowd's interests. The servants of those people are the repugs. Looking at today's repug party, it's so easy to see the exact same 'bent' and consensus that was able to get Kennedy murdered.
When the fascist French OAS generals tried to kill De Gaulle several times, he traced the money and co-ordination for the attempts back to the U.S. Kennedy asked De Gaulle after the last attempt if there was anything he could do. De Gaulle responded acidly 'No, there's nothing you can do.' He didn't blame Kennedy, was just stating the fact. After Kennedy got killed, De Gaulle commissioned a SDECE member named Herve Lamarr to investigate the murder, and Lamarr penned 'Farewell America', under the name James Hepburn. The book fingered the far-right Dallas oil bircher Hunt family for key involvement, and the fact that De Gaulle had the made showed that he bore no ill will toward Kennedy.
With the caveat that I'm not obtaining the WC, I'd like to see some of your questions. The thread is brick thick at this point, so you could always DU mail them to me, but I wouldn't mind offering my un-WC-'educated' opinion on them here.