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CIA backed Eugene McCarthy in '68 v. RFK


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Joan Mellen, in the thread David Talbot : Walter Sheridan and Jim Garrison Yesterday, 06:26 AM Post #15

A very close friend of mine was a friend of John F. Kennedy's, and a Harvard classmate. (He is interviewed in many of the biographies of President Kennedy). He liked "Jack" and Kennedy appointed him to be Ambassador to Morocco, a position he ultimately rejected, on the (bad) advice of David K. E. Bruce. My friend, along with his friends, thought Bobby was ruthless (the cliche that was true) and untrustworthy, and this was before my friend became campaign manager for Eugene McCarthy. The year, yes, was 1968.

Ah, yes, good old Gene McCarthy and his children’s crusade. So pure it hurts:

Objections general…

M.S. Arnoni, “Your Peace Candidates,” The Minority of One, June 1968, p.3:

“In the not so remote past, when one questioned the sincerity of a peace group’s given position or of its representatives’ role in international gatherings, one was inviting accusations of paranoia, but in the light of now documented CIA-penetration and subversion, it is no longer possible in good faith to dismiss such suspicions out of hand. Not only must the possibility not be dismissed that peace forces in this country are being manipulated in effect to support the next phase of the warfare state, but there is even evidence that this, precisely, is happening.”

And objections specific…

“A Tale of Two Doves,” JFK Assassination Forum, No.7, (April 1975), p.2:

“…when a dove of more conservative cast, Gene McCarthy, decided to oppose Johnson for the nomination, the CIA promptly infiltrated his campaign.

Names to conjure with: Allard Lowenstein, Curtis Gans and Sam Brown. Ostensibly these men were concerned with ‘containing’ the student anti-war movement. The motto of McCarthy’s student supporters was ‘Keep clean for Gene’ – none of your Hoffmans or Rubins, please.

In early 1968, when McCarthy’s campaign seemed dangerously short of funds, help was forthcoming from West Coast industrialist Sam Kimball, chairman of Aerojet-General Corp. whose representative in Washington was Admiral Raborn, a former CIA chief.

When Robert Kennedy…entered the nomination stakes, two more ‘former’ CIA men, Thomas Finney and Thomas McCoy joined McCarthy’s campaign. (For fuller information, see Private Eye 169.)”

According to Time (“The Nonconsensus,” Friday, Jul. 05, 1968 – see this link: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/...,941595,00.html ),Thomas Finney was “the Senator's organization chief.”

In 1980, William Blum notes, good old Gene, the eternal splitter of the anti-Republican vote, backed Reagan:

The Anti-Empire Report, No. 12, August 21, 2004

It's a painfully old story. Democrats can not be trusted ideologically, not even to be consistently liberal, never mind progressive or radical, no matter how much we wish we could trust them, no matter how awful the Republicans may be. In the 1968 election, Democratic Senator Eugene McCarthy of Wisconsin was the darling of the left. He ran in the Democratic primaries on an anti-war platform that excited a whole generation of protestors. Peaceniks and hippies, the story goes, were getting haircuts, dressing like decent Americans, and forsaking dope, all to be "clean for Gene" and work in his campaign. Yet, in 1980, Gene McCarthy came out in support of Ronald Reagan (2).

(2) San Francisco Chronicle, October 24, 1980, p.7

See this link: http://members.aol.com/bblum6/aer12.htm

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Joan Mellen, in the thread David Talbot : Walter Sheridan and Jim Garrison Yesterday, 06:26 AM Post #15

A very close friend of mine was a friend of John F. Kennedy's, and a Harvard classmate. (He is interviewed in many of the biographies of President Kennedy). He liked "Jack" and Kennedy appointed him to be Ambassador to Morocco, a position he ultimately rejected, on the (bad) advice of David K. E. Bruce. My friend, along with his friends, thought Bobby was ruthless (the cliche that was true) and untrustworthy, and this was before my friend became campaign manager for Eugene McCarthy. The year, yes, was 1968.

Ah, yes, good old Gene McCarthy and his children’s crusade. So pure it hurts:

Objections general…

M.S. Arnoni, “Your Peace Candidates,” The Minority of One, June 1968, p.3:

“In the not so remote past, when one questioned the sincerity of a peace group’s given position or of its representatives’ role in international gatherings, one was inviting accusations of paranoia, but in the light of now documented CIA-penetration and subversion, it is no longer possible in good faith to dismiss such suspicions out of hand. Not only must the possibility not be dismissed that peace forces in this country are being manipulated in effect to support the next phase of the warfare state, but there is even evidence that this, precisely, is happening.”

And objections specific…

“A Tale of Two Doves,” JFK Assassination Forum, No.7, (April 1975), p.2:

“…when a dove of more conservative cast, Gene McCarthy, decided to oppose Johnson for the nomination, the CIA promptly infiltrated his campaign.

Names to conjure with: Allard Lowenstein, Curtis Gans and Sam Brown. Ostensibly these men were concerned with ‘containing’ the student anti-war movement. The motto of McCarthy’s student supporters was ‘Keep clean for Gene’ – none of your Hoffmans or Rubins, please.

In early 1968, when McCarthy’s campaign seemed dangerously short of funds, help was forthcoming from West Coast industrialist Sam Kimball, chairman of Aerojet-General Corp. whose representative in Washington was Admiral Raborn, a former CIA chief.

When Robert Kennedy…entered the nomination stakes, two more ‘former’ CIA men, Thomas Finney and Thomas McCoy joined McCarthy’s campaign. (For fuller information, see Private Eye 169.)”

According to Time (“The Nonconsensus,” Friday, Jul. 05, 1968 – see this link: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/...,941595,00.html ),Thomas Finney was “the Senator's organization chief.”

In 1980, William Blum notes, good old Gene, the eternal splitter of the anti-Republican vote, backed Reagan:

The Anti-Empire Report, No. 12, August 21, 2004

It's a painfully old story. Democrats can not be trusted ideologically, not even to be consistently liberal, never mind progressive or radical, no matter how much we wish we could trust them, no matter how awful the Republicans may be. In the 1968 election, Democratic Senator Eugene McCarthy of Wisconsin was the darling of the left. He ran in the Democratic primaries on an anti-war platform that excited a whole generation of protestors. Peaceniks and hippies, the story goes, were getting haircuts, dressing like decent Americans, and forsaking dope, all to be "clean for Gene" and work in his campaign. Yet, in 1980, Gene McCarthy came out in support of Ronald Reagan (2).

(2) San Francisco Chronicle, October 24, 1980, p.7

See this link: http://members.aol.com/bblum6/aer12.htm

For a further peak into the netherworld of Simon Pure's conduct in 1968, see this 2004 book review in The New Yorker:

http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2004/04/0...?printable=true

For those short of time, the germane paragraphs:

Sandbrook’s book is distinguished by extensive research—notably, many interviews with people who knew and worked with McCarthy, including his estranged wife, Abigail (she died in 2001), along with interviews and correspondence with the subject himself. Sandbrook has discovered evidence that the Humphrey campaign secretly helped McCarthy in the 1968 primaries in order to deny delegates to Kennedy, a man Humphrey feared and McCarthy disliked. Sandbrook reports that after Kennedy was assassinated an exhausted and depressed McCarthy met with Humphrey and, according to Humphrey’s notes, begged him not to put Teddy Kennedy on the ticket.

Sandbrook’s book is also intelligent, well written, and unremittingly unsympathetic. Sandbrook doesn’t simply disagree with many of McCarthy’s positions and deplore many of McCarthy’s choices. He finds McCarthy sour, aloof, unfeeling, and inconstant, and he comes very close to blaming him personally for the election of Richard Nixon and the rise of the Republican right. He concludes his discussion of the 1968 election by remarking, “Had it not been for McCarthy’s campaign, it is possible that Johnson or Humphrey might have been elected. . . . Voters did not in fact treat the election in November as a referendum on Vietnam, and given that they chose Nixon as their next president, it can easily be argued that McCarthy ultimately failed.” And he concludes his book with the comment “There is not always honor in failure.”

McCarthy appears to have harboured a Lasky-like hatred of the Kennedys.

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Where’s the beef? I.E. what evidence do you have to back your claims?

“…when a dove of more conservative cast, Gene McCarthy, decided to oppose Johnson for the nomination, the CIA promptly infiltrated his campaign.

Names to conjure with: Allard Lowenstein, Curtis Gans and Sam Brown.”

“When Robert Kennedy…entered the nomination stakes, two more ‘former’ CIA men, Thomas Finney and Thomas McCoy joined McCarthy’s campaign.”

Citations indicating these guys were ex-CIA and that any of them other than Finney worked for McCarthy. Don’t forget that Sam Brown, Thomas McCarthy and Thomas Finney are common names. Even if you find citations for men by those names having worked for the CIA and men by those names having worked for McCarthy you’ll have to come up with evidence they were the same people.

“In early 1968, when McCarthy’s campaign seemed dangerously short of funds, help was forthcoming from West Coast industrialist Sam Kimball, chairman of Aerojet-General Corp. whose representative in Washington was Admiral Raborn, a former CIA chief.”

Citations? I wonder how reliable your source is since the guy’s name was Dan Able Kimball

http://www.astronautix.com/astros/kimball.htm . Raborn was only in the CIA (as DCI) for a little over a year. But supposedly Kimball was Raborn’s boss any evidence the latter controlled the former?

In any case it smacks of guilt by association, someone unfavorable to Bobby could point our his association with an earlier Senator McCarthy

"McCarthy appears to have harboured a Lasky-like hatred of the Kennedys."

Evidence?

Edited by Len Colby
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Paul there was a time when I would have looked at this view of McCarthy as paranoid. But after thirty years of highly professional losing--even when they win the country moves rightward-- your description of the McCarthy campaign smacks more of common sense than paranoia. Common sense with a low circulation.

You dont have to look further than last week. Actually the Democratic party is probably winning, if we measure it in a financial sense. They get the bovine anybody but Bush money, and at the same time the funders of Bush money, who this time need to elect a wolf in Clinton-cloth.

The dems have been dividing the opposition to rightward movement for the last forty years, and your version of the McCarthy campaign fits right into the story.

I am sure that tens of millions of people now realize this about the dems but TO TRY TO COMMUNICATE THIS OBVIOUS TRUTH IS LIKE SPEAKING INTO STYROFOME. That is one poll that the Ananberg School of Comminication sure won't fund!

Dissent without a mouthpiece. This is a far better strategy than the Soviet Unions's strategy of mental hospitals for their political dissidents. I guess our government is sure getting its money's worth for sixty years of "communications research" in our universities.

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Where’s the beef? I.E. what evidence do you have to back your claims?

“…when a dove of more conservative cast, Gene McCarthy, decided to oppose Johnson for the nomination, the CIA promptly infiltrated his campaign.

Names to conjure with: Allard Lowenstein...

Fair point, Len, and had time and access permitted – I can’t get at some of my more interesting bits and pieces: they’re in Ramsay Clark’s draw – I’d like to have offered more supporting detail.

The most important of the CIA men under discussion was Allard K. Lowenstein. His case also happens to be the most publicly discussed, so let’s begin with him.

You’re normally an indefatigable searcher of the internet, so I’m a little surprised you didn’t turn up Richard Cummings’ book on him, or, indeed, the NYRB spat between said Cummings and his detractor-in-chief, Hendrik Hertzberg. Still, I’m sure that for you, like me, time is frequently short, so I’ll lend you a hand.

The following link takes you straight to the 1986 NYRB argument between Hertzberg and Cummings following the publication of the latter’s The Pied Piper: Allard K. Lowenstein and the Liberal Dream (Grove Press, 1985). Hertzberg’s attempt to preserve the façade of Lowenstein’s philanthropic sponsorship is a hoot.

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/5226

For more on the strength of Lowenstein’s link with Fran Carlucci, see this Lew Rockwell site contribution from Cummings, wherein we find other fascinating bits and pieces of Agency business, not least in the literary world:

http://www.lewrockwell.com/cummings/cummings29.html

For an African perspective on Lowenstein’s African imposture – as dedicated anti-colonialist, while not, of course, working for the Central Intelligence Agency – try this link:

http://www.nshr.org.na/modules.php?op=modl...cle&sid=674

For Lowenstein’s connection with CIA’s Gloria Steinem, try this:

http://www.theconspiracy.us/vol9/cn9-47.html

Finally, for the moment, William, you appear pained at the mis-spelling of the surnames in the JKF Assassination Forum newsletter. I suspect the solution lies in the original source for the piece, Private Eye, which has from its inception played fast and loose with names for comic effect: in the Assassination Forum edition from which I quoted, Raborn is thus spelt “Rayburn.” If I manage to get hold of the 1968 PE edition in question, will confirm or refute.

Pip-pip!

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Not very convincing all the links refer to the claims of a single author who claims that Lowenstein worked for the CIA that claim has been disputed as can be seen on the NY Review of books page you linked. Interestingly even the publisher of the book that made the accusation admitted “Perhaps we'll never know for sure whether Lowenstein served as a CIA agent until the CIA opens its files to the public” but not surprisingly went on to say the evidence compiled by the author made “an extraordinarily convincing case”.

So perhaps he was, perhaps he wasn’t. The author seems at best to show that he like many other liberals of the era, such as the Kennedys, was ardently anti-Comunist and belonged to anti-Communist organizations and associated with anti-Communist people. He also did thing that presumably the CIA wouldn’t have approved of like campaign for civil rights and against apartheid and the Vietnam War. Even if he had at sometime knowingly had some sort of association with the agency that doesn’t mean he was acting on the CIA’s behalf when he backed McCarthy. But if that were the case, by your logic the CIA backed Robert Kennedy too:

“At first, Lowenstein had attempted to recruit Robert F. Kennedy to lead the charge, then persuaded Sen. Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota to serve as the antiwar challenger.”

http://www.newsday.com/community/guide/lih...tory-navigation

“In private discussions he repeatedly told us that McCarthy was a possibility, and that despite the denials by Bobby Kennedy, the New York Senator could be induced to run… When Bobby Kennedy belatedly entered the race four days after McCarthy nearly won the New Hampshire primary, Lowenstein stayed with McCarthy but his heart was with Kennedy.”

http://www.waxingamerica.com/2005/12/eugene_mccarthy.html

In 1967, he organized the New York Coalition for a Democratic Alternative, later to be dubbed the "Dump Johnson" movement. Colleagues warned him that Johnson was not vulnerable to intra-party attack, but Lowenstein thought otherwise. He started the movement before he even had a candidate lined up for 1968. First he asked his old friend Robert Kennedy to oppose the President Kennedy asked for time to think it over.

Most liberal activists wanted for the Senator to make a move. If he chose to run, they would support him. If he chose not to enter the face, they would forgo the attempt to unseat the President. But "here Lowenstein differed" writes Halberstam. "He was determined to go ahead whether or not Kennedy made the race." After an unsuccessful appeal to George McGovern, Lowenstein approached Eugene McCarthy a liberal Senator from Minnesota. McCarthy agreed to head the alternative ticket, and Lowenstein threw his energy into the campaign.

LATER when Robert Kennedy decided to join the fray, he would ask Lowenstein to shift to his camp. Torn between friendship and respect for Kennedy and his commitment to back McCarthy, Lowenstein said no Kennedy retreated to the back of the bus on which the group was riding, and scribbled Lowenstein a note. "For A1, who knew the lesson of Emerson and taught it to the rest of us," it read. "They did not yet see ... that if a single man plant himself on his convictions and then abide, the huge world will come round to him. From his friend, Bob Kennedy."

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=231158

September 23: Allard Lowenstein meets with New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Kennedy declines to run as the candidate of the anti-Johnson movement. (In his search for a candidate, Lowenstein will ask California Congressman Don Edwards, Idaho Senator Frank Church, Canadian-born economist John Kenneth Galbraith, General James M. Gavin, and South Dakota Senator George S. McGovern; no one accepts the role.)

October 20: Lowenstein meets with Minnesota Senator Eugene J. McCarthy. McCarthy agrees to be the movement's candidate.

http://www.geocities.com/athens/delphi/1553/c68chron.html

"Lowenstein asked New York Sen. Robert Kennedy to challenge President Johnson in the Democratic primaries in 1968. But Kennedy declined, and Lowenstein instead recruited Minnesota Sen. Eugene McCarthy"

http://www.slate.com/id/2147877/

Allard Lowenstein, a liberal Congressman from New York, was among those searching for a liberal candidate to oppose Johnson in the primaries.

In September 1967, Lowenstein went to Robert Kennedy, to attempt to

convince Kennedy to run…But Kennedy declined to run. “People would say I was splitting the party out of ambition and envy. No one would believe that I was doing it because of how I felt about Vietnam and poor people. I think that Al is doing the right thing, but I think that someone else will have to be the first one to run. It can’t be me because of my relationship to Johnson.”3

Representatives of the Peace and Freedom Party asked John Kenneth Galbraith to run as an anti-war candidate… Galbraith described the course his anti-war work took:

“In late October 1967...I went to see Kennedy. Be said flatly that he would not

be a candidate. That same day I talked with Gene McCarthy at Kennedy’s

suggestion. And McCarthy told me what I .knew from many others, that he

was considering it.”

Kennedy won in California…That night, McCarthy workers Allard Lowenstein and John Kenneth Galbraith agreed that the time had come for anti-war activists to unite around Robert Kennedy.34

From - THE HIGHBROW IN AMERICAN POLITICS: ARTHUR M. SCHLESINGER AND THE ROLE OF THE INTELLECTUAL IN POLITICS. BY DAVID B. KOPEL.

http://davekopel.com/Schlesinger/Schlesinger-chapter-12.pdf

His priority was getting rid of Johnson and he approached various people including Bobby Kennedy before McCarthy and was going to back Kennedy after he one in California. According to Galbraith approaching McCarthy was Kennedy’s idea. Are we to assume the CIA also backed all the other people Lowenstein approached?

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Not very convincing all the links refer to the claims of a single author who claims that Lowenstein worked for the CIA that claim has been disputed as can be seen on the NY Review of books page you linked. Interestingly even the publisher of the book that made the accusation admitted “Perhaps we'll never know for sure whether Lowenstein served as a CIA agent until the CIA opens its files to the public” but not surprisingly went on to say the evidence compiled by the author made “an extraordinarily convincing case”.

So perhaps he was, perhaps he wasn’t. The author seems at best to show that he like many other liberals of the era, such as the Kennedys, was ardently anti-Comunist and belonged to anti-Communist organizations and associated with anti-Communist people. He also did thing that presumably the CIA wouldn’t have approved of like campaign for civil rights and against apartheid and the Vietnam War. Even if he had at sometime knowingly had some sort of association with the agency that doesn’t mean he was acting on the CIA’s behalf when he backed McCarthy. But if that were the case, by your logic the CIA backed Robert Kennedy too:

“At first, Lowenstein had attempted to recruit Robert F. Kennedy to lead the charge, then persuaded Sen. Eugene McCarthy of Minnesota to serve as the antiwar challenger.”

http://www.newsday.com/community/guide/lih...tory-navigation

“In private discussions he repeatedly told us that McCarthy was a possibility, and that despite the denials by Bobby Kennedy, the New York Senator could be induced to run… When Bobby Kennedy belatedly entered the race four days after McCarthy nearly won the New Hampshire primary, Lowenstein stayed with McCarthy but his heart was with Kennedy.”

http://www.waxingamerica.com/2005/12/eugene_mccarthy.html

In 1967, he organized the New York Coalition for a Democratic Alternative, later to be dubbed the "Dump Johnson" movement. Colleagues warned him that Johnson was not vulnerable to intra-party attack, but Lowenstein thought otherwise. He started the movement before he even had a candidate lined up for 1968. First he asked his old friend Robert Kennedy to oppose the President Kennedy asked for time to think it over.

Most liberal activists wanted for the Senator to make a move. If he chose to run, they would support him. If he chose not to enter the face, they would forgo the attempt to unseat the President. But "here Lowenstein differed" writes Halberstam. "He was determined to go ahead whether or not Kennedy made the race." After an unsuccessful appeal to George McGovern, Lowenstein approached Eugene McCarthy a liberal Senator from Minnesota. McCarthy agreed to head the alternative ticket, and Lowenstein threw his energy into the campaign.

LATER when Robert Kennedy decided to join the fray, he would ask Lowenstein to shift to his camp. Torn between friendship and respect for Kennedy and his commitment to back McCarthy, Lowenstein said no Kennedy retreated to the back of the bus on which the group was riding, and scribbled Lowenstein a note. "For A1, who knew the lesson of Emerson and taught it to the rest of us," it read. "They did not yet see ... that if a single man plant himself on his convictions and then abide, the huge world will come round to him. From his friend, Bob Kennedy."

http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=231158

September 23: Allard Lowenstein meets with New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Kennedy declines to run as the candidate of the anti-Johnson movement. (In his search for a candidate, Lowenstein will ask California Congressman Don Edwards, Idaho Senator Frank Church, Canadian-born economist John Kenneth Galbraith, General James M. Gavin, and South Dakota Senator George S. McGovern; no one accepts the role.)

October 20: Lowenstein meets with Minnesota Senator Eugene J. McCarthy. McCarthy agrees to be the movement's candidate.

http://www.geocities.com/athens/delphi/1553/c68chron.html

"Lowenstein asked New York Sen. Robert Kennedy to challenge President Johnson in the Democratic primaries in 1968. But Kennedy declined, and Lowenstein instead recruited Minnesota Sen. Eugene McCarthy"

http://www.slate.com/id/2147877/

Allard Lowenstein, a liberal Congressman from New York, was among those searching for a liberal candidate to oppose Johnson in the primaries.

In September 1967, Lowenstein went to Robert Kennedy, to attempt to

convince Kennedy to run…But Kennedy declined to run. “People would say I was splitting the party out of ambition and envy. No one would believe that I was doing it because of how I felt about Vietnam and poor people. I think that Al is doing the right thing, but I think that someone else will have to be the first one to run. It can’t be me because of my relationship to Johnson.”3

Representatives of the Peace and Freedom Party asked John Kenneth Galbraith to run as an anti-war candidate… Galbraith described the course his anti-war work took:

“In late October 1967...I went to see Kennedy. Be said flatly that he would not

be a candidate. That same day I talked with Gene McCarthy at Kennedy’s

suggestion. And McCarthy told me what I .knew from many others, that he

was considering it.”

Kennedy won in California…That night, McCarthy workers Allard Lowenstein and John Kenneth Galbraith agreed that the time had come for anti-war activists to unite around Robert Kennedy.34

From - THE HIGHBROW IN AMERICAN POLITICS: ARTHUR M. SCHLESINGER AND THE ROLE OF THE INTELLECTUAL IN POLITICS. BY DAVID B. KOPEL.

http://davekopel.com/Schlesinger/Schlesinger-chapter-12.pdf

His priority was getting rid of Johnson and he approached various people including Bobby Kennedy before McCarthy and was going to back Kennedy after he one in California. According to Galbraith approaching McCarthy was Kennedy’s idea. Are we to assume the CIA also backed all the other people Lowenstein approached?

Interesting stuff, which I'll have a look at before replying. In the meantime, a few links by way of return. All a bit disorganised, but germane, nonetheless:

Namebase on Thomas D. Finney:

http://www.namebase.org/cgi-bin/nb01?Na=Finney%2C+Thomas+D

CIA in Denmark, 1952

Post-McCarthy, Curtis Gans later became the director of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate (!).

Gans in 1983: "I didn't need demagogic television. All I needed was the war in Vietnam to be going on, and Lyndon Johnson to appear on the tube. . . . Where there is real dissatisfaction with the incumbent, the incumbent can get ousted without these devices. And where it is created dissatisfaction, he probably shouldn't be ousted.”*

* Testimony before the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration, September 29, 1983 (available from Committee for the Study of the American Electorate);

http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa112.html

By Curtis B. Gans:

"How to Take the Big Money Out of Politics," Washington Monthly, April 1979, pp. 40-42.

“Table for One, Please,” Washington Monthly, July/August 2000:

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/books/2000/0007.gans.html

Try good old Namebase for the following:

http://www.namebase.org/cgi-bin/nb01?Na=Gans%2C+Curtis

Quotable Gans:

"Paranoia is killing this country. It is essentially reducing cohesion in our society and creating fear in the minds of citizens.”

McCarthy supporters in 1968:

James Woolsey, ex-DCI : the founder and chairman of the Yale Citizens for Eugene McCarthy in 1967-68…

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/internation..._role_1-10.html

Seymour Hersh, CIA mouthpiece:

http://archive.salon.com/people/bc/2000/01...rsh/index1.html

“After stints at United Press International and the Associated Press, he made a brief detour as a press secretary to antiwar presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy”

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/arch...5/21/2003156358

"That year, Sen. Gene McCarthy’s anti-Vietnam insurgency disturbed the Democratic Party’s equilibrium by mounting a serious challenge to the renomination of President Lyndon Johnson. McCarthy was able to do that only because a few wealthy people gave him large contributions."

http://johnstodderinexile.wordpress.com/20...rverse-effects/

A retired CIA official who knew my father asked me to consider an intelligence analysis career during my senior year in college in spring 1971. I knew why he had retired when he did (December 1967) and why he became the Washington D.C. director of Eugene McCarthy’s presidential campaign two months later.

http://www.danieldrezner.com/archives/001592.html

McCarthy puff piece in the New Republic for the CIA-scripted Pentagon Papers:

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=19710710&s=mccarthy071071

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His [Lowenstein's] priority was getting rid of Johnson and he approached various people including Bobby Kennedy before McCarthy and was going to back Kennedy after he won in California. According to Galbraith approaching McCarthy was Kennedy’s idea. Are we to assume the CIA also backed all the other people Lowenstein approached?

Len, you and I have had our differences in the past, but I do want to compliment you on the improved format and readability of your posts. Much simpler to follow and easier on the eyes.

Edited by Michael Hogan
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. Interestingly even the publisher of the book that made the accusation admitted “Perhaps we'll never know for sure whether Lowenstein served as a CIA agent until the CIA opens its files to the public”

Over to you, CIA - open the files!

And how about all those others you've been refusing to release?

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In the meantime, a few links by way of return. All a bit disorganised, but germane, nonetheless:

Namebase on Thomas D. Finney:

http://www.namebase.org/cgi-bin/nb01?Na=Finney%2C+Thomas+D

CIA in Denmark, 1952

Nothing in there about him being in the CIA, only that he was mentioned in 2 consecutive pages of a 400+ page book about the OSS. So maybe he worked for that agency;

"Post-McCarthy, Curtis Gans later became the director of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate (!)."

Irrelevant unless you can show the group was tied to the CIA. And that he was part of it well before 1983

"Try good old Namebase for the following:

http://www.namebase.org/cgi-bin/nb01?Na=Gans%2C+Curtis"

If anything on the page (or they parts of your post I cut out of this reply) tied him to the CIA I missed it

"McCarthy supporters in 1968:

James Woolsey, ex-DCI : the founder and chairman of the Yale Citizens for Eugene McCarthy in 1967-68…

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/internation..._role_1-10.html"

Interesting bit of trivia, good for him. Like many current conservatives he was more progressive in his youth. Got any evidence of his ties to the agency before he was appointed DCI by a democrat 25 years later?

"Seymour Hersh, CIA mouthpiece:

http://archive.salon.com/people/bc/2000/01...rsh/index1.html"

I have my doubts about his Kennedy book but I think it highly unlikely that Hersh is a “CIA mouthpiece”. Got any evidence? Was already working for them in ’68?

"That year, Sen. Gene McCarthy’s anti-Vietnam insurgency disturbed the Democratic Party’s equilibrium by mounting a serious challenge to the renomination of President Lyndon Johnson. McCarthy was able to do that only because a few wealthy people gave him large contributions."

http://johnstodderinexile.wordpress.com/20...rverse-effects/

So claims an obscure blogger who provides no documentation to back his claim. There were a good number of wealthy liberal back then

A retired CIA official who knew my father asked me to consider an intelligence analysis career during my senior year in college in spring 1971. I knew why he had retired when he did (December 1967) and why he became the Washington D.C. director of Eugene McCarthy’s presidential campaign two months later.

http://www.danieldrezner.com/archives/001592.html

Can you do any better than a reply to a blog entry? If true it should he verifiable who was “the Washington D.C. director of Eugene McCarthy’s presidential campaign” IF true you got one confirmed ex-CIA guy working for McCarthy

McCarthy puff piece in the New Republic for the CIA-scripted Pentagon Papers:

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=19710710&s=mccarthy071071

The Pentagon Papers were CIA propaganda? I suppose you have real evidence to back that claim? Even if true you would have to show that he knew this when he wrote the article and that it furthered their aims.

You said that “McCarthy appears to have harboured a Lasky-like hatred of the Kennedys” but you provided no evidence to back this claim. I suggest that this could well be a case of projection and that you ‘appear to harbor a Lasky-like hatred of McCarthy’.

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Paul Rigby:

Thomas D. Finney:

Nothing in there about him being in the CIA, only that he was mentioned in 2 consecutive pages of a 400+ page book about the OSS. So maybe he worked for that agency.

So, you've moved from "which Thomas Finney, lots of Agency bods called Thomas Finney" to Thomas D. Finney, ex-OSS, at heart of "Clean for Gene" campaign, but...what exactly? Couldn't conceivably have been CIA? Or merely I lack a signed confession?

"Post-McCarthy, Curtis Gans later became the director of the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate (!)."[/b]

Irrelevant unless you can show the group was tied to the CIA. And that he was part of it well before 1983

Pretty droll, no, to find Gans lecturing others about campaign dependence upon "big money" after serving in campaign utterly dependent upon, er, a small number of large contributors. Know who they were? Thought not. So how can you preclude CIA presence?

But you offer a useful prompt: more work to be done on Gans' Agency ties.

"McCarthy supporters in 1968:

James Woolsey, ex-DCI : the founder and chairman of the Yale Citizens for Eugene McCarthy in 1967-68…

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/internation..._role_1-10.html"

Interesting bit of trivia, good for him. Like many current conservatives he was more progressive in his youth. Got any evidence of his ties to the agency before he was appointed DCI by a democrat 25 years later?

You have a splendidly crude notion of politics: Woolsey was anti-Vietnam in 1967-68, ergo, he must have been a progressive. I suspect a) he was talent-spotted at Yale by CIA; and B) he was intent upon impressing his elders and betters with his nose for the prevailing wind. The mundane truth is that powerful Washington circles turned against the war in Vietnam on grounds of cost and efficacy; and for fear of war with China. Nowt to do with morality, as Woolsey's subsequent career attests.

"Seymour Hersh, CIA mouthpiece:

http://archive.salon.com/people/bc/2000/01...rsh/index1.html"

I have my doubts about his Kennedy book...

Well done, Len, there's no pulling the wool over your eyes...

...but I think it highly unlikely that Hersh is a “CIA mouthpiece”. Got any evidence? Was already working for them in ’68?
You mean Colby entrusted his anti-Angleton morsels to a non-CIA journo? But I jump ahead six years. Was he working for the Agency in '68? Highly likely.
"That year, Sen. Gene McCarthy’s anti-Vietnam insurgency disturbed the Democratic Party’s equilibrium by mounting a serious challenge to the renomination of President Lyndon Johnson. McCarthy was able to do that only because a few wealthy people gave him large contributions."

http://johnstodderinexile.wordpress.com/20...rverse-effects/

So claims an obscure blogger who provides no documentation to back his claim. There were a good number of wealthy liberal back then

A retired CIA official who knew my father asked me to consider an intelligence analysis career during my senior year in college in spring 1971. I knew why he had retired when he did (December 1967) and why he became the Washington D.C. director of Eugene McCarthy’s presidential campaign two months later.

http://www.danieldrezner.com/archives/001592.html

Can you do any better than a reply to a blog entry? If true it should he verifiable who was “the Washington D.C. director of Eugene McCarthy’s presidential campaign” IF true you got one confirmed ex-CIA guy working for McCarthy.

Why don't you just ask him? Or isn't that permitted?

McCarthy puff piece in the New Republic for the CIA-scripted Pentagon Papers:

http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=19710710&s=mccarthy071071

The Pentagon Papers were CIA propaganda? I suppose you have real evidence to back that claim?
Priceless! Tell you the truth, Len, I left the job of demolishing the Pentagon Papers to some obscure guy called Peter Dale Scott.
Even if true you would have to show that he knew this when he wrote the article and that it furthered their aims.

McCarthy knew the Pentagon Papers were nonsense because he was alive and conscious in the period 1961-1963, and was sufficiently concerned with matters CIA to a) oppose the nomination of John McCone; and B) write a lengthy piece on the CIA published in early 1964. Compare and contrast "The CIA is getting out of hand" (Sat Eve Post, 4-11 Jan 1964, pp.6 &10) with his review of the Pentagon Papers. In fairness to McCarthy, his was a common sojourn. Precisely the same rowing back is found, for example, in the case of Senator Gruening. I can think of no other example, however, of a Senate or House opponent of the Agency going quite so far in actively assisting the Agency later on.

You said that “McCarthy appears to have harboured a Lasky-like hatred of the Kennedys” but you provided no evidence to back this claim. I suggest that this could well be a case of projection and that you ‘appear to harbor a Lasky-like hatred of McCarthy’.

I hate Clean Gene? Not as much as you hate interrogating received wisdom, or challenging authority. You should try it some time. You might even get to differentiate one Finney from another.

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Len, you and I have had our differences in the past, but I do want to compliment you on the improved format and readability of your posts. Much simpler to follow and easier on the eyes.

Another essential contribution from the Wackford Squeers of the Education Forum.

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Splitter?

In 1960, McCarthy nominated Stevenson, improving Johnsons chances, and hampering Kennedy's.

In 1968, while Kennedy and King were still alive, William J. Vanden Heuvel, who served in the Kennedy administartions Justice Department, played a role in keeping King from supporting Gene and instead forming a united front with Kennedy.

Walter Reuther of the UAW, also supported such an alliance as a catlyst for sweeping social changes and an end to the Vietnam war.

"Peace and Prosperity"

A guaranteed minimum income

national public works programs

end to the vietnam war

This alliance was attacked vigorously by the right in the leadup to King's and R. Kennedy's assassination.

Relevant to this issue is also the CIA sponsoring/splitting of the labour movement, (from which Reuther suffered) a major operation overshadowed by the Nationa Students Association demise after the Ramparts revelations of CIA funding and no-draft assurances to few but significant top leadership of that organisation.

With King and Bobby out of the way, and Johnson damaged by a dramatic national drop in support for the Vietnam war, McCarthy and Humphrey were left to doodle about, probably assuring Nixons victory.

Victims of the 60's Civil Rights fight : Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, John F Kennedy, Martin Luther King jr, Robert F. Kennedy and the many slaughtered innocents and activists.

(image) Charles Evers, Bobby's friend: "There is a conspiracy going on in this country..."

Edited by John Dolva
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Len, you and I have had our differences in the past, but I do want to compliment you on the improved format and readability of your posts. Much simpler to follow and easier on the eyes.

Another essential contribution from the Wackford Squeers of the Education Forum.

My God you do have a sharp tongue Paul.

At the risk of copping a dose myself, I really must stick up for Michael here.

(1) His successful campaign to help Len improve the presentation of his posts has been a blessing for all concerned.

(2) Even if you don't share my fondness for Michael posts, is Wackford Squeers really the appropriate literary analogy?

The British Library reports that headmaster William Shaw was the model for Dickens' hateful character. In 1823, Shaw had been prosecuted for beatings and neglect that led to the blinding of two of his pupils.

Wikipedia is similarly unflattering:

A cruel, one-eyed, Yorkshire schoolmaster. He runs “Dotheboys Hall”, a place where unwanted children can be sent away. He mistreats the boys horribly, whipping them regularly. He gets his comeuppance at the hands of Nicholas when he is beaten in retaliation for the whipping of Smike. He travels to London after he recovers and partakes in more bad business, fulfilling his grudge against Nicholas by becoming a close partner in Ralph’s schemes to fake Smike’s parentage and later to hide the will of Madeline Brey. He is arrested during the last of these tasks and sentenced to transportation to Australia.

It's a side of Michael Hogan I have yet to see on the forum. He seems a such a nice guy. Hard to imagine him sadistically whipping other members.

Still, it clearly worked wonders with Len :tomatoes

Edited by Sid Walker
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I've been reluctant to reply to this post because I was personally involved in Gene McCarthy's '68 campaign, an experience that radicalized me as far as politics goes.

Just as David Talbot was a volunteer for RFK in '68, I was a student volunteer for McCarthy, enlisting early in the campaign and assigned the job of coordunating other volunteers for the New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York primaries, even though I was only 17 years old.

I also assisted a McCarthy advance man in Atlantic City in the summer of '68 when McCarthy was to address the NAACP convention, but was prevented from doing so.

I then traveled to Chicago and worked on the Special Projects Committe at the Democratic National Convention and was caught in the middle of the riots.

One memory that stands out is my father waking me one morning to tell me that RFK was killed. Because RFK didn't enter the campaign until after McCarthy faired so well against LBJ in New Hampshire, forcing LBJ out of the race, I didn't like him one bit. The other Kennedys were no better, failing to endorse McCarthy against Humphrey and instead naming George McGovern as their man.

Although I was there, working with McCarthy's national staff at the Conrad Hilton Hotel, I didn't realize that McCarthy had pretty much given up on getting the nomination, and after the anti-Vietnam war peace plank failed, the game was up.

The antimosity McCarthy's supporters felt towards RFK was not as serious as Lisa Howard and her crew, who really despised RFK, and thought him the devil incarnate.

Then there are those who worked on RFK's anti-Castro Cuban projects at JMWAVE, and ran the subversion and insurgency ops, who were informed of the Lisa Howard/Lechuga/Atwood/JFK back channel link, and set in motion the events that would result in what happened at Dealey Plaza.

This set up the blackmail of RFK via Jack Anderson/Walman/Ultimate Sac stories that RFK had approved the Castro murder plots that backfired on them.

My antimosity towards RFK, even in death, has been tempered by meeting and working with his sons RFK, Jr. and the late Michael, and reading David Talbot's Brothers, which I believe is an accurate interpation of events.

I also maintained my connections to Gene McCarthy, whose long time secretary Jean Stack became my neighbor in her retirement. I would occassionally call McCarthy at home and have discussions with him, one of which I recorded and transcribed.

As for CIA officials supporting him, that's not so surprising, as McCarthy was a thinkin man's intellectual, a poet and independent politician for whom liberal was not a dirty word.

But like I said, he didn't convert me to liberalism, but rather, gave me the political experience that made me radical, and I thank him for it.

BK

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