Why was JFK assassinated but Trump has not been?

[Douglas Caddy]

David Talbot posted this on Facebook today:

Why was JFK assassinated by his own national security forces, but Donald Trump so far has not been? I'm not trying to be inflammatory here. I'm just pondering a question that is looming large in many people's minds these days, even though the mainstream media is not allowed to breathe a word about the subject -- for obvious reasons. I'm asking the question as a journalist and as a presidential historian who has researched the Kennedy era in depth.

President Kennedy's tensions with the CIA and Pentagon grew to the breaking point during his 1,000 days in office as he tried to find a path out of the nuclear-loaded Cold War, antagonizing the "military-industrial complex" that Eisenhower had warned him about in the process. But JFK's struggles with his national security establishment were subtle and discreet compared to the open warfare that has raged between Trump and the "deep state" since the days before he was even sworn in.

It seems that each new day brings some Twitter broadside against the FBI, Justice Department or CIA. Now Trump is threatening to start yet another Constitutional crisis by demanding that his Justice Department investigate whether the FBI infiltrated his presidential campaign.

Kennedy might have threatened to "splinter the CIA in a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds" after the spy agency's Bay of Pegs fiasco. But he did so in private -- publicly, he shouldered the blame himself.

Trump, on the other hand, heaps scorn and ridicule on his security agencies nearly every week, humiliating the men and women who run them, and loudly calling for these organizations to be overhauled.

There has never been such a, bitter, flagrant power struggle between an American president and his national security bureaucracy.

So, I'll pose the question again: why is Donald Trump still alive?

It's certainly not because these understandably aggrieved security forces fear exposure by the media. Our major media institutions showed no courage when it came to investigating JFK's violent removal from office. When it comes to the deepest secrets of the deep state, our media just doesn't go there. And considering that the media has openly taken the side of the national security establishment in the epic battle with Trump --- seeing him (quite rightly) as a common enemy, there is even less chance that the press would look deeply into Trump's suspicious death.

Is the deep state less prone to violence nowadays than it was during the Kennedy presidency? Uh, no. Just ask the people of the Middle East and any foreign leader who becomes a major irritant to the U.S.

So what, then, is protecting Trump?

I think JFK was more at risk because in his day the national security complex was a smaller, more cohesive organism than it is today. It was simpler for a power player like Allen Dulles to build consensus within his circles (Wall Street and the security establishment) that Kennedy had to be eliminated "for the good of the nation." To this crowd, JFK was jeopardizing the country's security (and their own power and wealth) by trying to forge peace with our Communist enemies and demilitarize the U.S.

Today, America's security complex-- particularly since 9/11 -- is a vast and labyrinthine empire. The U.S. doesn't just have a military-industrial complex anymore. America is so thoroughly militarized that the country itself has become a subsidiary of that complex. This empire contains thousands of security agencies and government contractors and millions of employees.

There is no central power figure like Allen Dulles in today's vast security empire, and so it is much harder to develop consensus within this sprawling network.

JFK and Trump also have major ideological differences that account for why Kennedy was in a more precarious position. JFK's global peace ambitions directly threatened powerful men like Dulles and his circle. But Trump glories in America's world domination and has sizably increased the Pentagon budget, while fawning over men in uniform. His swaggering, imperial attitudes are shared by many in the security establishment.

So no matter how he blows off steam on Twitter, there are significant factions within the deep state that are still cheering him on, or that at least find him a useful idiot.

Finally, unlike Trump, JFK remained highly popular late into his first term and was likely to be reelected in 1964, even though his civil rights policies had cost him the Deep South. Trump's high negatives, not to mention his mounting legal troubles, give his ardent enemies in the deep state sufficient confidence that he will be removed from office legally -- either through impeachment or by the ballot. These security forces would then be spared exercising the extreme and risky option of Dallas 11/22/63.

I'd be interested to hear your own theories on this taboo topic.

[Joe Bauer]

Kennedy had many times the amount of extremely powerful groups and individuals against him and who hated him and his brother on a "murderous rage" level versus Trump.

Killing Kennedy to these people was a real and welcomed agenda.

The KKK's race mentality was shared by "millions" of Americans during JFK's time and he was considered an absolute traitor and threat to the cause and culture of segregation. And there was great monies available to these people and their cause. This was a huge monster of JFK hate when you combined their common sentiments, mentality and numbers.

Contrary to JFK however, Trump is loved by these race minded people, who are still here, but not as transparent and bold in making themselves and their beliefs known in public discourse.

Another massive machine of JFK/RFK murderous hate was U.S. organized crime. Does anyone here even need to be reminded how wealthy, powerful and influential this group was in 1963.

American organized crime has morphed into something less than it was back in 1963. Still wealthy and powerful, but more sophisticated and elevated into the white crime area. But this group doesn't feel Trump is anywhere near the  threat to them as JFK & RFK were back in 1963. It is even speculated by some that Trump is considered a friend to this group.

American oil barons ( the world's wealthiest men back in 1963) also looked at JFK as perhaps their greatest threat.

Today, the biggest oil companies and those that own the most interest in them like ( love? ) Trump. Same with all the highest level corporate wealth of this country. Trump just gave them a bigger gift than they have ever seen in one action by an American president. Their taxes went from 35% to 20%. The estate tax has been "removed" for those who have millions to pass on to their children.

Warren Buffet stated that Trump's wealthy class tax cut increased his corporate assets by 23 BILLION dollars.

The military feels the same way about Trump as our most wealthy. Trump will always give them whatever they want..

JFK on the other hand, stood up to our military hierarchy over many major policies. Many in that group in 1963 hated JFK and RFK and considered them the enemy as much as their commander in chief.

Then of course we had the numbered agencies in 1963 who felt JFK was a serious adversary at times.

Not so with Trump at all.

I believe these agencies have grown ( numbers and sizes) into enormous entities with much more influence and mind boggling budgets since 1963. However, I don't think they feel Trump is a serious threat. I think they view Trump as not much more than a deluded, simple minded, and egomaniacal yet harmless dupe who is hugely corrupted personally and has been for decades.  There is no need for them to deal with Trump any more than they are doing. I believe they feel he will bring himself down before he causes too much damage without  much extra influence on their part.

The JFK hate group machine was huge in it's combined wealth, power, influence and numbers back in 1963.

Trump doesn't have anything close to the power holding and wielding hate movement and pressure JFK had.  

Middle and lower income class and liberals generally don't have the "killer instinct" and mind set that the wealthy and right wing and racist groups have. They are not as powerful, corrupted, aggressive and fanatical in their causes as the later.

Just my take on this thread question.

 

Edited May 22, 2018 by Joe Bauer

[Cliff Varnell]

1 hour ago, Douglas Caddy said:

I'd be interested to hear your own theories on this taboo topic.

First of all, pulling off an assassination may be harder than we imagine.

Could the Dealey Plaza ambush have been pulled off if everyone was armed with a movie camera?

A big lesson the MIC star chamber learned from the 60's assassinations is that in death the assassinated become bigger than in life.

Assassinating Trump ensures he's forever romanticized, his record eternally white-washed in many quarters.

Assassinating Trump enshrines Trumpism as a valid political movement -- instead of the anti-American power grab it actually is.

Rather than killing the person, the thing now is to assassinate their character.

Trump is doing a great job of aiding and abetting that effort.

The elements of the "deep state" opposed to Hillary Clinton didn't need to assassinate her -- instead they got James Comey and the FBI to  assassinate her character right before the election.

That's how it works these days.

Edited May 22, 2018 by Cliff Varnell

[David Andrews]

Didn't Trump just give CIA the director it had vetted for itself?

[Mervyn Hagger]

7 hours ago, Douglas Caddy said:

David Talbot posted this on Facebook today:

Why was JFK assassinated by his own national security forces, but Donald Trump so far has not been? I'm not trying to be inflammatory here. I'm just pondering a question that is looming large in many people's minds these days, even though the mainstream media is not allowed to breathe a word about the subject -- for obvious reasons. I'm asking the question as a journalist and as a presidential historian who has researched the Kennedy era in depth.

President Kennedy's tensions with the CIA and Pentagon grew to the breaking point during his 1,000 days in office as he tried to find a path out of the nuclear-loaded Cold War, antagonizing the "military-industrial complex" that Eisenhower had warned him about in the process. But JFK's struggles with his national security establishment were subtle and discreet compared to the open warfare that has raged between Trump and the "deep state" since the days before he was even sworn in.

It seems that each new day brings some Twitter broadside against the FBI, Justice Department or CIA. Now Trump is threatening to start yet another Constitutional crisis by demanding that his Justice Department investigate whether the FBI infiltrated his presidential campaign.

Kennedy might have threatened to "splinter the CIA in a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds" after the spy agency's Bay of Pegs fiasco. But he did so in private -- publicly, he shouldered the blame himself.

Trump, on the other hand, heaps scorn and ridicule on his security agencies nearly every week, humiliating the men and women who run them, and loudly calling for these organizations to be overhauled.

There has never been such a, bitter, flagrant power struggle between an American president and his national security bureaucracy.

So, I'll pose the question again: why is Donald Trump still alive?

It's certainly not because these understandably aggrieved security forces fear exposure by the media. Our major media institutions showed no courage when it came to investigating JFK's violent removal from office. When it comes to the deepest secrets of the deep state, our media just doesn't go there. And considering that the media has openly taken the side of the national security establishment in the epic battle with Trump --- seeing him (quite rightly) as a common enemy, there is even less chance that the press would look deeply into Trump's suspicious death.

Is the deep state less prone to violence nowadays than it was during the Kennedy presidency? Uh, no. Just ask the people of the Middle East and any foreign leader who becomes a major irritant to the U.S.

So what, then, is protecting Trump?

I think JFK was more at risk because in his day the national security complex was a smaller, more cohesive organism than it is today. It was simpler for a power player like Allen Dulles to build consensus within his circles (Wall Street and the security establishment) that Kennedy had to be eliminated "for the good of the nation." To this crowd, JFK was jeopardizing the country's security (and their own power and wealth) by trying to forge peace with our Communist enemies and demilitarize the U.S.

Today, America's security complex-- particularly since 9/11 -- is a vast and labyrinthine empire. The U.S. doesn't just have a military-industrial complex anymore. America is so thoroughly militarized that the country itself has become a subsidiary of that complex. This empire contains thousands of security agencies and government contractors and millions of employees.

There is no central power figure like Allen Dulles in today's vast security empire, and so it is much harder to develop consensus within this sprawling network.

JFK and Trump also have major ideological differences that account for why Kennedy was in a more precarious position. JFK's global peace ambitions directly threatened powerful men like Dulles and his circle. But Trump glories in America's world domination and has sizably increased the Pentagon budget, while fawning over men in uniform. His swaggering, imperial attitudes are shared by many in the security establishment.

So no matter how he blows off steam on Twitter, there are significant factions within the deep state that are still cheering him on, or that at least find him a useful idiot.

Finally, unlike Trump, JFK remained highly popular late into his first term and was likely to be reelected in 1964, even though his civil rights policies had cost him the Deep South. Trump's high negatives, not to mention his mounting legal troubles, give his ardent enemies in the deep state sufficient confidence that he will be removed from office legally -- either through impeachment or by the ballot. These security forces would then be spared exercising the extreme and risky option of Dallas 11/22/63.

I'd be interested to hear your own theories on this taboo topic.

If ever there was to be a Kennedy Cult example, the creation of this thread by Douglas, has to be it with accompanying sanctification by Cliff of Hillary Clinton, no less, who suggested that the FBI "assassinate(d) her character right before the election." The Clintons and Kennedys feeding out of the same trough and in today's world of suing everyone for sexual abuse, they would both be bankrupt and probably facing prison time. I guess I will be adding to my 'avoid' list immediately. The only reason for my being here is because I know that there are some intelligent people like Jason Ward; Gary Murr and Larry Hancock (and a few others), who show up here. 

[Steve Thomas]

8 hours ago, Douglas Caddy said:

David Talbot posted this on Facebook today:

 

 

"So what, then, is protecting Trump?

 To this crowd, JFK was jeopardizing the country's security (and their own power and wealth) by trying to forge peace with our Communist enemies and demilitarize the U.S.

So no matter how he (Trump) blows off steam on Twitter, there are significant factions within the deep state that are still cheering him on, or that at least find him a useful idiot.

Trump's high negatives, not to mention his mounting legal troubles, give his ardent enemies in the deep state sufficient confidence that he will be removed from office legally -- either through impeachment or by the ballot. These security forces would then be spared exercising the extreme and risky option of Dallas 11/22/63."

I'd be interested to hear your own theories on this taboo topic.

Douglas,

 

It's funny. I was just thinking about that this morning.

 

As much as Kennedy was hated by the upper eschelon, he was still adored by the masses. 

Look at the crowds standing ten deep along Main St. in Dallas.Something Ralph Yarborough said has always stuck with me. He said that along the parade route, the people down on the street were clapping and cheering, but if you looked up into the upper floors of the buildings, the peoples' eyes were full of anger and hatred. I always took that as a metaphor.

 

So I was wondering, what couldn't wait for the regular election process to run its course? Why the urgent need to eliminate Kennedy now?

So far, I don't have an answer to that.

 

Steve Thomas

 

[Ron Ecker]

1 hour ago, Steve Thomas said:

So I was wondering, what couldn't wait for the regular election process to run its course? Why the urgent need to eliminate Kennedy now?

So far, I don't have an answer to that.

 

We know that LBJ had two urgent needs: to stay out of jail and not to be removed from the ticket.

When a hearing about your corruption is being held on Capitol Hill on the very day of the assassination, that's really cutting it close.

 

 

[Steve Thomas]

1 hour ago, Ron Ecker said:

We know that LBJ had two urgent needs: to stay out of jail and not to be removed from the ticket.

When a hearing about your corruption is being held on Capitol Hill on the very day of the assassination, that's really cutting it close.

 

 

Ron,

 

I figure there was either an urgent need, or it was a matter of revenge, and the timing was coincidental.

On a thread dealing with Lyman Lemnitzer, I wrote:

"Lately, I've been speculating lately on "revenge as motive" for the hit on JFK.

Not so much for what he "might" do with respect to getting out of Vietnam, or eliminating the oil depletion allowance, etc., but for what JFK "had" done; and looking at the people who had been "exiled to the frontier". So far, I've come up with Lyman Lemnitzer and William King Harvey, who was transferred to Rome after the Cuban Missile Crisis. Remember his handwritten ZR/Rifle to use Corsicans rather than Mafia. Being CIA Station Chief in Rome would make him pretty well positioned to find some.

I think they sat out there in the boondocks and stewed.

In ancient Roman times, wasn't it the generals who had been banished to Gaul who were always stirring up trouble, with this legion or that legion always seemingly ready to "cross the Rubicon" at any moment?

 

Although they weren't exiled, I'd add Allen Dulles and Charles Cabell, who were forced into retirement rather than banished to the frontier."

 

Steve Thomas

[Cliff Varnell]

4 hours ago, Mervyn Hagger said:

If ever there was to be a Kennedy Cult example, the creation of this thread by Douglas, has to be it with accompanying sanctification by Cliff of Hillary Clinton, no less, who suggested that the FBI "assassinate(d) her character right before the election."

Sanctification?

I also noted the character assassination of Donald Trump -- does that mean I'm sanctifying him?

Or perhaps you're not aware of the "Comey letter" released Oct. 28, which turned the narrative surrounding the election into a 24/7 fixation on a sex pervert in possession of Hillary e-mails?

I'm surprised you're not fully aware of it -- after all, it was in all the papers...

 

 

Edited May 22, 2018 by Cliff Varnell

[Cliff Varnell]

11 hours ago, Cliff Varnell said:

Assassinating Trump enshrines Trumpism as a valid political movement -- instead of the anti-American power grab it actually is.

Looks like that one drew blood with the Trump Cult.

[Jason Ward]

15 hours ago, Cliff Varnell said:

The elements of the "deep state" opposed to Hillary Clinton didn't need to assassinate her -- instead they got James Comey and the FBI to  assassinate her character right before the election.

That's how it works these days

That's how it worked in 1963 as well.

The "deep state" both then and now has no need to risk the wildly dangerous, circus-show stunt of trying to kill someone as they drive by in a convertible, cameras rolling.   

Those in power have and had many ways to defrock a president.   Dealey Plaza barely "worked" with 1-2 "good" shots and several misses; furthermore it never really "worked" since the conspiracy accusations began, loudly, right away.  Sloppy evidence is all over the place. 

The "Deep State" destroys presidents with no or very little second guessing from its opponents - zero reason to do this in public, with cameras, with Dallas doctors indicating a frontal shot right away, with 100s of witnesses, etc.

 

 

 

Jason

Edited May 22, 2018 by Jason Ward

[James DiEugenio]

Trump turned out not to be such a maverick in the Oval Office as he had been before he got there.

Trump first tapered his image before he ran for president as a Republican.  If one recalls, when he considered running back in the late eighties on the Reform ticket, he was really a moderate, much more like a Perot type.  And he wanted the rich to pay more, not less in taxes.

This time, domestically, he changed that whole platform and became much more in the mainstream of the modern, extreme GOP.  But he also pilloried Jeb Bush for what his brother did in Iraq.  And he even made noise about being more fair to the Palestinians.  Well, that did not last long did it?  He bombs Syria, allows Benny to move the Israeli capital to Jerusalem and pulls out of the Iran nuclear agreement. Next he will be visiting Saudi Arabia.

He gives the Pentagon a blank check which we cannot afford, and he gets a torturer as CIA Director, and then moves the CIA director over to State.  On top of that, he makes no move against the NRA and forgot who David Duke was.

I think the Power Elite has figured out that Trump likes to be a Noise Machine.  His one real Maverick characteristic is his feud with the media.  But in fact, they also understand that that is the thing that will send him down in the next election.  

[Ron Ecker]

Since Trump's former doctor stated that all of his test results were positive, maybe they're hoping he'll die of disease.

 

 

 

 

 

[Kirk Gallaway]

As I've been saying since his Presidency, the fact that Trump hasn't been assassinated is absolutely no surprise to me. The illusions in this article come from a misunderstanding of where the power really is.  Talbot, kind of goes in and out for me in this piece but I think this is the most significant thing he says.

I think JFK was more at risk because in his day the national security complex was a smaller, more cohesive organism than it is today. It was simpler for a power player like Allen Dulles to build consensus within his circles (Wall Street and the security establishment)

The 50's-60's was a time of teeming profusion at the start of the era of big government. The heads of these agencies could amass great power. Government was the  place to be. Now most people in government can make more money in the private sector. This kind of power just doesn't exist in government anymore. That's why I'd like to ask Talbot, what is the nature and goals of the "deep state". I bet he couldn't give any better answer than he does in this article,as he just alludes to it as something we can 'all agree upon'. I don''t know if he's still stuck on this image of a bunch of mighty generals and intelligence in their dark little windowless rooms, plotting our future, because he is smart  enough to recognize that there was a whole other world behind Allen Dulles.(Wall street and the Security Establishment) One person who seems from his public statements to be stuck in those dark, bureaucratic quarters is Oliver Stone.  IMO Oliver's done great things for open government, and intuitively I think he has a high character and he follows his ideals and who, despite his family exposure to Wall Street, and the fact that he's made 2 movies about the greed of Wall Street. Still,it's the one element that's seriously missing and barely touched upon in his and Peter Kuznic's otherwise excellent series, "The Untold history of the United States."

To grasp it , you have to change your mindset and realize that there's not the need for subversion that there once was. These people don't have to form secret societies! We've become an oligarchic, corporate state. (You'll never hear that phrase from Talbot, Stone) And in what serious way, does Trump really pose any threat to that?  His agenda is the  multi national corporate agenda.

And what is that? That agenda poses the idea that capital is best left in the hands of people who can really do something with it. Government programs that seek to redistribute the wealth run counter to that. Rather than have legislation to protect the consumer or the environment, that  can better be handled by individual lawsuits in the courts, ( a lot of people and groups just won't have the money, but tough luck!) They'd like to gut the SEC, the cops and regulators on Wall Street and promote their idea of freer markets, as well as to cut disaster relief agencies.To them, everything is better off being privatized including basic services and Education.(De Voss-vouchers) Taxes should be lower for those who can best appropriate capital and people should get used to the idea  of an era of government limits, hence they perpetuate talk that Social Security is a ponzi scheme that won't be around when you retire anyway to lower the public expectation.  If this agenda was implemented on a global scale, the financial opportunities freed up from government spending would be a great windfall for a small select group of people (1-2%)

When countries like Venezuela go belly up and can't make their payments to the international banking cadre, what do you think they do? The everyday people are starved out indefinitely until inevitably a deal is made where a payment plan is re enacted, but it's not free, the country agrees to privatize their previously state owned resources, as in this case Venezuela, that's their oil industry.

This isn't just their pipe dream, it's being accomplished little by little over about the last 35 years without firing a shot..Anyone who has been following the Trump administration can see this direction. Why in the world would they stop it? They've gotten a lot of things they wanted, this is the most pro business era in almost 100 years. But there's not that much fear of Trump not filling out his term, because it's understood, Mike Pence would just be an extension they could never have gotten any other way, with any mainstream Presidential political  candidate. These people are smart and know their candidates and how their government works.

As gloomy as it all sounds. There is one simple and very reachable step that can be made that would radically change everything for the better. and that is, to simply get the money out of politics. There are a lot of ways to do it. Maximum contributions $100, no pacs, public financing, (sure there's d be a lot less money for campaigns, and what's wrong with that? Shorter campaigns without near the the number of commercials or compel the TV and radio stations to donate more in depth coverage than just sound bytes)  Make it so politicians aren't spending 1/3 of their time soliciting for sponsorship. That would be the beginning of a new kind of public servant in Washington.

Maybe it will take a generation of millennials to put it in action, but it would be a good start and it's a revolution that has broad support and is very doable..

[Lawrence Schnapf]

Having been quoted about this possibility back in March 2017 by an article on Inforwars, I think the reason this hasnt happened is that social media has made physically assassination of presidents unnecessary.  we now engage in character assassination to the point where a leader is forced to resign or loses vital powers. Except for his judicial appointments, there is very little that Trump has done that cannot be reversed by another president. the Deep State has basically kept him reined in with investigations and resistance. Think of it- Trump is trying to get help from Congress to control parts of his own Executive Branch.....