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Muckrake: (noun) a: a rake for spreading dung; (verb) a: to search out and publicly expose real or rumored misconduct of a prominent person or business.
Recently, there have been a couple of up-beat OPs on this forum, where people have noted that President Obama reminds them of President Kennedy. Most of the responses have been positive, but there have been some negative attacks against each of the two men. These negative responses alone suggest another similarity between the two.
The "talking points" parroted in these negative responses tend to be identical to those used by the parasites posing as tabloid journalists. In Kennedy’s day, these journalists were known as "muckrakers"; today, they are known as "shit-stirrers." I thought it might be of interest to look more closely at one of the lies that was told about Kennedy when he was a US Senator, and which a number of people continue to repeat today.
Senator Kennedy wrote a book, "Profiles In Courage," which won a Pulitzer Prize. In the book’s preface, Kennedy wrote, "The greatest debt is owed to my research associate, Theodore C. Sorensen, for his invaluable assistance in the assembly and preparation of the material upon which this book is based."
In 1956, Senator Kennedy had been considered as the vice presidential candidate for the Democratic ticket. In the year that followed, it became rumored that he was considering running for the top office in the 1960 primary. Although he would be an underdog, his status as a WW2 hero, an award-winning author, and his gracious conduct at the ’56 convention made him a potential threat to other candidates. Hence, the muckraking began.
On Saturday, December 7, 1957, nationally syndicated columnist Andrew Russell ("Drew") Pearson appeared on Mike Wallace’s ABC program. This was one of the most influential news shows of that era. Wallace questioned Pearson about his recent attack on what Pearson described as the Kennedy family’s "machine" in promoting the book. Pearson responded by saying that Senator Kennedy had "won a Pulitzer Prize on a book which was ghostwritten for him ….the book, ‘Profiles in Courage’ was written for Senator Kennedy by somebody else and he has never acknowledged the fact." When Wallace asked who the real author was, Pearson said that he could not remember.
The following day, Senator Kennedy contacted officials from ABC. In a meeting that followed – and which Kennedy invited Pearson to attend – the Senator showed his hand-written outlines and rough drafts, and allowed them access to his Dictaphone tapes. Further, he provided them with an affidavit from Ted Sorensen, which detailed his role in editing the rough drafts. (After Kennedy’s initial call, ABC contacted Pearson, who claimed that Sorensen had authored the book, though he had no sources to verify his claim.)
On the November 14 Mike Wallace show, a statement by ABC’s vice president was read on air: "This company has inquired into the charge made by Mr. Pearson and has satisfied itself that such charge is unfounded and that the book in question was written by Senator Kennedy. We deeply regret this error and feel it does a grave injustice to a distinguished public servant and author, to the excellent book he wrote, and to the prize he was awarded. We extend our sincere apologies to Senator Kennedy, his publishers, and the Pulitzer Prize Committee."
Three months later, in his February 16, 1958 column, Pearson admitted that Senator Kennedy was indeed the author of the book. But he could not restrain himself from muckraking: he quoted Norman Thomas (father of Evan Thomas), who had said "it’s easy to write profiles in courage about men who are dead – what we need is profiles in courage among men who are living."
It’s sad to see DUers attacking JFK on the grounds that he didn’t write "Profiles in Courage." It is, of course, easy to attack men who are dead, especially by using a lie that has been repeated so frequently over the years that uninformed people might actually believe it. But it was a lie, and it was fully exposed as a lie immediately after that Pearson told the lie on national television. While I am fully aware that both President Kennedy and President Obama were imperfect – as all human beings are – we should be above repeating the lies of muckrakers and shit-stirrers.
I’ll end this with a quote from President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who was Pearson’s favorite politician. At the time, Pearson had been exposed for telling other lies in his "reporting," and FDR wrote to General Patrick J. Hurley, "His ill-considered falsehoods have come to the point where he is doing much harm to his own Government and to other nations. It is a pity that anyone anywhere believes anything he writes."
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