Who Killed The Kennedys?

Jack Kennedy was shot on my twentieth birthday.

I was a Dartmouth student, getting ready to drive down to Skidmore to celebrate with my girlfriend, when the news ricocheted around the dormitory. I went down to Skidmore anyway, spending the weekend in a Saratoga Springs motel room, watching the TV coverage, including that astonishing moment when Ruby shot Oswald in front of our eyes in living black and white.

Does this mean I have more insight than others into the Kennedy assassination? No. But that coincidence did give me an extra frisson when the date “November 22, 1963” was superimposed at the beginning of Episode 7 of the new The Kennedys miniseries.

I spent the last couple of days watching all eight episodes of the series, courtesy of the production company. It was certainly a trip down memory lane. Like so many of my generation, my life had intersected with the Kennedys in the world of political imagination and sometimes even in reality.

I had been in the audience, close enough to shake his hand, for an East L.A. speech of Bobby’s two days before he was shot, the largely Chicano and Mexican crowd yelling “Viva! Viva!” as if the California primary voters were about to elect him dictator, not president.

And then, a few years later, I had a literary agent who, it turned out, was one of the six young women at that Chappaquiddick reunion party for RFK’s campaign the fateful night Ted Kennedy took his chauffeur’s car keys to drive the late Mary Jo Kopechne home himself. The agent never spoke of what happened. (This hugely dramatic incident does not appear in the series, nor is there even a mention of Ted Kennedy. More on this later.)

So what did I think of the miniseries? No one could mistake it for Citizen Kane — television political biopics tend to the humdrum and stilted, as most of us know — but it is nowhere near as bad as the fulminating critics would have us believe. Their major objection seems to be that the series emphasizes the soap opera aspects of the Kennedy lives — Jack’s parade of women that would make Bill Clinton envious, his and Jackie’s amphetamine cocktails from “Dr. Feelgood,” the Mafia connections via Giancana, Sinatra, and Judith Exner, Joe Sr.’s having his troubled daughter (Jack’s younger sister) lobotomized, not to mention the patriarch’s infamous flirtation with the Third Reich, etc.

Well, why not? These things are the stuff of drama (cf. the House of Atreus), not endless discussions of policy. The latter are much better handled in a book. But never mind. When the early drafts of the screenplay leaked out, JFK’s speechwriter, the late Ted Sorenson — among several others — joined a campaign organized by filmmaker Robert Greenwald aimed at preventing the film from being made and attacking it as a right-wing hit piece led by that known conservative attack dog Joel Surnow of 24 fame.

But here’s the surprising thing — and I should put this in bold because it is the linchpin of this article — The Kennedys (made by right-wingers though it may be) is tremendously respectful of JFK as a president. Indeed, the JFK it portrays is arguably one of the best presidents of the post-war period, if not of all time.

In the three key events dramatized in the series — his taking personal blame for the Bay of Pigs fiasco, his steadfastness in supporting racial integration at the University of Mississippi and, of course, his resolute behavior in confrontation with Khrushchev in the Cuban Missile Crisis — the Jack Kennedy of The Kennedys is a superlative and courageous decision maker.

This makes the miniseries — unlike the fuddy-duddy Greenwald site — oddly modern and heroic and pro-JFK.The Kennedys filmmakers have respected their audience and allowed them to reflect on the fascinating question of how someone so lacking in his personal life could achieve so much good in his public life. (Missing from this film is another positive action with a contemporary twist — JFK’s cutting of tax rates to stimulate the economy.)

That question — the relationship of doer and deed — is as old as drama. Shakespeare reveled in it. Nevertheless, as many of you know, the series was rejected by the channel for which it was originally made, the History Channel. It was eventually sold and is now showing on the lesser-known Reelz.

I had assumed the History Channel was to blame in this but, in an interview with Lionel Chetwynd and me, Joel Surnow said the rejection came from a higher corporate source. The History Channel is owned by AETN, A&E Television Networks, which is a joint venture of The Hearst Corporation, Disney-ABC Television Group and NBC Universal.

Some unknown person or persons in the upper reaches of these huge media companies apparently succumbed to pressure and suppressed The Kennedys. This pressure most likely came from the Kennedy family (Caroline?) and friends. The family has been quite successful over the years in their attempts to keep their detractors quiet.

I have no way of knowing, but they may have succeeded inside the making of The Kennedys as well as outside. Curiously, “The Lion of the Senate” and youngest son of Joe and Rose Kennedy, Ted Kennedy, is never seen or even mentioned in any of the eight episodes of the miniseries. What is the reason for this extraordinary omission?

The aforementioned Chappaquiddick incident is easily the most extreme case of Kennedy personal malfeasance. Jack may have been a serial adulterer, but he was never involved in death from his dalliances, nor did he leave the scene of a fatal accident. Teddy did and got away with it.

There has been some debate about the extent of his culpability, but how do you dramatize this event in any way without making him look really bad? And how do you tell the story of Ted Kennedy without Chappaquiddick? It becomes an almost comical whitewash. So Teddy is a non-person in The Kennedys, the man who was never there. I don’t know if this was true in earlier drafts, but it is in the series as it is being broadcast.

So whoever really killed The Kennedys is out hiding somewhere in an impenetrable corporate tower. I’m not into conspiracy theories, so I’m not going to pursue it further.

But I will say this. Whoever did this has conflated politics and religion. The Kennedys are not religious icons. They are highly fallible human beings. To show them as they were is the duty of the artist as well as the mission of America, that is freedom of speech. Surnow and company had their speech temporarily eclipsed. That was not good for them, but more than that, it is not good for our country.

Source:  Pajama’s Media

If you are not familiar with the history of the Kennedy’s this miniseries is a good place to start.  There are presidents and leaders, in general, who inspire us to become better and who are are larger than the office they hold.  In modern times, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan fill that place in American history, in spite of their personal flaws.  Even though they were of different parties and different in many ways, Kennedy and Reagan were also the same in many ways that matter!  They were both Irish descended Americans who loved America and the opportunities she gave to their families and to all legal immigrants; they loved the Constitution and knew it was their job to uphold the law and keep America safe; they were excellent inspiring speakers and they were strong in their convictions, ideals and leadership abilities.  They made the tough decisions and then took responsibility for the outcome of their decisions!  They both also had strong wives, Jackie and Nancy, who supported them and filled their roles as First Ladies with style and grace.

The re-writing of history and minimal focus on our true history, both good and bad, is what had made us weaker.

“He who does not learn from history is destined to repeat it!” and America has sadly done a poor job of teaching her children…

Related:

Camelot Fights Back: Who Killed ‘The Kennedy’s’ Miniseries?

–> JFK on Taxes and the Economy <–

–> The Assassination of John F. Kennedy and the Federal Reserve <–

Kennedy United States Notes actually circulated shortly

We Choose to go to the Moon

Resources on the Kennedys:

America's Queen: The Life of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Grace and Power: The Private World of the Kennedy White House

Four Days in November: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy

Jackie, Ethel, Joan : Women of Camelot

The Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy

The Sins of the Father: Joseph P. Kennedy and the Dynasty he Founded

Ted Kennedy: The Dream That Never Died

LBJ: The Mastermind of JFK's Assassination

American Legacy: The Story of John and Caroline Kennedy

JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

The Kennedy Curse: Why Tragedy Has Haunted America's First Family for 150 Years

A Thousand Days: John F. Kennedy in the White House

Kennedy vs. Carter: The 1980 Battle for the Democratic Party's Soul

A Nation of Immigrants by JFK

Kevin Costner’s JFK - Director's Cut (Two-Disc Special Edition)

The Kennedys miniseries

Scott Brown's Shot Heard 'Round the World: What If?

Political pundits are running out of superlatives to describe the fallout President Barack Obama faces if Republican Scott Brown captures the Senate seat that the late liberal lion Ted Kennedy held for more than four decades, in a state with a 3-to-1 Democratic voter registration advantage.

Although the Democratic get-out-the-vote machine and heavy snowfalls in Brown strongholds have left the outcome very much in doubt, the most recent polls show a powerful surge favoring the GOP challenger.

Anti-Obamacare sentiment in the Bay State, as well as a series of damaging gaffes by Brown's opponent, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley, have propelled him into the lead by double digits, according to some polls.

Obama aides reportedly hvae begun to advise Democratic leaders privately that they consider the race a lost cause.

Already, analysts are beginning to assess the political fallout from what Suffolk University pollster David Paleologos predicts will be a political "shot heard 'round the world." But in some ways, the impact is difficult to gauge, simply because the scope of the turnabout in Massachusetts is almost unprecedented.

A Coakley defeat despite Obama's heavy personal investment in the race might constitute the biggest upset in modern political history, some political pundits say. Obama taped robocalls, made a campaign appearance, blasted his e-mail list, and is appearing in a last-minute Coakley ad that is blanketing Massachusetts airwaves – all perhaps to no avail.

It is a stunning reversal, given that polls showed Coakley coasting along with a 30-point lead only a few months ago.

Here are the sea changes to expect in the immediate future if Brown wins, according to a wide range of experts and analysts:

Beware the Spinmeisters
The first reverberation, political experts say, will be massive media coverage and a full-court press by the Obama administration and Democrats to spin the upset to their advantage – as difficult as that may be.

Look for the administration to send out surrogates who will say the people have spoken and the administration has heard their message. The administration will go back to the political drawing board, they'll say, while pointing out that Democrats still have strong majorities in Congress.

"We're told that the president is going to come back fighting," Politico's Mike Allen said Tuesday on MSNBC's “Morning Joe” program. "We're going to hear the president with much more tough, populist language. We heard him out there saying, 'We're going to get our money back from the banks.' We heard him say Sunday at that [Coakley] rally, 'The bankers don't need another senator in Washington.'

"And so even though they'll have to accept smaller victories, you're going to hear the president in a fighting mood trying to say, 'Look, I said change was going to be hard. Whoa! Change was harder than I thought,'" Allen said.

Obamacare in the Balance

A lot of attention has focused on whether the president's healthcare reforms, which both houses of Congress are revising, will be a casualty if Brown wins and the GOP gains its 41st vote in the Senate – enough to mount a filibuster.

Of course, Democrats are working on a "plan B" in case Coakley loses. But while there are certainly parliamentary avenues available by which healthcare reform still could be enacted, skittish Democrats up for re-election may find those options politically unpalatable.

With public opposition to Obamacare continuing to rise, at some point the question becomes how much damage Democrats are willing to sustain.

New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote that ramming healthcare reform through after a Coakley defeat would be "political suicide."

"It would be the act of a party so arrogant, elitist and contemptuous of popular wisdom that it would not deserve to govern," he writes. "Marie Antoinette would applaud, but voters would rage."
Even firebrand New York Democrat Anthony Weiner said on "Morning Joe" Tuesday that “I think you can make a pretty good argument that healthcare might be dead” if Coakley loses.

There will be fierce liberal arguments to proceed at any cost, however.

Facing voters in the midterm elections without having acted on the president's primary policy initiative would be a formula for disaster at the polls, they'll say.

Obama's Big Agenda

Election years are known mostly as legislative wastelands – no one wants to pass a big-ticket item that an opponent could use against him a few months later. After Democrats shake off the effects of the Brown haymaker, look for that to be even more the case.

Although Congress will still be under pressure to pass measures that promise to boost employment and revive the economy, much of the administration's transformative agenda will be put on the shelf. Energy cap-and-trade legislation was already a non-starter in the Senate, and it would certainly remain so. Chances of passing immigration reform that includes some indirect form of amnesty for illegal aliens would be remote indeed.

"It’s hard to see how the more controversial parts of Obama’s agenda get passed now, at least after healthcare reform, which Democrats can ram through in various ways, quickly, if they want," Larry Sabato, the director of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics, told Newsmax. "I would bet many Democrats would say they’ve given enough blood at the office. Now they’ll spend their energy trying to find a way to get re-elected."

And as the Brown-Coakley race demonstrates, that won't be easy for Democrats to do. But look for Obama to continue to cater to his left-leaning political base; in the aftermath of Coakley-Brown, that may be all he's got left.

It would be too extreme to say the shocking setback in Massachusetts would transform Obama into lame-duck status. But given the legislative gridlock he can expect anyway in an election year, the remainder of his term could prove to be a very difficult battle indeed.

A 'Plan B' for Everything

David Paleologos, director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center, says a Coakley-Obama defeat will "totally change how the administration approaches the next nine months."
Democrats are looking furiously for "Plan B" on healthcare reform if the political balance shifts in the Senate. But Paleologos says the administration's legislative strategies will all have to change.

"That's tells me strategically they're going to have to have a fallback for every other issue," Paleologos told Newsmax, "and to work on anyone that's borderline in the Senate.

"And in fact it might bind the administration's hands, which isn't going to help at the polls, especially if the recession doesn't sort of bottom out, and people [don't] begin to feel that we're turning around."

What remains to be seen, however, is whether Team Obama can be flexible enough ideologically to follow the course of former President Bill Clinton, who responded to his midterm defeat by moving to the center politically.

Brickbats From the Left

As much as the president faces criticism from the right, a defeat in Massachusetts will evoke howls of protests from prominent figures on the left.

Expect MSNBC hosts Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann, and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, to lead the charge. Although liberal enclaves may circle the wagons initially. they also will complain that the reason for the president's sagging fortunes is that he hasn't gone leftward enough.

Obama needs to return to his core values, they will say, ignore the growing cries for fiscal restraint, and propose more big-government programs to jump start the flagging economy. Sometimes, it seems, failure isn't an orphan after all.

Rediscovering Bipartisanship

The president came into office promising to nurture bipartisanship but felt he really didn't have to work with Republicans because his party enjoyed a supermajority.

The latest example of the administration's hubris: locking Republicans out of the Obamacare negotiations, and allowing C-SPAN to televise the weeks-long proceedings for only a single hour.

If Obama hopes to make any progress in Congress, he'll have to scale back his ambitions and get at least some Republicans to sign on to his proposals. Look for him to soften the barrage of anti-Bush rhetoric.

So the irony of a Republican win in Massachusetts today is that it could encourage the president to begin to deliver on his campaign pledge for a new style of politics.

"They will need to fulfill the promise of bipartisanship, because it's now the reality," Paleologos told Newsmax. "With the numbers potentially being 59 to 41, that changes so much of the methodology of doing the work in Congress. And that's going to have a significant impact."

No More Mystique

Remember how international leaders jostled to have their picture taken with the new president after the inauguration? Hollywood stars tried to cadge a visit to the White House, and his choice of a family pet became a front-page news story?

Well, if all the president's men and a bevy of attack ads couldn't save Coakley from a bitter loss, the Obama honeymoon is arguably over once and for all. Post-Coakley, he may find he's no longer the darling he once was on Capitol Hill, let alone a celebrity when he meets the leaders of other countries.

"If Brown wins, Obama will have spent a huge amount of political capital and cache for naught," Boston University professor and political analyst Tobe Berkovitz told Newsmax. "This will have a huge impact on the president's ability to fly in and out for campaign appearances for democrats at the start of the 2010 election.

"He's used up several political lives stumping for candidates in 2009 and 2010 and promoting his policies for economic recovery, the war against terrorism, and most significantly healthcare reform," Berkovitz said. "A loss of the 'Kennedy seat' would be a huge repudiation of the Obama and Democratic agenda. This might not prove insurmountable in the long run, but will place the president and the democrats in a massive tailspin into the spring.

Presidential promises to leverage his popularity on behalf of candidates who support his agenda will ring hollow, Berkovitz said. The president remains personally popular with voters, but that status may now be at risk. In fact, don't be surprised if Democrats from conservative districts begin to distance themselves from a president whose popularity appears to be on the wane.

"The 41-59 party split [in the Senate] will be the least of Obama's problems. He and the democratic leadership will be battling with incumbents up for reelection who will be watching their political careers evaporate, as they march in and out of votes forced by the House and Senate leadership," Berkovitz said.

Congressional Fallout

One of the problems facing White House political strategists has been a rash of Democratic retirements in Congress. Parker Griffith, the erstwhile Democrat from Alabama, even switched parties to avoid the expected midterm bloodbath bearing down on incumbents.
People shouldn't be surprised if even more Democrats opt out of running in November, in the wake of Brown-Coakley, Sabato said.

"Obama was unable to help his candidate in a state [Massachusetts] he carried with 62 percent. He didn’t help Jon Corzine last fall even though he won New Jersey by about a 15 percent [margin]. So you have to wonder where he can make a difference for Democrats in the midterm elections.

"This has got to scare the bejesus out of Democrats everywhere," Sabato told Newsmax. "If Brown can win in Massachusetts, the second-most Democratic state, then what must Democrats who represent Republican states be thinking? It’s possible this will nudge a few more Democrats to retire from Congress."

Republican Gains

As the national political momentum swings away from Democrats, much of it will swing over to Republicans. The bombshell that a GOP win in Massachusetts would represent would bring with it a whole host of benefits for the party of Lincoln and Reagan.

"The national Republican brand will no longer be toxic," commentator and GOP strategist Roger Stone told Newsmax. "Look for party-switchers – moderate and conservative Democrats who switch and jump into statewide races."

Already the party is enjoying a resurgence of enthusiasm from its base, now that the party faithful see that the "Obama miracle" appears astoundingly short lived.

Along with that will come money – lots of it. It is a sad reality of U.S. politics that special-interest lobbyists read the political tea leaves to determine which party's fortunes are on the rise, and then contribute money accordingly in order to buy influence.

Pundits say it was no accident Obama attracted record-breaking donations in his presidential campaign – once the economy tanked in September 2009, it didn't take Svengali to figure out which candidate was likely to win.

Now, the flow of dollars will begin to reverse, meaning GOP candidates will be much better off than in recent elections.

There's another important political impact felt as the pendulum swings to the right: GOP leaders will find it much easier to attract top-drawer candidates willing to toss their hats in the political ring and run for office.

Depending on the district, however, Democrats who step forward to run could be accused of having a death wish.

More Tea

One of the big winners in Massachusetts: the tea party movement. Although tea party leaders kept a low profile in Massachusetts to avoid alienating die-hard Democrats, they poured in resources to help Brown mount his bid to come from behind. An upset victory by a candidate whose No. 1 issue was fiscal restraint can only bolster the tea party faithful.

"The tea party movement, named for a Boston event, will grow as a vehicle for reform," Stone predicted.

Demise of a Media Lovefest

During Obama's first year in office, he basked in positive press the likes of which arguably no previous president had experienced. But with his job-approval numbers in a free-fall – and likely to take even more of a hit in the weeks to come as the media runs postmortems ad nauseam on why he couldn't save Coakley from defeat – Obama will face much tougher questioning.

If Coakley loses, the media universe that will be forced to recognize what the rest of the nation realized a long time ago: The president isn't the ratings magic that the media once thought he was.

The biggest change if Brown wins may be an altered perception that Obama represents a new era in politics. In precisely one year's time, the hope and change promised by his move into 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. will be sucked into the Beltway swamp, possibly forever.

All of which raises another question: Can Republican leaders reverse their well-earned reputation for not being able to handle success?
"The Republicans have the ability to make a sow's ear out of the political silk purse that might be handed to them by the voters in Massachusetts," Berkovitz told Newsmax. "Just as the Democrats misread the election of President Obama as a possible realignment rather than a repudiation of the Bush administration.

"The Republicans should place themselves on hubris alert," he said. "The possible win in Massachusetts should be seen as much as a 'throw the bums out' vote as 'vote the Republicans in.'"

By: David A. Patten

Source: Newsmax

Time Magazines 100 - The World's Most Influential People

In the annual TIME 100 issue, Time Magazine attempts do the impossible: name the people who most affect our world, or have in the previous year, including:  leaders, revolutionaries, builders, titans, artists, entertainers, heroes, icons scientists, writers and thinkers... even some villains.

In a stunning result, the winner of the third annual TIME 100 poll and new owner of the title World's Most Influential Person is moot. The 21-year-old college student and founder of the online community 4chan.org, whose real name is Christopher Poole, received 16,794,368 votes and an average influence rating of 90 (out of a possible 100) to handily beat the likes of Barack Obama, Vladimir Putin and Oprah Winfrey. To put the magnitude of the upset in perspective, it's worth noting that everyone moot beat out actually has a job.

Related

Graphic

The People Behind The People

TIME 100

The Most Influential People in the World

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Since moot launched 4chan.org in 2003, the site has given birth to Internet memes as diverse as Lolcats and Rickrolling. 4chan averages 13 million page views a day and 5.6 million visitors a month; by some estimates it is the second largest bulletin board in the world.

See the world's most influential people in the 2009 TIME 100.

For proof of moot's influence on the Web, one need look no further than the TIME 100 poll results. While Filipino boxer Manny Pacquiao got a larger vote total (20,391,818), the runner-up for the title of World's Most Influential Person, Malaysian politician Anwar Ibrahim, received a mere 47 on the influence scale. Moot denies knowing about any concerted plan by his followers to influence the poll, though TIME.com's technical team did detect and extinguish several attempts to hack the vote. (See the full results here.)

Undoubtedly, many people will question moot's worthiness of the title World's Most Influential Person. TIME.com managing editor Josh Tyrangiel says moot is no less deserving than previous title holders like Nintendo video-game designer Shigeru Miyamoto (2007) and Korean pop star Rain (2006). "I would remind anyone who doubts the results that this is an Internet poll," he says. "Doubting the results is kind of the point."

See a video on the TIME 100 moot vs. Rain showdown.

See more video on the TIME 100.

Sources:  Time Magazine Online

Posted:  Ask Marion at Knowledge Creates Power

Arrival of New First Pooch Imminent

A portuguese water dog Photo: GETTY

TMZ  reported yesterday that the appearance of the new White House dog is on schedule and that the suspense is finally over.  It has been confirmed that the first pooch will be a Portuguese Water Dog and will be presented by Senator Ted Kennedy who has two himself and had recommended the breed to the Obama’s.

The word on the arrival date is ‘imminent’ rather than “soon… so soon” but nothing definite as Michelle told reporters last week, or ”Oh, man, now, that’s top secret,” as the President said to laughter last week. “That’s top secret.” 

TMZ reported that the chosen pooch comes from a prominent Texas kennel with the help of Senator Ted Kennedy’s family and that Michele and Barack intend to introduce their girls to their new dog to be  named Bo, on Tuesday.

“The black dog,  a male,  is approximately six months old,” it reports. “We’ve learned it was bred at the kennel and sold to someone who gave it back. The kennel is now “re-homing” the dog to the Obamas.” 

The dog was named Charlie, but the Obamas will rename it, Bo.  The girls chose that name for their grandfather, Michelle’s dad.  His nickname was Diddly, as in Bo Diddly.

“Now here’s where the Kennedys come into play. The kennel has sold the Kennedys three Portuguese Water Dogs in the past, all from the same lineage.

The dog the Obamas will be getting is from the same lineage as the Kennedy dogs. The Kennedy family will be presenting the new dog to the Obamas, but it’s really coming from the kennel.”

The reason this all sounds a bit odd or technical is that there are issues regarding gifts to the President. The fact that the pup is being re-homed makes it all ‘kosher’.

Senator Dick Durbin, Mr Obama’s fellow Illinois politician, said the dog had been going through training while the president and the first lady were on their recent travels in Europe.  And, according to another report, the dog has already been to the White House for a “familiarisation” visit.

Reported Actual Foto of Obama Dog from FirstDogCharlie.com

By:  Marion Algier/Ask Marion - Just One More Pet - Arrival of New First Pooch Imminent

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