Today marks the 50th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and other than the improbable official version, a.k.a. the Warren Commission Report, the questions of who killed him and why still remain.
JFK had his detractors, to put it mildly. The first Roman Catholic president, he upset the American bishops when he told them he would not push for aid to parochial schools. Does this mean the Vatican had him killed? That seems unlikely.
Some speculate that he angered the military-industrial complex because he was about to pull out of Vietnam. There is no proof of that one way or another.
Others speculate that he was about to disband the Central Intelligence Agency and it ordered the hit. Again, no proof one way or the other.
There is even speculation that Mossad did him in because he was no great fan of Israel. Once again, no proof one way or the other.
Then there is the speculation the Soviets or the Cubans did it, but that hardly makes any sense. The Soviets backed down during the Cuban missile crisis rather than risk World War III, so why would they have surely set it off by assassinating Kennedy? As for Cuba, which the mysterious Lee Harvey Oswald is alleged to have been so fond of, Fidel Castro seemed more engaged in dodging US assassination attempts—one included a cigar that was to explode killing him.
And let us not leave out the Mafia, which allegedly was livid because JFK’s brother and the US attorney general, Bobby, was making life miserable for them, which was hardly gratitude for the help they gave the family patriarch, Joseph P, Kennedy, in getting Jack elected. No proof one way or the other.
Thusly, we are left with Oswald, the purported lone gunman, who managed to get off three shots from a third floor window Texas Book Depository in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas. The Warren Commission claimed one shot totally missed, a second got JFK in the neck, then did some strange gyrations going through Texas Gov. John Connelly’s chest and wrist, embedding itself in his thigh and coming out pristine—the single bullet theory, a.k.a. called the Magic Bullet Theory, was the brainchild of the late Arlen Specter who, at the time, was a Warren Commission staffer and later a US senator. Oswald’s third shot, sayeth the Warren Commission, was the fatal one to Kennedy’s head.
Oswald is then alleged to have left the Book Depository and gone to a movie theater where he encountered Officer J.D. Tippet of the Dallas Police Department and shot and killed him before being taken into custody.
Two days later, on Nov. 24, 1963, as Dallas police were leading Oswald through the department’s basement to be transferred to the county jail, Jack Ruby stepped forward and pumped a fatal bullet into Oswald. That leads to the question, since the Dallas police weren’t stupid and they reportedly had the president’s assassin in their custody, wouldn’t they have better protected him from any possible harm? Or is it dead men tell no tales?
Jack Ruby was a two-bit nightclub operator in Dallas. There also is speculation that Ruby was mobbed up in his hometown of Chicago. Ruby was tried, convicted and sentenced to death for killing Oswald, but he appealed the conviction and was granted a new trial. But before a second trial date was set, Ruby died of cancer on Jan. 3, 1967.
So there is the cast of characters we know about who might have been connected, in one way or another, with the Kennedy assassination.
And thus, “that brief shining moment known as Camelot” did not end happily. Something wicked happened 50 years ago in Dallas. An assassin’s bullet took the life of the 46-year-old 35th president of the United States, who left behind a widow and two young children. Fifty years and still questions remain unanswered. Fifty years and counting . . .
Bev Conover is the editor and publisher of Intrepid Report. Email her at editor@intrepidreport.com.
If someone, any one, were kind enough to give GHWB a truth serum, we might know the truth some day.
Also, why did Obama seemed so disingenuous standing before JFK’s tomb eternal torch there two days ago–honoring Kennedy–when Obama seems to have gone counter every democratic and liberal principle held near and dear to Kennedy’s heart? The Cllintons, too, who might have some time ago looked like sincere mourners honoring the memory of Kennedy looked as disingenuous as the Obamas standing there facing the Kennedy eternal torch.
Interesting how Jr. referred to Clinton as his dad’s new son after Clinton left the presidency, interesting too how the Obamas both seem to follow the track set forth by Bush Jr. who probably was being puppeteered by his father. Thusly, not in jest, but seriously: Give GHWB a truth serum before nature makes him kick the bucket and join the underground habitat of JFK. We might then some day know the truth!
Dear Ms. Conover, I believe the “no proof” theme that runs through your essay is weakened by the massive amount of reputable research that has been done in the last half century. Mark Lane demolished the government line in 1964. May I suggest that you go to YouTube and watch the several video clips of interviews with Fletcher Prouty, who was an Air Force Colonel in charge of coordination of Air Force support of CIA activities during the Eisenhower and Kennedy years. He discusses many aspects of the assassination and those present. May I also suggest “History as Mystery” by Michael Parenti (City Lights 1999).
Tony, I have read many of those books. There are a myriad of theories of who killed JFK and why. The problem is we lack definitive proof. It’s been all downhill since that day in Dallas. The Warren Commission Report was a whitewash, just as the 9/11 Commission’s Report was a whitewash.
Excellent perspective.
There will never be proof of any conspiracy w.r.t. JFK and there is no use in seeking it as such. It is only for historical record that anyone should try to make any sense of the sea of confusion left by this episode. I think any reasonable person would consider it strange the circumstances of the murder. Enough so that one would suspect conspiracy.
Eyewitness Testimony to Kennedy Assassination by Ex-CIA Agent James Huggins
http://youtu.be/RTHfITp7-TQ
Just for starters, and there is much, much more, SCORES of eye-witnesses in Dealy Plaza reported hearing shots and seeing “puffs of smoke” from behind a picket fence on the “grassy knoll” and rushed towards it. This is common knowledge. A handful of people saw men operating behind the fence. The FBI (forever burying information) demanded that they change their testimony and claimed they heard only echoes. None were called as witnesses. And by the way, it is impossible to fire the alleged three well-aimed accurate shots from a bolt-action rifle (especially if it’s a Mannlicher-Carcano) through tree branches in six and a half seconds, especially if the mail-order rifle’s scope is only bolted on and not yet sighted in (as FBI testimony revealed).