Cowardly Democrats Allowed the Cover-Up to Occur

[Michael Griffith]

Yes, the vast majority of the Republican members of Congress and Republican federal officials displayed moral cowardice in response to JFK's assassination, and a few of them actually took part in the cover-up. However, the cover-up probably would have failed if JFK's family members, close friends, and other prominent Democrats had had the courage to publicly challenge the obscene lone-gunman theory.

The excuse given for their cowardice was that they had to remain silent "in order for the Kennedy family to heal." How could anyone "heal" when an obscene myth about JFK's death was being foisted on the nation? 

The pattern of tragic cowardice continued in the 1970s with the HSCA investigation. Congressional Democrats Don Edwards and Henry Gonzalez, supposed allies of JFK, played key roles in the firing of Richard Sprague as chief counsel for the HSCA. Gonzalez, as HSCA chairman, was the one who fired him. When Sprague was fired and when G. Robert Blakey was then installed as chief counsel, the Democrats had huge majorities in the House and Senate, and Democrat Jimmy Carter was president. Democrat Griffin Bell, appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals by JFK, was the Attorney General, appointed to the post by Jimmy Carter. How could they have allowed these things to happen? Where were the Democrats when the CIA was obstructing, stonewalling, and misleading the HSCA?

JFK's family and friends--the people who should have publicly voiced loud, fierce objections to the lone-gunman fiction--displayed tragic cowardice and enabled the Warren Commission to mislead tens of millions of Americans for years to come. Years later, when outrage over the leaked Zapruder film and disclosures of CIA crimes led to the creation of the HSCA, JFK's fellow Democrats again failed to do their moral and civic duty (as did nearly all Republicans in Congress and elsewhere in the government).

[Guest]

Hi Michael,

 

I have a pretty full explanation or justification for the way the family responded, or handled it. Before I get into that. Can you tell me if you were in RFK’s shoes, what steps you would have taken to produce a different outcome? 

Edited August 18, 2022 by Chris Barnard

[Joseph McBride]

From my book INTO THE NIGHTMARE:

 

Kennedy’s supposed political allies seemed strangely indifferent as well. Mort Sahl, the political satirist who later suffered serious damage to his career when he began concentrating on trying to tell the truth about Dallas, says in a 1989 documentary film about his life,

 

The social democrats in this country have a lot of guilt. They didn't stand up to Vietnam. They didn't stand up to the encroachment of the intelligence community. And they walked away from Jack Kennedy. The most they could come up with after he was shot in the street like a dog was to say, “He wasn't that good a president anyway.” Yeah, let me tell you, he had a strange group of friends. Remarkably absent when he fell.

[Joe Bauer]

Well, there's that old proposition that RFK knew he couldn't do anything about a real JFK investigation until and only if he was President.

His enemies were too powerful to take on without the full power of the Presidency.

As President he could have placed his own people to head the CIA, FBI, AG and so many other powerful positions to then get the kind of control and power he needed.

[Benjamin Cole]

1 hour ago, Kathy Beckett said:

Why does it have to be a partisan problem?  Wasn't it everyone's problem? 

If a Republican President were to be assassinated, shouldn't concern for something like that be non partisan? Who cares what party?

 

Amen. 

The M$M never misses a beat in inflaming petty partisan divides. Sadly, a passion for many, including on this site. 

If any President is assassinated, we should be concerned. The President is a fellow human first, and an elected leader. 

The investigation into an assassination should be impartial, politically or otherwise. 

Just like investigations into other recent major events. 

If a Donk President, or a 'Phant president, is undermined by the Deep State, we need to know the full story. 

[Benjamin Cole]

6 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

Yes, the vast majority of the Republican members of Congress and Republican federal officials displayed moral cowardice in response to JFK's assassination, and a few of them actually took part in the cover-up. However, the cover-up probably would have failed if JFK's family members, close friends, and other prominent Democrats had had the courage to publicly challenge the obscene lone-gunman theory.

The excuse given for their cowardice was that they had to remain silent "in order for the Kennedy family to heal." How could anyone "heal" when an obscene myth about JFK's death was being foisted on the nation? 

The pattern of tragic cowardice continued in the 1970s with the HSCA investigation. Congressional Democrats Don Edwards and Henry Gonzalez, supposed allies of JFK, played key roles in the firing of Richard Sprague as chief counsel for the HSCA. Gonzalez, as HSCA chairman, was the one who fired him. When Sprague was fired and when G. Robert Blakey was then installed as chief counsel, the Democrats had huge majorities in the House and Senate, and Democrat Jimmy Carter was president. Democrat Griffin Bell, appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals by JFK, was the Attorney General, appointed to the post by Jimmy Carter. How could they have allowed these things to happen? Where were the Democrats when the CIA was obstructing, stonewalling, and misleading the HSCA?

JFK's family and friends--the people who should have publicly voiced loud, fierce objections to the lone-gunman fiction--displayed tragic cowardice and enabled the Warren Commission to mislead tens of millions of Americans for years to come. Years later, when outrage over the leaked Zapruder film and disclosures of CIA crimes led to the creation of the HSCA, JFK's fellow Democrats again failed to do their moral and civic duty (as did nearly all Republicans in Congress and elsewhere in the government).

The Donks and the Old Guard 'Phants are allied with the Deep State, as is the modern M$M. 

There it stands. 

This does not make Trump a nice guy.

Bu neither does Trump change the nature of the modern arrangement. 

[Ron Bulman]

Cowardly Democrats.  That seems a bit provocative Mike.  Initially all were in shock.  Gunned down in a public execution in the street.  If your Bobby who you gonna call to investigate?  Your adversary Hoover and his FBI.  The CIA you suspect of participation from day one?

Let's flip the scenario for a moment.  Say Nixon won that then closest election ever.  Then was shot down like the dirty low down dog bastard he later proved to be in the street by a lone commie nut.  Would Pat, his brother, or even mentor Prescott Bush have said J Edgar, Allen, something is wrong here, we've got to get to the bottom of it?  I don't think so.  America needs to heal, support President Rockefeller.  All those Cowardly Republicans would have looked the other way.

BTW.   I believe I've read Jimmy Carter did support further investigation of the JFKA beyond what the HSCA concluded, a Conspiracy, until one was supposedly thwarted by the Secret Service in 1979 on his own life.  But the FBI concluded Raymond Lee Harvey was a lone nut, no conspiracy here to see.  Move on.

The Assassination Attempt Plotted Against Jimmy Carter Explained (nickiswift.com)

[Pat Speer]

Some points to consider... 

1. LBJ picked 4 Republicans and 3 Southern Democrats to man the Warren Commission because he knew a northern Democrat was unlikely to play along. 

2. Arlen Specter became a Republican after his stint on the Warren Commission's staff, in part because he knew that his creation of the SBT would hurt him more with Democrats than Republicans. 

3. The congressmen and historians who called for a new investigation in the 60's were largely Democrats.

4. Ted Kennedy supported the creation of the HSCA, and the HSCA may not have been created without his support.

5. Pre-Trump, the prominent politicians to say they questioned the conclusions of the Warren Commission were mostly Democrats, and the Republicans who did question it were mostly of the commies-did-it variety.

Edited August 18, 2022 by Pat Speer

[Sandy Larsen]

The reason the coverup was allowed to happen was to prevent the public from learning what the evidence indicated, that Oswald killed Kennedy in a conspiracy with Russia and Cuba. The LBJ administration feared calls for war if that happened. The coverup involved Democrats only because Democrats were in power at the time.

The reason the coverup was later allowed to stand is because a large part of government officials believed the WC report. Of those who didn't, many suspected the CIA was behind the assassination. It is my opinion that most of those who suspected the CIA worried that the public would call for the dismantling of the CIA if it was shown that they it was behind the assassination. I believe that many feel that an evil CIA is better than no CIA at all.

 

[Paul Brancato]

3 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

The reason the coverup was allowed to happen was to prevent the public from learning what the evidence indicated, that Oswald killed Kennedy in a conspiracy with Russia and Cuba. The LBJ administration feared calls for war if that happened. The coverup involved Democrats only because Democrats were in power at the time.

The reason the coverup was later allowed to stand is because a large part of government officials believed the WC report. Of those who didn't, many suspected the CIA was behind the assassination. It is my opinion that most of those who suspected the CIA worried that the public would call for the dismantling of the CIA if it was shown that they it was behind the assassination. I believe that many feel that an evil CIA is better than no CIA at all.

 

Oswald killed Kennedy in a conspiracy with Russia and Cuba? 

[W. Niederhut]

Excellent points by Ron Bulman and Pat Speer.

I would add that those suspecting CIA and FBI involvement in JFK's murder must surely have feared Murder, Inc.

Jackie Kennedy didn't want Bobby to run in '68, because she feared he would be murdered.

And look what happened to Hale Boggs.

 

[Kirk Gallaway]

Gee, what is this? A 60 year old Democrat party vendetta!

I think there was a lot of government rationale, real and phony used to not rock the boat any further after the JFK assassination.

 

My take is a little different  than the established view here. I do agree in one aspect. I'll comment about the Kennedy's reaction.. People were shocked and looking for some sign from AG Bobby, after all he was the AG. You could see that transference in martyrdom in the RFK entry into the 1964 Democratic convention. Some say the applause went on for 20 minutes! I can't say but I remember it, and it was a long and a tremendous pent up feeling of release. I think, at that point  a large segment of the population would have followed Bobby anywhere, including after a conspiracy of his brother's death..The Kennedy family passivity to the findings  of the Warren Report,  does lead credence to the theories that Bobby had something to hide, perhaps a complicity with possible assassination plots of Castro. Though there could have been a window when that was happening.  I don't tend to believe that, so it is puzzling. In recent years, there's talk of RFK's alleged plan to wait until he became President to look into his brother's death.There would have been more on Bobby's plate  than any U.S. President in 25 years, so I don't think that was a politically practical consideration but I suppose he might have.

 

IMO, The capitulation by the Kennedys to the official story of the JFKA assassination and Warren Report findings was a major untold factor in essentially killing public fervor to getting to the bottom of the assassination. As unlikely as it would seem, with  back to back 2 alleged lone nut killings, people went on with their lives, and actually wanted to forget about it.  It seems incredible that it took 12 years for the U.S. citizenry  to view the Zapruder film. But there were no protests demanding that it should be shown. With no real msm support,  The JFKA investigation was left to the courage and incentive of small time researchers and reporters.

 

From someone who was young at this time, and remembers the reaction of people around me and the public. I take issue with a lot assertions made here  that "the JFKA started a distrust of government in the U.S. that's never recovered". No way, It was the tragedy of the Viet Nam War and the war resistance, and the race riots of the 60's that changed the U.S.for good. The JFKA was sort of an afterthought, a sort of icing on the cake  that reared it's ugly head after people finally started doubting their government narrative, and their kids were coming home in body bags. That was the lead story for almost a decade!.

 

Edited August 18, 2022 by Kirk Gallaway

[Pat Speer]

5 hours ago, Sandy Larsen said:

The reason the coverup was allowed to happen was to prevent the public from learning what the evidence indicated, that Oswald killed Kennedy in a conspiracy with Russia and Cuba. The LBJ administration feared calls for war if that happened. The coverup involved Democrats only because Democrats were in power at the time.

The reason the coverup was later allowed to stand is because a large part of government officials believed the WC report. Of those who didn't, many suspected the CIA was behind the assassination. It is my opinion that most of those who suspected the CIA worried that the public would call for the dismantling of the CIA if it was shown that they it was behind the assassination. I believe that many feel that an evil CIA is better than no CIA at all.

 

The "LBJ feared calls for war" argument was a cover-story to avoid that LBJ's greatest fear was an open-ended investigation that would look into his own involvement. He thought Robert Kennedy might use such an investigation to force him from office. When books by Epstein and Lane started selling, for that matter, he told Fortas and others that he assumed Robert Kennedy was secretly behind them all, trying to force him from office. Bobby lived rent-free in LBJ's brain. I wonder why.

[Pete Mellor]

18 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

JFK's family and friends--the people who should have publicly voiced loud, fierce objections to the lone-gunman fiction--displayed tragic cowardice and enabled the Warren Commission to mislead tens of millions of Americans for years to come.

No doubt Bobby Kennedy became de facto head of the family in '63, so his word and direction would dictate any public comments on the assassination and the W.C.

Didn't Bobby say to McCone on the afternoon of the 22nd, "One of your guys did it."  Was RFK pointing a finger at rogue agency agents and angry Cubanos and maybe even organised crime figures, that he had been driving to eliminate Castro.  Bobby's own political future would have ended if details of those operations were exposed.  'Murder Incorporated' was kept under wraps for years after JFK's demise.  RFK knew that the W.C. was 'a shoddy piece of work' but was his silence because he was stuck between a rock and a hard place?  

[Sandy Larsen]

2 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:

Oswald killed Kennedy in a conspiracy with Russia and Cuba? 

 

Yes, that is what the early evidence indicated. The evidence had Oswald traveling to Mexico City (by car with some associates, I believe), meeting with alleged KGB assassination chief Valeriy Kostikov, and getting paid a $6500 up-front fee for the assassination.

This was covered up right away, and then the LBJ administration proceeded to pin the assassination on Oswald alone.

Of course the whole Mexico City thing was a false flag operation to be used as a pretense for war or an invasion of Cuba. (Some say it was a "virus" used to trigger the coverup.) Oswald probably wasn't even there. The "Oswald" in the consulates was clearly an imposter, as even Hoover said.