Conspiracy Theories—How JFK’s Assassination Explains It All
It was all downhill after the Warren Commission.
I have been participating in Professor Larry Sabato’s online
course “The Kennedy Half-Century, and there is a segment covering the
investigation of the assassination of JFK.
Sabato makes a point that is rather startling in its scope; that the findings
of the Warren Commission led to the pervasive cynicism that so many Americans
have about their government.
It is a fascinating story. The nation is traumatized by the
public execution of their young, energetic, impossibly charismatic
President. It is all played out on
television; the early cut-in to regular programming, the gripping moment when
Walter Cronkite announces that JFK has been declared dead, the elegant,
mournful funeral with John-John saluting his father’s casket, and the killing
of Lee Harvey Oswald by Jack Ruby.
We live in a culture where violence is ritualized and
glamorized to the point where it like empty calories, but watch this clip
of CBS’s coverage. The grainy black and
white, the stunned reporter for the CBS Dallas affiliate almost incoherently
repeating himself, the well-dressed crowd in the Dallas Trade Mart (JFK was
headed there to give a speech) moving back and forth without direction, the
African-American waiter mopping away his tears.
That is reality, unscripted, chaotic, and human. The feelings of shock and of loss feel real,
because they are real. Watch Cronkite’s
intensely personal reaction: how he
takes his glasses off, how he dips his head, how his voice catches.
People wanted answers.
There were wild rumors floating around of vast conspiracies. President Johnson needs an authoritative
determination about the events surrounding JFK’s death to bring an end to the
speculation, and he wants it wrapped up before the following year’s
election. He brings in the respected
Supreme Court Chief Justice, Earl Warren to head a commission that will bring
finality. Faced with a time-line, the
Commission’s review is anything but exhaustive, and many of the members don’t
even show up for the majority of the meetings.
Numerous witnesses are never interviewed. Contrary data is discarded. A desire for
closure leads to a convenient conclusion.
And yet, while Specter might have been right (and he has his
defenders) the feeling in the country was that Commission’s conclusions were
political. The people weren’t being told
the truth by their government, and the cover-up began at the very top--the
President and the Chief Justice.
Why? Adults
understood that there was always a little chicanery in politics, and a little
secrecy in foreign and military affairs. But there is a fundamental difference
between the small-bore fabrications that make up a politician’s daily life and
a whopper on a topic of universal interest.
Why would our government lie?
What purpose is to be served?
What is the hidden secret that is so damaging that these supposedly wiser
heads think the country cannot be trusted with the truth?
Fifty years later, we just don’t know. The conclusions of the Warren Report, even
those not entirely substantiated by the evidence, might very well be true. But there remains clamminess; the discomforting
sense the government, our government, either didn’t look hard enough, or if it
did, decided not to share. If we cared
so much, what does it say that they cared so little?
This mistrust has never left us. It’s been passed on like an
untreatable virus from generation to generation. It is amplified by ambitious politicians and
by opinion makers looking for votes and attention. It runs amok on the web, where any distortion
can go viral, and any set of data-points can be arranged to “prove” even the
most outlandish.
A healthy mistrust of government isn’t a bad thing--I
briefly considered reciting one of the truly crazy rumors, but edited it out
when I realized that the mere mention of it might get me on some NSA list of
crackpots. But pure paranoia, seeing
conspiracies everywhere, is a little too much for most rational people. So they
align themselves around a set of truths—political truths—that permit them to
focus their fears. It leads to a different type of bi-polarity: government is
not to be trusted, but their guys are the moral ones. This also allows them to live with the
inherent dissonance in some of their positions; combatting evil requires a
strong hand, and a virtuous end justifies the means.
So, if you truly believe that (Democratic, of course) vote
fraud is pervasive, it was perfectly fine that Ken Cuccinelli purged 40,000
voters from the ranks in the weeks before the election. And, if you are convinced that the only
electoral result that is valid is the one that supports your candidate, you
have absolutely no problem with the Virginia State Electoral Board issuing a
ruling this last Friday (that would be three days after the election) that
requires provisional voters (including some just purged) to physically appear
on their own behalf (on a work day) to plead their cases, instead of having a
representative. This despite long
accepted bipartisan practice. And which
county is this being applied to? Fairfax
County, which went heavily for the Democratic candidate for Attorney General.
How many provisional votes in question?
About 400. Who cares about 400
votes? Well, Democrat Mark Herring
trails Republican Mark Obenshain by about 130 votes Statewide, and Fairfax
County has gone more than 2/1 for Herring.
You can do the math. So,
apparently, can others. Just why did the
Virginia State Electoral Board change the rules after the election? On the
order of the Attorney General, a Mr. Ken Cuccinelli.
Put the purge and the sudden fealty to voting rules together
in a tight election, and you have a bit of a conspiracy, if one would want to
see it. Put together a promise by a
President “if you like it, you can keep it” and the enactment of a
controversial program, and you can see another.
Perhaps that is the true legacy of the investigation into
JFK’s assassination; an expectation that those in power, or who want power,
trim constantly to meet a personal or political agenda. Government that is not so much immoral, as it
is amoral.
I would say Professor Sabato is on to something. Let’s call it the single bullet theory of
governing. Take your shot, truthful or
not. You never know who will believe it.
Michael Liss (MM)
Follow us on Twitter @ SyncPol
