I was born in 69. How did you people feel after Kennedy assassination

[PretzelWarrior]

followed by horrific war and body count in Vietnam (believe it or not I almost typed Iraq).

followed by assassination of MLK Jr and Bobby Kennedy and National Guard killing student protestors?

I can't imagine we could feel any worse right now than folks did back then.

[molly]

1. I still had hope as horrific as all those things were

[MnFats]

2. Absolutely awful. Teen Angst! Curt Cobain had nothin' on me...

....
that summer I turned 16.
I truly believed that MLK would bring evil and discrimination to public attention and that all the wrongs would be righted. Especially with Bobby Kennedy as president.

Those were the two public figures I admired the most at that time....I was naive, I suppose, but I thought we would at last have a good and decent country that lived up to its ideals for all of us...

and then within a matter of months....they were both dead.

...to make matters much, much worse, a few months after that, we had....Nixon. Fucking Richard Milhaus Nixon was president....

you wanna talk about alienation?

[BayStateBoy]

3. Numb. Like Now. But There Was Still Hope Back Then n/t

[PretzelWarrior]

7. you're the second person to say you had hope back then

as though this time around the fires of hope are barely flickering today.

[Maccagirl]

18. The hope actually came from the culture

i.e. music, TV, books, etc surrounding us-not the politicos. We don't see that today.

[The Backlash Cometh]

30. We had hope because the baby boomers were young and waiting

for their turn to change things. But three things happened that stopped everything.

First, the Vietnam War elders worked it good so that the boys of that generation would be at each other's neck throughout that generation's life-span. The split between Liberal and Conservative was very evident during that era.

Second, Generation X turned out to be more ambitious than the Baby Boomers and actually scoffed at the idealism of the sixties. They started taking college seriously and getting good jobs, making good money. Soon, the Baby Boomers learned that greed was good.

And the final nail in the coffin for Liberals was the AIDS epidemic. In the late 1980s, Liberals lost many moderate liberals (like me). They lost the idealistic youthful vision. We learned that there were consequences to "Live and let live." It just didn't work in the long run. Since then, Liberals haven't really come up with a suitable moral direction. I have suggested social pragmatism in the past. It would be a major start in changing your direction regarding moral values, if you could adopt something similar.

[Omnibus]

62. I'd like to contradict you on one point.

Don't blame the greed era on generation X. Most of us were still in our formative years and too young to vote when Reagan got elected and Yuppies were suddenly everywhere. If we scoffed at the idealism of the sixties, it's because most of the Boomers had long since left the Sixties behind.

I don't mind if you blame my generation for things that are our fault, but since we've been overshadowed by the boomers our whole lives, that's a very short list.

[PretzelWarrior]

63. LOL. proud Gen x-er here. I know exactly what you mean.

even now...to most of the Boomer generation it's all about them. oh well.

[The Backlash Cometh]

77. We can settle this quite easily by determining which generation

proportionately chosed more M.B.A.s over Liberal Arts. Your generation may not have started the trend, but you embraced it.

And, I beg to differ, but I distinctly remember a news show which encapsulated it all for me. The interviewed X'er was a female in a business suit who basically stated that she didn't have time for the social minded boomers nor protest marches.

Whatever you say about the boomer, they at least had a social-minded era.

[PretzelWarrior]

80. who raised gen x-ers? yep. the ones who sold out.

but hey....no need for recriminations. there is a whole band of young voters who are seeing the need to fight for justice. they will be some heroes.

[The Backlash Cometh]

85. You all should have gotten away from the shadows of your parents

The sixties was an entire counter-culture revolution. Kids were looking for a direction away from their parents -- who were basically pretty hypocritical. What exactly did you generation contribute besides the yuppies, grunge and punk?

Just wondering.

[Wind Dancer]

86. It's been great to see the young become activists.

Unfortunately, many of the boomers turned into the very thing they protested, but not all of us. I think some of the most hardcore liberals are still fighting like they did back in the day.

[BayStateBoy]

79. No Hope Unless We Fight Voter Fraud Today

[genius]

4. My instant reaction was that Nixon and the Republicans did it.

I said that Nixon would become Pres sometime in the future because of the assassination. At the time I did not know who George H.W. Bush was. But now it turns out that he was involved in the assassination.

BTW, I was a little kid at the time and my parents weren't interested in politics. I've always been good at predicting the future when it comes to politics. I also predicted 2000, 2002, the California recall and exactly what happened in 2004. However, I did not predict that Kerry would just fold. He promised he would not.

[Hubert Flottz]

5. Numb!

About the way I feel now!

[henslee]

6. I was shitting my pants. I cried a lot. And I threw my food. I was 2.

[PretzelWarrior]

9. LOL! Good one

sounds like a day in the life of 80-something yr old G. Herbert Walker Bush.

[prayin4rain]

61. Hahaha... that's funny :)

[patdem]

8. I agree with Molly...as bad as things were hope was eternal...but now???

It is probably more like Germany in 1933 than America in the 60's ...so you probably need to ask the people in Germany how they felt as fascism overtook their population?

[aquart]

10. This is nothing like the Kennedy assassination.

That was sheer, pure grief. The conspiracy theories didn't surface then. We were celebrating the smooth transition of power, and mourning our loss.

With the other deaths it began to feel that anyone who stood up for the people would be murdered,and the lone assassin became a joke. Something else was going on.

THIS is like 9/11. We are in shock, and huge denial, and it took some time for the grief to set in, and leave that never-healing wound.

[PretzelWarrior]

13. I watched a thing on Bobby Kennedy on PBS or something

I can't remember which channel but it had to be publicly run. Anyway, the way they described the hope in his heart....trying to pick up pieces from MLK's assassination earlier in the year....

it just seemed too tragic to be true.

We have some of the most horrific and animalistic people holding the reins of power in this country. It is truly frightening to contemplate.

Sometimes, I feel the only reason more of us aren't put in our place by the powers that be is their keen sense that we really don't matter and aren't really changing anything.

[aquart]

69. I'm not actually one of Bobby's admirers, but that's okay.

My candidate, at the time of Bobby's assassination, was Eugene McCarthy, the Howard Dean of his day (but so much taller).

[immoderate]

74. I was in that boat too!

It seemed that Bobby only came to oppose the war AFTER he saw the political gains made by Gene.

--IMM

[Gman]

11. Shock and disbelief, especially

since it came so soon after they also killed Martin Luther King. And I say "they" as in the right wing. Its the same people, figuratively speaking, now as it was then. Those people hate as much now as they did 30 - 40 years ago. But make no mistake. The right wing killed JFK, MLK and RFK.

Being the "same" people, they also tried to kill Clinton through the impeachment. They killed Gore and Kerry using demonization. I've no doubt if Gore or Kerry were elected they would be walking dead men as the right wing would have outright killed them probably in the name of Jesus Christ.

[kitchen girl]

12. I was born in 1957, so was...

only six when Kennedy was assassinated, but I remember it like it was yesterday, as well as the other things you mentioned and some things you didn't mention (Cuban missile crisis, race riots). As an extremely aware child, I can tell you it was a terrifying time. Before she died in 1999, my mother was reminiscing about her childhood in the 1930s and 40s and what a wonderful, perfect time that was (guess she forgot WWII). She said she wished she could go back to that time, and then asked me if I would want to go back to my childhood. Um...no. I've often thought I should write an essay of my experiences of those events as seen through the eyes of a child.

[jcv1]

21. I clearly remember

Sitting in my 2nd grade class and listening to the school principal announce the President had been shot and then that he had died. The walk home was the longest walk in my life. My parents were crying and we stayed glued to the TV for days. This was the beginning of my involvement in community activism that lasts to this day....

[kitchen girl]

25. I remember thinking my grandmother was going to die.

I was at her house that day, and Grandma had a heart condition and a definite hysterical personality. I was sitting with my back up against the big old console TV, playing with paper dolls, when my mother called and told her the news. Grandma was shaking and wailing, "The Russians are going to kill us all!", running around the house like a maniac. And the only person there with her was me. And I was six. I got out of her way when she turned on the TV, but I kept my back to the TV and kept playing with my paper dolls like nothing was wrong...someone has to be calm here, might as well be me. It wasn't long after that when my mother came over, and we all sat glued to the TV.

My father worked for the railroad, and let me tell you, he never got off work for any reason, but he didn't have to go to work for about three days. We all sat in the living room and watched the funeral. I remember the procession, the salute...and a few days (weeks?) later seeing Oswald get blown away on the TV news.

Heavy stuff for a six-year old.

[jcv1]

46. 6 year olds shouldn't have to bear the burden

You must have been the oldest child to be so aware of your involvement in what was going on.... I think that day affected a generation... too bad some in power today forget the 60's

[kitchen girl]

49. Nope. I was the only child.

And, according to my mother, I was "born old". However, to quote a wonderful song, "I was so much older then, I'm younger than that now". :hippie:

[DemBones DemBones]

50. Oswald was killed before JFK's funeral.

As I remember, he was killed the day after the assassination.

[kitchen girl]

51. That's entirely possible.

I just remember seeing it on TV and, in the passing of time, it seems like there was more time between the events.

[DemBones DemBones]

53. Time passes slowly for a 6 year-old. I was 16

and learned about it in school. My dad was in the military and we were living on base then. The next day I went to a memorial service with him at one of the base chapels. When we got home, my mother and younger sibs had seen Oswald killed on tv.

[orpupilofnature57]

56. BEING BORN IN 57,MEANS MOST OF OUR LIVES

Seeing oswald shot live,was shocking,the presidents funeral one of the saddest moments in our history.

[Individualist]

76. I saw Oswald shot on live TV coverage

I was 20 years old when JFK was assasinated on Friday, 11/22/63. I watched TV all weekend and was watching on Sunday morning, the 24th, when live TV coverage showed Oswald being shot.

[John Q. Citizen]

14. As someone else pointed out

now kind of feels like when Nixon was re-elected after the Water-Gate scandle had broken but before evidence had piled up deeper and deeper.
The feeling was how could people not see that Nixon was a crook. However, we expected to lose based on polling and general consensus.

It's different now in that we have had 3 elections in a row (two pres, one midterm) where the outcome was based on fraud.

I expected this race to be close but I thought we had it. We did but it was ripped off.

The Kennedy assasination was closer to 9/11, kind of a national shock and profound saddness.

[The Backlash Cometh]

15. Only 6 at the time, so it was the reaction of the people around me

that made me realize the enormity of what had happened. I lived overseas and the people in that country were just as affected, if not more so than the Americans. You'd think it was their president too. Kennedy was loved by so many people.

[wryter2000]

16. But you're forgetting

The continuing quest for civil rights, followed by some important legislation, and the war on poverty (Great Society). Awful things happened, but it didn't feel as if the whole country was for the awful things (except the Viet Nam war, but that changed, too).

The war was terrible, but we had a great feeling of hope that we could change things for the better.

[jcv1]

17. It was the closest this country came to revolution

Since the real one.... years of war, thousands dead, civil rights demonstrations and race riots, government secrecy and violations of the Constitution, rock and roll musicians calling for peace, Woodstock, Kent State, Jackson State and on and on... We're not there yet but another terrorist attack, another attack on a sovereign nation, another Patriot Act, and another stolen election and history will repeat itself.

[hlthe2b]

19. I was only 5 yo when JFK assasinated: I was confused & horrified...

but after MLK and RFK, along with the violence of Kent State, Mi Lai, civil rights violence of the 60s, and the palpable fear being disseminated by those--especially following the murder of MLK, that race war was on the horizon, I was terrified.

Especially hearing racist rhetoric by many in my extended family, whose actions their whole lives seemed to contradict their words.... I guess they simply did not know or truly understand what was happening and were often swayed by the mass hysteria that accompanied media stores during this time and which the Repugs later used to their poltical advantage. (Unfortunately, this was and remains all too common in our society--though thankfully no longer in my family-- and I've had to put some stops on my tendency to judge on abhorent rhetoric alone. Fear causes some to let lose with pretty horrible language and scape-goating). I spent much of my adolescence in the deep south, and saw first-hand the Nixonian efforts to use race as a potent political weapon. Going away to college was instrumental in cementing my burgeoning liberal values. Thus, I think I understand why those who are never exposed beyond high school to more worldly ideas and shared attitudes are so susceptible to traditional political ideas and sterotypes.

Repubs and racist groups truly do benefit from an uneducated populace.

[PretzelWarrior]

23. HEAR! HEAR! I'm not from deep south, but MO and KS

and I've thought a lot about the folks I knew in those tiny towns of Kansas. Some of them were truly scary people in the way they were so close-minded, manipulated by religious dogma, and downright mean to anyone/anything they didn't understand which was quite a wide array of things.

How in the world can we force exposure to more of the world around us for these people? If anything it will get worse with No Child Left Behind because schools will spend even less time/money on increasing children's perspective and world understanding because they're all busy jamming on how to pass the reading/writing/math tests.

Okay, I'm officially depressed again.

[hlthe2b]

36. My family was from rural Missouri and parts of Kansas...

so, I do relate..Some of those folks had never experienced any kind of relationship with someone of another race/ethnicity-- and gays, were surely whispered about, but very deeply closeted.

These were not and are not bad people; but they, in their ignorance, are VERY SUSCEPTIBLE to manipulation. This is why we simply have to make reform of the media a top priority, expecially television media.

[Zookeeper]

20. I was very young when Kennedy was assassinated...

I remember that school was dismissed early and I went to a babysitter's house. The adults around me were shocked and saddened, which I found curious since many of them had been quite critical of Kennedy just a day or two before. I don't remember the grief being as partisan as I think it would be now.

On the other hand, when MLK was assassinated, I actually heard someone say, "Good. It's about time someone got that ******." That moment cemented my Liberal inclinations.

[AnnInLa]

27. Yes, that happened to me also re MLK

raised in the South, and hearing the grownups laugh when pictures on TV showed the proud, brave Blacks marching for Civil Rights, and being hosed, being beaten, being set upon by the dogs....seeing those brave young blacks sitting at the lunch counters while whites jeered and screamed at them....seeing the quiet satifaction in the white community after MLK was murdered...it cemented my liberalism too. It makes me sick to recall all of that, but thank goodness I was old enough for it to make a lasting impression.

[kitchen girl]

87. MLK's death devastated me.

And I was an 11-year old, white, Appalachian girl in the middle of Ohio who had never even met a black person. I was in fourth grade, and a few months before his death, I had to give a book report. The only book in the classroom I hadn't read was a biography of MLK, so that's what I had to do my book report on. God knows how it got into that classroom - there weren't any black people in our community. When I read his story, I was totally galvanized for civil rights for whoever and wherever these black people were. I talked to my parents about it, and they, even though they didn't know any black people, either, were totally supportive of me. My friends all thought I was weird. And then...he was murdered. I remember watching the TV news and hearing his "I Have A Dream" speech, and sobbing. To this day, I still sob when I hear it. It would be another four years or so before I met a black person, but it didn't matter. MLK was one of my childhood heroes.

[watercolors]

22. shock and despair

cried for weeks, the country mourned for so long. He was my hero, I worked so hard for his campaign. We all felt hopeless. However today I feel anger and a hopelessness that we are losing our country. I worry what kind of country will my grandchildren have. Today I found out we are to become great grandparents and my heart fell. What will happen for this child, what future will it have? I do not feel confidant at all, it is changing so quickly, I fear a religious war in the future. I think it was Walter Cronkite who said the only fear we have in this country was the religious right.It was over 25 yrs ago or more. I see more evidence of it every year.

[SW FL Dem]

24. I was 5 when Kennedy was assasinated n/t

[DemoTex]

26. The assassinations, Vietnam, and Kent State were on a different level ...

Those were much more horrific and life-altering events than the 2004 election. We feel violated by this election, but we felt much deeper emotions during those events of the 60s. What bothers me now is that many of the players on the Bu$h side lived through the 60s (although very few actually fought in Vietnam), but it does not appear that they underwent any moral annealing from the experience.

[Keirsey]

31. Oliver Stone's "JFK"

I pretty much went along with the masses until I saw that powerful film.

Remember driving home and terrifying my (in)significant other with my reckless driving. I was, and remain, furious, at how we were lied to.

Stone may not have gotten the conspiracy exactly right, but we KNOW that there was a conspiracy.

[DemoTex]

58. Read Norman Mailer's "Oswald's Tale."

It is fairly objective. But with the way Oswald was treated in the USSR and later escapades, I smell a conspiracy. Now, the Oswald brothers were fucked-up. They slept with and were bathed by their mother until the age of consent. "Oh Lee, let mommy soap up your little thingy." No wonder he was a paid assassin!

Don't miss LHW's mother's outrageous actions post-assassination and at the graveyard. Don't miss the shennanigans of the color-man, Jack Ruby. Don't miss the connections of Ruby with other Dallas notables! Most of all, and it is not in any book, don't forget the big blast at the Dallas Country Club in the center of the ultra-rich Highland Park (where Cheney lived) on 11/22/63. The animals that celebrated JFKs death (and I have it from an appalled eye-witness) are running this country now.

[Zookeeper]

81. Thanks, DemoTex. I'll look for that book....

Is there any chance your eye-witness would go on record? (Even through a videotaped or signed statement that could be kept safely until he/she felt it was appropriate to release it?)

[stevedeshazer]

57. That's for sure

As a teenager, those events affected me for life.

[idiosyncratic]

28. JFK's assassination elicited pure, agonizing grief.

I spent the days after the assassination with my horse. I sat on his back in the pasture and leaned over his neck and cried and cried into his black mane. The grief was uncontrollable.

After the other assassinations, I looked into moving to Australia.

I didn't want to live in a country where those things could happen. :cry:

[glitch]

29. It was bad then - but we still had the belief in the vote. We lost our

best and brightest, but we still had our country and hope. That's the down side of today.

The up side of today is we know a lot more, and information truly is power. So we may not have heroes, but we have a much clearer idea of who our enemy is.

In the 60s we had stopping the war as our focus, but we now see that the war was only a symptom of the cancer that has come back with a vengeance now. Just as the Iraq war is a symptom of our deeper sickness.

Now we know we're sick, we know where the cancer is, we're evaluating treatment methods. It will be treated.

Much better position to be in than maybe suspecting you're sick and not even looking for and fighting the cancer.

So I think we're much better off than we were in the 60s or the Germans in 30s.

And we can fight to get the vote and our country back which is a clear focus of the first step we need to take to clean up our system.
That clear focus is a godsend.

[Individualist]

32. Sickened

I was 20 when JFK was murdered. Because of the assasinations, Viet Nam and atrocities committed during the fight for civil rights, until 2000 I had always considered the 60's the worse decade of my life.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

33. I can tell you exactly where I was and what I was doing

on Nov. 22, 1963. I was eating lunch in my high school. RFK was assassinated two days before my high school graduation. The Kent State kids were murdered while I was in college, and I thought, "There but for the grace of God...."

I cried then. I cry now. Now I'm even more troubled, because I fear that our nation is at an end, either through dictatorship or a nuclear war.

Pray, people, in whatever way you pray.

[livinbella]

34. it is much worse now

And I recall those events clear as a bell.

[On Par]

35. We Went Through A Lot in The 60's....

....Not only did we endure the JFK assassination, we also had the late great 1968.

But since you missed those years, you need only look back on 9/11 and how you felt for days afterward. My parents compare the JFK assassination to Pearl Harbor, I compare 9/11 to the JFK assassination.

While each of these events tore at your heart, nothing compares to what happened in 2000, and Nov 2, 2004. They are similar in that something was taken away, but the similarity ends there. After Pearl Harbor, JFK, and 9/11, America grew stronger and pulled together.
These past two elections have provided a divide, and the divide has grown deeper with suspicious voting. 50% of American's feel despair. No one is sure what the real outcome was, or what the future will hold. The media drones on about "mandate." Cries of fraudulent voting echo back despite exit polling that has never been more than 1/10th of 1% wrong. Past events have always provided hope. No longer.

Maybe Bill Clinton said it best for all of us. "I feel your pain."

OP

[PretzelWarrior]

37. thanks. and you bring up a difference. in those cases it was

"the other". It was the Japanese enemy or some crazed gunmen or the Arab hijackers.

This one feels like being betrayed by your own people or being robbed.

What is more, I always took satisfaction in the fact that Bush got into power illegitimately. We were on to him. We would toss his sorry fuckingly DUMB ass out onto the street.

THe fact that one of my central goals these past 4 years didn't come to pass and the fact that we were so close (Ohio that everybody thought would be the pivot was indeed) just tears at my heart.

I look at what happened at Abu Graib. I look at 9/11 and all Bush team knew and could have done to prevent it. I look at the over 1100 American soldiers and thousands upon thousands of innocent Iraqis dying...and I lay it right at the feet of Bush.

To know he will have another 4 years to work his horrendous policies and further decimate the idealists in this country....it is very hard to bear.

[Cookie wookie]

40. Yes it is. I couldn't even work after the elections

and had to stay home, as I had to be able to cry whenever wherever.

Now that I'm feeling a little better, I'm starting to think more creatively. One thing we need to do is create our own media, as those of us who may have held out hope that the bloody corporate media would turn around, really need to give that up. Obviously we need to get the word out about what is really happening -- the facts.

Other than getting rid of all computerized voting, creating our own media and distributing news has to be at the top of the list.

[PretzelWarrior]

43. THAT'S WHAT I SAY!!! I like a FOCUSED GOAL for us

we should get our voices in the media by whatever means we can pull together (there are 55 million of us at least).

So....let's just get busy.

[chookie]

71. You might be interested in something Jackie said

She confessed to William Manchester that she could not deal with the fact that it was the act of a nut. She said she might have been able to deal with it better had it been clearly for a political purpose -- as by a Bircher, because Jack was so bitterly hated by the right wing -- that it would have given his senseless violent death some meaning....

God rest your soul Jackie, but it may very well have been a very well executed covert political act -- and that tragically the son of someone kinda sorta floating around in strange conspiracies at the time is now president....

Sound wacko? Don't take my word for it -- check out Kevin Phillip's book on the Bush Dynasty. I was shocked to see him mention funny business regarding "The Bay of Pigs thing"....

[Cookie wookie]

38. I was 18 and a newlywed

living at Camp LeJeune, N.C. when Kennedy was killed -- my husband (now ex) was in the Marine Corps and would later serve in Vietnam. The day is burned in my memory. Feelings: confusion, loss, terrible sadness, emptiness, broken hearted. I remember the turmoil then, the riots, cities burning, assasinations, all the violent factions, the antiwar movement, NIXON (vomit), but I don't remember being afraid like I have been during the * presidency.

I just always felt there were enough people, the press, and citizens who would make sure that the Constitution was upheld and that no matter how bad things were, we always could stand on a solid foundation of democracy, no matter how crazy things got.

After all, if we had had the Patriot Act back then, Nixon's illegal activities wouldn't have been illegal. That's a scary thought.

Now I see that this large segment of our society votes for a man who -- well we all know the long list so I won't repeat it -- but to me this is much more serious, much more dangerous time than back then. Not because of terrorism, as we had the Cold War, etc., but because of terrorism within, the complicity of the media in pumping out 24/7 propaganda to support the lies and the people blindly following their leader to their own detriment. They are waving flags and giving away the safety, security, integrity, and future of the country.

I think this is worse. And, at least back then we had great music.

[PretzelWarrior]

39. very well said. I totally think you boiled it down

because my SENSE was that people who could compare the two would see this is worse on a lot of levels than those very fractious and saddening times.

I can't stand it. On Franken's show the other day, Joe Conasan was trying to act like we will get perspective and this win likely won't mean much in the grand historical context of American politics...but I just think that's wrong.

[Cookie wookie]

42. I heard Conasan too. I have been deeply touched

by the number of men, brilliant, talented, successful, beautiful men who have obviously been weeping too. I've never seen that after an election, ever ever. On Air America when Robert Kennedy was on this week, even he sounded like he had been crying.

We are in totally new territory, folks.

[The Backlash Cometh]

47. Yes, we had the press in the 60s to make us feel that someone

was working to make us safe. Not anymore.

[seraph]

41. I was there...

This is bad, but I hate to say it; It was worse then.


We shall see what happens now. The difference NOW is the media.

Back then we got a bit of truth out of "journalists" (sic).

[GarySeven]

44. Imagine: The top three political leaders of these times suddenly dead

That's what the world was like in 1968. We knew we were in a war with an implacable enemy but somehow we knew that there were enough of us so that we could and would rebuild this country back the way the forefathers had meant it to be. But now, I am not so sure. Perhaps
curse of getting older is increased cynicism. It seems that people are WILLFULLY ignorant these days, unable or unwilling to look beyond their own selfish goals to the future of the Republic. What's worse, there are too few willing to put their bodies into the fray, even if it is just to appear in mass demonstrations. I can only hope that the younger people out there will be willing to throw themselves up against the barricades of police because that, once again, is what it will take. This grim duty falls to some generations; thankfully not all. In the past, the generation called has summoned the necessary will to fight.

[xxqqqzme]

45. a month after RFK was shot

we left the US for four years. '68 was a bad year.

[On Par]

64. A Time Line of 1968

http://www.stg.brown.edu/projects/1968/reference/timeline.html

OP

[PretzelWarrior]

65. wow. that is really fascinating

They forgot March 9. bransonfu's parents got married. LOL.

[snacker]

48. I was only 12,

but I remember it was the first time I saw my father cry.

[Wind Dancer]

55. I was a young girl too.

My father, the most loving and caring man I've known, was devastated. It scared me to see my family so heartbroken, they mourned for a long time and then my dad introduced me to the world of politics. Kennedy was a man he truly respected and counted on to lead in the civil rights movement. I felt scared, but safe and hopeful.

I know that the deaths of MLK and RFK were the beginning of activism for me, my family fought in the south for the civil rights movement - I knew the stakes were high. I don't feel the safety I did back then. My dad would be horrified if he was alive today. My mom recently confided that she has never been through anything as frightening in her 77 years as this current atmosphere.

This is a different feeling - we are united as progressives but our obstacles are overwhelming, it's not time to stop fighting.

[DemBones DemBones]

52. To me, this is worse because the GOP has full control now

and they have some real crazies in their party (the neoconservatives, the "Christian" Reconstructionists and Dominionists), crazies who have Bush**'s ear.

I compare 12/12/2000 to 11/22/63. The SCOTUS selection of Bush* made me feel the way the killing of JFK did: numb, hopeless, "This can't be happening in this country."

Although I allowed myself to hope this year, 2000 was always in the back of my mind so when it turned out badly for us, I wasn't surprised. After JFK, it wasn't too much of a shock to hear that MLK, and the RFK, had died in a similar way.

What I'm saying is that this is no shock but it's worse in terms of what happens from here on out.

[Swamp Rat]

54. We are being attacked by the some of the same reptiles now

[PretzelWarrior]

60. that is one scary picture. how did he not get charged with anything?

he's slippery like George Bush the elder. CIA guy. His name never came up for serious inquiry during Iran Contra.

Some people are "the untouchables"

[Swamp Rat]

67. Some "untouchables" are not people

[Zookeeper]

82. It always struck me that the media was...

somewhat infatuated with Kissinger. Perhaps they were mesmerized by his accent...kinda like another popular politician of today.

[Rowdyboy]

59. June 1968-November 1968 has to be one of the saddest, darkest

periods of American history. I was 15 and it hurt like hell.

[Carolab]

66. I feel much worse now

we weren't faced with the "new world order" then

[Logansquare]

68. Every night, in my childish prayers

I asked Jesus to not send my brother to Vietnam. My mother overheard me one night, and gently reassured me that if he was drafted, she and my father would do everything possible to get him into Canada.

Bobby Kennedy's asassination was depressing and sad, but when King was killed, it seemed like the very seams of society were coming apart. Riots everywhere--entire sections of American cities were burned; people who we knew who seemed perfectly nice before talked about getting guns in case "the niggers" came to get us all. The fear and despair of that time really marked my childhood.

[chookie]

70. A walk down memory lane

I was VERY young during this tumultuous time -- younger than Caroline but slightly older than JohnJohn. I can't offer any info from that awful event that would be useful to you to understand it. My family -- although stricken by Jack's death, did not discuss it in front of us kids. It was not until many years later that I became aware of the controversies surrounding the assassination. (I also later found out that my Grandma had fingered Lyndon Johnson as the guy who put out the contract!)

I was however slightly older when Martin and Bobby were killed. Still too young to make sense of it, and I can't say I had a sensitive family which discussed pertinent issues....but something I DO remember -- and get ready to gag -- that "average Americans" were getting burned out on having to watch state funerals on tv, and complained to their stations to put their familiar regular programming on. Mind you, the murders of MLK and Bobby occured within a few months of each other, and apparently was too much for the "average American" attention span to take it -- and, if I may conjecture in hindsight -- many didn't give a fuck about MLK because he was a "trouble-maker" and didn't care about Bobby because he was a "nigger-lover." So you see, young friend, "Red Statism" has been around for a long time -- indeed, I believe the Civil War is still being waged, and that the South has finally prevailed.

No one talked about this stuff when I was a kid -- I kinda wish they would have....I don't think "shielding" children from harsh reality is smart in the long run. (For example -- I have a friend who has a 7 year old who didn't know what "Sept 11" meant -- JEEZ! ) Hell -- not even our liberal nuns at my Catholic school talked about these horrific events, which mystifies me to this day....

On the other hand, our (racist) neighborhood was near one of the "projects" which saw riots and the burning of buildings. Mom said civil war was about to break out, which scared the HELL out of me because I had seen a very violent movie that day, so I was afraid that what was in store.

As to the war, here is another child memory: I used to come home for lunch everyday. One day a week, our local newscaster -- Bill Burns -- read the numbers of dead and wounded. Unlike the haircuts today, who just read this horror straightfaced -- Mr Burns would shake his head gravely from side to side and look utterly appalled and stricken. God bless you, Bill Burns.

[PretzelWarrior]

72. kick for workweek

good responses here.

[otohara]

73. Numb

when JFK died - really sad and angry when MLK, RFK, and Ohio happened.

[pdx_prog]

75. I too was 6....

but remember it well......our school let out for that entire week. I sat at home sitting two feet from the TV watching the whole thing with my mother. My mother cried and cried, and I couldn't figure out what was wrong with people and why someone would do such a thing.

My history teacher in HS was on the house assasinations comittee.....we had a LONG investigation in our class about the assasination....he brought up questions and descrepancies that blew our minds as 11th graders.

[TahitiNut]

78. Since I'd seen him in person 15 months before he was shot ...

... I was stunned, holding back tears, deeply appalled at those (in Mobile, AL) who who cheered his death, and feeling bereft. It was a killing of a piece of my nation's soul, not so much because of who he was as because of how so many saw him as a symbol of our best aspirations. Those were very, very sad and somber days.

[Baja Margie]

83. We were devastated,

but we were also innocent & naive, we had hope and we trusted our government. Very few dare thought there was a conspiracy, that came later. It started to unravel rapidly after the assassination, and now we are where we are. It's easy to look back and be melancholy over the early 60's, but I think the entire zeitgeist ,the social fabric, was completely different than it is now. We didn't have gangs, automatic weapons on the streets, homeless, AIDS, deteriorating cities, choking smog and polution Yes, there was bigotry for sure, and women, black & Mexican, and gay rights were unheard of. The emphasis was more family orientated. People were friendlier, more apt to help each other generally speaking. Of course there was a downside to all this great nostalgia.

But this election, this time I think, is far worse, far worse than anything I've ever experienced.

[cassiepriam]

84. I was just thinking about this today!

I have lived through JFK, RFK, MLK assassinations.
Viet Nam, Kent State, Nixon, Reagan.
It was awful when JFK died. A shock and so sad.
The whole nation was in deep deep mourning.
But all in all I must admit that now is the worst
I have ever seen. It is a nightmare, filled with
fear and dread, shame as an American, horror
and disbelief at what is happening.

[Puglover]

88. Branson

I was sitting in Mrs. Shannons 4th grade class when she left suddenly. She returned in tears and quietly told us the President had been shot. We left early for home...I remember being scared and sad. All weekend we watched the coverage and Sunday morning(I think it was Sunday) I saw Oswald shot by Ruby. I grew up in a tiny town in Iowa where my Aunt once told me....Don't hang around so much with the Bradshaws" Ahem...we were Lutheran and they were Catholics. :)
The two churches were kitty corner and I never once stepped inside the Catholic church. Cripes I thought they bit off live chicken heads over there. But everyone loved Kennedy and mourned.
I shook Bobby Kennedys hand when he rode down Marion Iowas main street...I was in junior high at that point. I'll never forget the horror of his death and the same for Martin Luther King....
I was young and more resilient then now; I had more faith in my fellow humans.
I still feel hope but there it is mixed with so much bitterness and cynicism. I can't believe that we have ended up with a grinning Alfred E. Newman gone fundie for a president.