22 November 2013

J.F.K. 50th ANNIVERSARY OF THE ASSASSINATION

The assassination of President John F. Kennedy was fifty years ago today. 

Recently I read a couple new books about his presidency as well as his relationship with his wife, Jackie, that focused on his last year or so of life.  I also rewatched the Oliver Stone film that came out a few years ago that starred Kevin Costner and suggested CIA involvement - a coup.  There have been so many conspiracy theories and notions about who was behind this assassination; the Mafia, Vice President Lyndon Johnson, Texas Oilmen, Fidel Castro - and Cuba, the Soviet Union - Russians, Democrat Haters, and maybe you could name a few others.  Maybe we will never know.

ONE THING FOR SURE IS THAT SOME AMERICANS THOUGHT KENNEDY'S IDEAS AND VALUES WERE RADICAL.  Fifty years later things have changed greatly such as that we went from a country in which racism was a fact to a time when not being politically correct can get a celebrity in trouble, if not sued.  The other morning I was listening to a morning radio show and the host was interviewing a Black man on why he gets to call other Blacks Nigger.  The host pointed out that Jewish people do not go around calling each other Kike.

Besides the 50th anniversary being a publishing event, I sometimes think that the Kennedy Presidency is felt by those who remember those days, to be the best of America. Some feel that the assassination itself ended America's innocence. (Others feel that Watergate ended it.)  I think it had it's good points (much more privacy as the best example) and it's bad.

What is meant by America's innocence?

ANSWER THAT FOR YOURSELF and ask your family members who were alive then.  Interview them and record their memories of JFK and this black day in American History.