Andrew Hagen

William Gaines is the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign professor who led the famous class project to uncover Deep Throat and in the process named Fred Fielding. Gaines now admits they were wrong. Deep Throat was Mark Felt. (*) (†)

Nevertheless, key questions remain. Gaines states these in terms of how he was led to believe Deep Throat was Fiedling and not Felt. How did Deep Throat know that there were suspicious gaps on the White House tapes, months after Felt had left the FBI? The FBI would not have had access to this information normally. Gaines writes:

In November 1973, according to the book [All the President’s Men], Throat told Woodward by phone that the Nixon tapes had gaps of a suspicious nature that could have been deliberate. When the students checked the newspaper reports of that week, they found that quotation from Throat to be attributed to a White House source. The FBI is an agency of the Justice Department, outside the gates of the White House.

(undated article on front page of deepthroatuncovered.com)

The possible resolutions to this are one of the following four. (1) Woodward and Bernstein simply lied about this statement by Deep Throat. He never said it. (2) “Deep Throat” was a composite. He was partially Felt and partially someone at the White House. (3) Felt and the FBI had illegal access to information at the White House. (4) Felt had his own “deep throat” source who worked at the White House and fed him information.

I’d like to know which one it is.

Frequent Republican administration foreign policy official Lawrence Eagleburger is usually a mature and sober voice. A recent exchange with Joe Watkins on CNN’s “Crossfire,” however, opens the door to some questions.

WATKINS: OK. Secretary Eagleburger, this is the million dollar question. I mean, folks have been waiting for three decades to know who Deep Throat was or is. Is Mark Felt, in your opinion, Deep Throat?

EAGLEBURGER: Probably.

WATKINS: Do you think he’s Deep Throat?

EAGLEBURGER: Probably. You know, President Nixon once suspected him. I’m surprised he didn’t end up dead somewhere because of that. But nevertheless, I think he did suspect it. I think, if you think about it now, it is at least very likely.

I don’t know why Woodward and Bernstein don’t now come out with this if, in fact, he is the man. If he’s not — they’re stretching this out, and I’m not at all sure that’s wise. If he is truly the man, they ought to say so.

(*) (Since then, Felt is confirmed to be Deep Throat.)

What in Sam Hill did Eagleburger mean by that? It doesn’t sound like a joke. As yet there is no explanation for this statement by Eagleburger.

The famous Ben Stein excoriates the recently decloaked Deep Throat, Mark Felt. (*) Stein is terribly put off by how his old boss, Richard Nixon, was knocked off his pedestal by people telling the truth about him. Stein’s suggestion that deputy FBI director Felt should properly have had a higher loyalty to a foreign country is spurious. Felt swore an oath to the Constitution of the United States.

Even if it really were Nixon’s fall that directly led to communist darkness enveloping southeast Asia, as Stein suggests, it wasn’t Felt that brought the President down. The discrediting of Nixon and his subsequent swan dive into the mud pits of historical remembrance were all his own doing. It would have happened anyway.

It’s true that the Felt revelation is banal, and thus cause for popcorn throwing amongst the adolescents in the theater. Nevertheless, so it is with another recently revealed secret of the 70s, how Darth Vader went over to the Dark Side, and you don’t get much except appreciation for that. And so we see the advantage of writing fiction.

Early nineteenth-century President John Quincy Adams had a highly negative assessment of Islam, equating it with jihad (”holy war”). (*)

This is particularly interesting because of its bearing on early American foreign policy.

An interesting fact is that if George W Bush wins re-election on November 2nd and completes his term in 2009, it will be the first time in almost two hundred years that two or more US Presidents have served consecutive eight-year terms in office.

Thomas Jefferson’s presidency ranged from 1801 to 1809. Madison presided from 1809 to 1817. James Monroe served as President from 1817 to 1825. Since then, the US has not had consecutive eight-year presidencies.

Should Bush serve eight years, he will follow Bill Clinton’s eight year term in office.

There are interesting parallels. Bill Clinton’s middle name is “Jefferson.” Both were very smart men who suffered from sex scandals despite their many successes in office. During Madison’s presidency, foreign troops (British) attacked and burned down the White House and the Capitol. During Bush’s term, we have had the 9/11 attacks, where the White House and Capitol were both targeted by foreign terrorists. The Bush Doctrine has been compared, approvingly and disapprovingly, to the Monroe Doctrine.

In the election of 1816, when Madison was re-elected, his opponent was Rufus King, Senator from New York and member of the Federalist Party. Madison cruised to an easy victory. The Federalist Party opposed the War of 1812. As a result, the Federalist Party faded and never returned as a force in American politics. (*) Could the Democratic Party face the same fate as the Federalist Party? The Democrats have not been pragmatic enough on issues of national security, in my opinion. It’s possible that the antiwar, dogmatic approach could discredit the whole party. As a liberal, this concerns me.

The historian who brought the world’s attention to the pseudo-event died this past weekend. Daniel Boorstin was 89. (*) (†)

I read Boorstin’s book, the Image, in high school and was much affected by it. Boorstin was properly intolerant of phoniness in politics and society. He upbraided the press corps for keeping the American public unaware for years that President Franklin Roosevelt sat in a wheelchair.

Some would term Boorstin a conservative, but an intellectual firmly grounded in reality as he was is a thinker whose thoughts are beneficial to all.

Omer Bartov has an important essay in the New Republic. Initially, in reviewing Hitler’s chilling second book, Bartov writes:

[W]e still do not seem to have learned a simple crucial lesson that Hitler taught us more definitively than anyone else in history: some people, some regimes, some ideologies, some political programs, and, yes, some religious groups, must be taken at their word. Some people mean what they say, and say what they will do, and do what they said.

Most liberal-minded, optimistic, well-meaning people are loath to believe this. They would rather think that fanaticism is merely an “epiphenomenal” façade for politics, that opinions can be changed, that everyone can be corrected and improved. In many cases, this is true—but not in all cases, and not in the most dangerous ones. There are those who practice what they preach and are proud of it. They view those who act otherwise, who compromise and pull back from ultimate conclusions, as opportunists, as weaklings, as targets to be easily conquered and subdued by their own greater determination, hardness, and ruthlessness. When they say they will kill you, they will kill you—if you do not kill them first.

(*) If we progressives fail to thoroughly learn this lesson, progressive reforms where planned will not be implemented and where implemented will be revoked.

Bartov covers more ground. He links the present epidemic of anti-Semitism to the decaying corpse of Hitlerism that haunts us even now. He notes that the charter statement of the terrorist group Hamas, for example, calls for the violent destruction of the State of Israel. He notes that Mohammed Atta and the Hamburg cell of Al Qaeda considered their motivation for the 9/11 attacks on the US to be anti-Semitism. They wanted to fight Jews by fighting the US.

A quibble is in order. Bartov notes disapprovingly that a recent survey finds “70 percent of Germans resent being blamed for the Holocaust.” Assuming that someone has indeed blamed “the German people as a people” for the Holocaust their reaction would not be unexpected. Most Germans alive today were not even born until after the Holocaust. To blame a people for a crime of their ancestors is not in accord with basic principles of justice. (†) If Bartov had more finely tuned his argument to eliminate the bashing of Germans for being German and focused more clearly on the atrocious wave of anti-Semitism washing over Germany and Europe, Bartov’s argument would have improved.

Those of us who defend Israel should not waste time trying, for example, to blame people born after the Holocaust for the Holocaust. Instead, we should blame Europeans, including Germans, for what they do wrong today. That includes the EU’s support for Palestinian Arab terrorism. (‡) (§)

Bartov bogs down his essay by ironically stating in the context of an event at Rutgers University, “So some may think that destroying Israel is legitimate and some may think otherwise.” Would Bartov really suggest that academic freedom is not wide enough for such an opinion, assuming the “destruction” is not violent or involved a redefinition of the state? Of course academic freedom must be that wide, and apparently Bartov wishes to constrict it.

Bartov would have done better to criticize the event as pro-terrorism. The point is not that a few students would dare to criticize Israel or even suggest it should not exist as a Jewish state. I believe Israel should continue as a Jewish state, but I also support the right to hold other opinions on the subject. Theoretically the State of Israel could legally redefine itself in the context of peace with its neighbors. That may be a bad idea or unrealistic but it is not an illegitimate point of view. The problem was not, as Bartov seems to suggest, that the event took academic freedom too far. The problem was that it was not really an exercise of academic freedom. They advocated murder, violence, and terrorism against innocent people. It was a group of reprobates, not a group of scholars.

Unfortunately, Bartov’s advocacy for the State of Israel is not effective enough. He overstates his claims and thereby limits his ability to persuade an unsympathetic audience. Doubly unfortunately, amidst the current global wave of Jew-hatred, the State of Israel needs her advocates to be at their peak effectiveness right now.

To better characterize the Global War on Terrorism a consideration of history is in order.

The last few years strike me as building progressively toward greater heights of crisis. For example, since the bitter Congressional campaign of 1994, political intensities in the United States have heated up considerably.

Let’s take a chronological look at some major events, starting with the onset of the World War I to provide perspective. Note how events have sped up since 1994.

1914 - World War I begins.

1917 - US enters war. Russian Revolution deposes the Czar. Soviet Union created. Millions are killed by communists.

1918 - World War I ends. Ottoman Empire ceases to exist. Austro-Hungarian empire ceases to exist.

1921 - Quota Law significantly reduces number of immigrants entering US. Ideology of Islamism created by Sayyid Qutb and others.

1933 - Hitler comes to power in Germany. While he is in power, millions of Jews and others are murdered in the Holocaust.

1939 - World War II begins.

1941 - Pearl Harbor attack by Empire of Japan. US enters World War II.

1945 - World War II ends. The British Empire begins to break up.

1947 - The Cold War begins.

1948 - The Berlin Airlift. The State of Israel is created.

1950 - The Korean War begins.

1953 - The Korean War ends.

1956 - Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education finds segregation unconstitutional.

1962 - The Cuban Missile Crisis.

1963 - President Kennedy assassinated.

1964 - The Gulf of Tonkin incident. The US enters the Vietnam War in earnest.

1965 - For first time since 1920s, US immigration law changed to allow in large numbers of newcomers.

1969 - First men on Moon.

1973 - The US withdraws from Vietnam War.

1974 - Under pressure of Watergate scandal, President Nixon resigns.

1979 - Saddam Hussein takes power in Iraq. Khomeini takes power in Iran. Hostage crisis begins. Soviet Union intervenes in Afghanistan on behalf of its puppet regime.

1980 - Hostage crisis ends. Iran-Iraq war begins.

1983 - Hizb’Allah bombs US Marine barracks and other Western facilities in Beirut, Lebanon.

1986 - Iran-contra scandal comes to light. Chernobyl accident.

1988 - Iran-Iraq war ends. Soviet Union withdraws from Afghanistan.

1989 - Berlin Wall torn down.

1990 - Germany reunifies as Western liberal democracy. Saddam invades and purports to annex Kuwait. The Peace of Paris officially ends the Cold War.

1991 - Gulf War ejects Saddam from Kuwait. Soviet Union finishes breaking up.

1993 - World Trade Center bombed. US soldiers ambushed by Al Qaeda in Somalia. NAFTA passed into law.

1994 - Republican Party conducts “Contract with America” campaign, wins control of House and Senate in historical shift.

1995 - Federal government shuts down during budget conflict between President Clinton and Congress. NATO intervention in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Oklahoma City bombing.

1996 - Welfare reform passed. Defense of Marriage Act passed. Taliban take de facto power in Afghanistan. Al Qaeda hits US troops barracks at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia.

1997 - Princess Diana dies in car crash.

1998 - Lewinsky scandal comes to light. President Clinton impeached in House. Al Qaeda bombs US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Missile strikes against Al Qaeda facilities in Afghanistan and the Sudan, and Iraqi WMD installations. India and Pakistan each announce that they have nuclear weapons.

1999 - President Clinton not convicted in Senate. NATO intervention in Kosovo against Yugoslavia.

2000 - Al Qaeda bombs USS Cole. Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic turned out after corrupt election. US Presidential election result unknowable due to botched Florida election. Katherine Harris, official in charge of Florida election, says George W Bush wins. Supreme Court says Bush wins.

2001 - Al Qaeda attacks US on 9/11. Anthrax attacks occur. US–led intervention in Afghanistan deposes Taliban, rousts Al Qaeda from bases.

2002 - Al Qaeda attack on Bali nightclub. UN Security Council demands Iraq comply with weapons inspections. Iraq does not comply.

2003 - US, UK and other countries liberate Iraq and capture Saddam. Libya gives up secret nuclear weapons program. Al Qaeda attacks in Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Massachusetts court stamps gay-marriage into law.

2004 - President Bush proposes increased immigration to the US.

Despite the tendency to consider recent events more important, it seems to me that the past few years have indeed had great historical importance.

Philip Bobbitt argues in his book the Shield of Achilles that the 1917–1990 period was “the Long War.” Now, he says, we face a separate, new, lengthy war against terrorism. His analysis of history finds that long periods of peace clearly separate historical wars from each other. Since the Peace of Paris in 1990 the world has enjoyed little peace, however. Even as the Cold War ended, the wars with terrorists took its place.

Perhaps the Long War did not concern itself only with the fates of Germany and Russia, and determining the winner between democracy, fascism, and communism. Perhaps the Long War resulted from the breakup of the many empires of the world that began during World War I. Perhaps the Long War began with World War I and continues now. Perhaps fascism suffered defeat in World War II only to reemerge as Islamofascism. With the decline of communism, perhaps the Global War on Terrorism is the final confrontation of the Long War—the confrontation between democratic liberalism and the last totalitarianism, militant Islamism. The victor will be the architect of world order. Thus the need for liberal democracy to persist, persevere, and triumph against the enemies of freedom.

Classics scholar Rob Johansen explodes popular thinking on ancient Greece being a welcoming society for those practicing same-sex love and sex. In fact, it was an intolerant society on such matters, moreso than Western countries today. (*)

The term homosexual is frequently misapplied. It should only be applied to persons and events in the late 19th century and after. Prior to that time, the homosexual movement did not exist. (†)

Sixty-two years ago today, on 7 December 1941, the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, on the island of Oahu, in the territory–later the state–of Hawaii, was attacked without warning by the Empire of Japan. (*) Over 2,400 Americans were killed. (†) (‡) Afterward, some Americans were trapped inside battleships, only to slowly starve to death because they could not be freed. (§)

After that day of infamy, the US entered World War II, and the course of history was changed forever.

Update: 3 March 2004. The White House proclamation. (**)

Since Oliver Stone’s propagandistic movie JFK, many people have simply accepted a certain egregiously false notion that the movie presented as fact. In the movie, Jack Ruby wants to tell the Warren Commission who really murdered President Kennedy. Chief Justice Earl Warren prevents Ruby from so testifying. This is fabrication.

Jack Ruby told the Warren Commission he was not part of any plot to kill Kennedy, or any plot to keep Oswald from talking. (*) Jack Ruby was Jewish. After he shot Lee Harvey Oswald, some right-wing groups spread the story that Jack Ruby was part of a conspiracy to kill Kennedy. These claims were fabricated, motivated in part by anti-Semitism. Ruby caught wind of the charges. He was afraid that if someone believed that he, Ruby, had been part of a conspiracy, his life and the lives of his family would be at risk. Ruby demanded to take a lie detector test to prove he had no connection to any plot to silence Oswald.

At one point, in the actual hearings, when Ruby is explaining to the commission why he is afraid for his life, Chief Justice Earl Warren says that he would allow Ruby to refrain from further testifying, if he felt that way. Ruby, however, continued to testify. (†) Mirror

All of the evidence suggests that Jack Ruby acted alone and independent of anyone else.

One can’t help but draw some striking parallels upon reading Richard Pipes’ historical account of the curious Western academic discipline known as Sovietology, a field dedicated to studying the Soviet Union. (*) It’s tempting when reading it to just replace “Soviet Union” with “radical Islam,” “Sovietology” with “current academic thought,” and “Richard Pipes” with “Daniel Pipes” (his son) (†) Note this passage of the elder Pipes:

The Sovietological community was first and foremost committed to bringing the the [sic] adversaries together and in so doing ignored or downplayed whatever ran counter to this objective. As a result, it grossly misunderstood the nature of communist regimes and the forces that animated them.

This approach enjoyed popularity because it carried a comforting message. It appealed to those who had no sympathy for communism but were frightened of nuclear war and liked to think that patience and understanding would persuade the Russians to adopt a more friendly stance. Evidence to the contrary was rationalized.

Sound familiar? Note importantly the word rationalized. This is exactly the reaction to Islamist terror attacks like 9/11 by the Western Left, which is now little more than a bunch of professors and intellectuals anyway.

So many people ask: why do they hate us? They are asking that question because they are personally afraid of the terrorists, and they want to do anything but stand up to the terrorists. These people are behaving in a cowardly manner.

Cowardice is the real motivation behind Bush hating. The President is taking the offensive against terrorism. In the cowardly, irrational mindset of many liberals, however, taking the offensive is liable to provoke further attack. The mindset becomes, “Bush is going to get us all killed. Better to just play defense.” This leads battle shirkers to direct their ire not at the enemy, radical Islam, but at their own president.

In the Cold War, as today, the “enemy within” was not malevolent and truly hostile, as the Ann Coulters and the David Horowitzes believe. Instead, the most strident dissenters are essentially cowards, preferring to run and hide rather than stand and fight.

It is of great importance to have a leader who can unite the people with a common objective against a real enemy like radical Islam, Communism, or the fascist powers. A great leader can stiffen the backbone of a people and channel society’s energies into establishing victory. FDR did this in World War II. Only a few intellectuals dissented. People in both parties trusted him with the country’s security. Ronald Reagan also inspired this level of trust, and partially as a result, won the Cold War. Unfortunately, George W. Bush has not risen to such heights of inspiration in the War on Terrorism. Perhaps Gephardt, Clark, or Kerry could. Perhaps not.

Here is something of interest in the John F. Kennedy assassination case. In 1963, minutes before the assassination, a telephone company employee in California heard a woman say something on the line.

A whispered warning from an Oxnard area telephone predicted President John F. Kennedy would be killed only moments before he was shot in downtown Dallas yesterday.

A woman’s voice whispered to two General Telephone Co. operator supervisors about 10:05 a.m.: “The President will be killed at 10 minutes after 10.”

Moments later the same voice told the supervisors, “It won’t be 10 after 10, it will be 10:30.”

(*) The listening employee was Ray Sheehan, the director of the telephone company’s Oxnard, California office. He was working the lines because of a strike. He said the call “had to come from his office’s service area of Oxnard, Port Hueneme or Point Mugu.” (†)

The basic trouble with this is the lack of much additional information. With just this information, we can’t make the case that there was a conspiracy to kill the president.

Some conspiracy theories attached to this report are not backed by evidence. (‡)

Other conspiracy theorists, like Gary Wean, say that they have some piece of important information. They would tell the world, but they can’t for fear of being killed themselves. (§) Let’s assume that is true. The best solution for anyone in that position is to just publish whatever it is you have to the world. You can publish in a newspaper, a magazine, or on the Internet. Once the secret is out in the world, there is no reason for the bad guys to kill you. In fact, killing you after you publish would make them look even more guilty. Therefore, publish what you’ve got, assassination researchers. That’s the best way to be safe.

The BBC’s Gavin Esler looks at the conspiracy theories that surround the killing of President Kennedy. (*) This is nicely done. It is written as if starting with no knowledge of the subject, and then working through the evidence to learn what happened.

Max Holland writes that the Warren Commission was undermined by Soviet propagandists who spread the lie that Kennedy had been assassinated by an American conspiracy. (*) The suggestions that the CIA or supposedly rogue US governmental agencies were behind the JFK assassination were first publicized in the US by an American publisher that was on the payroll of the Communist Party.

Now that’s a real conspiracy.

Holland tries to link this to the KGB, but he doesn’t successfully make that case in his short article.

He is writing a book on the Warren Commission. That should be very interesting.

Christopher Hitchens flattens the Camelot myth, saying it conceals the self-promotion, the spinning, and the irresponsibility of the real President Kennedy. (*)

Nevertheless, the language of a president is not merely style to fill in gaps of substance or logic. Language has intrinsic value. The best of our presidents, including Jefferson and Lincoln, were noted for their excellent language and rhetorical skill. Kennedy’s speeches were triumphs.

It is not enough to know what is right. It is required that those who have the sense of right have also the ability with which to communicate it.

The Pulitzer Prize Board has decided to not revoke Walter Duranty’s 1932 Pulitzer, even though it is a prize given for apologetics of Stalin’s regime written in willful disregard of Stalin’s mass murder. (*)

This controversy has erupted around the New York Times, as it published Duranty’s filings. (†)

When a people suffers mass murder and a famous reporter who knows about it doesn’t report it writes a glorification of the regime that is mass murdering them, and then wins a major prize, those people tend to be unhappy. (‡) As well they should.

The Times commissioned Mark von Hagen (§) (no relation) to write an eight page report on the subject. He recommended revocation of the prize. Unfortunately, I can’t find this report online, even though some newspaper reports summarize it. If anyone has a link to it, I’d be grateful.

Unless the prize is somehow revoked or returned, the reputation of the New York Times will continue to sink.

Update: 4 May 2004. I found von Hagen’s report online. (**)

Not every baby boomer is obsessed with Vietnam, but a few are. As a person handicapped by relative youth, it does get extremely tiresome for me when we have to talk about Vietnam again. Just because something happened in the 1960s does not mean it had anything to do with Vietnam. Nor is the Vietnam War any more important to American or world history than other major events.

Nearly every baby boomer remembers the day John F. Kennedy was shot. For baby boomers, two traumatic public affairs events of their childhood and youth were the Vietnam War and the Kennedy assassination. It is not surprising that many baby boomers have claimed that these two events are somehow connected, even though no evidence supports the notion.

Son of the famous economist John Kenneth Galbraith is economist James K. Galbraith. He makes the case that JFK would surely have withdrawn American troops from Vietnam. (* warning, access only after viewing ad) Galbraith asserts that this withdrawal is indisputable fact. Furthermore he says lowly that we shouldn’t forget this when discussing the Kennedy assassination, which occurred forty years ago today. Then, either Galbraith or, more likely, a Salon editor adds: “Setting the record straight is crucial as Baghdad continues to explode.” Oh, please.

As the New York Times editorial page editor says, there is just no way to answer the Kennedy and Vietnam “what if” question other than in the negative († article publicly available only after no-fee registration and then only for limited time)

What would Kennedy have done with regard to Vietnam? Other than withdrawing one thousand troops from the many thousands that were then there, Kennedy made no concrete plans. He might have withdrawn. He might have escalated. No one knows and no one can know. Not even Robert McNamara can really know what JFK would have done.

The idea of the conspiracy theorists is that the military-industrial complex, which apparently thinks with one mind, wanted Kennedy dead for the sake of war profits in the Nam. LBJ was in on it, too. He’s always in on it. Eyes roll, but they keep saying it.

Nevermind that Lee Harvey Oswald was a militant, pro-Castro Marxist with the motive and the means to shoot and kill Kennedy without any help or outside encouragement.

Nevermind that Lee Harvey Oswald got his job at the Texas School Book Depository before Kennedy’s withdrawal of 1,000 troops was announced.

Nevermind that even if JFK wanted to withdraw from Vietnam, he still might have escalated to the level LBJ did. Only an insane leader would prefer war over all other alternatives, and JFK was not insane. JFK may have wanted to withdraw from Vietnam, but that was LBJ’s first choice as well. Even though the execrable Noam Chomsky has championed that JFK would never have withdrawn without victory, it is the indisputable fact.

What Oliver Stone’s propaganda and Galbraith’s “what if” history show is only motive. There were people who did oppose Kennedy’s politics strenuously and bitterly. There were indeed several people other than Oswald with a motive to kill Kennedy, but they did not act on it. It was Oswald that acted, and he acted alone. Not one shred of evidence suggests otherwise.

Vietnam was not a major issue in the Kennedy presidency. Kennedy was primarily focused on space exploration, domestic issues, and other aspects of the Cold War, especially Cuba. Only looking back do we see that Kennedy’s continuation of America’s Vietnam policy, stretching back from the days of World War II, was of particular interest.

Here I should resolve a minor difficulty. I side with those who say that Sirhan Sirhan shot Robert F. Kennedy in 1968 because of Sirhan Sirhan’s anger at RFK’s pro-Israel stance, announced shortly before the shooting. Looking back in history, we see that this was an early shot fired in the war by militant Islamism against the free world, but then it was not so understood. It was poorly explained then as the insanity of the times. In the case of the RFK assassination, we have a killer who shouted at the time of the act that he did it for his country (”Palestine”). In the case of the JFK assassination, we also know the assassin’s motive. Oswald wanted to protect Marxism and Castro’s regime from Kennedy. It is not relevant that Castro did not welcome JFK’s assassination, and was worried about a US attack on his country afterward. Oswald was not in touch with Castro. Oswald acted of his own volition. When we look back, we see what really motivated these assassinations. Even though in JFK’s case it was immediately clear what the motive was, and in RFK’s case it was not, there is no contradiction or logical tension present.

Vietnam is not the central feature of US or world history, and was not the central feature of the Kennedy presidency. Vietnam did not motivate Oswald. Vietnam was at the time a minor issue that would only later become a major one.

Many unjustly denigrate the JFK assassination researchers. They have been diligent in the search for truth. They have augmented the official investigations by the Warren Commission, for example. Thanks to them, we know more than we otherwise would have. When research devolves into conspiracy theory, however, denigration is appropriate. Furthermore, the attempt to make a certainty out of a “what if” scenario is also worthy of denigration. It is not that all the questions are now answered. We still don’t have a good handle on the motive of Jack Ruby to shoot Oswald. If researchers insist on looking at Kennedy and Vietnam, then Kennedy’s order to overthrow the Ngo Dinh Diem government, carried out in early November 1963, needs a better explanation than confusion at the White House.

Researchers should focus on the unanswered questions. It is pointless to overturn stones that have been profitlessly overturned countless times already.

Unfortunately, Galbraith destroys his own credibility with this:

Did Lee Harvey Oswald fire three shots, from an old rifle, along a difficult line of sight, striking Kennedy at least twice and Texas Governor John Connally at least once, as well as a bystander some distance away? No serious person can believe that, either.

(‡ Salon article) That is crazy. (§)

Forty years ago this week, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas by Lee Harvey Oswald, acting alone. A large number of people falsely believe that a wider conspiracy killed the beloved president. President Lyndon Johnson authorized the Warren Commission to investigate. It discredited all possibilities except Oswald acting alone.

Nevertheless, in the 1990s, after the make-believe movie and exemplary work of propaganda JFK was released by Oliver Stone, the number of conspiracy theorists multiplied.

Some of the facts that I find especially convincing are:

• Three spent shells were found near the window from where Oswald shot. Two bullets were found. Both match the ballistics of Oswald’s carbine rifle, not any other gun. A third bullet grazed a bystander. The third bullet was never found. It may have disintegrated when it hit a concrete berm or wall. No other ballistics evidence was ever found. All the ballistics evidence matches Oswald’s gun, and no other gun.
• A witness saw a man firing a rifle from the sixth floor of the building. That is, he saw Oswald. No witness ever reported seeing another gunman.
• The “single bullet theory,” or what Oliver Stone calls the “magic bullet theory” is frequently criticized because the bullet that caused seven different wounds is supposedly in pristine condition. That is false. The bullet is not in anything like pristine condition. (*) (†)
• The credibility of the evidence has been criticized, but the science of forensics has greatly advanced since 1963. What would be poor handling of evidence today was standard handling of evidence then.
• Oswald was a hard-core leftist, and supported the Fidel Castro regime in Cuba. Oswald was aware that Kennedy launched assassination efforts against Castro. Revenge was apparently Oswald’s motive.
• I have personally visited Dealey Plaza in Dallas, where the assassination occurred. From video clips in news reports and in JFK, I was under the impression that the top floor of the book depository building, from where Oswald fired his shots, was far away from where the presidential car was. In fact, the building is very close. Shooting down into an open car from that building would be almost like shooting fish in a barrel.
• Jack Ruby killed Oswald, but no evidence ties Ruby to the Kennedy assassination. (‡)

Gerald Posner’s book, Case Closed, is the best refutation since the Warren Commission of the conspiracy theories. (§) There may be some factual inaccuracies in Posner’s book. (**)

There are some humorous conspiracy theories. (††)

I’m looking forward to the next book coming out from Vincent Bugliosi. The Charles Manson prosecutor is said to be writing a new door-slamming book on the assassination.

Update: 20 November 2003. There is actually a college class that teaches JFK conspiracy theory, if you can believe that. (‡‡) What has happened to education? Did I wake up one day in another country?

Update: 22 November 2003. Added part about persistent “magic bullet” nonsense. Added to sentence about bullet fragments. Added part about witnesses.

The mass suicide or mass murder of 913 people in Guyana, under direction of cult leader Jim Jones took place twenty-five years ago this week. (*)

Evil exists. It cannot be rationalized.