Joan Mellen's Taking Aim broadcast on WBAI

[Myra Bronstein]

...

As for Brecht ... The need for heroes is so deeply wired into our species that its disappearance perforce will mark our own final exit from this stage. Pity the human being who has no such need.

...

Charles

The human with no such need would be an extreme aberration.

I'll quote one of the best articles I've read on propaganda:

"Propaganda works by appealing to our most base, animalistic instincts. It does not appeal to our better nature, although one of the purposes of it is to convince us it does. It pretends to appeal to our reason, when in fact it appeals to our most primitive emotions. There is good reason for this: perception travels through the emotional brain first, to the rational brain last.

Specifically, propaganda works by appealing to three things: emotionalism, tribalism and narcissism.

I just mentioned perception travels first to the emotional brain, then the rational brain. This happens to everyone, including people who con themselves they are the most rational and intelligent of intellectuals.

As for tribes, we share with every nearly every animal in the world the instinct to form tribes, arranged in a hierachy, with a leader. We are group animals. The fact we look to a leader to take care of us is one of the most firmly established principles in psychology (if you don't remember anything else, remember that).

...

Bernays claimed that "the group mind does not think in the strict sense of the word…In making up its mind, its first impulse is usually to follow the example of a trusted leader. This is one of the most firmly established principles in mass psychology.""

http://home.att.net/~bob.wallace/howpropagandaworks.html

[Charles Drago]

Very nice, Myra.

Thank you for the references.

[Nathaniel Heidenheimer]

Joan:

Thanks for making the time to respond to my questions. I appreciate it, especially as you are spending so much time researching your next book, which I look forward to reading. I thought AFTJ was excellent in many ways, especially in the area of media and the CIA. Its great to recognize a windmill without an airfare to Holland!

I hope its not beating a depressed camel if I refine a few points I may have expressed unclearly, resulting in misinterpretation.

First, I never claimed that it was not true that RFK MAY have been involved in the ongoing attempts to assassinate Castro that preceded the Kennedy administration. My point was that quoting Helms and Halpern on this issue requires an extremely careful analysis of their background and motivations in placing most of the blame on Bobby. If you go back and listen to the taking aim broadcast, I don’t see how you can avoid concluding that this analysis was entirely absent.

As we know the CIA had contact with both Kennedy approved and non-Kennedy approved groups of exile Cubans. There seems to have been a legitimate CIA interest in monitoring these non-approved exile groups, to see if they were trying to start something that was not approved by the administration. There also exists the possibility—a strong one in my opinion—that this CIA monitoring of the non-approved

Cuban exile groups may have resulted in cooperation between a faction of the CIA –a

faction that I see as by no means peripheral because of what I am convinced at this point are clear links to the Angleton-Helms maypole—and one or more groups of “exiles on the outs” to murder Kennedy. Larry Hancock has argued convincingly that these cooperating partners need not have shared the same motives.

It seems an inescapable conclusion that your quoting of Charles Ford is highly selective at best. Note the reference in Ford’s written testimony to the David Morales led AMOTS , the CIA “shadow intelligence organization” (SWHT p.131):

I was then asked if the word ‘AMOTS’ meant anything to me and I said that

it did, but that all I could say was that it had to do with counterintelligence

activities. Mr. Rhea asked me whether I would say that the ‘AMOTS” activity

was concerned with contacting Cuban exiles in the Miami area and I indicated

that this was my understanding. The subject was not pursued further. (CIA:

104-10303-10001: JFK-MISC: CIA-OP, p.9) Sorry, this warn’t covered in Strunk

‘n White!

Its worth noting that throughout the written testimony, the questioners seem very curious about RFK his possible links to assassins; their curiosity seems much more circumscribed when it comes to Ford’s knowledge about CIA connections to the exiles that were unknown to the Kennedys

Now look at section 12 from Ford’s written testimony:

Mr. Robert Kelley expressed considerable interest in the organization

of Task Force W. At one point he asked how many echelons there were

between me and Mr. Helms. I told them that I reported to Bill Harvey; that

my title was Special Assistant; that Mr. Harvey reported to Mr. Helms; That

I frequently received assignment and reported to Sam Halpern; and that I

occasionally undertook tasks for Bruce Cheever, Harvey’s deputy, although

these tasks were concerned with the workings of Task Force W and did not

involve contacts with the Cubans.

Both Helms and Halpern seem a little too close to the action to be objective sources

on Bobby and the Castro assassination attempts, especially considering that this was the

fourth year of such attempts-- however varied the species--that the agency had tried to

coordinate.

This highly selective searching image used by the Senate investigators is alluded to again

by Ford in the confidential memo he wrote for the CIA’s internal record,

detailing what he had told Church Committee investigators when they came calling

on him the day before. ‘The main, if not the only, point of concern to the [senate]

investigators is whether I was directed to sally forth and initiate contact with

members of the underworld in the U.S. and who directed me to do so,’ wrote

Ford . Once again, I explained that my job was broader than this by a long shot, and

that I was never directed to take the initiative in establishing contacts withthe under

world’ Ford added that investigators were very interested in his meetings with AG

Kennedy, but he explained to them that these meetings focused on the efforts of a

Cuban exile group to foment an anti-Castro uprising not on the Mafia Assassination

plots. (p.123 Brothers)

Given the complexity of CIA relations with the anti-Castro Cubans, the near myopic concern of the Senate investigators questions with RFK at the exclusion of CIA agents not under nominal control of Task Force W, and your own exclusion of Ford’s state-ment that he was alluding to a broader range of possible Coup related activity than simply assassination, your use Charles Ford’s testimony in the Taking Aim broadcast

proves very little.

Well it’s an hour show with a lot to talk about, and besides, Taking aim audiences are already familiar with CIA involvement in the Kennedy Assassination, one might respond. Well it was two years ago since you were on, and the Kennedy Assassination, while covered on the show often with great insight, is the topic maybe once a year. Compare that to the coverage given to Posner Schemes in the corporate media. Your show may have been the only one that many people under 40 listen to about the assassination, as they have been subject to and endless stream of throw out baby with

Bathwater “conspiracy theory” discourse in the mass media.

With reference to Clark you write “You also seem to conflate the FBI and the Justice

Department. You need to add the fact that Hoover ren roughshod over the Justice

Department” Interesting that the very significant Hoover factor is brought up as a

mitigating circumstance when it comes to Clark’s collaboration with Langley

and Johnson’s “Get Garrison,” but is nowhere to be seen in your account of Bobby

the King-Bugger.

You write “to equate Ramsey Clark with Richard Helms is simply ahistorical and inaccurate” I agree, and I never made this equation. I simply was pointing out that Clark had participated in the overall Garrison sabotage, and that therefore his

statements must be weighed for bias and motive as any other.

Finally in response to your view that the CIA decided to help assassinate Kennedy (hope

this is not an inaccurate phrasing of your views) to avoid a neutralist South Vietnam, I think this may have been one reason, although I don’t see how you can conflate a neutralist Laos with a neutralist Vietnam circa 1968, save with an extremely cynical and ahistorical eye.

I think there were other factors including preventing an investigation of JFK s assassination with control over the institutions with the real power to make that investigation legitimate. At this point I am more in agreement with Talbot than with

John about which RFK feared more: pursuing the investigation with deeply compromised

investigative agencies, or on the other hand, the possibility that his own involvement in the Castro Assassination plots would come to light. It just seems that it would be harder to pin on RFK any more than the CIA, and even if it were true it would be more manageable to solve this conflict of interest than the one Talbot raises. Note that this cannot be dismissed as hero-worship because I don’t state that RFK DEFINITELY WAS NOT INVOLVED. I just think that its harder to prove than some might think, and given the CIA s ongoing involvement in Castro assassination plots it is possible that they were never RFK’s plans at all. Or if they were, how do we know they were not to pacify the military, while back channel operations were being considered.

Those who see JFK as a peace-seeker and his brother as an ultimate hawk, fail to consider that one might not have been possible without the other. Such was JFK’s predicament with a fanatically unilateralist JCS and their friends who guarded the guardians.

Neither John nor Joan mention the speeches made by RFK between 1966-and 68, concentrating more on what his earlier actions suggest about his true motivation. That’s easy to do—until you look at them again.

Seen from the point of view of today’s Democratic Party, or even the Dems of 1992, there is a difference to be measured in light-years. There is a willingness to connect the two antennae that are never to be connected: wars overseas and distribution of income and the social structure, domestically.

Now one might argue, ‘RFK was doing that not out of conviction but out of opportunism to exploit the grass roots” Fine. But to my reading he did it with gusto, and in a way that was likely to have unintended consequences even if you assume that his views were not subject to considerable change, which I don’t.

In 2007 we have become rightly cynical about the words of pols. But it is ahistorical to misplace this cynicism if it obscures the relationship between words at the top and heat in the street in 1968.

Hoover himself had voiced fears in 1964 of a NATIONAL black leader who had the power of access to the media which would enable the linking of local struggles coast to coast. Words on NATIONAL MEDIA could have had a very real and powerful reciprocal interaction with grass roots movements. Already, MLK had been assassinated, in my view, because he was uniting three different strands of social protest: the anti-war movement, the union movement, and parts of the Civil Rights movement.

Jr. Senator you knew RFK and he was no MLK? True dat, and yet there are some real similarities if one looks at the speeches, especially the linking of foreign wars and domestic poverty. In my mind the CIA doesn’t give a hoot about the content of a

politicians character: in 1968, RFK had the power of a national megaphone, and was speaking words very very different from 1963 to a wide audience and in a historical context that together spelled a serious threat to the powers that still be.

Recall that the middle and end of most historical revolutions bear little similarity to their beginning.

Edited August 21, 2007 by Nathaniel Heidenheimer

[Joan Mellen]

Dear Nathaniel Heidenheimer,

I appreciate the time you are taking on this topic. E-mail has its limitations, and there are a few misconceptions that I'll try to clear up. Let me say, first, that you use the term "motivation" several times. This is troubling, when it comes to a given individual, as in the case of Sam Halpern. In the case of CIA, I devote an entire chapter to chronicling CIA's political motivation to thwart President Kennedy at every turn, and his motivation, in turn, to reign them in. All that can be documented. Personal motivations, as in the case of Halpern, are impossible to penetrate unless the speaker helps us out, and why, indeed, should he!

Let me say, again, with respect to "Taking Aim," that had I "world enough and time" I would have given a lengthy discussion of the attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro and the CIA would be at the top of the list of perpetrators. I, perhaps mistakenly, didn't believe that I had to reinvent the wheel during my few minutes on the recent "Taking Aim" program. Since the 1967 Inspector General's Report, and the huge JMWAVE releases, the witness testimony, etc. I can't even begin to recite the litany of evidence of murder plots by the CIA this morning. I'm sure you're aware of it, so the point is a bit disingenuous.

We know that the CIA was in the murder business, the Executive Action business. This is received wisdom. I perhaps should have nodded to that fact. For "young" listeners, I would hope that they would read "A Farewell to Justice" for my views and many other books as well, such as Gaeton Fonzi's. It's not a good idea to get your information from radio programs, which offer but a glimpse of the issues.

We expected nothing more of the CIA given their record of assassinations and assassination attempts. We did expect more of the Kennedys, who presented themselves as peace-loving liberals. That THEY were also engaged in attempts to murder Fidel Castro is breathtaking, and of a different order of information than the CIA doing what had become its nature to do.

I know I'm repeating myself, but if it were merely Halpern as the source, I would be suspicious too. But there is a considerable list of corroborators of Bobby's assassination schemes.The rule in journalism is that you need two. We've got three times that.

Yes, Bobby was involved, from his office at Langley, in CIA organized plots as well as the plots on his own. CIA's efforts weren't mere "monitoring" of obstreperous exiles, as we know. That CIA was carrying on without telling the Kennedy administration is true, as you say.

This still does not justify Bobby free-lancing with Lansdale and others. I don't know what you mean by "exiles on the outs," and I don't want to venture where I don't know: exiles on the outs with CIA were the people involved in the Kennedy assassination? Does this mean that CIA is not responsible? This takes us away from the matter at hand.

Charles Ford, like the Kennedys, had his fingers in more than one pie, as the released documents show. He had that assignment from Bobby, out of Langley. He also was a CIA operative, as we know. (I didn't get the reference to Strunk and White, sorry). There is no doubt that the CIA ran its own show, and didn't inform the Kennedys of many things. That's in "A Farewell To Justice," and many other places, particularly in the biographies of John F. Kennedy. That's not new. (I am not including "The Dark Side Of Camelot" in any of this: the implication that JFK's policy-making was influenced by his infidelities is preposterous, and unproven).

I might flag your use of the word "objective" along with your use of the word "motivation." This is not aesthetics. No one is "objective" here. Everyone is acting out of their own interests. This bears no relation on what is true and what isn't true. Yes, Charlie Ford testified that he didn't do anything naughty. What's useful in the Church committee records, which are filled with such denials as Ford's, is when the truth rears its head, as when Helms admits that he made up the story that Jim Garrison met Johnny Rosselli when he was in Las Vegas. Astonishing admission! But then, the Church committee had Rosselli testify and Rosselli made his own denial that he ever met Garrison. If you read the Rosselli transcript, it's clear he is dumbfounded. He never met Garrison in his life. He saw him on television. Reading that, I believed Rosselli. What did he care about Garrison anyway! But Helms sure did.

I did not use Charles Ford's testimony in my "Taking Aim" interview. I used Halpern's oral history for the CIA.

Are you referring to my 2005 program or to the recent one? On the 2005 program, did I discuss all this Ford/Fiscalini Castro issue? I can't remember. All along I thought you were referring to the recent "family jewel" program, and then I was not on for anything like the full hour.

Bobby seems to have spent much of his time at Langley, which may account for the ease with which Hoover ran roughshod, etc. But it was, of course, Ramsey Clark that the FBI really ran roughshod over. Hoover had those files on the Kennedys, of course, and blackmail was his game, as we all know.

I did not write that the CIA "decided to help assassinate Kennedy." Nor did I ever say anything about "a neutralist South Vietnam." That was never, ever in the cards. The Vietnamese were going for broke. These are indeed, inaccurate statements. What I wrote in "A Farewell to Justice" was that the clandestine service of the CIA organized the assassination of President Kennedy, and I have paid for taking that stand. What the Kennedys hoped for, a "Laotian solution" in Vietnam, would, of course, never have happened. It's what Bobby Kennedy said his brother DESIRED, not what would have come to pass, in my opinion. Vietnamese history tells that story. They had already beat back the Chinese, the Japanese and the French.

There would never have been an investigation by RFK "with deeply compromised investigative agencies." That's a straw man you erect. Bobby knew better than that. Again, I am not getting into the CIA assassination plots that RFK may or may not have known about. I was confining my discussion to RFK's own private efforts. The why and the wherefore, I didn't discuss.

The Kennedys were neither peace-seekers (!) nor hawks. They were pragmatic politicians. As one of the books (Kaiser's or another) quotes Kennedy intimate, Charlie Bartlett, their main concern was getting JFK re-elected in 1964. This was the continuing preoccupation and obsession. Given what was going on in the world, Bartlett was taken aback. Of course, politicians worrying about being re-elected is not a crime. This is what is to be expected of politicians. We are talking about politicians here, not saints, radicals, or even social reformers. Look at Chris Dodd here yesterday saying that the Democrats shouldn't devote themselves to impeaching George Bush, since this effort would hurt their chances for re-election. So politicians play their game. Obviously the Kennedys had no idea of the depth of opposition to them.

I love Ted Sorensen's speeches, as I said in my last post, but rhetoric is not evidence. Regarding Bobby's last speeches, and his campaign, the approval he received from crowds was related to the need in this society for change, not, in any provable way, to what he would have done. I don't know what he would have done. This is not a fruitful question, it seems to me.

You close with more of those comparisons I find odious. No one at the time, those who lived this history, confused Bobby Kennedy with Martin Luther King in terms of addressing the needs of the poor and the disenfranchised. Bobby can't ride those coattails, if you have an interest in history.

And I have to say, this all seems like a fairy-tale to me, this glorification of Bobby Kennedy as someone people today believe would have marshaled social change in a meaningful way. I can imagine that those, now dead, who knew what Bobby was about because they were close to these events would be absolutely astonished. I really dislike being personal, but let me add that among my very closest friends for years was a Harvard classmate of John F. Kennedy's and a good friend of his (Kennedy appointed him to be Ambassador to Morocco, but he turned it down), and who later became Eugene McCarthy's campaign manager. He had a storehouse of evidence about Bobby's antics and tricks. He respected "Jack," but, like virtually every liberal of the day, despised "Bobby." Alas, he died some years ago, or I would have asked him to chat with you.

[Nathaniel Heidenheimer]

Joan-

Thanks for taking the time to address your concerns. Look forward to the next volume!

[Tim Gratz]

RFK was a good man for several reasons.

One, as Mr. Dunne correctly points out, for being concerned with the plight of poor people.

Also, for doing his best to restore freedom to Cuba. (I think it would have happened in 1964 had JFK lived.)

(In a different post, John incredibly appears to criticize a Guatemelian who donated land to help train the courageous members of Brigade 2506 who were willing to die to bring freedom to the land they loved.)

From the August 20, 2007 Key West Citizen: (Note this is not an unusual occurence.)

First there were shouts of jubilation coming from the beach. Then a couple men, clothes dripping wet, ran down the concrete steps from Smathers Beach to the sidewalk. Then a couple more, and then more.

"America? America?" one asked Key West resident Phyllis May. "I said, 'Yes, this is America,'" May said Sunday. "They just got down and kissed the ground. .... Until somebody told them it was America, they just didn't want to believe it."

The men were among 27 Cubans who stepped ashore at Smathers Beach at about 8:30 a.m. Sunday as May pedaled her bike along the popular beachside path.

The 17 men, two boys and eight women were all reportedly in good health when Key West police officers arrived moments after the Cubans were dropped off by a light blue speed boat that fled the scene, Christie Phillips, spokeswoman for the Key West Police Department said in a press release.

The group told authorities they left Cuba at 2 a.m. and encountered rough seas. Most were soaking wet, and some of them were dehydrated from seasickness, Phillips said.

Officers gave the refugees water and food from McDonalds, and Key West firefighters gave them T-shirts.

Under the U.S. wet-foot, dry-foot policy, Cubans who make it to American soil are allowed to stay in the United States, while those stopped at sea are returned to Cuba.

That explains the early morning shoreside celebration, which took a few minutes for May to comprehend.

"[At first] I thought whoa, somebody's really having an early morning exuberating experience," she said, adding that she finally realized what had happened when they started asking about America and kissing the ground. "It was something that I thought I'd never see, but it was just heart-wrenching."

The Cubans were being held at the Monroe County Detention Center while U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents traveled from Miami to take custody of them. The U.S. Coast and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission were on the lookout Sunday for the speed boat that shuttled the Cubans across the Florida Straits to Key West.

Another group of Cubans was stopped at sea near the Marquesas Keys, about 22 miles west of Key West after the Cuban government alerted the U.S. Coast Guard of a possible migrant crossing at 4:30 a.m. Friday, according to a Sheriff's Office report. The Coast Guard located the boat and activated lights and siren to try to stop it, but the driver of the 33-foot 2007 Avanti with twin 275 horsepower Mercury engines refused to stop, Detective Paul Schultz said in the report.

Several times during the pursuit the alleged smuggler drove at speeds reaching 45 knots and attempted to ram the Coast Guard vessel, one time actually hitting it, according to the report.

Because of the extreme danger to both the passengers on the fleeing boat and the crew on the Coast Guard vessel, Schultz said the Coast Guard had to fire a weapon into the starboard engine of the speed boat to bring it to a stop. The 19 Cuban migrants and alleged smugglers Yudel Armada, 26, of Hialeah and 23-year-old Dariel Sanchez of Homestead were taken to the Coast Guard station in Key West. None of them was injured.

The Sheriff's Office was notified and Schultz arrested Armada and Sanchez on charges of fleeing and eluding police, aggravated assault on a law enforcement officer and reckless operation of a vessel. They were booked into the Monroe County Detention Center on Stock Island.

Schultz said the Coast Guard took custody of the 19 Cuban migrants, who are likely to be repatriated to Cuba because they did not make it to American soil.

Edited August 23, 2007 by Tim Gratz

[Bernice Moore]

No one at the time, those who lived this history, confused Bobby Kennedy with Martin Luther King in terms of addressing the needs of the poor and the disenfranchised. Bobby can't ride those coattails, if you have an interest in history.

And I have to say, this all seems like a fairy-tale to me, this glorification of Bobby Kennedy as someone people today believe would have marshaled social change in a meaningful way. I can imagine that those, now dead, who knew what Bobby was about because they were close to these events would be absolutely astonished....

Joan fails to mention the oft-repeated sentiment of actual black people, after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.: "At least we've still got Bobby." But clearly Robert Kennedy was an evil man, and there's no point arguing with Joan or John S. on the subject, since they know so much.

From Robert Kennedy: A Memoir by Jack Newfield (New York: E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc., 1969).

[uS Senators for the state of New York Jacob Javits and Robert] Kennedy visited a migrant farm worker camp just outside of Rochester, New York, in September of 1967. As the two Senators, a few union officials, and about a half-dozen reporters reached the campsite, they were welcomed by a sign that read, "Anyone entering or trespassing without my permission will be shot if caught." Most of the people in the entourage stopped, except for Kennedy: he kept on walking, head down, into an abandoned bus that was converted into living quarters for three migrant families. Inside the stench-filled bus, Kennedy saw six children, all less than ten years old. Their bodies were covered with unhealed scabs, and flies, and most of them had running noses. They were all black. Kennedy's face suddenly recaptured the terrible look it had in the months after his brother's assassination. Compassion, anger, and pain mingled and flattened his features. An old, bent woman wandered into the bus, and Kennedy asked her how much money she earned. She said, as she looked at her feet, that she earned $1 an hour picking celery. Kennedy made a face, and shook his head.

He went out and looked into the next dilapidated bus. It was empty except for one child playing on a filthy mattress. The windows were filled with torn cardboard. There was no running water and no stove. As Kennedy looked down at the child, his hand and his head trembled in rage. He seemed like a man going through an exorcism, or a religious experience.

He walked out and confronted the camp's owner, Jay DeBadts.

"You had no right to go in there," DeBadts shouted at Kennedy, gesturing to his sign. "You're just a do-gooder trying to make some headlines."

Kennedy looked at him, still struggling to control his emotions, and almost whispered, "You are something out of the nineteenth century. I wouldn't put an animal in those buses."

"It's like camping out," replied DeBadts.

Kennedy turned and left. But the memory was burned into his imagination. He talked about it again and again in othe places. He wrote letters to Governor Nelson Rockefeller asking for an investigation of health conditions at the migrant camps. He wrote letters to labor leaders urging them to organize the migrants, and lobby to gain for them the right of collective bargaining. And he thought about what it might feel like to live in a bus and pick celery for $1 an hour.... (pp. 82-83)

***************************************

"It's like camping out," replied DeBadts..........

B......

[John Simkin]

Joan fails to mention the oft-repeated sentiment of actual black people, after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.: "At least we've still got Bobby." But clearly Robert Kennedy was an evil man, and there's no point arguing with Joan or John S. on the subject, since they know so much.

I am sure they did say this. However, I wonder what they thought about RFK if they read Edwin Guthman and Jeffrey Shulman (ed.), Robert Kennedy in his Own Words (1988). In these interviews he explained what his real views on civil rights were.

[Cliff Varnell]

The need for heroes is so deeply wired into our species that its disappearance perforce will mark our own final exit from this stage. Pity the human being who has no such need.

America eats its heroes.

An order of ruthless Bobby with a side of clueless Big Jim?

Pass.

Preferring to regard "heroic acts" more than our always-flawed "heroes,"

I will admit John Lennon is a hero of mine, w/ a side of John Lydon.

[Paul Rigby]

Bobby might also have transferred the ground war in Vietnam to a Laos-like solution, with death squads roaming the countryside to get rid of radicals. We know this because Bobby revealed it to Daniel Ellsberg in an interview reported in Ellsberg's memoir.

That piece of diction – “radicals” – lingers. Could it be that Mellen wishes to suggest to her readers that RFK, had he won the presidency in ’68, would have hunted down domestic “radicals” like, well, Mellen herself?

But we need not linger on mere suspicion of hysterical and self-dramatising anti-RFK propaganda when we have such clear proof of same: Did RFK really reveal any such plan – to fill Vietnam with “death squads,” no less - to Ellsberg? If so, why is it missing from Ellsberg’s first version of his contacts with, and impressions of, RFK? It certainly isn’t anywhere in an article on the subject which preceded Ellsberg’s book-memoir by thirty years: Jan Wenner, “Dan Ellsberg: Interview, part II,” Rolling Stone, 6 December 1973, pp.16-25. On the contrary, Ellsberg became increasingly impressed with RFK (p.24):

“The picture that people had of him, that he was purely an opportunist on the War – nailing down a particular position so as to oppose Johnson – I felt was exactly the opposite of the truth. That he cared very deeply about the War and that, often – too often – he compromised that feeling for political tactics. But I don’t doubt the sincerity of his feelings, and that drew me to him very strongly.”

Of course, the obvious rejoinder to this charge of an obsession with the mere acquisition of power is what on earth could RFK achieve without it? One group certainly did not share the view of RFK here propounded by Mellen – the people who killed him, as Mellen herself, with that sure mastery of logic which so disfigures her Garrison book, proceeds to make clear in her very next paragraph:

Bobby states that a Laos-like solution is what he believed his brother would have done, re: Vietnam, had he lived. Yet the ground war was indeed what the military-industrial complex wanted and needed. So in a way Bobby was assassinated for the same reason his brother was.

A second group – let us here assume there were no links with the first - doubtless perplexed by Mellon’s version of JFK’s policies in Laos would appear to be the very CIA/Special Forces men running the actual death squads there in 1961-62.

Both the Agency and Military Assistance Advisory Group personnel there “scarcely hid their disapproval” of the Kennedy-backed peace negotiation and worked actively to “subvert it.” (1) The opposition became so naked that in mid-November 1961 Brigadier Andrew Boyle, commander of the US military “adviser” contingent in Laos, was obliged to threaten “that any enlisted man or officer who violated” his order to desist from public dissent to the Kennedy White House policy “would be returned immediately to the United States with an official reprimand and might face further disciplinary action.” (2) A New York Times editorial at the end of the month lamented that “American policy in Laos has often suffered from conflicting action by agents of different branches of the United States Government. In Vientiane the embassy has at times pursued one program, Pentagon men and Central Intelligence operatives still another.” (3)

In summary, Mellen’s game-plan is the familiar one – offer revelations about the CIA to gain credibility, then lavish the banked credit on a depressingly familiar assortment of preposterous inversions & crude smears.

(1) Don A. Schanche, “Have We Lost Southeast Asia?,” Saturday Evening Post, 7 April 1962, p.88.

(2) Jacques Nevard, “US Bars Carping By Aides In Laos,” The New York Times, 29 November 1961, p.8.

(3) Editorial, “Untogetherness in Laos,” The New York Times, 30 November 1961, p.

[Guest Tom Scully]

The quotes are from posts four to seven years old. I am simply matching up what was posted then, with some details I have come across recently. I think the only thing we may agree on is that we know more than we did then, but it does not seem we are any closer now to agreeing on who was behind the assassination of JFk, or whether or not Joan Mellen got a few things right, as I have excerpted her quotes. Look whose name just happens to show up on the second page of the "Bush of the CIA" memo. I've never seen that second page, before.

..... Thank you very much for reading “A Farewell To Justice,” for listening to “Taking Aim,” and for sending along your questions. I appreciate it very much. I hope I can reply to these questions to your satisfaction.

I remain the same person who wrote “A Farewell to Justice,” the person who placed responsibility for the assassination of President Kennedy at the door of the clandestine service and Richard Helms, along with close associates like Lawrence Houston, David Atlee Phillips and others. I don’t know who else has drawn that conclusion, but I did, and I stand by it. So I must not have made myself clear if you concluded that I was defending Helms for anything...

....When I interviewed Clark at his office, he repeated the line he had been given by the FBI, that Jim Garrison had persecuted and prosecuted Clay Shaw because Shaw was gay.Clark mumbled this line, as if he no longer believed it, but it was what he still allowed himself to believe. This was not noble, no. There are no saints, and no heroes in this story, although some might even argue that Jim Garrison, in his commitment to his investigation, deserves high praise, no matter that he made inevitable mistakes. I was very amused by the person on the Forum who said, so you’re saying Jim Garrison was John F. Kennedy’s real brother? Garrison came to believe that it was his desire to be President that prevented Bobby from an open inquiry into his brother’s death. Garrison also said often that if only Bobby had gone public with what he knew about his brother’s death, his own life might have been spared. But that’s another subject. In general, of course, telling what you know is the best way to ensure yourself some measure of safety.

Needless to say, I challenged the nonsense Clark repeated about Garrison going after Shaw out of some anti-homosexual sentiment. Clark has become a credible citizen, and a principled person, whether or not we might always agree with the causes he chooses. I believe that we are different people at different stages of our lives. The Ramsey Clark of today is not the man manipulated by Hoover and DeLoach.

Clark was clearly uncomfortable with remembering those times, I am certain of that. He did tell me that he was appalled by Walter Yeagley and his unilateral, devious and suspicious approach to these issues: that might be a lead worth following up on.

Shakespeare said that “comparisons are odious.” I don’t believe anything constructive can be gained by arguing about who is worse than whom. Sheridan was a criminal and a thug. Clark was a tool of the FBI, the tail, indeed, wagging the dog. Recall that he was still an acting Attorney General on that day that he said Shaw had been cleared. Helms was the planner of the deed. Each character should be discussed separately. That the CIA and FBI penetrated the Garrison investigation does not justify and excuse Walter Sheridan’s outrageous and illegal behavior first in Tennessee and then in New Orleans. Question number three lumps together Clark, the FBI and the CIA as if these were identical. I am uncomfortable with that approach. You also seem to conflate the FBI and the Justice Department. You need to add the fact that Hoover ran roughshod over the Justice Department...

....To add another small personal note: I was an adult was Robert Kennedy ran for President, and a fierce opponent of the Vietnam War. I was not one of those goody two-shoes, as we called them, who put their faith in Eugene McCarthy as likely to get us out of Vietnam. Allow me to assure you that of those who were committed and fighting to end that war, no one I knew or every heard of, supported Bobby Kennedy. Rather, we were appalled that Bobby, noticing that McCarthy had done well in New Hampshire, suddenly entered the race for the Presidency. Liberal people of that day found Bobby Kennedy’s name synonymous with the adjective “ruthless.” There was cause.

Regarding what is going on today: poor President Kennedy would have loved to be able to do to the CIA what the George W. Bush has done, subject them to his control. This leads us to another important issue, and one we should all ponder:

On whose behalf did the CIA undertake the murder of President Kennedy? Did they do it for themselves, or because they represented other interests? Why did Bush establish a Director of National Intelligence? Might he not have had in mind taming the CIA, which, I believe we would agree, had run a shadow government making policy for so long? And for the “Taking Aim” audience, I didn’t think it was necessary to discuss the CIA’s history of assassination attempts against Fidel Castro, although, of course, you’re certainly correct that they did make those attempts.

I hope this responds to your questions.

George H. W. Bush and Assassination of JFK

Thanks William but my only real question is about the two Bush documents, the one referencing to Miami and a pro-Castro group.

I would like to verify that its indeed in the NARA collection - as well as the first "Mr Bush of the CIA" letter - because neither one of them shows on a search as far as I can find. If neither one is actually I'd like to ask the NARA folks why not - but to do that I need to know details on who found them where and when.

-- Larry

....My question is a lot simpler than that - I don't care who publishes what in a magazine article or on the internet, what I'm interested in is primary source information (where the document was found and how it was corroborated in the first place). In particular I need to know where the second document you have posted on your WEB site originated and how you vetted it to ensure that it is a real document. Actually I'd like to know the same about the first document on Bush as well but that is more curiosity.

Once I know where the second document came from it will help me find out why it does not appear to be in the NARA collection and may also help me understand other things as well - as why Hoover would identify FBI informants in other agencies by name, a very strange thing for him to do.

If the document can be proven to be real and not a one that has been manipulated, especially in the last paragraph, it will also raise a lot of interesting questions about involvement with a Pro-Castro group.

If you can't provide the source or verify the second document that's fine and I'll keep trying to validate it myself.

-- Larry

I also find this document difficult to believe. I suspect that the last paragraph has been added to a genuine document. Larry has made some good points about why it is unlikely to be genuine. It seems to me a very crude attempt to implicate George Bush. What is very strange is the document suggests that Bush had close contacts with pro-Castro forces. I wonder how he managed that? Bush’s political opinions on the subject were well known in 1963. I would have thought he would have found it impossible to have got close to this group. Even if he did, what does it prove in itself?

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?mode=searchResult&absPageId=756871

FBI 62-109060 JFK HQ File, Section 18 Page 23

http://www.maryferrell.org/mffweb/archive/viewer/showDoc.do?docId=62268&relPageId=24

http://gulib.georgetown.edu/dept/speccoll/fl/f159%7D4.htm

THE FULTON OURSLER, JR. PAPERS: FOLDER LISTING CONTINUED

...Box: 3 Fold: 33 "Reasonable Doubt" - Correspondence, 1982-83

DATE SPAN: 10/06/1982 - 12/09/1983

DESCRIPTION: Correspondence between Fulton Oursler, Jr. and Henry Hurt regarding the research and writing of Hurt's "Reasonable Doubt" for Reader's Digest.

Box: 3 Fold: 34 "Reasonable Doubt" - Correspondence, 1984

DATE SPAN: [01/20/1984]? - 12/12/1984

DESCRIPTION: Correspondence between Fulton Oursler, Jr. and Henry Hurt and others regarding the research and writing of "Reasonable Doubt" for Reader's Digest.

Box: 3 Fold: 35 "Reasonable Doubt" - Correspondence, 1985-86

DATE SPAN: 05/02/1985 - 05/26/1986

DESCRIPTION: Correspondence between Fulton Oursler, Jr. and Henry Hurt and others regarding the writing, editing, and publication of "Reasonable Doubt" for Reader's Digest.

Box: 3 Fold: 36 "Reasonable Doubt" - Impact

DATE SPAN: 11/27/1985 - 11/04/1986

DESCRIPTION: Clippings and correspondence regarding the publication of Henry Hurt's "Reasonable Doubt", including 1 TLS from David Atlee Phillips denouncing passages of the book as being libelous to his character.

Box: 3 Fold: 37 "Reasonable Doubt" - Mss. Re

DATE SPAN: [01/01/1983]? - [01/01/1986]?

DESCRIPTION: 1 photocopy TMs of "The Conspirators" by Adam B. Morong regarding the Kennedy assassination, along with other notes used in the research, writing and editing of Henry Hurt's "Reasonable Doubt".

Box: 3 Fold: 38 "Reasonable Doubt" - Research Materials

DATE SPAN: 11/27/1963 - [11/30/1983]?

DESCRIPTION: Miscellaneous photocopied documents related to the investigation of the assassination of John F. Kennedy, as well as photographs of the sixth floor interior of the Texas School Book Depository. ...

[Kathleen Collins]

Dear Nathaniel Heidenheimer,

I appreciate the time you are taking on this topic. E-mail has its limitations, and there are a few misconceptions that I'll try to clear up. Let me say, first, that you use the term "motivation" several times. This is troubling, when it comes to a given individual, as in the case of Sam Halpern. In the case of CIA, I devote an entire chapter to chronicling CIA's political motivation to thwart President Kennedy at every turn, and his motivation, in turn, to reign them in. All that can be documented. Personal motivations, as in the case of Halpern, are impossible to penetrate unless the speaker helps us out, and why, indeed, should he!

Let me say, again, with respect to "Taking Aim," that had I "world enough and time" I would have given a lengthy discussion of the attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro and the CIA would be at the top of the list of perpetrators. I, perhaps mistakenly, didn't believe that I had to reinvent the wheel during my few minutes on the recent "Taking Aim" program. Since the 1967 Inspector General's Report, and the huge JMWAVE releases, the witness testimony, etc. I can't even begin to recite the litany of evidence of murder plots by the CIA this morning. I'm sure you're aware of it, so the point is a bit disingenuous.

We know that the CIA was in the murder business, the Executive Action business. This is received wisdom. I perhaps should have nodded to that fact. For "young" listeners, I would hope that they would read "A Farewell to Justice" for my views and many other books as well, such as Gaeton Fonzi's. It's not a good idea to get your information from radio programs, which offer but a glimpse of the issues.

We expected nothing more of the CIA given their record of assassinations and assassination attempts. We did expect more of the Kennedys, who presented themselves as peace-loving liberals. That THEY were also engaged in attempts to murder Fidel Castro is breathtaking, and of a different order of information than the CIA doing what had become its nature to do.

I know I'm repeating myself, but if it were merely Halpern as the source, I would be suspicious too. But there is a considerable list of corroborators of Bobby's assassination schemes.The rule in journalism is that you need two. We've got three times that.

Yes, Bobby was involved, from his office at Langley, in CIA organized plots as well as the plots on his own. CIA's efforts weren't mere "monitoring" of obstreperous exiles, as we know. That CIA was carrying on without telling the Kennedy administration is true, as you say.

This still does not justify Bobby free-lancing with Lansdale and others. I don't know what you mean by "exiles on the outs," and I don't want to venture where I don't know: exiles on the outs with CIA were the people involved in the Kennedy assassination? Does this mean that CIA is not responsible? This takes us away from the matter at hand.

Charles Ford, like the Kennedys, had his fingers in more than one pie, as the released documents show. He had that assignment from Bobby, out of Langley. He also was a CIA operative, as we know. (I didn't get the reference to Strunk and White, sorry). There is no doubt that the CIA ran its own show, and didn't inform the Kennedys of many things. That's in "A Farewell To Justice," and many other places, particularly in the biographies of John F. Kennedy. That's not new. (I am not including "The Dark Side Of Camelot" in any of this: the implication that JFK's policy-making was influenced by his infidelities is preposterous, and unproven).

I might flag your use of the word "objective" along with your use of the word "motivation." This is not aesthetics. No one is "objective" here. Everyone is acting out of their own interests. This bears no relation on what is true and what isn't true. Yes, Charlie Ford testified that he didn't do anything naughty. What's useful in the Church committee records, which are filled with such denials as Ford's, is when the truth rears its head, as when Helms admits that he made up the story that Jim Garrison met Johnny Rosselli when he was in Las Vegas. Astonishing admission! But then, the Church committee had Rosselli testify and Rosselli made his own denial that he ever met Garrison. If you read the Rosselli transcript, it's clear he is dumbfounded. He never met Garrison in his life. He saw him on television. Reading that, I believed Rosselli. What did he care about Garrison anyway! But Helms sure did.

I did not use Charles Ford's testimony in my "Taking Aim" interview. I used Halpern's oral history for the CIA.

Are you referring to my 2005 program or to the recent one? On the 2005 program, did I discuss all this Ford/Fiscalini Castro issue? I can't remember. All along I thought you were referring to the recent "family jewel" program, and then I was not on for anything like the full hour.

Bobby seems to have spent much of his time at Langley, which may account for the ease with which Hoover ran roughshod, etc. But it was, of course, Ramsey Clark that the FBI really ran roughshod over. Hoover had those files on the Kennedys, of course, and blackmail was his game, as we all know.

I did not write that the CIA "decided to help assassinate Kennedy." Nor did I ever say anything about "a neutralist South Vietnam." That was never, ever in the cards. The Vietnamese were going for broke. These are indeed, inaccurate statements. What I wrote in "A Farewell to Justice" was that the clandestine service of the CIA organized the assassination of President Kennedy, and I have paid for taking that stand. What the Kennedys hoped for, a "Laotian solution" in Vietnam, would, of course, never have happened. It's what Bobby Kennedy said his brother DESIRED, not what would have come to pass, in my opinion. Vietnamese history tells that story. They had already beat back the Chinese, the Japanese and the French.

There would never have been an investigation by RFK "with deeply compromised investigative agencies." That's a straw man you erect. Bobby knew better than that. Again, I am not getting into the CIA assassination plots that RFK may or may not have known about. I was confining my discussion to RFK's own private efforts. The why and the wherefore, I didn't discuss.

The Kennedys were neither peace-seekers (!) nor hawks. They were pragmatic politicians. As one of the books (Kaiser's or another) quotes Kennedy intimate, Charlie Bartlett, their main concern was getting JFK re-elected in 1964. This was the continuing preoccupation and obsession. Given what was going on in the world, Bartlett was taken aback. Of course, politicians worrying about being re-elected is not a crime. This is what is to be expected of politicians. We are talking about politicians here, not saints, radicals, or even social reformers. Look at Chris Dodd here yesterday saying that the Democrats shouldn't devote themselves to impeaching George Bush, since this effort would hurt their chances for re-election. So politicians play their game. Obviously the Kennedys had no idea of the depth of opposition to them.

I love Ted Sorensen's speeches, as I said in my last post, but rhetoric is not evidence. Regarding Bobby's last speeches, and his campaign, the approval he received from crowds was related to the need in this society for change, not, in any provable way, to what he would have done. I don't know what he would have done. This is not a fruitful question, it seems to me.

You close with more of those comparisons I find odious. No one at the time, those who lived this history, confused Bobby Kennedy with Martin Luther King in terms of addressing the needs of the poor and the disenfranchised. Bobby can't ride those coattails, if you have an interest in history.

And I have to say, this all seems like a fairy-tale to me, this glorification of Bobby Kennedy as someone people today believe would have marshaled social change in a meaningful way. I can imagine that those, now dead, who knew what Bobby was about because they were close to these events would be absolutely astonished. I really dislike being personal, but let me add that among my very closest friends for years was a Harvard classmate of John F. Kennedy's and a good friend of his (Kennedy appointed him to be Ambassador to Morocco, but he turned it down), and who later became Eugene McCarthy's campaign manager. He had a storehouse of evidence about Bobby's antics and tricks. He respected "Jack," but, like virtually every liberal of the day, despised "Bobby." Alas, he died some years ago, or I would have asked him to chat with you.

In some ways -- maybe in all ways -- Robert Kennedy was different after his brother's death. I recall reading about Hoffa watching the speech Kennedy delivered to the black people telling them Martin Luther King was shot and killed. Hoffa is watching this and he says (paraphrase): That's not him. He's never like this. He's a phony.

I think RFK should have stopped chasing the Mob as it could get his children hurt or killed. Why did he keep going after them when John Kennedy became President. This was putting the President in danger.

I find it hard to believe that John Kennedy would have assassinated Castro and invade Cuba. First of all, the Russians allied themselves with Cuba. It would be all over for us. It would be a stupid move. And Robert Kennedy having a secret cabal with the Cuban Exiles. I hope he wasn't going to invade Cuba with them without the President knowing it. When Bay of Pigs happened, it was a disaster and Kennedy took complete responsibility, when I understand Robert McNamara had lied to him.

Kathy C

[Kathleen Collins]

Dear Nathaniel Heidenheimer,

I appreciate the time you are taking on this topic. E-mail has its limitations, and there are a few misconceptions that I'll try to clear up. Let me say, first, that you use the term "motivation" several times. This is troubling, when it comes to a given individual, as in the case of Sam Halpern. In the case of CIA, I devote an entire chapter to chronicling CIA's political motivation to thwart President Kennedy at every turn, and his motivation, in turn, to reign them in. All that can be documented. Personal motivations, as in the case of Halpern, are impossible to penetrate unless the speaker helps us out, and why, indeed, should he!

Let me say, again, with respect to "Taking Aim," that had I "world enough and time" I would have given a lengthy discussion of the attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro and the CIA would be at the top of the list of perpetrators. I, perhaps mistakenly, didn't believe that I had to reinvent the wheel during my few minutes on the recent "Taking Aim" program. Since the 1967 Inspector General's Report, and the huge JMWAVE releases, the witness testimony, etc. I can't even begin to recite the litany of evidence of murder plots by the CIA this morning. I'm sure you're aware of it, so the point is a bit disingenuous.

We know that the CIA was in the murder business, the Executive Action business. This is received wisdom. I perhaps should have nodded to that fact. For "young" listeners, I would hope that they would read "A Farewell to Justice" for my views and many other books as well, such as Gaeton Fonzi's. It's not a good idea to get your information from radio programs, which offer but a glimpse of the issues.

We expected nothing more of the CIA given their record of assassinations and assassination attempts. We did expect more of the Kennedys, who presented themselves as peace-loving liberals. That THEY were also engaged in attempts to murder Fidel Castro is breathtaking, and of a different order of information than the CIA doing what had become its nature to do.

I know I'm repeating myself, but if it were merely Halpern as the source, I would be suspicious too. But there is a considerable list of corroborators of Bobby's assassination schemes.The rule in journalism is that you need two. We've got three times that.

Yes, Bobby was involved, from his office at Langley, in CIA organized plots as well as the plots on his own. CIA's efforts weren't mere "monitoring" of obstreperous exiles, as we know. That CIA was carrying on without telling the Kennedy administration is true, as you say.

This still does not justify Bobby free-lancing with Lansdale and others. I don't know what you mean by "exiles on the outs," and I don't want to venture where I don't know: exiles on the outs with CIA were the people involved in the Kennedy assassination? Does this mean that CIA is not responsible? This takes us away from the matter at hand.

Charles Ford, like the Kennedys, had his fingers in more than one pie, as the released documents show. He had that assignment from Bobby, out of Langley. He also was a CIA operative, as we know. (I didn't get the reference to Strunk and White, sorry). There is no doubt that the CIA ran its own show, and didn't inform the Kennedys of many things. That's in "A Farewell To Justice," and many other places, particularly in the biographies of John F. Kennedy. That's not new. (I am not including "The Dark Side Of Camelot" in any of this: the implication that JFK's policy-making was influenced by his infidelities is preposterous, and unproven).

I might flag your use of the word "objective" along with your use of the word "motivation." This is not aesthetics. No one is "objective" here. Everyone is acting out of their own interests. This bears no relation on what is true and what isn't true. Yes, Charlie Ford testified that he didn't do anything naughty. What's useful in the Church committee records, which are filled with such denials as Ford's, is when the truth rears its head, as when Helms admits that he made up the story that Jim Garrison met Johnny Rosselli when he was in Las Vegas. Astonishing admission! But then, the Church committee had Rosselli testify and Rosselli made his own denial that he ever met Garrison. If you read the Rosselli transcript, it's clear he is dumbfounded. He never met Garrison in his life. He saw him on television. Reading that, I believed Rosselli. What did he care about Garrison anyway! But Helms sure did.

I did not use Charles Ford's testimony in my "Taking Aim" interview. I used Halpern's oral history for the CIA.

Are you referring to my 2005 program or to the recent one? On the 2005 program, did I discuss all this Ford/Fiscalini Castro issue? I can't remember. All along I thought you were referring to the recent "family jewel" program, and then I was not on for anything like the full hour.

Bobby seems to have spent much of his time at Langley, which may account for the ease with which Hoover ran roughshod, etc. But it was, of course, Ramsey Clark that the FBI really ran roughshod over. Hoover had those files on the Kennedys, of course, and blackmail was his game, as we all know.

I did not write that the CIA "decided to help assassinate Kennedy." Nor did I ever say anything about "a neutralist South Vietnam." That was never, ever in the cards. The Vietnamese were going for broke. These are indeed, inaccurate statements. What I wrote in "A Farewell to Justice" was that the clandestine service of the CIA organized the assassination of President Kennedy, and I have paid for taking that stand. What the Kennedys hoped for, a "Laotian solution" in Vietnam, would, of course, never have happened. It's what Bobby Kennedy said his brother DESIRED, not what would have come to pass, in my opinion. Vietnamese history tells that story. They had already beat back the Chinese, the Japanese and the French.

There would never have been an investigation by RFK "with deeply compromised investigative agencies." That's a straw man you erect. Bobby knew better than that. Again, I am not getting into the CIA assassination plots that RFK may or may not have known about. I was confining my discussion to RFK's own private efforts. The why and the wherefore, I didn't discuss.

The Kennedys were neither peace-seekers (!) nor hawks. They were pragmatic politicians. As one of the books (Kaiser's or another) quotes Kennedy intimate, Charlie Bartlett, their main concern was getting JFK re-elected in 1964. This was the continuing preoccupation and obsession. Given what was going on in the world, Bartlett was taken aback. Of course, politicians worrying about being re-elected is not a crime. This is what is to be expected of politicians. We are talking about politicians here, not saints, radicals, or even social reformers. Look at Chris Dodd here yesterday saying that the Democrats shouldn't devote themselves to impeaching George Bush, since this effort would hurt their chances for re-election. So politicians play their game. Obviously the Kennedys had no idea of the depth of opposition to them.

I love Ted Sorensen's speeches, as I said in my last post, but rhetoric is not evidence. Regarding Bobby's last speeches, and his campaign, the approval he received from crowds was related to the need in this society for change, not, in any provable way, to what he would have done. I don't know what he would have done. This is not a fruitful question, it seems to me.

You close with more of those comparisons I find odious. No one at the time, those who lived this history, confused Bobby Kennedy with Martin Luther King in terms of addressing the needs of the poor and the disenfranchised. Bobby can't ride those coattails, if you have an interest in history.

And I have to say, this all seems like a fairy-tale to me, this glorification of Bobby Kennedy as someone people today believe would have marshaled social change in a meaningful way. I can imagine that those, now dead, who knew what Bobby was about because they were close to these events would be absolutely astonished. I really dislike being personal, but let me add that among my very closest friends for years was a Harvard classmate of John F. Kennedy's and a good friend of his (Kennedy appointed him to be Ambassador to Morocco, but he turned it down), and who later became Eugene McCarthy's campaign manager. He had a storehouse of evidence about Bobby's antics and tricks. He respected "Jack," but, like virtually every liberal of the day, despised "Bobby." Alas, he died some years ago, or I would have asked him to chat with you.