Do you think the assassination of President Kennedy affects us today?

[Octafish]

From what I can attest, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963
changed the course -- and nature -- of the United States in profound ways. I believe the effects are all around us.
Until we get the nation back on track, I won't be ready to move on.



What say you? Do you think, almost 47 years on, the assassination of President Kennedy affects us today?

Either way, what are your thoughts on the question?

[saltpoint]

1. Yes. Without question.

[Octafish]

63. President Kennedy said, 'We choose to go to the moon...'

By taking that route, we showed the world free people could do anything -- even "the impossible."

[L0oniX]

91. Well ...Jackie Gleason was going to send Alice to the moon before that.

:silly:

[saltpoint]

107. Hi, Octafish. This here thread of yours is a true winner.

Thank you for having the heart and mind to put it up for us.

Very nice.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. Not just yes.......but HELL YES.

The effects may dim over time, but they will be here for years.

It's like a wound that won't heal.

And it's very, very sad.

[Octafish]

64. The Posthumous Assassination of JFK

The anger inside me has grown exponentially over the years. It's reached the point where I can't tolerate ultra-conservatives. I particularly loathe those who denigrate his memory -- no matter what political persuasion.

The Posthumous Assassination of JFK
Judith Exner, Mary Meyer, and Other Daggers

By James DiEugenio
Probe
From the September-October, 1997 issue (Vol. 4 No. 6)

Current events, most notably a past issue of Vanity Fair, and the upcoming release of Sy Hersh’s new book, extend an issue that I have dealt with in a talk I have done several times around the country in the last two years. It is entitled “The Two Assassinations of John Kennedy.” I call it that because there has been an ongoing campaign of character assassination ever since Kennedy was killed.

In the talk to date, I’ve dealt primarily with the attacks on Kennedy from the left by Noam Chomsky and his henchman Alexander Cockburn which occurred at the time of the release of Oliver Stone’s JFK. But historically speaking, the attacks on the Kennedys, both Jack and Robert, have not come predominantly from the left. The attacks from the right have been much more numerous. And the attacks from that direction were always harsher and more personal in tone. As we shall see, that personal tone knows no limits. Through papers like the New York Times and Washington Post, the attacks extend into the Kennedys’ sex lives, a barrier that had not been crossed in post-war mainstream media to that time. To understand their longevity and vituperativeness, it is necessary to sketch in how they all began. In that way, the reader will be able to see that Hersh’s book, the Vanity Fair piece on Judith Exner, and an upcoming work by John Davis on Mary Meyer, are part of a continuum.

The Right and the Kennedys

There can be no doubt that the right hated the Kennedys and Martin Luther King. There is also little doubt that some who hated JFK had a role in covering up his death. One could use Secret Service agent Elmer Moore as an example. As revealed in Probe (Vol. 4 No. 3, pp. 20-21), Moore told one Jim Gochenaur how he was in charge of the Dallas doctors testimony in the JFK case. One of his assignments as liaison for the Warren Commission seems to have been talking Dr. Malcolm Perry out of his original statement that the throat wound was one of entry, which would have indicated an assassin in front of Kennedy. But another thing Gochenaur related in his Church Committee interview was the tirade that Moore went into the longer he talked to him: how Kennedy was a pinko who was selling us out to the communists. This went on for hours. Gochenaur was actually frightened by the time Moore drove him home.

But there is another more insidious strain of the rightwing in America. These are the conservatives who sometimes disguise themselves as Democrats, as liberals, as “internationalists.” This group is typified by men like Averill Harriman, Henry Stimson, John Foster Dulles and the like. The common rubric used to catalog them is the Eastern Establishment. The Kennedy brothers were constantly at odds with them. In 1962, Bobby clashed with Dean Acheson during the missile crisis. Acheson wanted a surprise attack; Bobby rejected it saying his brother would not go down in history as another Tojo. In 1961, JFK disobeyed their advice at the Bay of Pigs and refused to add air support to the invasion. He was punished for this in Fortune magazine with an article by Time-Life employee Charles Murphy that blamed Kennedy for the failure of the plan. Kennedy stripped Murphy of his Air Force reserve status but — Murphy wrote to Ed Lansdale — that didn’t matter; his loyalty was to Allen Dulles anyway. In 1963, Kennedy crossed the Rubicon and actually printed money out of the Treasury, bypassing that crowning jewel of Wall Street, the Federal Reserve Board. And as Donald Gibson has written, a member of this group, Jock Whitney, was the first to put out the cover story about that Krazy Kid Oswald on 11/22/63 (Probe Vol. 4 No.1).

Killing off the Legacy

In 1964, author Morris Bealle, a genuine conservative and critic of the Eastern Establishment, wrote a novel called Guns of the Regressive Right, depicting how that elite group had gotten rid of Kennedy. There certainly is a lot of evidence to substantiate that claim. There were few tears shed by most rightwing groups over Kennedy’s death. Five years later, they played hardball again. King and Bobby Kennedy were shot. One would think the coup was complete. The war was over.

CONTINUED...

http://www.ctka.net/pr997-jfk.html

Thank you for knowing what it's all about, CaliforniaPeggy.

[SDuderstadt]

84. Jesus, Octafish....

can't you lay off this long enough for us to remember JFK?

Christ, dude...give it a rest.

[Name removed]

88. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[SDuderstadt]

90. Because you start out with a very respectful question...

then you steer it in the direction of your conspiracy theories. Give it a rest, dude.

[Truthbeknown]

131. Give it a rest with the 'dudes'

Hasn't your handlers told you they are not cool anymore?

[SDuderstadt]

133. Ummm, no...

dude.

[sabrina 1]

138. Since a majority of Americans do not believe the official

story that JFK was killed by a 'loner' I think that you put you in the minority. A President was murdered and no one was held accountable. The 'suspect' was not allowed a trial where there might have been some answers.

Today, a President lied us into war. And then went on to oversee egregious crimes against humanity. No one has been held accountable for that either.

Before that, we had Iran/Contra, Watergate, and so many other criminal acts committed by people in power in this country, since the JFK assassination. And the RFK murder and MLK.

What kind of country allows all these crimes to be committed from generation to generation where no one is ever prosecuted? The murder of JFK was never solved. I have read many books about that period of time. I agree with the majority of Americans that we were never told the truth about murder and unless people keep demanding there is no chance that we ever will. I am glad people like Octafish won't just 'move on'. There is no statue of limitations on murder.

[SDuderstadt]

144. What the "majority of Americans" believe....

is trumped by the physical evidence, which points overwhelmingly to LHO. The reason a "majority of Americans" believe differently lies in the way that many people walked out of screenings of "JFK" saying to themselves, "Now I know what happened", when Stone and Garrison badly misled them.

Why couldn't it have happened largely the way the WC said it did, even given the fact that science has made great strides since 1963? Are you really suggesting that Warren and the other members of the Commission would willingly be accessories-after-the-fact to murder?

What I really get tired of is the way that "assassination buffs" question the credentials of anyone who doesn't buy their goofy bullshit, as if there are not two sides to this debate. It's been nearly 47 years. Jesus christ, can't the buffs crack this case?

In another thread, I asked if anyone could explain how, if Connally's entrance wound was in his back, any shooter could have shot Connally WITHOUT first going through JFK. At that point, I got the predictable CT nonsense about how we couldn't know which direction Connally was shot from. I then provided the WC testimony of the doctor who operated on Connally who, in no uncertain terms, described the wound in Connally's back as the entrance wound and the wound in his chest as the exit wound. Given that, the CT's fell predictably silent. The very fact that many did not even know of Shaw's testimony shows that the CT community is not very knowledgeable about the specific facts and, in fact, ignores any evidence that doesn't fit their pre-drawn conclusions.

I know it's nearly impossible for many people to accept that a nobody like LHO was able to kill someone larger than life like JFK, but that's what the convergence of evidence shows. One thing we can all agree on (with the possible exception of Kennedyphobes in our midst) is that losing JFK has not become easier over the years. I miss him every day.

[Octafish]

94. Crocodile tears downthread. Here it's righteous indignation.

Interesting.

Edit: Mis-spelled crocodile. No need to hit alert.

BTW: I really appreciate your PM. Very kind.

[SDuderstadt]

96. Your OP is, to put it mildly, misleading...

dude. There's not a hint of your CT nonsense there.

[Octafish]

97. It's for my Journal. How's yours coming?

I've been looking forward to reading it.

[SDuderstadt]

98. Dude...

you can stop with the stupid "you don't have a journal" rant. I don't want one. You seem to think people hang on your every word. As for me, I just ask why, after nearly 47 years, you can't seem to crack the case. Hint: LHO did it, dude.

[SDuderstadt]

136. You're accusing my tears for the Kennedy of...

not being real, dude??

How dare you, dude. How dare you. You're getting in way over your head.

[Octafish]

146. That's not what I wrote. I find it ironic you denigrate people who seek truth.

First off: What do yopu mean I'm getting "in over my head?" What kind of statement is that? Is it a veiled threat?

You see, you smear me and other DUers -- not all, but a good number -- as liars "spreading conspiracy bullshit" because we disagree with the Warren Commission and its findings. Here's an excellent example of what I mean:

Evidence trumps your CT bullshit...

...What are you waiting for? More witnesses to die?

Well. You are wrong about the basic finding of the WC, even beyond the Magic Bullet fantasy. Here's what University of Georgia Law Professor Donald E. Wilkes, Jr., has to say:

THE ROSETTA STONE OF THE JFK ASSASSINATION?

Published in Flagpole Magazine, p. 8 (November 20, 2002).
Author: Donald E. Wilkes, Jr., Professor of Law, University of Georgia School of Law.

In his book November 22, 1963: You Are the Jury (1973), David Belin, Assistant Counsel to the Warren Commission and one of the chief defenders of the Warren Report, asserts that “he Rosetta Stone to the solution of President Kennedy’s murder is the murder of Officer J. D. Tippit. . . . Once is admitted that Oswald killed Patrolman J. D. Tippit, there can be no doubt that the overall evidence shows that Lee Harvey Oswald was the assassin of John F. Kennedy.”

Belin and other apologists for the Warren Commission believe, in the words of Bemard Fensterwald, Jr., Coincidence or Conspiracy? (1977), that “the Tippit murder provide(s) strong corroborative evidence of Oswald’s capacity to kill as well as his desperate attempt to escape after murdering John F. Kennedy.” Warren Report defenders, as Henry Hurt explains in Reasonable Doubt (1985), maintain that “(r)esponsibility for the assassination ... explain(s) why Oswald might be driven to the brutal murder of Tippit ... and (that) the murder of Tippit ... irrefutable proof of Oswald’s capacity for violence.”

That the proponents of the Oswald-was-the-lone-assassin thesis believe proof that Oswald killed Tippit is essential for there to be “no doubt” that Oswald assassinated JFK indicates the flimsiness of their thesis. They are impliedly admitting that, absent proof that Oswald killed Tippit, there can be doubt that Oswald assassinated JFK. They forget that proof, if any, that Oswald assassinated JFK can be found only by examining the facts of that assassination; it cannot be found in the facts of a separate murder committed at a different time and place.

At any rate, the evidence that Oswald murdered Tippit is unconvincing. Thirty-nine-year-old Dallas police officer J. D. Tippit was shot to death near the intersection of Tenth and Patton Streets in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas shortly before 1:16 p.m. on November 22, 1963. Tippit's death occurred about 45 minutes after JFK was shot in Dealey Plaza, approximately four miles away in downtown Dallas. While cruising east in his marked police car on Patton, the uniformed Tippit came across a pedestrian walking in the same direction on the sidewalk. Bringing his car to a stop, Tippit called the pedestrian to the car, whereupon the pedestrian approached and apparently spoke to Tippit through the open right front vent window. After a brief conversation, Tippit exited his car and started to walk to the front of his car. As he reached the left front wheel, the pedestrian pulled out a pistol and began shooting Tippit across the car hood. Tippit, who by now had drawn his service revolver, fell into the street, and shortly thereafter the killer fled the scene. Half an hour later Oswald, while in possession of a .38 caliber pistol, was arrested at a movie theater approximately eight blocks away.

CONTINUED...

http://www.lawsch.uga.edu/academics/profiles/dwilkes_more/jfk_19rosetta.html

There are more examples of truth you denigrate, SDuderstadt. If you were interested in the best interests of justice in the assassination of President Kennedy and finding the treasonous cabal responsible, I believe you'd be interested in learning the answers to what happened 46 years ago in Dallas. That's why, when you say you cry tears, I find it ironic.

Something else: My posts are based on fact as I know it. That is why I source my posts. That way, you are welcome to show me where I am wrong. So far, you haven't.

[onehandle]

3. Yes. Maybe even more by the assassination of Bobby.

I would have loved to see his Presidency.

[yurbud]

15. someone once said if all those assassinations in the 60s on one side of the political spectrum...

occurred in any other country, we would not hesitate to call it a coordinated effort to take out a whole generation of leaders. and who were we left with after that? Jimmy Carter & Walter Mondale?

[DailyGrind51]

33. JFK, RFK, MLK were the heart and soul of Progressive politics in the '60s.

There untimely deaths gave rise to frustration and two extremes, weakness and rage.

[CTyankee]

40. I was a young woman living in NYC during the early years of JFK's presidency

and there was a very vocal left that saw JFK as a corporatist and not progressive enough on racial equality. They saw him as a sell out to the military-industrial complex and warned that our involvement in Vietnam was the continuation of French colonialism.

I think it is interesting that progressives on this board look back on JFK as a model of progressivism...the hard left in New York at least didn't buy it...

[newtothegame]

46. Wish I could recc this. n/t

[CTyankee]

54. I should add that the hard left in NYC was, and probably still is, much to the left

of the rest of the country's "left." New York absorbs them but apart from maybe Chicago, Boston and San Francisco, much of the U.S. just wouldn't, IMO...

[EFerrari]

123. JFK's positions shifted left over time and sometimes, because he was forced there

as with Civil Rights.

[DailyGrind51]

139. Actually, there is a case for considering RFK a repudiation of JFK.

RFK acknowledged his late brother's error in expanding our involvement in Vietnam and took on J. Edgar Hoover.

[mochajava666]

47. I agree. It was the cumulative effect of all three

[havocmom]

112. And when some real progressive influence was rising up again

it got 'Wellstoned' :cry:


Oh yeah, the pols who really had stones to stand up to corporations got taken down. The lesson seems to have been learned by hundreds of DEM pols. Why they even pretend to advocate change is beyond me. They are about protecting their own skin.

[newtothegame]

45. RFK, yes, JFK and MLK, I'm not sure about.

I'm not entirely sure how MLK or JFK would have aligned themselves if they were around today. Today's Democratic Party and African-American leadership are not the leadership of the 1960's, and neither are today's problems the problems of the 1960's.

[yurbud]

50. Nixon is to the left of most Democrats today, so they would be too.

[Octafish]

65. RFK ran as the Party's 'Peace Candidate.'

Will we ever see his kind again?

Vietnam was a quagmire. Our involvement started by a lie. Sounds familiar, wot?

Vietnam and Iraq Wars Started by Same People

Thanks for knowing, onehandle.

[Cetacea]

4. 100 %

[Octafish]

66. I suspect this would be a much more peaceful nation.

Prsident Kennedy certainly wouldn't have dragged us into the Vietnam quagmire by a lie.

JFK Would NEVER Have Fallen for Phony INTEL!

Thank you for understanding what we're in, Cetacea.

[Thothmes]

113. Why did he buy into the Bay of Pigs.

[timtom]

127. Oh, no. Not another "let's turn history topsy-turvy" person!

He refused to commit troops to a scheme hatched by the prior administration.

[Thothmes]

130. It was executed during his administration.

[timtom]

132. Here:

"April 15-19, 1961: A Cuban exile brigade, trained and commanded by the
CIA, invades Cuba at the Bay of Pigs. As the Cuban army led by Premier
Fidel Castro surrounds the invading force, President Kennedy refuses to send
in U.S. combat forces . The exile brigade surrenders, and more than one thousand
of its members are taken prisoner. President Kennedy realizes he has
been drawn into a CIA trap designed to force him to escalate the battle by
ordering a full-scale invasion of Cuba by U.S. troops. Kennedy says he wants
" to splinter the CIA in a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds."

Douglass, James W. JFK And The Unspeakable. New York: Orbis Books, 2008.

[Swamp Rat]

5. I have no doubt

:hi:

[Octafish]

67. Shocking! Pentagon and CIA recommended US launch an all-out nuclear attack on the USSR in Fall 1963.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_NE-72ZXux-g/SljlB6hjoZI/AAAAAAAAKDo/vpGSXYPfqOE/s400/Dulles+Kennedy+McCone.jpg

Betcha most Americans, including a sizable chunk o' DU, don't know that.

Did the U.S. Military Plan a Nuclear First Strike for 1963?

by James K. Galbraith and Heather A. Purcell

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

TOP SECRET EYES ONLY

Notes on National Security Council Meeting July 20, 1961

General Hickey, Chairman of the Net Evaluation Subcommittee, presented the annual report of his group. General Lemnitzer stated that the assumption of this year's study was a surprise attack in late 1963, preceded by a period of heightened tensions.

After the presentation by General Hickey and by the various members of the Subcommittee, the President asked if there had ever been made an assessment of damage results to the U.S.S.R which would be incurred by a preemptive attack. General Lemnitzer stated that such studies had been made and that he would bring them over and discuss them personally with the President. In recalling General Hickey's opening statement that these studies have been made since 1957, the President asked for an appraisal of the trend in the effectiveness of the attack. General Lemnitzer replied that he would also discuss this with the President.

Since the basic assumption of this year's presentation was an attack in late 1963, the President asked about probable effects in the winter of 1962. Mr. Dulles observed that the attack would be much less effective since there would be considerably fewer missiles involved. General Lemnitzer added a word of caution about accepting the precise findings of the Committee since these findings were based upon certain assumptions which themselves might not be valid.

The President posed the question as to the period of time necessary for citizens to remain in shelters following an attack. A member of the Subcommittee replied that no specific period of time could be cited due to the variables involved, but generally speaking, a period of two weeks should be expected.

The President directed that no member in attendance at the meeting disclose even the subject of the meeting.

Declassified: June, 1993

SOURCE:

http://www.maryferrell.org/wiki/index.php/Essay_-_Did_the_US_Military_Plan_a_Nuclear_First_Strike_for_1963

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

THIS ARTICLE FIRST APPEARED IN THE AMERICAN PROSPECT, NUMBER 19, FALL 1994, PP. 88-96. COPYRIGHT (c) 1994 BY NEW PROSPECT, INC. PERMISSION IS GRANTED TO COPY AND CIRCULATE FOR NON-COMMERCIAL PURPOSES ONLY, PROVIDED THAT THIS NOTICE ACCOMPANIES ALL COPIES MADE.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Introduction

During the early 1960s the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) introduced the world to the possibility of instant total war. Thirty years later, no nation has yet fired any nuclear missile at a real target. Orthodox history holds that a succession of defensive nuclear doctrines and strategies �� from "massive retaliation" to "mutual assured destruction" �� worked, almost seamlessly, to deter Soviet aggression against the United States and to prevent the use of nuclear weapons.

The possibility of U.S. aggression in nuclear conflict is seldom considered. And why should it be? Virtually nothing in the public record suggests that high U.S. authorities ever contemplated a first strike against the Soviet Union, except in response to a Soviet invasion of Western Europe, or that they doubted the deterrent effect of Soviet nuclear forces. The main documented exception was the Air Force Chief of Staff in the early 1960s, Curtis LeMay, a seemingly idiosyncratic case.

But beginning in 1957 the U.S. military did prepare plans for a preemptive nuclear strike against the U.S.S.R, based on our growing lead in land-based missiles, And top military and intelligence leaders presented an assessment of those plans to President John F. Kennedy in July of 1961. At that time, some high Air Force and CIA leaders apparently believed that a window of outright ballistic missile superiority, perhaps sufficient for a successful first strike, would be open in late 1963.

The document reproduced above is published here for the first time. It describes a meeting of the National Security Council on July 20, 1961. At that meeting, the document shows, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the director of the CIA, and others, presented plans for a surprise attack. They answered some questions from Kennedy about timing and effects, and promised further information. The meeting recessed under a Presidential injunction of secrecy that has not been broken until now.

CONTINUED...

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=did_the_us_military_plan_a_nuclear_first_strike_for_1963

JFK said, "No," and ordered everyone at the meeting to shut up about it. RFK wrote a note to his brother during the meeting that said (paraphrasing) "Now I know how Tojo felt," referring to Pearl Harbor.

PS: Beautiful. Beckidile tears. Twisted. In every way, Glennmorous.

[annabanana]

102. Ooooo! GREAT pic, Swampy!

Right up there!

[hlthe2b]

6. There is no doubt... it is deep within our national psyche...

Just seeing the photos of this vigorous (seemingly) handsome young President are enough to rekindle the feelings all over again...A century from now, I think it will still impact us--more so than Lincoln even because of the media availability that brings it all back to new generations.

[Octafish]

69. What a searing wound, still unhealed after almost 47 years.

It'd be great if in the future it were so. We'd live in a better world.



Unfortunately, the reich is doing all it can to tarnish the legacy and create a false history.

Campaign Against JFK Miniseries Smear Effort Forces History Channel to Change Its Tune

Thank you for carrying the memory and the truth, hlthe2b.

[Name removed]

86. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Radical Activist]

141. It's deep within the boomer psyche

and it usually manifests itself in negative ways that hold the left back. Future generations will look past the glamor and see that LBJ was a far more significant and accomplished President.

[Jennicut]

7. Yes, and I was not even alive when it happened. I experienced it through what my parents told me.

They told me where they were when it happened and what the state of the country was like in that moment.

[Kat45]

16. I was only 8 years old, and I remember where I was. n/t

[Richard D]

8. This would be a very different world . . .

. . . I have to include King in this one too. Megdar Evars as well. Malcolm X.

What would the world be like today had these people lived. Very very different.

[Octafish]

73. 'You can kill a man, but you can't kill an idea.' -- Medgar Evars.

"It may sound funny, but I love the South. I don’t choose to live anywhere else. There’s land here, where a man can raise cattle, and I’m going to do it some day. There are lakes where a man can sink a hook and fight the bass. There is room here for my children to play and grow, and become good citizens—if the white man will let them....”

—Medgar Evers, “Why I Live in Mississippi”

Thank you for knowing and sharing, Richard D.

[Ozymanithrax]

9. Americans have cultural amnesia. From what I can see, the eletion of Obama as no affect.

[Octafish]

128. Even in discussions with Liberal Democrats, I'm taken aback at the lack of historical understanding.

They have zero idea about how things got so messed up. That's when I bring up:

Know your BFEE: Phil Gramm, the Meyer Lansky of the War Party, Set-Up the Biggest Bank Heist Ever.

That gets their attention away from American Idle and whatnot.

Thank you for understanding and remembering what it's all about, Ozymanithrax.

[nevergiveup]

10. It affected us for many many years but very little today.

On the other hand the affects of 9/11 may still result in our demise. IMHO

[pocoloco]

12. You really don't know who is in control??

Or when they took over?

[saltpoint]

11. Some fragments of a legacy:

“I think the cover-up of Kennedy’s assassination, then the pardoning of Nixon finished it for a lot of people. They said, ‘Well, we didn’t know it was bullshit before. We certainly know it’s bullshit now. So fuck it. Every man for himself.’ No one gives a shit. They know they’re getting fucked. No time to take care of anything else.”

--Lou Reed


“If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.”

--John F. Kennedy, Inaugural, 1961


“When power leads man towards arrogance, poetry reminds him of his limitations. When power narrows the areas of man’s concern, poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of his existence. When power corrupts, poetry cleanses.”

--John F. Kennedy


“And a man standing alone at the side of the road holding up a copy of the Morning News opened to the page that had everybody talking. Welcome Mr. Kennedy to Dallas. An ad placed by a group called the American Fact-Finding Committee. Grievances, accusations, jingo fantasia--not so remarkable, really, even in a major newspaper, except that the text was bordered in black. Nicely ominous. Jack Kennedy had seen the ad earlier and now, with towered downtown Dallas in the visible distance, he turned and said softly to Jacqueline, ‘We’re heading into nut country now.’”

--Don DeLillo, in LIBRA (early moments of the Kennedy motorcade through
Dallas)



-- and not least, we grimace when we recall Dan Quayle, Indiana’s junior Senator, incessantly comparing himself in length of public service to John Kennedy in the Dukakis-Poppy presidential contest.

Quayle did it once too often and prompted his debate oppoent in Omaha, Senator Lloyd Bentson of Texas, to slay him with this retort:

"Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you're no Jack Kennedy."

[the other one]

13. K and r

Someone make it five. This should go to greatest.

[goclark]

14. My friend, where have you been?

Glad to see you!

[Octafish]

83. Good to read you, goclark!

After the old scribe keeled over, they called me in for emergency temp duty. The 'puters at the rabbit are monitored -- every keystroke, every website, every lonelyhearts dating page I frequent gets gone over by a nice man with a crew cut and a badge. It's like TIA.



Typical, wot? I can do the job, but I fear they'll hire the prettier package.

[DesertFlower]

17. yes. nt

[saltpoint]

18. Has anybody here

seen my old friend John?

Can you tell me where he's gone?

. . .

It seems the good they die young.

* * *

SuperMan once revealed his secret identity to John F. Kennedy. SuperMan cited the trust that was of essence between U.S. citizens and their President. What a time that must have been, as I wonder if the same comic book writer would have used that story if Nixon had prevailed in the 1960 election.

[gleaner]

19. I said yes ...

He died when I was 15 and I remember how the feeling of the country changed. It became charged with suspicion, fear and uncertainty.

There were stories at the time that he wanted to withdraw from Viet Nam; Johnson committed every resource we had to it and the country became completely polarized. I don't think we were ever told the truth about who was responsible and that is polarizing too.

I don't know what JFK would have done if he had lived, but I don't think the conservatives would have been able to come out with such force. Nixon was a much disliked figure of ridicule until he ran against Hubert Humphrey and the Viet Nam war. Suddenly he became preferable, if not credible and it has been all downhill from there.

[saltpoint]

20. In Kennedy we see "so vividly what we admire in a human life..."

- - -

“Thinking of him, we all see so vividly what we admire in a human life, and what are the great causes we care about. The impact of his example will help and inspire men and women for time yet to come.”

--Arthur Michael Ramsey, Archbishop of Canterbury, in his eulogy for JFK

[ProgressiveProfessor]

21. Not anymore. Americans have a very short collective memory

Its both a good and bad thing...

[Binka]

22. Good In What Way? n/t

[ProgressiveProfessor]

24. If the US harbored the same historical mind sets of old Europe we would still

be be mad at the Brits for 1812 or be hating or occupying Japan.

I really do not know why so many Americans ignore history, but clearly we do. Many think its the not looking back part of the national psyche that makes us the entrepreneurs and risk takers that we are. For whatever the reason its clearly deep in the American personality.

On a more personal level, my daughters, both a good deal better educated than many, scarcely remember or care about Vietnam...and they have been there! Most of their peers could not find it on the map. Few students I teach understand or think about the 60s, except for hippie parties. At times it makes one want to cry out in frustration, but since they are clearly not governed by the history perhaps they can change the future. :shrug:

[whathehell]

34. ...Not when it comes to a still unresolved assassination of

a beloved, iconic young president and I think most who remember would agree.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

68. Unfortunately, fewer and fewer remember ....

In a post up thread I mentioned how few younger people have any thought of Vietnam, which was a defining event for many of us older guys. Same with the 60s

[whathehell]

71. Well, that's true, but for those of us who do remember

and that would be many baby boomers, a large demographic, it still resonates.

I saw President Kennedy in person when I was eleven years old. He rode in his campaign car through the main drag of my neighborhood. He was as handsome in person as he is in all the old photos and newsreels and I was entirely thrilled.

I was in eighth grade when the school principal came on the PA and told everyone he'd been assassinated.

The day of the funeral was a day of national grief like no other I've experienced.

It was almost unbearable.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

93. My daughters' thoughts on this is that each generation has its own critical events

My wife/her mother was supposed to be in DC when 9-11 happened "near the Pentagon". I knew she was elsewhere, but our daughters did not. They were more than a little distraught until they finally called me instead. For her and her sister, it remains a seminal moment when they realized that the US is not safe from attack and profoundly changed their thinking and that of many others in their age group

[whathehell]

108. One can have more than one "critical event"...I consider 9/11 my second.

although it was different in nature.

Trust me, I thought the U.S. was impregnable too.

[BlueIris]

23. Yes. The story of the assassination and cover up changed my life.

Even though I didn't find out about it until I was 12, almost thirty years after it happened.

[pnorman]

25. Here's a related DU thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=125x283096

[Jax]

29. Octafish is the BEST of DU

[truedelphi]

62. He really is a gift to all of us. n/t

[OnyxCollie]

26. Yes.

My stomach turns whenever I think of Poppy Bush at Gerald Ford's funeral.

"Gerry Ford signed off on the Warren Commission report. Gerry Ford was a good man."

[jxnmsdemguy65]

122. That admission by Poppy was a rosetta stone of sorts for the BFEE's involvement in the JFK hit...

http://www.jfkmurdersolved.com/bush.htm

[slipslidingaway]

27. Yes, Yes, Yes. n/t

[tucsonlib]

28. No Question About It

I was 13 yrs. old. Believe it or not, there was a time when most Americans actually TRUSTED their leaders. After Kennedy's assassination we had Johnson - A courageous liberal who championed civil rights and Medicare, but who also escalated the war in Vietnam and trusted his Generals more than his conscience. The final nail was driven into the coffin of "The Greatest Country On The Planet" when Bobby was murdered. It was suddenly made crystal-clear just who was running things, and just as clear that they would NEVER allow a true reformer to ever again occupy the White House. Nixon, Reagan, Clinton, Bush 1 & 2.....

Somewhere in there it suddenly took TWO incomes instead of one to raise a family. And instead of e pluribus unum we adopted some new mottoes - "Every Man For Himself!" "I've got mine! So screw you, my fellow Americans!" And "The only things we have to fear are commies, hippies, taxes, drugs, terrorism, WMD and anything else we tell you to cower before."

JFK inspired us to reach for the moon. And we DID IT! That was the last time, in my recollection, that Americans were united in a common goal (at least, one that didn't involve blowing some indigenous population to smithereens).

Put simply, before 11/22/63 we were "The United States". After, we began the long slide to where we are today - just "The States".

[Golden Raisin]

30. I lived through the assassination

of JFK and 38 years later the 9/11 attacks (I'm a New Yorker). I believe these were the two seminal, traumatic events effecting the Nations's psyche during my lifetime.

[KT2000]

31. this was when the military-industrial

complex that Eisenhower warned us about took control.

[harun]

38. +1, they've been running the show ever since.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

117. Nobody listened to Eisenhower

who was Supreme Allied Commander in WWII, and knew all about war.

He said that the United States had no business getting into a ground war in Southeast Asia.
Our leaders did not listen to the French. They called it French Indo-china, and they left when they realized they could not subdue the people.

Those two warnings, if heeded, would have made a much different world. He also pointed out that every dollar spent on war means that people go hungry.

A very wise man, from the distance of fifty years.

[H2O Man]

32. Yes.

Absolutely.

[lunatica]

35. If you can truly say that things would have been different

Then yes, it has affected the direction of this country in profound ways. If Bobby Kennedy hadn't been assassinated Nixon wouldn't have become President. That's something to grieve about.

[Name removed]

36. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Octafish]

70. I bring up facts. It's not my fault if they indicate conspiracy.

For example: Henry J. Rybka was the Secret Service agent who asked "Why?"

[Name removed]

120. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Octafish]

126. Show me where I'm theorizing and I'll shut up. Otherwise, mind your own business.

[Name removed]

134. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[truth2power]

143. Thank you, Octafish. Don't EVER shut up about this...

Guess I should get in here before the thread is locked or disappeared or sent to the dungeon.

It doesn't matter. They will NEVER shut us up.

I had occasion, about a week ago, to view Kennedy's "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech in another venue. Unexpectedly, I found I could hardly contain the feelings of sadness that welled up.

I remember the day Kennedy was killed. They killed everyone we cared about in the 60's. And the rotten bastards (those who aren't burning in Hell) are still out there, pulling the strings.

Those who think this is all CT stuff can bite me!!!

[whathehell]

74. Why?

[SidDithers]

119. Because that's where the site owners have determined they should go...

and that's where they get moved when posters, like the OP, put them in GD.

Sid

[whathehell]

121. Really?....Interesting.

[Orsino]

37. Certainly.

The Warren Commission helped train us to be good little citizens, and to accept the narratives of our betters without question.

[Festivito]

39. The assassination was bad enough, that they got away with it is the problem.

That they are still scott free, destroys US little by little, day by day.

[Echo In Light]

42. +1

[L0oniX]

89. Aren't "they" used to getting away with it by now? How about all the recent war criminals too?

[Festivito]

114. They are so accustomed. The new crop will be also, assured by their predecessors skate.

And, that is only in part why it matters, but it's enough to make it matter greatly.

[Mira]

41. Anything unresolved festers. Of course it affects us today ----therefore ----

if we let the thugs, thieves, liars, warmongers, war criminals of the last administration get away with their crimes

we do so AT OUR SERIOUS PERIL.

Letting them be will affect everything and everybody and all we are and all we do for generations to come.

[nashville_brook]

43. it's called "learned helplessness."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learned_helplessness

[Initech]

44. If you think otherwise, you're not paying attention.

[Blue_In_AK]

48. Absolutely.

The assassinations of the Kennedys and Martin Luther King were defining moments in our nation's history. No one will ever be able to convince me that a coup didn't take place.

[dajoki]

49. Yes I do...

but I believe his brother Robert's changed the country for the worse even more.

[upi402]

51. Justice delayed is justice denied - to the United States of America

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKboggs.htm

k/r

[HughBeaumont]

52. 11.22.63 = Message Sent.

That message was "Doesn't matter WHAT party you're from. Mark and Remember: You Will Not Cross Us. EVER."

"Us" = The MIC + Big Business + Old Money.

[troubledamerican]

109. A second message was also sent to the American people: We will lie to you with magic bullets, and

rewrite your own history as lies, with a pen dipped in blood, and you will be powerless to share the truth of your own lifetime.

M - a - g - i - c fucking bullets. And you'll believe it or be disciplined & marginalized. And you'll accept that all public discourse must first embrace the lie.

[robertpaulsen]

53. Until we destroy the military-industrial complex, it will ALWAYS affect us.

Great poll. It reinforces my experience in polling DU. Whenever I asked in the past whether DU members thought the assassination of JFK was a conspiracy, or if the Warren Commission covered up the truth of JFK's assassination, I consistently found DU members polled in around 90%, just like in your poll. Thank you for posting this in General Discussion, so it could reach the greatest number of DU members. That so many have responded approvingly that this issue still affects us today is proof that there is no reason to hide discussion of this subject.

[L0oniX]

75. +1 ...It's an us or them thing for me. 700+ billion a year for the military is whats wrong...

with this country. Who made us the fucking world police? We should be spending a small "reasonable" amount more than the Russians. What we are letting our government and military is spend us into the ground ...just like what happened to Russia. WTF don't people see that is beyond me and I suppose beyond sanity.

[Gabi Hayes]

78. this is more in answer to your other post downthread:

you do know that one of the main reasons he was killed was that he'd made it known that he wanted to wind down the cold war, make peace (after a fashion) with Castro, start pulling troops out of Vietnam, smash the CIA "into a thousand pieces," among other things that were anathema to the MIIC

you might want to read this (or read it again, just to remind you of what he was about just a few months before they killed him):

http://www1.media.american.edu/speeches/Kennedy.htm

[L0oniX]

87. That may be but he will never be any kind of hero to me for his negligence.

There's no way a destroyer is going sneak up on a PT boat at any time of the day. Some one was sleeping at the wheel and he was in charge. No wonder he did what he could do to save his men afterwords ...because he was responsible and he knew it. I think too many have subscribed to the PT 109 movie and the history written by the victors ...oh not to mention the propaganda to bolster his presidential campaign.

[OneBlueSky]

55. what really bothers me is that we still don't know the truth about . . .

not only the JFK assassination, but the MLK and RFK assassinations and 9/11 as well . . . none of the "official" stories of any of these events make any sense, yet there they sit, unsolved and largely removed from the public consciousness . . .

I have a hunch that if we knew the truth about all of these events, things might take a much different turn in this country . . .

[Echo In Light]

57. Yes, and that even at 158 yay to 15 nay, the yay side remains seemingly uphill

... if you take my meaning... re the establishment approved, out of hand dismissals of so called 'conspiracy theories'

[anonymous171]

56. JFK was anti-soviet and supported US anti-communist imperialism.

He was most likely killed by a crazy asshole.

[Sebastian Doyle]

58. Well, nobody was perfect

But at least the Soviet Union was an "enemy" which actually existed. And nobody was trying to build a pipeline from Moscow to Vladivostok, nor was the CIA trying to protect potato fields to control the vodka trade.

[anonymous171]

59. I agree completely. His anti-communism was justified.

But to say that he was some kind of radical and was killed because he threatened the status quo is ridiculous.

[Sebastian Doyle]

60. I wouldn't call him a "radical". But the Bush Crime Family/MIC/CIA apparently did.

To them, "radical" would mean opposing the wars & black ops that THEY wanted. Operation Northwoods, for example was a CIA plot very similar to the 9/11 scenario, which they intended as an excuse for a full scale invasion of Cuba, after Poppy's "Bay of Pigs" plot was a miserable failure. JFK rejected this madness, and some heads rolled. Unfortunately not enough, as the evil clearly manifested itself later, in Dallas.

Also, he reportedly wanted to stop the Vietnam War before it really took off. He knew that "communism" wasn't a valid excuse for that one, and probably knew about all the other motivations for controlling that area, whether it was the rubber trees in the area, or the CIA "Golden Triangle" drug smuggling operation.

And then there's this......



Notice the name of a certain private banking cabal missing from this bill?

President Kennedy wanted to keep it that way.

A lot of people considered that "radical", as they do any political figure who makes a similar comment about the "federal" reserve today, be it a Liberal like Dennis Kucinich, or a Conservative like Ron Paul.

I don't think it's radical at all myself, I think the "federal" reserve has been an enemy of the people from day one.

[defendandprotect]

61. Absolutely . . . killed not only the president, but our "people's" government and

eventually destroyed the Democratic Party --

Additionaly, Watergate never ended --

[Name removed]

72. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[anonymous171]

76. I agree. Sargent Shriver came up with all of his cool ideas anyways.

[Octafish]

77. You don't know what you're talking about.

After PT-109 was rammed and sunk by the Japanese destroyer, JFK and a couple of his men collected the nine survivors of a crew of eleven on the floating bow of the boat. Some were seriously burned and injured from the collision, which occurred in the middle of a moonless night.

When morning light finally came, JFK led the several mile swim to a nearby island. JFK pulled the most severely wounded man by holding the man's lifejacket strap in his teeth.

Later that night, JFK took a lantern and swam out into the shark-infested channel, hoping to signal a passing ship. He did it again the next night, but was too sick to go the third. His XO, if memory serves, swam out. Again, no luck.

The next day, they were contacted by local people. They took a message JFK carved onto a coconut to their allied, an Australian coastal watcher. Within hours, they were rescued.

What you wrote:

L0oniX (1000+ posts) Tue Mar-09-10 09:03 PM
Response to Original message

72. He should have been court marshalled for negligence.

WTF ...a PT boat gets run down by a fucking jap destroyer? WTF You can't tell me those tin cans were stealth. He was not a hero. Fucking sick of the fucking Camelot bull shit and worship.

It was a moonless night. Kennedy was under orders to sit tight. By the time they detected the destroyer, they weren't able to get out of the way. The guy ended up rescuing his surviving crew, including towing a wounded crewman with his teeth while swimming miles toward a nearby island. How about swimming in shark-infested waters at night trying to signal a passing ally? It's easy to see how a guy like that could go up against the military industrial complex.

Here's the story, from perhaps a more objective source:

Declassified (8 SEP 59)

Subject: Sinking of PT 109 and subsequent rescue of survivors.

Source: Survivors of PT 109.

Narrative: On the night of August 1, fourteen boats were ordered into Blackett Strait from the Rendova PT base in anticipation of the Bougainville Express running into Vila. Four patrol sections were formed: 1st, under Lt. G. C. Cookman was stationed in Ferguson Passage; 2nd, under Lt. W. Rome, whose station was East of Makuti Island; 3rd, under Lt. A. H. Berndston stationed between Makuti Island and Kolombangara; and the 4th, the section in which PT 109 was a part, under Lt. E. J. Brantingham stationed five miles West of the 3rd section. Lt. Brantinghams' boats were further subdivided into two sections; PT 159, radar equipped, operating with PT 157, while PT 162, under the command of Lt.(jg) J. R. Lowrey, was the lead boat of the second section with PT 109 following. PTs 159 and 162 both carried TBYs for inter-boat communications. Instructions were issued to Lt.(jg) Jack Kennedy, captain of PT 109, to follow closely on PT 162's starboard quarter, which would keep in touch with the radar equipped PT 159 by TBY.

All boats departed from Rendova at 1830 and reached their patrol station about 2030. The 4th section patrolled without incident until gunfire and a searchlight were seen in the direction of the southern shore of Kolombangara. No radio or other warning had been received of enemy activity in the area. It was impossible to ascertain whether the searchlight came from shore or from a ship close into shore. Presumably it was not a ship as PT 162 retired on a westwardly course toward Gizo Strait. PT 109 followed and inquired as to the source of the firing. PT 162 replied that it was believed to be from a shore battery. However, PT 109 intercepted the following sudden terse radio message: "I am being chased through Ferguson Passage. Have fired fish". That was all, but it was enough to inform the group that an action with the enemy was in progress, and a significant one. At this time PT 169 came alongside to inquire about the firing in Blackett Strait and to report that one of her engines was out of order. PT 169 lay to with PTs 109 and 162 to await developments.

In the meantime all contact with PT 109 had been lost. Instructions from base were requested and orders were received to resume normal patrol station. PT 162, being uncertain as to its position, requested PT 109 lead the way back to the patrol station, which it proceeded to do. When Lt. Kennedy thought he had reached the original patrol station, he started to patrol on one engine at idling speed.

The time was about 0230. Ensign Ross was on the bow as lookout: Ensign Thom was standing beside the cockpit: Lt. Kennedy was at the wheel, and with him in the cockpit was McGuire, his radioman; Marney was in the forward turret; Mauer, the quartermaster was standing beside Ensign Thom; Albert was in the after turret; and McMann was in the engine room. The location of other members of the crew upon the boat is unknown. Suddenly a dark shape loomed up on PT 109's starboard bow 200-300 yards in the distance. At first this shape was believed to be other PTs. However, it was soon seen to be a destroyer identified as the Ribiki Group of the Fubuki Class bearing down on PT 109 at high speed. The 109 had started to turn to starboard preparatory to firing torpedoes. However, when PT 109 had scarcely turned 30, the destroyer rammed the PT, striking it forward of the forward starboard tube and shearing off the starboard side of the boat aft, including the starboard engine. The destroyer traveling at an estimated speed of 40 knots neither slowed nor fired as she split the PT, leaving part of the PT on one side and the other on the other. Scarcely 10 seconds elapsed between time of sighting and the crash.

A fire was immediately ignited, but, fortunately, it was gasoline burning on the water's surface at least 20 yards away from the remains of the PT which were still afloat. This fire burned brightly for 15-20 minutes and then died out. It is believed that the wake of the destroyer carried off the floating gasoline there by saving PT 109 from fire.

Lt. Kennedy, Ensigns Thom and Ross, Mauer, Mc McGuire and Albert still clung to the PT 109's hull. Lt. Kennedy ordered all hands to abandon ship when it appeared the fire would spread to it. All soon crawled back aboard when this danger passed. It was ascertained by shouting that Harris, McMahon and Starkey were in the water about 100 yards to the Southwest while Zinser and Johnson were an equal distance to the Southeast. Kennedy swam toward the group of three, and Thom and Ross struck out for the other two. Lt. Kennedy had to tow McMahon, who was helpless because of serious burns, back to the boat. A strong current impeded their progress, and it took about an hour to get McMahon aboard PT 109. Kennedy then returned for the other two men, one of whom was suffering from minor burns. He traded his life belt to Harris, who was uninjured in return for Harris's waterlogged kapok life jacket which was impeding the latters' swimming. Together they towed Starkey to the PT.

Meanwhile, Ensigns Thom and Ross had reached Zinser and Johnson who were both helpless because of gas fumes. Thom towed Johnson, and Ross took Zinser and Johnson who were both helpless because of gas fumes. Thom towed Johnson, and Ross took Zinser. Both regained full consciousness by the time the boat was reached.

Within three hours after the crash all survivors who could be located were brought aboard PT 109. Marney and Kirksey were never seen after the crash. During the three hours it took to gather the survivors together, nothing was seen or heard that indicated other boats or ships in the area. PT 109 did not fire its Very pistols for fear of giving away its position to the enemy.

Meanwhile the IFF and all codes aboard had either been completely destroyed or sunk in the deep waters of Vella Gulf. Despite the fact that all water- tight doors were dogged down at the time of the crash, PT 109 was slowly taking on water. When daylight of August 2 arrived, the eleven survivors were still aboard PT 109. It was estimated that the boat lay about 4 miles north and slightly east of Gizo Anchorage and about 3 miles away from the reef along northeast Gizo.

It was obvious that the PT 109 would sink on the 2nd, and decision was made to abandon it in time to arrive before dark on one of the tiny islands east of Gizo. A small island 3 1/2 - 4 miles to the southeast of Gizo was chosen on which to land, rather than one but 2 1/2 miles away which was close to Gizo, and, which, it was feared, might be occupied by the Japs.

At 1400 Lt. Kennedy took the badly burned McMahon in tow and set out for land, intending to lead the way and scout the island in advance of the other survivors. Ensigns Ross and Thom followed with the other men. Johnson and Mauer, who could not swim, were tied to a float rigged from a 2 x 8 which was part of the 37 mm gun mount. Harris and McGuire were fair swimmers, but Zinser, Starkey and Albert were not so good. The strong swimmers pushed or towed the float to which the non-swimmers were tied.

Lt. Kennedy was dressed only in skivvies, Ensign Thom, coveralls and shoes, Ensign Ross, trousers, and most of the men were dressed only in trousers and shirts. There were six 45s' in the group (two of which were later lost before rescue), one 38, one flashlight, one large knife, one light knife and a pocket knife. The boats first aid kit had been lost in the collision. All the group with the exception of McMahon, who suffered considerably from burns, were in fairly good condition, although weak and tired from their swim ashore.

That evening Lt. Kennedy decided to swim into Ferguson Passage in an attempt to intercept PT boats proceeding to their patrol areas. He left about 1830, swam to a small island 1/2 mile to the southeast, proceeded along a reef which stretched out into Ferguson Passage, arriving there about 2000. No PTs were seen, but aircraft flares were observed which indicated that the PTs that night were operating in Gizo not Blackett Strait and were being harassed as usual by enemy float planes. Kennedy began his return over the same route he had previously used. While swimming the final lay to the island on which the other survivors were, he was caught in a current which swept him in a circle about 2 miles into Blackett Strait and back to the middle of Ferguson Passage, where he had to start his homeward trip all over again. On this trip he stopped on the small island just southeast of "home" where he slept until dawn before covering the last 1/2 mile lap to join the rest of his group. He was completely exhausted, slightly feverish, and slept most of the day.

Nothing was observed on August 2 or 3 which gave any hope of rescue. On the night of the 3rd Ensign Ross decided to proceed into Ferguson Passage in another attempt to intercept PT patrols from Rendova. Using the same route as Kennedy had used and leaving about 1800, Ross "patrolled" off the reefs on the west side of the Passage with negative results. In returning he wisely stopped on the islet southeast of "home", slept and thereby avoided the experience with the current which had swept Kennedy out to sea. He made the final lap next morning.

The complete diet of the group on what came to be called Bird Island (because of the great abundance of droppings from the fine feathered friends) consisted of coconut milk and meat. As the coconut supply was running low and in order to get closer to Ferguson Passage, the group left Bird Island at noon, August 4th, and using the same arrangements as before, headed for a small islet west of Cross Island. Kennedy, with McMahon in tow arrived first. The rest of the group again experienced difficulty with a strong easterly current, but finally managed to make the eastern tip of the island.

Their new home was slightly larger than their former, offered brush for protection and a few coconuts to eat, and had no Jap tenants. The night of August 4th was wet and cold, and no one ventured into Ferguson Passage that night. The next morning Kennedy and Ross decided to swim to Cross Island in search of food, boats or anything else which might be useful to their party. Prior to their leaving for Cross Island, one of three New Zealand P-40s made a strafing run on Cross Island. Although this indicated the possibility of Japs, because of the acute food shortage, the two set out, swam the channel and arrived on Cross Island about 1530. Immediately the ducked into the brush. Neither seeing nor hearing anything, the two officers sneaked through the brush to the east side of the island and peered from the brush onto the beach. A small rectangular box with Japanese writing on the side was seen which was quickly and furtively pulled into the bush. Its contents proved to be 30-40 small bags of crackers and candy. A little farther up the beach, alongside a native lean-to, a one-man canoe and a barrel of water were found. About this time a canoe containing two persons was sighted. Light showing between their legs revealed that they did not wear trousers and, therefore, must be natives. Despite all efforts of Kennedy and Ross to attract their attention, they paddled swiftly off to the northwest. Nevertheless, Kennedy and Ross, having obtained a canoe, for and water, considered their visit a success.

That night Kennedy took the canoe and again proceeded into Ferguson Passage, waited there until 2100, but again no PTs appeared. He returned to his "home" island via Cross Island where he picked up the food but left Ross who had decided to swim back the following morning. When Kennedy arrived at base at about 2330, he found that the two natives which he and Ross had sighted near Cross Island, had circled around and landed on the island where the rest of the group were. Ensign Thom, after telling the natives in as many ways as possible that he was an American and not a Jap, finally convinced them whereupon they landed and performed every service possible for the survivors.

The next day, August 6, Kennedy and the natives paddled to Cross Island intercepting Ross, who was swimming back to the rest of the group. After Ross and Kennedy had thoroughly searched Cross Island for Japs and found none, despite the natives' belief to the contrary, they showed the two PT survivors where a two-man native canoe was hidden.

The natives were then sent with messages to the Coastwatcher. One was a penciled note written the day before by Ensign Thom; the other was a message written on a green coconut husk by Kennedy, informing the Coastwatcher that he and Ross were on Cross Island.

After the natives left, Ross and Kennedy remained on the island until evening, when they set in the two-man canoe to again try their luck at intercepting PTs in Ferguson Passage. They paddled far out into Ferguson Passage, saw nothing, and were caught in a sudden rain squall which eventually capsized the canoe. Swimming to land was difficult and treacherous as the sea swept the two officers against the reef on the south side of Cross Island. Ross received numerous cuts and bruises, but both managed to make land where they remained the rest of the night.

On Saturday, August 7, eight natives arrived, bringing a message from the Coastwatcher instructing the senior officer to go with the natives to Wana Wana. Kennedy and Ross had the natives paddle them to island where the rest of the survivors were. The natives had brought food and other articles (including a cook stove) to make the survivors comfortable. They were extremely kind at all times.

That afternoon, Kennedy, hidden under ferns in the native boat, was taken to the Coastwatcher, arriving about 1600. There it was arranged that PT boats would rendezvous with him in Ferguson Passage that evening at 2330. Accordingly he was taken to the rendezvous point and finally managed to make contact with the PTs at 2315. He climbed aboard the PT and directed it to the rest of the survivors. The rescue was effected without mishap, and the Rendova base was reached at 0530, August 8, seven days after the ramming of the PT 109 in Blackett Strait.

B. R. WHITE,
Lieutenant (jg), USNR,
MTB Flotilla ONE Intelligence Officer

J. C. McClure,
Lieutenant (jg), USNR,
MTB Flotilla ONE Intelligence Officer

More info: http://www.history.navy.mil/faqs/faq60-11.htm

Sounds heroic to me. BTW: Did you ever set out to sea in a small boat, L0oniX?

[Gabi Hayes]

79. you are correct sir. a similar account appears in this very interesting book:

http://www.amazon.com/Kennedys-at-War-1937-1945/dp/038550165X

well worth reading

[Name removed]

81. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

104. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[SDuderstadt]

105. JFK was an absolute hero...

in the PT 109 incident, GH. On that we absolutely agree.

[L0oniX]

106. I have no problem with you believing that one of the fastest boats in WW2 couldn't avoid...

a destroyer ...an obviously very stealthy and quiet one. I can't believe that. Nice of you to descend into name calling and insulting ...makes DU such a nice place ...thanks!

[Gabi Hayes]

110. bit of thinskinitis, have we? you have no problem tossing around

insults in quite the willy nilly fashion, do you? you should expect to be answered in kind

grow up, little critter, learn to take it like a....DUer

and since you're quite the nautical authority, what's the speed a PT boat makes on one engine set at idle?

[L0oniX]

111. Hypocritical irony much?

[Octafish]

92. Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. was very brave.

Then-Ensign Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. with his Navy flight trainer.



Big brother to three U.S. Senators, one of whom became President of the United States. The four brothers all were veterans of the armed forces, three serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II.

Joe Kennedy, Jr. lost his life in the closing months of World War II, while on an extremely dangerous Top Secret mission. He died in the service of his country to fight fascism and to keep America free. Let all who read this know, Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. is a hero of our nation.

JPK was being groomed for a life in politics by his father, Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. So, Joe Jr. was preparing for just such a career, serving as a delegate from Massachusetts voting for FDR at the 1940 Democratic convention.

A brave, athletic and conscientious man, he volunteered for service in the US Navy before World War II. After completing his training in multi-engine aircraft, JPK was assigned command of a US Navy B-24 Liberator on anti-submarine warfare duty, flying missions out of an airbase in the UK over the North Atlantic from 1943-44.

On one mission, Kennedy’s four-engine aircraft was attacked by a Focke-Wulf 190, perhaps the German’s best propeller fighter. Instead of hightailing for a cloudbank, Kennedy turned his ship toward the fighter and ordered his crew to open up. The surprised FW tore off.

After completing his tour of 35 missions, IIRC, Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. was ready to be rotated stateside. Instead, he volunteered for a top-secret mission. The targets were the V-2 launch sites along the coast of France. The V-2 was developed by Werner von Braun and his team at Peenemünde.

One of Hitler's super-weapons, history's first ballistic missiles were used to rain death, destruction and terror upon London. The allies were worried that if the Nazis continued developing their super-weapons, the V-2’s descendants would be delivering bombs — possibly atomic — to New York City.

So the US Navy and Army Air Corps developed a secret weapon to use against the German V-2 sites along the coast of France. The plan was called: Operation Aphrodite and its objective was to knock out the V-2 sites along the coast of France. So, the Navy and Army Air Force converted B-24s and B-17s to create something out of Buck Rogers. They wanted a remote-control flying mega-bomb.

The plan called for developing, basically, history’s first guided cruise missiles (Hey, Condi! You reading this?). The entire fuselage was filled with Torpex and gelignite, IIRC, and was to be armed by a rather elaborate, and untested, electronic arming panel. The giant plane had been converted from being a bomber capable of carrying sixteen 500 pound bombs and requiring a 10-man crew into one giant flying bomb.

Joe Kennedy had completed his tour of duty and was scheduled for rotation home. Instead, he volunteered to skipper an experimental version of the B-24 bomber. His job was to get the ship airborne from its airfield in Great Britain, point it toward Europe, and bail out over the countryside. Sounds simple, but it was anything but. It was state-of-the-art science, engineering, and warfare.

Joe Kennedy’s plane was among a few Liberators and Flying Fortresses modified for a very early version of remote control. The way the thing worked was with a primitive 2-channel remote-controled robotic pilot. One radio signal could make the plane dive and climb and another signal could make it turn left and right. A prototype video camera would also send information to the Mother Ship, where the remote pilot sat before a tiny TV monitor a few miles behind and above the flying bomb.

Joe Kennedy and his fellow volunteer pilots were needed to get the flying bombs airborne. One aloft, they were to turn on the radio-guidance controls and arm the flying bomb. Then, somewhere over the English countryside, the pilot and bombardier were to bail out at an altitude of about ONE THOUSAND FEET.

The scientists and engineers in the Mother Ship would take over and signal on two radio frequencies: One to turn the stick RIGHT or LEFT; or push the stick FORWARD or pull the stick BACK. Primitive today, they were the first remote-controlled weapon of mass destruction. The Mother Ship would follow two miles or so back and then fly it over the English Channel and guide it down into the rocket launch sites.

It was dangerous work. Because of the modifications to the B-17s, one pilot was killed and another lost an arm in the process. By the time it was Joe’s turn in the B-24 there was reason for concern about a plan that was seeming to look like a suicide mission.

For the Kennedys and the future of American politics, the tragedy was that the Navy ship used a rather primitive arming panel. The regular engineer/co-pilot refused to fly and instead the Navy sent aloft the engineer who designed and installed the system.

Over the English countryside, the ship exploded, killing the two flyers and changing American political history. Joe's younger brother John Fitzgerald Kennedy then became the heir to the family's political ambitions.

John F. Kennedy made an outstanding President, living up to his brother’s promise of greatness. JFK, it should be remembered, saved the world from nuclear annihilation during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

While he never lived to see the dream realized, JFK also stretched mankind’s imagination and reach to the moon. Ironically, he even used the NAZI rocket scientist who developed the V-2 to do so. The same von Braun who the allied air command sent his lost brother, Joseph, to destroy.

— Octafish

# # #

Thank you for remembering and thank you for the book recommendation, Gabi Hayes! You might enjoy these two outstanding books on the subject of Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. and his service in World War II:

Aphrodite: Desperate Mission by Jack Olsen

and

The Lost Prince: Young Joe, the Forgotten Kennedy by Hank Searls.

[L0oniX]

80. Ohhh ...damn them stealthy jap destroyers ...and yea I own a 30' boat and been out at night.

[Octafish]

85. Lucky you.

Best of luck while you're at sea.

[SDuderstadt]

99. "court marshalled"....

LOLOLOLOL

It's "court-martialed", dude....

[L0oniX]

101. spell check failure

[SDuderstadt]

103. Not really....

since "marshalled" is an actual word. You just don't know what the right word is.

[SDuderstadt]

82. Somehow, I can't vote "yes" without tears welling up in my eyes...

he was my first live political hero...Jefferson and Lincoln were obviously both dead...and LHO robbed us of so much.

I admired both RFK and EMK..I cannot watch the "Last Train Ride" (not sure of the exact title, but the short clip of the train carrying Bobby's body back to DC)without sobbing...life is not the same without them.

They were all giants and I don't see anyone who fills their shoes, even though I think Obama is a fine president.

[Octafish]

125. Odd thing for you to write…

…considering how you treat "dudes" and "you guys" who don’t agree with the Warren Commission that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. Here’s what you wrote when asked to consider the evidence someone impersonated Oswald at the Cuban and Soviet embassies in Mexico City in the Fall of 1963:

Dude...think this through....

if the CIA was going to have someone impersonate oswald, why in the world would they choose someone who looks nothing like him? This is why 46 years later, you guys have produced exactly:



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4021403#4025329

There are many more examples I can bring up to illustrate the irony in your tears.

[SDuderstadt]

135. What do my feelings for the Kennedys...

have to do with your goofy bullshit, dude?

There's a pretty simple explanation for that picture, dude. Tell me something. Are you implying that one cannot love the Kennedys, yet believe the WCR? Simple question: why did EMK believe the WCR? Did he not love his family?

The really ironic thing is assassination buffs constantly question whether I sincerely love the Kennedy, but despite your goofy CT nonsense, I have never once questioned your love of the Kennedys. Do you see the issue there?

[kwassa]

95. No, the affect has died over time. Young people neither know or care.

I never think about it, personally, and I was 11 when he was assassinated, and vividly remember the circumstances and events.

but, the world has radically changed since his death, the Kennedy family influence is greatly diminished, and the name no longer insures election.

[L. Coyote]

100. YES 200, No 12, Don't care 0

I'm #200

[The Midway Rebel]

115. Yes.

The CT's have have spawned a mythology equal in its breadth and impact on American politics to the Myth of the Lost Cause of the Confederacy.

At least I think that may make a good dissertation for someone to defend.

[lonestarnot]

116. I fear our nation will never get back on track. Mousad demonstrated

how meticulously they can calculate an assasination, so what if they are found out after the fact. The damage has already been done.

[nemo137]

118. It's the Boomers' founding myth.

For better or worse, how Boomers approach politics is shaped by the Kennedy assassination and it's aftermath.

[upi402]

124. Lore, an Octafish post that's great service work

(I hope it's OK to drop this reply down to a current position on the thread in hopes more people get to read it)

Big brother to three U.S. Senators, one of whom became President of the United States. The four brothers all were veterans of the armed forces, three serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II.

Joe Kennedy, Jr. lost his life in the closing months of World War II, while on an extremely dangerous Top Secret mission. He died in the service of his country to fight fascism and to keep America free. Let all who read this know, Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. is a hero of our nation.

JPK was being groomed for a life in politics by his father, Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. So, Joe Jr. was preparing for just such a career, serving as a delegate from Massachusetts voting for FDR at the 1940 Democratic convention.

A brave, athletic and conscientious man, he volunteered for service in the US Navy before World War II. After completing his training in multi-engine aircraft, JPK was assigned command of a US Navy B-24 Liberator on anti-submarine warfare duty, flying missions out of an airbase in the UK over the North Atlantic from 1943-44.

On one mission, Kennedy’s four-engine aircraft was attacked by a Focke-Wulf 190, perhaps the German’s best propeller fighter. Instead of hightailing for a cloudbank, Kennedy turned his ship toward the fighter and ordered his crew to open up. The surprised FW tore off.

After completing his tour of 35 missions, IIRC, Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. was ready to be rotated stateside. Instead, he volunteered for a top-secret mission. The targets were the V-2 launch sites along the coast of France. The V-2 was developed by Werner von Braun and his team at Peenemünde.

One of Hitler's super-weapons, history's first ballistic missiles were used to rain death, destruction and terror upon London. The allies were worried that if the Nazis continued developing their super-weapons, the V-2’s descendants would be delivering bombs — possibly atomic — to New York City.

So the US Navy and Army Air Corps developed a secret weapon to use against the German V-2 sites along the coast of France. The plan was called: Operation Aphrodite and its objective was to knock out the V-2 sites along the coast of France. So, the Navy and Army Air Force converted B-24s and B-17s to create something out of Buck Rogers. They wanted a remote-control flying mega-bomb.

The plan called for developing, basically, history’s first guided cruise missiles (Hey, Condi! You reading this?). The entire fuselage was filled with Torpex and gelignite, IIRC, and was to be armed by a rather elaborate, and untested, electronic arming panel. The giant plane had been converted from being a bomber capable of carrying sixteen 500 pound bombs and requiring a 10-man crew into one giant flying bomb.

Joe Kennedy had completed his tour of duty and was scheduled for rotation home. Instead, he volunteered to skipper an experimental version of the B-24 bomber. His job was to get the ship airborne from its airfield in Great Britain, point it toward Europe, and bail out over the countryside. Sounds simple, but it was anything but. It was state-of-the-art science, engineering, and warfare.

Joe Kennedy’s plane was among a few Liberators and Flying Fortresses modified for a very early version of remote control. The way the thing worked was with a primitive 2-channel remote-controled robotic pilot. One radio signal could make the plane dive and climb and another signal could make it turn left and right. A prototype video camera would also send information to the Mother Ship, where the remote pilot sat before a tiny TV monitor a few miles behind and above the flying bomb.

Joe Kennedy and his fellow volunteer pilots were needed to get the flying bombs airborne. One aloft, they were to turn on the radio-guidance controls and arm the flying bomb. Then, somewhere over the English countryside, the pilot and bombardier were to bail out at an altitude of about ONE THOUSAND FEET.

The scientists and engineers in the Mother Ship would take over and signal on two radio frequencies: One to turn the stick RIGHT or LEFT; or push the stick FORWARD or pull the stick BACK. Primitive today, they were the first remote-controlled weapon of mass destruction. The Mother Ship would follow two miles or so back and then fly it over the English Channel and guide it down into the rocket launch sites.

It was dangerous work. Because of the modifications to the B-17s, one pilot was killed and another lost an arm in the process. By the time it was Joe’s turn in the B-24 there was reason for concern about a plan that was seeming to look like a suicide mission.

For the Kennedys and the future of American politics, the tragedy was that the Navy ship used a rather primitive arming panel. The regular engineer/co-pilot refused to fly and instead the Navy sent aloft the engineer who designed and installed the system.

Over the English countryside, the ship exploded, killing the two flyers and changing American political history. Joe's younger brother John Fitzgerald Kennedy then became the heir to the family's political ambitions.

John F. Kennedy made an outstanding President, living up to his brother’s promise of greatness. JFK, it should be remembered, saved the world from nuclear annihilation during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

While he never lived to see the dream realized, JFK also stretched mankind’s imagination and reach to the moon. Ironically, he even used the NAZI rocket scientist who developed the V-2 to do so. The same von Braun who the allied air command sent his lost brother, Joseph, to destroy.

— Octafish

[EFerrari]

129. The thing is, it wasn't just one. Our leaders were slaughtered

one after the other during that decade. Maybe that resolves to Camelot or something but it's much broader than that in reality. So, Camelot is more a part for the whole.

[Radical Activist]

140. And it's usually for worse.

The level of widespread self-defeating negativity and pessimism among most boomer progressives is poisonous to the movement. I think some of it is the psychological trauma of multiple assassinations in the 60's. The left never recovered. It took a new generation coming of age.

[RexS]

137. Always

he wanted to make certain people and groups accountable for their actions and they killed him for it.

[Name removed]

142. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[AzDar]

145. K & R

[Grand Taurean]

147. We do NOT know the truth as to what occured.

That does affect the integrity of the nation, regardless of what you feel about JFK personally.