Kennedy Assassination ‘Con’ ’Spiracy

The PBS show NOVA frequently evokes mixed reactions from me: on the one hand, I love shows with scientific and/or technological content; on the other, NOVA seems at times to have an ax to grind. Tonight's show in Houston was billed as containing "new" forensic evidence shedding light on the Kennedy assassination. As I watched, I realized I had seen the episode or one very much like it several years ago, and knew the conclusion: that the Warren Commission got it right... one assassin, three shots, one bullet through Kennedy and Connally, no shot from the grassy knoll (decades later I wondered if the late Progressive editor Erwin Knoll, who occasionally appeared as the token liberal on the MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour, was any relation to Grassy), yada yada yada. No real news from a years-old segment.

Well, almost no news. Sometimes I actually watch as the credits roll, and this was one of those times. The episode was sponsored in part by the David H. Koch Charitable Foundation, the same David H. Koch who is on the board of WGBH, PBS's Boston station that produces so much science content, including... you guessed it... NOVA; one of the Koch brothers currently infamous for effectively funding the founding of the Tea Party.

IMHO, that fact alone renders every expert who participated in the ballistics experiments shown in the episode highly suspect. And could the rebroadcast of that episode years after it was made be an attempt to improve D. Koch's public image as he is under attack by progressives who want him off the WGBH board? YMMV. I was never much of a Kennedy assassination conspiracy theorist back in the day, but I may have to do some more thinking...

Fifty Years Without JFK

Mrs. Perry, Tenth Grade geometry teacher, elderly, rail-thin, probably homely even when she was young, systematic in her approach to her subject... just what you want in a geometry teacher, not distracting but commanding for those of us who loved math... was exceptionally somber when she entered the classroom fifty years ago today, making sure all of us were settled and quiet before directing our attention to the PA for an announcement. The principal announced... the principal never made any announcements, but that day, he did... that the President had been shot.

Before geometry class was over, the principal announced that President Kennedy was dead.

Nothing has been the same since then. Camelot faded, distressingly quickly. Americans of that era liked to think that their government did not depend on any one person for its continuity, its ability to function, even its spirit. We were right about two out of three of those matters. There was no coup attempt. Johnson, apart from his tragic obsession with the Vietnam war, was a competent and craftsmanly president, with some significant and genuinely liberal credits to his name. But Johnson didn't have the magic.

Now, fifty years later, presidents, though probably themselves still the targets of assassination attempts, are better known as the perpetrators of assassinations by proxy.

And in one way or another, America after Kennedy has been bereft of spirit for 50 years. I'm afraid it's not coming back.

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AFTERTHOUGHT: Just for balance, Chomsky eschews hero worship in favor of almost cynical views of Kennedy in real life. He's right, of course; no president in real life could match Kennedy's heroic image. But damn, we could surely use a few heroes today...