Within a matter of a few years of the publication of "FASCISM!" the authors were under investigation by the resurgent Republican right as "communist agents". It happened right in front of everyone and he only ones who recognized it were silenced by the threat of being called "communists" and having their lives destroyed. We call it "McCarthyism" and think it died with him, but it didn't, and now it's so strong we live in fear of it taking formal power next year.
And remember - I write this at the risk of being most unpopular here - that Robert F. Kennedy was counsel to the McCarthy Committee, and as Attorney General he went on to approve the FBI’s relentless campaign of surveillance and blackmail of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., as detailed in the new biography.
Anyone who wants to remedy their ignorance about Robert Kennedy's trajectory might benefit from reading Patricia Sullivan's JUSTICE RISING: Robert Kennedy's America in Black and White. He was an important mover in the Johnson administration's push for the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act of the mid-1960s.
But of course not everyone cares to change their views. RFK's early work with the Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations, a job he quit under pressure from Roy Cohn allows them to defend Cohn and Trump by using the old ploy of argument by changing the subject.
People can change. RF Kennedy did. To see the film of him speaking the night after the MLK assassination to calm a group in a large city (?Detroit) makes that abundantly clear. It is likely the change got him assassinated.
Indianapolis. It was the night OF the assassination: he was the one who gave the news to the crowd of mostly African Americans. The speech is on YouTube. It was mostly extemporaneous, and it's less than 5 minutes long. https://youtu.be/TtLHsYJ8pmc
What motivated his assassin was RFK's support for Israel. He was shot during the first anniversary of the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. And as a top candidate for the Democratic nomination for president, he and his positions were very much in the public eye.
Thank you, Susanna. It was only recently that I saw the speech and was much moved by the words and the tone. Had never been aware of RFK’s stance on Israel and am a bit surprised that it was such an issue at the time. These days another matter.
Which is one reason RFK began to come into his own after JFK was killed. And EMK (better known as Teddy ;-) ) was a damn good senator despite his many personal failings. A lot of the JFK idolatry misses the context he was embedded in -- and the civil rights activism of the early-to-mid '60s, esp. '63 to '65, changed that context in a big way.
The Kennedy Bros along with Nixon were in the thick of “the Red Scare” and used it for their own purposes. Jack was the reluctant president, pushed by his bully father. Bobby was the enforcer for his big brother. Camelot was a myth. They spread the fear of the Domino Theory creating the foundation for the Endless War in Viet Nam as half the country draped themselves in the Flag and railed against educated protestors trying to stop the military industrial complex war macht
We don’t learn the lessons of history because politicians bury it
No, Robert F. Kennedy was not a counsel to the McCarthy Committee. The McCarthy Committee, officially known as the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, was led by Senator Joseph McCarthy and conducted investigations into alleged communist infiltration in the United States during the early 1950s.
Robert F. Kennedy, the younger brother of President John F. Kennedy, had a notable career in politics and law. However, he did not serve as a counsel or have any direct involvement with the McCarthy Committee. Robert F. Kennedy initially gained prominence as a counsel to the Senate Subcommittee on Investigations, which focused on labor and management corruption in the late 1950s.
Later, Robert F. Kennedy served as Attorney General of the United States from 1961 to 1964 during his brother's presidency. He played a significant role in various policy initiatives, including civil rights, organized crime, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.
I’d prefer to believe this, not questioning your info here. These contrasting statements are why I spend now so much time in research and Heather’s Letters so enlightening. My age affords me a lot more time to read .
Hi Harvey. I am an admirer of Robert Kennedy, but you are wrong. Robert Kennedy was an assistant counsel to the Senate Committee chaired by Joe McCarthy. McCarthy was a close friend of the Kennedy family. He vacationed with them in Cape Cod. McCarthy dated two Kennedy sisters. As a result of his relationship with McCarthy, Robert was called "Bad Bobby" by his adversaries. Best.
I stand corrected: RFK worked as an assistant counsel to the subcommittee for several months, from January to June 1953. During this period, he was responsible for researching and investigating various matters related to the subcommittee's work, which included examining alleged communist influences in the Army Signal Corps. RFK's role was primarily focused on legal research and writing, rather than active participation in the hearings or McCarthy's controversial tactics.
However, it is worth noting that RFK became disillusioned with McCarthy's methods and tactics over time. He disagreed with McCarthy's aggressive and often reckless approach in pursuing alleged communists, and RFK ultimately left the subcommittee after six months due to his concerns about McCarthy's tactics and the damaging impact they had on individuals' lives.
But what we need to keep in perspective is that communism was this monolithic threat in the minds of everyone almost everyone. It included extremists and moderates as well. JFK and LBJ were products of that mindset. Ann Rand was its fanatic critic. There are demigods in every generation that we must be watchful of. Today, we are allowing social media run rampant and it’s breaking society into pieces and infecting children. I watched a couple of kids at a public event not long ago. Every two or three minutes, they instinctively grabbed their cell devises and God knows what they kept returning to. This behavior is destructive and parents are not even aware of this influence.
The difference to me was those politicians who could grow intellectually. Communism was a very scary thing then, with first Stalin then Khrushchev presenting as psychopaths. The Kennedys came to political power as Stalin was killing millions of his own people, and communism had half of Eurasia and a heavy presence in Africa. An enormous threat.
But both Kennedys (RFK & JFK) demonstrated a real capacity for change. This happened to be at a time when many American verities were being challenged. About the government’s unfettered right to make war, on the rights of women, on the rights of minorities, on the responsibilities of the government to protect the rights of minorities, and the role of the government in caring for its most vulnerable. JFK grew with these changes, but he died early. RFK continued his growth until his death.
Those posting comments that paint the entirety of their characters with a single aspect of their lives miss the point. You could do the same with MLK, FDR, Truman or any figure of the past. As someone once said, the past is a foreign country. You can’t navigate it with today’s thoughts and understanding.
The Kennedys wear halos because they were assassinated, but they were simply humans who handled political power in the same complex ways almost every politician does (except for Trump, who simply abused it). I remember being very angry with Obama and what I saw as his abuse of surveillance on American citizens.
Heck, I was disappointed with Obama when he only sent a few missiles against Assad for launching biological weapons against his own people. That was inadequate but probably had the excess of cowboy W Bush to restrain himself.
Yes, and don't forget the Soviet Union had the hydrogen bomb, we executed the Rosenbergs for a couple of crude drawings and we kids were being taught to "duck and cover" just as today's kids are being taught to hide, barricade and, as a last resort, confront mass shooters. I was a high schooler in Key West, Florida, during the Cuban Missile Crisis and watched troops and missiles pour onto the island for three days. My military father had the option of sending us kids away but decided against it because where were we going to go to be safe in the event of a nuclear war? There's a lot of context to apply to leaders in those very scary days when talking about communism and fascisms just as there is now.
In those days Communism was synonymous with fascism as an idea. It was understood to be tied to an authoritarian government and therefore the opposite of democracy. Still, governments don't have neat pretty actions, they are always a mixed bag, as are politicians.
An ongoing debate in my own head, which is based more about intent -good vs bad. Manipulation by evil forces , hmmm , do we recognize it from critical thought ability and/or from where does THAT begin. Good parenting? and is that opening yet another canned worms? I prefer ,currently, to think ‘woke’ (barely defined) is good. Not of manipulated opinion, but of good intent. Those who started this verbage being of the dark side/more ...having been manipulated through bad intents.
My understanding is that even at conception things can go ‘wrong’ , results -being born a girl or a boy in appearance isn’t one ‘gets what [you] see’. And those people are OK with me, I understand ( came from IMHO good parenting).
But the manipulation part gets tricky. The natural attraction is a tumultuous period for many/most? Can reading be a part of grooming? The word itself has now bad connotation . Is not good parenting part of good intent.
My point is in the muddling.
When good intent is muddled for control/money/perversion it then has become manipulation/bias/racism/etcs.
I’m interested in reading your book(s?) , and now Belefonte’s..he was ‘a first love’ of mine I think I was around 10-12 y.o.
Ellen Though I was a supporter of Bobby Kennedy in the 1968 presidential primaries, I was later aghast that he had pursued, with CIA (and, presumably, JFK’s approval), about two dozen schemes to assassinate Fidel Castro.
Although Castro had good reason to try to kill JFK, I am confident that Lee Harvey Oswald did this alone. I do acknowledge that Oswald had a strange relationship with the Soviets, but, especially after the Cuban Missile Crisis, it seemed extremely unlikely that Khrushchev would authorize such an action.
[On the evening of November 21st, Oswald went to the home of a friend of mine, where Oswald’s estranged wife was living. The next morning he took his gun from the garage and, as Ruth Paine observed, seemed normal as he went off to the book depository building. My friend wrote a small book about the Oswalds and the gun.]
Well, if RFK had a change of heart after MLK was assassinated, it had to happen quickly, because MLK was killed in April of 1968 & RFK himself was assassinated on June 6, 1968.
1968: The worst year of my life both privately and watching tragedy unfold month after month. It didn’t end. I think I’ll write this chapter for my memoirs. That why these comments are important for me. I use them as ideas to further write.
For insight into RFK's thinking read Harry Belafonte's autobiography. He and King worked to move RFK to take a more aggressive stance to protect civil rights even as King knew he was under surveillance by the FBI. Hardly any doubt after the tapes sent to him by Hoover and the letter urging him to commit suicide in advance of going to Stockholm to get the Nobel. And Belafonte himself took steps to use a safe phone. There were instances demonstrating that the movement had indeed gotten through to RFK after JFK's death and Birmingham, where he secretly intervened to help get kids out of jail in a way that certainly endangered his own job. . And the possibility that Hoover threatened to expose JFK's philandering in order to get the wiretapping approved. (Meanwhile at home Hoover was a cross dresser. You can't make this stuff up.) When I decided to read Belafonte 's book I had no idea it would contain so much inside information about major players, of which Belafonte himself was certainly one. He was a source for Taylor Branch too. The book tells a fascinating tale not only of Belafonte' s own story, which is pretty complicated, but of his perspective on and partipation in the civil rights struggle. It's not just another celebrity bio by any means.
It really infuriates me that even today all over the nation the FBI buildings carry the name of that FASCIST, J. Edgar Hoover. He had a dossier on Sammy Davis Jr. because he married a white woman. He was pure racist, hypocritical scum and should be buried with the rest of them.
One thing to remember about any successful politicians in office is that they didn’t get there using Gandhi love. All are calculating and they think in terms of how popular their actions will be. If you put any of these politicians in a room and listened to them privately you just might have a different perspective on them.
That was an amazing speech. The first time I heard it my first thought was to try to think of a single politician of today (this was in 2007) that could or would come close to that.
RFK’s quivering voice, when he spoke, for this then 12 year old, "got” me. Along with seeing the black horse with empty backward boots, really tore me up.
Ellen, you haven't lost any points with me. There's a great deal of trash in our background, and I remember well the FBI's defamation and blackmail of MLK. I'll add that the "beloved" Reagan ruined many Hollywood lives and careers when, as president of the Screen Actors Guild, accused many of being Communists, whether it was true or not. Thus, the beginning of his quest for the White House.
And Ellen, I will be equally unpopular when I suggest that our political side must or should let go of the newest and the far flung notions aka, “woke” issues for two reasons; 1. They are misguided and 2. They give ammunition to the enemy. And what I speak to is this new game fad of boys/men dressing as girls in order to play on female sports. I have no understanding why people can’t see this for what it is; exploitation of women. Even NOW seems to have swallowed this. I went to their site and someone commented in favor of this deception. I countered but don’t know if their moderator will approve my position. It was reasonable devoid of anger. The other most important point is allowing children to obtain gender reaffirming surgery. Children have been influenced by anything online and there is a terrible amount of destructive influences online.
We as a society had better begin policing this or our enemy will do it for us. Children are being manipulated pure and simple. And anyone who criticizes this is called a hater. Boy, have I heard that before. Point of fact, I have accepted gay and lesbian lifestyles all of my life. Friends are gay. It’s never been a big deal for me even when it was a big deal for society in general. I even ran away from home with hippie friends as a kid and enjoyed a week in PTown — the lesbian and gay capital of the East Coast. (I have the infamous claim to have spent overnight accommodations in the Provincetown jail for trying to sell LSD to the chief of police. The charges were quickly reduced to child delinquency, lol.)
What we are witnessing today is a terrible breaking apart of society. We had better stop it, wake up, smell the coffee, and become rational folks again. My hunch is we won’t. It’s more likely that we will continue on this self-destructive path. I never understood Plato admonishment about Tyranny following Democracy as I do today. When push comes to shove, the trend is to go to the right rather than the left. This is what is in store for us if we don’t wake up . And please do read my book, “Donald’s Vanity Tantrums.” It’s only $15 maybe less on Amazon or ask me and I’ll mail you a copy email: bkatz321@gmail.com
Bill, with all due respect, you are as wrong as you could be on trans issues. Boys are not dressing as girls in order to play “female sports,” whatever those are. Children are not typically allowed to receive gender affirming surgery related to transition until at least age 16, and only then following years of both hormonal and psychological care - but breast enhancements are just fine (that is also gender affirming surgery). What trans children are allowed to do is take puberty blockers, to postpone puberty until they are old enough to receive other therapies, and to receive counseling to help with their gender dysphoria. Social transition alone isn’t an easy thing to do, and if you think about it clearly, I think you’ll conclude that few to no high school boys would transition socially just to play sports. That sounds pretty ludicrous, doesn’t it?
Further, you are talking about a tiny proportion of the population. 1.4% of the youth population identifies as trans. Not all of them are trans girls, and not all of them play sports. Estimates are that there are fewer than 100 teen trans athletes nationwide. (Source: https://www.newsweek.com/how-many-transgender-athletes-play-womens-sports-1796006.). This is not the huge problem you make it out to be. And further, being a trans athlete is no guarantee of winning in girls’ sport.
“The idea that women and girls have an advantage because they are trans ignores the actual conditions of their lives.” (Source, ACLU)
Full disclosure: I am the proud mother of a transitioning young adult. Believe me, this process is far from easy for her, and her athletic performance is the farthest thing from her mind. I fear every day for her, and ignorance makes her less safe.
Thanks for your report from the "front lines". I finished typing about 5 minutes after you posted. Gender expression is not a fad, and gender dysphoria is separate and distinct from gender expression.
Ally, thank you. Ignorance is awfully hard to combat. And for sure this is a complicated and strange thing. I can’t pretend to understand what my child is going through - how could I? But what I can do is inform myself, and love her unconditionally. Part of that includes battling ignorance.
KR, thanks for sharing these sources. I'll need to look at these and learn more. Honestly, I admit that I don't understand a lot about trans issues and it's tough for me to grasp, having been born and raised in a binary mode. I can't guarantee that I'll "get it" but I'm trying my best to understand better.
Having said that, right leaning politicians pointing to trans people as a grave threat to our nation, while waving off Putin's open hostility to our country, his interference in our election process, embracing dictators like Orban and attacking individual and civil rights is wrong. Not grasping a person's life shouldn't mean attacking it or their right to exist safely, like everyone else. This is wrong and making trans people a focal point for attacks is wrong.
Exactly, C! I don’t understand either, but I don’t have to understand in order to support my daughter. For sure I’ve taken the time to educate myself better, though, as you suggest. I want her to have the right to live her life as she sees fit. I trust her judgement; she’s a fine, intelligent person - and this is really hard. Literally nobody would choose to go through this in order to compete at synchronized swimming in high school.
I am not sure I need to “get it” in whatever degree of understanding or friend or family experience. I DO need to learn to accept it. That single issue is far more complicated and the difference in someone’s pretrans experience and my preteen/post teen experience, means I will never completely get it but I sure can learn to accept someone who is different in that regard.
Bless you, KR, for your being your daughter’s strong advocate! My great-nephew is trans and is so happy now. He despised his breasts as a teenager and felt “inadequate” as a girl. The entire family rallied behind him, which is amazing considering since his grandparents were Repubs. But, they love him for no matter what. That, is the key for a happy and successful person anyway, right?
KR, thank you for your non-judgmental and factual response. Your family is indeed fortunate to have you, and your approach will assist in your daughter's safe transition.
Thank you for responding to the inaccurate statements made by Mr. Katz. There are some very young children who experience a sense of being the "wrong" gender at a very young age, much to young to have been influenced by media.
Here's an article includes a lot of valuable information including an extensive list of sources on which the article is based:
"Young children do not get medical transition treatment, but they do have feelings about their gender and can benefit from support from those around them. “Children start to have a sense of their own gender identity between the ages of 2 1/2 to 3 years old,” Olezeski said." {snip} “Research substantiates that children who are prepubertal and assert an identity of [transgender and gender diverse] know their gender as clearly and as consistently as their developmentally equivalent peers who identify as cisgender and benefit from the same level of social acceptance,” the AAP guidelines say, adding that differences in how children identify and express their gender are normal." https://www.factcheck.org/2023/05/scicheck-young-children-do-not-receive-medical-gender-transition-treatment/
Oh really? I’m taking time out from my business to write several responses to sell a couple of books at the most and not one most likely while I could be engaging my day business with a 10 times or more rate of return. Maybe you are remiss that you haven’t written a book perhaps? Having said that and since you brought the matter up, it does rely on humor and satire along with illustrations something you don’t often find in detailing the goings on of the worst president in US history. And if you want a copy, I’ll personally autograph it at no extra charge. How does that grab ya? And just for you, I’ll pay the shipping.
You may not have meant it this way, but there seems to be in your writing a near association of society breaking apart and transgender issues. I believe that the story is far more complicated than that. American society is in a state of extreme tension at this moment as a result of a complex interplay of complex issues and extreme changes brought on by the (historically) rapid rise of technology.
In the last forty years there has been massive change in American life. The steady rise upward in economic and thus social status of a multitude of Americans has been rudely closed off. Part of it is extreme concentration of wealth and part is due to the huge changes in economic uncertainty brought about by the infiltration of technology into our lives. To focus on the effects of gender issues in sports is akin to being angry that a picture is hanging crookedly after an earthquake ha shattered much of your house.
Nobody reacts well to massive change. The right is fixating on gender issues, book banning, “immoral” teaching of American History as stalking horses for the major problems America faces - a widespread breakdown in family life, the diminishment in the spread of jobs that pay well, a sharp and extremely troubling rise in suicide, most especially by teenagers, a resurgence in open and blatant racism after Obama’s Presidency and a drug use problem that has spiraled out of control.
There is a dangerous number of citizens now who have chosen the path of extreme individualism over the sticky but worthwhile struggles of belonging to a real community. They are lonely and afraid and and that leads to a heavy burden of anger - the dominant emotion in American public life today Add 400 million guns to that mix and you have an exponential increase in the threat of a social earthquake.
The political apparatus is trying to con Americans into believing that there is some magical path back to the simplicity of the Fifties, when POC knew their place, the economy was always strong, men were men and women were subordinate and so on. They want us to vent our fears and anger on issues of gender and sexuality because they do not have a fucking clue how to address the really big issues, some of which I listed above. They are delighted to see people twist themselves into pretzels over conspiracy theories that have become more and more ludicrous with each decade.
Unless this downward spiral into inanity is aborted, how will AI be thoughtfully addressed? How will climate change be reduced from apocalypse to disaster? How will the structural weaknesses in the American form of government - from elections to the Supreme Court - be muted? How will the dragon of financial inequality be slain?
Fundamentally America is hampered by a crippling imbalance. The ratio of thoughtful adults to mere grownups is getting smaller by the day.
I always wonder when the Republicans harken back to the magical 1950s what they think of the tax policies then that permitted such an explosion of the middle class post-war.
I'm curious, Bill. Who is manipulating what children, and what are they doing to manipulate them? Where are you seeing IMAB (Identified Male at Birth) children transitioning just to play on IFAB (Identified Female at Birth) sports teams? I know a fair number of people whose children have either identified as "gender fluid" with their expressions of gender or as those who are more "textbook" gender dysphoric that have supported them as loving parents. In none of these cases was participation in sports any part of the equation.
Ally, I’m not an expert here. I have always supported women in every aspect and guys slipping through the proverbial gate to play against women don’t set well with me and never will. And I’m frankly miffed why more women don’t get it. Perhaps because it’s a brand new (well not brand new) but new issue to address. Again, may we say what’s good for the goose is good for the gander? You will not likely see a trans man (biological woman) playing against men because they couldn’t compete. And if this simple point can’t be understood, I rest my case. I’m not going to stop being supportive of women on this issue. The guys that are signing on to women’s teams are gaming the system.
Bill Katz, you said that "guys that are signing on to women’s teams are gaming the system." Can you give any examples of guys signing on to women's teams? I have heard this before and would like to know the actual statistics. Thanks in advance.
I'll take your suggestions and I am, right now, actually smelling the coffee. And we are, right now, doing exactly what you said -- we are behaving as rational folks and having this discussion! As for the "woke" stuff, I do wish we had a better sense of where government should and should not be involved. For instance, even though the we get to see the results, live, on sports channels, how a private sports organization handles transgender issues should be entirely up to them. Since it's not a good issue for legislative action, there's no way to "win" a fight to pass or defeat it.
I note with interest your silence in the face of clear evidence that nearly everything you wrote is wrong. But then, you were really just posting that to hustle your book, weren't you?
I don't believe that transgender females should be competing in women's sports. However, I don't think that it is based on a "fad." These people have genuine gender issues, based on biology, that simply don't fit the norm as traditionally understood.
Richard, the Olympics has had rules on the participation of trans athletes since 2003. The Tokyo Olympics in 2021 were the first instance of trans athletes participating - it took almost 20 years. Male to female transition doesn’t magically make trans women dominate Olympic sport, never mind high school athletics.
Our increasingly open society is allowing people to live openly their true experiences for the first time. Personally, I don’t think it hurts anybody, and is no one’s business but their own. Transition is so hard. Nobody would choose that, given another path.
No, Robert F. Kennedy was not a counsel to the McCarthy Committee. The McCarthy Committee, officially known as the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, was led by Senator Joseph McCarthy and conducted investigations into alleged communist infiltration in the United States during the early 1950s.
Robert F. Kennedy, the younger brother of President John F. Kennedy, had a notable career in politics and law. However, he did not serve as a counsel or have any direct involvement with the McCarthy Committee. Robert F. Kennedy initially gained prominence as a counsel to the Senate Subcommittee on Investigations, which focused on labor and management corruption in the late 1950s.
Later, Robert F. Kennedy served as Attorney General of the United States from 1961 to 1964 during his brother's presidency. He played a significant role in various policy initiatives, including civil rights, organized crime, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.
He worked for McCarthy in 1953. One source of many, in addition to Wikipedia, is a piece in the “American Experience” series on PBS.org entitled “RFK’s Enemies.”
And people make mistakes especially in the initial stage of careers — maybe? I’m not defending him. I agree that the patriarch of the family made a deal with the devil and it came back in a terrible way. Almost a Shakespearean tragedy.
Joseph Kennedy was the devil incarnate and just an all around piece of garbage. It’s the women who married into the family who suffered the most, beginning with Rose. That SOB husband of hers put their “special” daughter in an mental institution, without his wife’s approval. Their children were aghast! It prompted their daughter, Eunice Shriver, to start Special Olympics which has become an international and a national event.
Jonathan Eig’s newly released biography of King. See the Guardian’s review of May 27, and also an article in The Atlantic (July/August 2002), available online, for just two of many sources.
Thank you Ellen; I will review the cited sorces. That's an old habit of mine from trial work; I check the citations & the "pin cites".
I read 'The Guardian US' 5/27 article which contains some details of MLK's arrival at Dexter Baptist Church circa 1955 & his joining of boycott to support Rosa Parks at the start of 1956. Robert Kennedy became the Nation's AG over 5 years later afterJFK's inauguration .That leaves at least 5 yeats of the FBI's anti-MLK, unspecified sabotage of MLK ... PRIOR to Robert Kennedy's alleged "authorization".
First rule of behavioral science & form instruction to jurors "association is not causation".
A pinpoint citation, often called a pincite, is necessary to point the reader to specific the page(s) within the case. Pincites are placed after the page on which the case begins, separated by a comma and a space. A pincite may consist of a page range or multiple pages that are not consecutive.
Tearing off the veil of myths to expose the truths and realities is important to remind folks that revisionist history is not a new thing. If that makes you unpopular then people are not thinking. They are swallowing propaganda whole. Thanks for bringing this up.
In December 1952, at his father's behest, Kennedy was appointed by family friend Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy as assistant counsel of the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Kennedy disapproved of McCarthy's aggressive methods of garnering intelligence on suspected communists. This was a highly visible job for him. He resigned in July 1953, but "retained a fondness for McCarthy". The period of July 1953 to January 1954 saw him at "a professional and personal nadir", feeling that he was adrift while trying to prove himself to his family. ... After a period as an assistant to his father on the Hoover Commission, Kennedy rejoined the Senate committee staff as chief counsel for the Democratic minority in February 1954. That month, McCarthy's chief counsel Roy Cohn subpoenaed Annie Lee Moss, accusing her of membership in the Communist Party. Kennedy revealed that Cohn had called the wrong Annie Lee Moss and he requested the file on Moss from the FBI. FBI director J. Edgar Hoover had been forewarned by Cohn and denied him access, calling RFK "an arrogant whippersnapper". When Democrats gained a Senate majority in January 1955, Kennedy became chief counsel and was a background figure in the televised Army–McCarthy hearings of 1954 into McCarthy's conduct. The Moss incident turned Cohn into an enemy, which led to Kennedy assisting Democratic senators in ridiculing Cohn during the hearings. The animosity grew to the point where Cohn had to be restrained after asking RFK if he wanted to fight him ....
Donald accused the Democrats holding a witch hunt, he being the witch - is he projecting again ?
The most commonly accepted etymology derives warlock from the Old English wǣrloga, which meant "breaker of oaths" or "deceiver"[2] and was given special application to the devil around 1000.[3] In early modern Scots, the word came to be used as the male equivalent of witch (which can be male or female, but has historically been used predominantly for females).[4][5][6] The term may have become associated in Scotland with MALE WITCHES due to the idea that they had made pacts with Auld Hornie (my note: remember pussy grabbing and that horney old devil - Epstein ?) and thus had betrayed the Christian faith and broke their baptismal vows or oaths.[7] From this use, the word passed into Romantic literature and ultimately 20th-century popular culture. A derivation from the Old Norse varð-lokkur, "caller of spirits", has also been suggested,[8][9][10] but the Oxford English Dictionary considers this implausible due to the extreme rarity of the Norse word and because forms without hard -k, which are consistent with the Old English etymology ("traitor"), are attested earlier than forms with a -k.[11] - witch hunt" - wikipedia
The British called the American revolutionaries Yankees. Subsequently the Americans owned the epithet and sang Yankee Doodle as they attacked the British.
So lets own the epithet Witch Hunt
because Donald has graduated from Flim Flam Man to Warlock by definition. We can beat the evangelicos to the punch. I'm tired of trying to be like the Quakers and be gentle and peaceful . I don't think that is appropriate behavior anymore with cowardly Republican bullies. It's time to fight fire with fire.
I was thinking of referring to individual and collective Republicans as warlocks when they use name callimg and, character assassination to misinform and manipulate their followers. I don't believe in witches. I suspect that now-a-days women who are considered "sensitive" may have a well developed sense of what event or behavior to expect. I
But if Donald's behavior or words fit the definition of warlock, let's use it and just see how they wiggle out of that one. But in this case, we'd be justified.
Those things you mention that they do: name calling, character assassination and deliberately misinforming and manipulating their followers. That’s a Warlock or a bad Witch. There are good witches too. Those who with no one knowing, seek to improve your life by their actions.
Thank you, Heather for sharing the 1943 War Dept pamphlet !!! It describes exactly what is going on before our very eyes!!! We MUST work hard to get out the vote in spite of the GOP gerrymandering and voter restrictions. Our Democracy and freedoms depend on our votes. I will crawl to the polls if I have to do so!!!! We are truly on the edge of the
destruction of “by the people and for the people”. It is terrifying and, Heather, thank you for giving us such a definitive description of the horrific this fascism virus that is oozing it’s way into our lives germ after germ and drip by drip!!!!! 😳
I thought about Memorial Day. I thought about the people who gave up their lives for our freedom. Then I thought what about our people in Congress fighting for our freedom, right now, their only weapons being our laws, clear thinking, and trying to hold their calm. That is a real war too. I thought of them on Memorial Day. My heart goes out to them. It must be nearly intolerable.
Within a matter of a few years of the publication of "FASCISM!" the authors were under investigation by the resurgent Republican right as "communist agents". It happened right in front of everyone and he only ones who recognized it were silenced by the threat of being called "communists" and having their lives destroyed. We call it "McCarthyism" and think it died with him, but it didn't, and now it's so strong we live in fear of it taking formal power next year.
Remember that McCarthy's right hand man was Roy Cohn. And Cohn taught Trump how to manipulate our legal system.
And remember - I write this at the risk of being most unpopular here - that Robert F. Kennedy was counsel to the McCarthy Committee, and as Attorney General he went on to approve the FBI’s relentless campaign of surveillance and blackmail of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., as detailed in the new biography.
Not everyone will be happy with what you wrote, but truth is a defense and what you said is true.
No so.
Harvey Kravetz
Writes Harvey’s Newsletter
"No so."
? I don't know what that means.
I believe Harvey simply forgot the "t" in "Not."
Neither does Harvey....
Anyone who wants to remedy their ignorance about Robert Kennedy's trajectory might benefit from reading Patricia Sullivan's JUSTICE RISING: Robert Kennedy's America in Black and White. He was an important mover in the Johnson administration's push for the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act of the mid-1960s.
But of course not everyone cares to change their views. RFK's early work with the Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations, a job he quit under pressure from Roy Cohn allows them to defend Cohn and Trump by using the old ploy of argument by changing the subject.
People can change. RF Kennedy did. To see the film of him speaking the night after the MLK assassination to calm a group in a large city (?Detroit) makes that abundantly clear. It is likely the change got him assassinated.
Indianapolis. It was the night OF the assassination: he was the one who gave the news to the crowd of mostly African Americans. The speech is on YouTube. It was mostly extemporaneous, and it's less than 5 minutes long. https://youtu.be/TtLHsYJ8pmc
What motivated his assassin was RFK's support for Israel. He was shot during the first anniversary of the 1967 Arab-Israeli War. And as a top candidate for the Democratic nomination for president, he and his positions were very much in the public eye.
Thank you, Susanna. It was only recently that I saw the speech and was much moved by the words and the tone. Had never been aware of RFK’s stance on Israel and am a bit surprised that it was such an issue at the time. These days another matter.
The Kennedys presented a united front, but what a difference there was in their real life.
Which is one reason RFK began to come into his own after JFK was killed. And EMK (better known as Teddy ;-) ) was a damn good senator despite his many personal failings. A lot of the JFK idolatry misses the context he was embedded in -- and the civil rights activism of the early-to-mid '60s, esp. '63 to '65, changed that context in a big way.
Exactly but I extend this sentiment to all politicians. We tend to accept the public veneer too readily.
The Kennedy Bros along with Nixon were in the thick of “the Red Scare” and used it for their own purposes. Jack was the reluctant president, pushed by his bully father. Bobby was the enforcer for his big brother. Camelot was a myth. They spread the fear of the Domino Theory creating the foundation for the Endless War in Viet Nam as half the country draped themselves in the Flag and railed against educated protestors trying to stop the military industrial complex war macht
We don’t learn the lessons of history because politicians bury it
And that's why a historian like Heather is so vital.
This is comic book superficiality.
Ok sure
The part about JFK’s reluctance as a Presidential candidate?
The part about JFK, RFK, and Nixon being actively involved in fighting The Red Scare?
The part about RFK being the law enforcer? ( lets talk Jimmy Hoffa)
The part about JFK secretly escalating the Viet Nam involvement?
The part about the military industrial complex and Washington’s support of the Western State’s aero defense political campaign base?
Or the part about how History is massaged by politicians in our school books?
You have a few facts and a few semi-facts. No context. This is laughable high school emotional ranting.
No, Robert F. Kennedy was not a counsel to the McCarthy Committee. The McCarthy Committee, officially known as the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, was led by Senator Joseph McCarthy and conducted investigations into alleged communist infiltration in the United States during the early 1950s.
Robert F. Kennedy, the younger brother of President John F. Kennedy, had a notable career in politics and law. However, he did not serve as a counsel or have any direct involvement with the McCarthy Committee. Robert F. Kennedy initially gained prominence as a counsel to the Senate Subcommittee on Investigations, which focused on labor and management corruption in the late 1950s.
Later, Robert F. Kennedy served as Attorney General of the United States from 1961 to 1964 during his brother's presidency. He played a significant role in various policy initiatives, including civil rights, organized crime, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.
I’d prefer to believe this, not questioning your info here. These contrasting statements are why I spend now so much time in research and Heather’s Letters so enlightening. My age affords me a lot more time to read .
Thank you for adding to ...
Just checking history sites, I'd say you are mistaken. He was recruited as Assistant Counsel to Roy Cohen on that committee, and credited with getting things "back on track", at least for it's other labor responsibilities. McCarthy was an old friend of their father, Joe Kennedy. John Kennedy avoid the censure vote on McCarthy by recuperating from back problems. https://www.inlander.com/comment/when-robert-kennedy-and-joe-mccarthy-crossed-paths-the-greatness-of-rfk-became-even-more-obvious-10476294
Hi Harvey. I am an admirer of Robert Kennedy, but you are wrong. Robert Kennedy was an assistant counsel to the Senate Committee chaired by Joe McCarthy. McCarthy was a close friend of the Kennedy family. He vacationed with them in Cape Cod. McCarthy dated two Kennedy sisters. As a result of his relationship with McCarthy, Robert was called "Bad Bobby" by his adversaries. Best.
I stand corrected: RFK worked as an assistant counsel to the subcommittee for several months, from January to June 1953. During this period, he was responsible for researching and investigating various matters related to the subcommittee's work, which included examining alleged communist influences in the Army Signal Corps. RFK's role was primarily focused on legal research and writing, rather than active participation in the hearings or McCarthy's controversial tactics.
However, it is worth noting that RFK became disillusioned with McCarthy's methods and tactics over time. He disagreed with McCarthy's aggressive and often reckless approach in pursuing alleged communists, and RFK ultimately left the subcommittee after six months due to his concerns about McCarthy's tactics and the damaging impact they had on individuals' lives.
But what we need to keep in perspective is that communism was this monolithic threat in the minds of everyone almost everyone. It included extremists and moderates as well. JFK and LBJ were products of that mindset. Ann Rand was its fanatic critic. There are demigods in every generation that we must be watchful of. Today, we are allowing social media run rampant and it’s breaking society into pieces and infecting children. I watched a couple of kids at a public event not long ago. Every two or three minutes, they instinctively grabbed their cell devises and God knows what they kept returning to. This behavior is destructive and parents are not even aware of this influence.
The difference to me was those politicians who could grow intellectually. Communism was a very scary thing then, with first Stalin then Khrushchev presenting as psychopaths. The Kennedys came to political power as Stalin was killing millions of his own people, and communism had half of Eurasia and a heavy presence in Africa. An enormous threat.
But both Kennedys (RFK & JFK) demonstrated a real capacity for change. This happened to be at a time when many American verities were being challenged. About the government’s unfettered right to make war, on the rights of women, on the rights of minorities, on the responsibilities of the government to protect the rights of minorities, and the role of the government in caring for its most vulnerable. JFK grew with these changes, but he died early. RFK continued his growth until his death.
Those posting comments that paint the entirety of their characters with a single aspect of their lives miss the point. You could do the same with MLK, FDR, Truman or any figure of the past. As someone once said, the past is a foreign country. You can’t navigate it with today’s thoughts and understanding.
The Kennedys wear halos because they were assassinated, but they were simply humans who handled political power in the same complex ways almost every politician does (except for Trump, who simply abused it). I remember being very angry with Obama and what I saw as his abuse of surveillance on American citizens.
Heck, I was disappointed with Obama when he only sent a few missiles against Assad for launching biological weapons against his own people. That was inadequate but probably had the excess of cowboy W Bush to restrain himself.
Yes, and don't forget the Soviet Union had the hydrogen bomb, we executed the Rosenbergs for a couple of crude drawings and we kids were being taught to "duck and cover" just as today's kids are being taught to hide, barricade and, as a last resort, confront mass shooters. I was a high schooler in Key West, Florida, during the Cuban Missile Crisis and watched troops and missiles pour onto the island for three days. My military father had the option of sending us kids away but decided against it because where were we going to go to be safe in the event of a nuclear war? There's a lot of context to apply to leaders in those very scary days when talking about communism and fascisms just as there is now.
Thank you for this clear-headed assessment of the times in which the Kennedys were ascendant.
In those days Communism was synonymous with fascism as an idea. It was understood to be tied to an authoritarian government and therefore the opposite of democracy. Still, governments don't have neat pretty actions, they are always a mixed bag, as are politicians.
Parents are modeling this same behavior.
An ongoing debate in my own head, which is based more about intent -good vs bad. Manipulation by evil forces , hmmm , do we recognize it from critical thought ability and/or from where does THAT begin. Good parenting? and is that opening yet another canned worms? I prefer ,currently, to think ‘woke’ (barely defined) is good. Not of manipulated opinion, but of good intent. Those who started this verbage being of the dark side/more ...having been manipulated through bad intents.
My understanding is that even at conception things can go ‘wrong’ , results -being born a girl or a boy in appearance isn’t one ‘gets what [you] see’. And those people are OK with me, I understand ( came from IMHO good parenting).
But the manipulation part gets tricky. The natural attraction is a tumultuous period for many/most? Can reading be a part of grooming? The word itself has now bad connotation . Is not good parenting part of good intent.
My point is in the muddling.
When good intent is muddled for control/money/perversion it then has become manipulation/bias/racism/etcs.
I’m interested in reading your book(s?) , and now Belefonte’s..he was ‘a first love’ of mine I think I was around 10-12 y.o.
Opinions are solicited
Ellen Though I was a supporter of Bobby Kennedy in the 1968 presidential primaries, I was later aghast that he had pursued, with CIA (and, presumably, JFK’s approval), about two dozen schemes to assassinate Fidel Castro.
Although Castro had good reason to try to kill JFK, I am confident that Lee Harvey Oswald did this alone. I do acknowledge that Oswald had a strange relationship with the Soviets, but, especially after the Cuban Missile Crisis, it seemed extremely unlikely that Khrushchev would authorize such an action.
[On the evening of November 21st, Oswald went to the home of a friend of mine, where Oswald’s estranged wife was living. The next morning he took his gun from the garage and, as Ruth Paine observed, seemed normal as he went off to the book depository building. My friend wrote a small book about the Oswalds and the gun.]
I really don’t know RFL’s biography, but I wonder if he had a change of heart when MLK was assassinated, or maybe before.
Well, if RFK had a change of heart after MLK was assassinated, it had to happen quickly, because MLK was killed in April of 1968 & RFK himself was assassinated on June 6, 1968.
1968: The worst year of my life both privately and watching tragedy unfold month after month. It didn’t end. I think I’ll write this chapter for my memoirs. That why these comments are important for me. I use them as ideas to further write.
Given that he tried to stop the Freedom Riders because they "embarrassed" JFK I doubt it.
For insight into RFK's thinking read Harry Belafonte's autobiography. He and King worked to move RFK to take a more aggressive stance to protect civil rights even as King knew he was under surveillance by the FBI. Hardly any doubt after the tapes sent to him by Hoover and the letter urging him to commit suicide in advance of going to Stockholm to get the Nobel. And Belafonte himself took steps to use a safe phone. There were instances demonstrating that the movement had indeed gotten through to RFK after JFK's death and Birmingham, where he secretly intervened to help get kids out of jail in a way that certainly endangered his own job. . And the possibility that Hoover threatened to expose JFK's philandering in order to get the wiretapping approved. (Meanwhile at home Hoover was a cross dresser. You can't make this stuff up.) When I decided to read Belafonte 's book I had no idea it would contain so much inside information about major players, of which Belafonte himself was certainly one. He was a source for Taylor Branch too. The book tells a fascinating tale not only of Belafonte' s own story, which is pretty complicated, but of his perspective on and partipation in the civil rights struggle. It's not just another celebrity bio by any means.
It really infuriates me that even today all over the nation the FBI buildings carry the name of that FASCIST, J. Edgar Hoover. He had a dossier on Sammy Davis Jr. because he married a white woman. He was pure racist, hypocritical scum and should be buried with the rest of them.
Thanks for the tip on Belafonte's autobio! I really want to read it!
One thing to remember about any successful politicians in office is that they didn’t get there using Gandhi love. All are calculating and they think in terms of how popular their actions will be. If you put any of these politicians in a room and listened to them privately you just might have a different perspective on them.
Find the speech (I’ve seen it online) that RFK gave to the City Club of Cleveland immediately after MLK was assassinated.
That was an amazing speech. The first time I heard it my first thought was to try to think of a single politician of today (this was in 2007) that could or would come close to that.
Or after JFK's assassination?
RFK’s quivering voice, when he spoke, for this then 12 year old, "got” me. Along with seeing the black horse with empty backward boots, really tore me up.
Ellen, you haven't lost any points with me. There's a great deal of trash in our background, and I remember well the FBI's defamation and blackmail of MLK. I'll add that the "beloved" Reagan ruined many Hollywood lives and careers when, as president of the Screen Actors Guild, accused many of being Communists, whether it was true or not. Thus, the beginning of his quest for the White House.
And Ellen, I will be equally unpopular when I suggest that our political side must or should let go of the newest and the far flung notions aka, “woke” issues for two reasons; 1. They are misguided and 2. They give ammunition to the enemy. And what I speak to is this new game fad of boys/men dressing as girls in order to play on female sports. I have no understanding why people can’t see this for what it is; exploitation of women. Even NOW seems to have swallowed this. I went to their site and someone commented in favor of this deception. I countered but don’t know if their moderator will approve my position. It was reasonable devoid of anger. The other most important point is allowing children to obtain gender reaffirming surgery. Children have been influenced by anything online and there is a terrible amount of destructive influences online.
We as a society had better begin policing this or our enemy will do it for us. Children are being manipulated pure and simple. And anyone who criticizes this is called a hater. Boy, have I heard that before. Point of fact, I have accepted gay and lesbian lifestyles all of my life. Friends are gay. It’s never been a big deal for me even when it was a big deal for society in general. I even ran away from home with hippie friends as a kid and enjoyed a week in PTown — the lesbian and gay capital of the East Coast. (I have the infamous claim to have spent overnight accommodations in the Provincetown jail for trying to sell LSD to the chief of police. The charges were quickly reduced to child delinquency, lol.)
What we are witnessing today is a terrible breaking apart of society. We had better stop it, wake up, smell the coffee, and become rational folks again. My hunch is we won’t. It’s more likely that we will continue on this self-destructive path. I never understood Plato admonishment about Tyranny following Democracy as I do today. When push comes to shove, the trend is to go to the right rather than the left. This is what is in store for us if we don’t wake up . And please do read my book, “Donald’s Vanity Tantrums.” It’s only $15 maybe less on Amazon or ask me and I’ll mail you a copy email: bkatz321@gmail.com
Bill, with all due respect, you are as wrong as you could be on trans issues. Boys are not dressing as girls in order to play “female sports,” whatever those are. Children are not typically allowed to receive gender affirming surgery related to transition until at least age 16, and only then following years of both hormonal and psychological care - but breast enhancements are just fine (that is also gender affirming surgery). What trans children are allowed to do is take puberty blockers, to postpone puberty until they are old enough to receive other therapies, and to receive counseling to help with their gender dysphoria. Social transition alone isn’t an easy thing to do, and if you think about it clearly, I think you’ll conclude that few to no high school boys would transition socially just to play sports. That sounds pretty ludicrous, doesn’t it?
Further, you are talking about a tiny proportion of the population. 1.4% of the youth population identifies as trans. Not all of them are trans girls, and not all of them play sports. Estimates are that there are fewer than 100 teen trans athletes nationwide. (Source: https://www.newsweek.com/how-many-transgender-athletes-play-womens-sports-1796006.). This is not the huge problem you make it out to be. And further, being a trans athlete is no guarantee of winning in girls’ sport.
“The idea that women and girls have an advantage because they are trans ignores the actual conditions of their lives.” (Source, ACLU)
May I point you to a few sources?
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/trans-girls-belong-on-girls-sports-teams/
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-the-science-on-gender-affirming-care-for-transgender-kids-really-shows/
https://www.newsweek.com/how-many-transgender-athletes-play-womens-sports-1796006
Full disclosure: I am the proud mother of a transitioning young adult. Believe me, this process is far from easy for her, and her athletic performance is the farthest thing from her mind. I fear every day for her, and ignorance makes her less safe.
Thanks for your report from the "front lines". I finished typing about 5 minutes after you posted. Gender expression is not a fad, and gender dysphoria is separate and distinct from gender expression.
Ally, thank you. Ignorance is awfully hard to combat. And for sure this is a complicated and strange thing. I can’t pretend to understand what my child is going through - how could I? But what I can do is inform myself, and love her unconditionally. Part of that includes battling ignorance.
KR, thanks for sharing these sources. I'll need to look at these and learn more. Honestly, I admit that I don't understand a lot about trans issues and it's tough for me to grasp, having been born and raised in a binary mode. I can't guarantee that I'll "get it" but I'm trying my best to understand better.
Having said that, right leaning politicians pointing to trans people as a grave threat to our nation, while waving off Putin's open hostility to our country, his interference in our election process, embracing dictators like Orban and attacking individual and civil rights is wrong. Not grasping a person's life shouldn't mean attacking it or their right to exist safely, like everyone else. This is wrong and making trans people a focal point for attacks is wrong.
Exactly, C! I don’t understand either, but I don’t have to understand in order to support my daughter. For sure I’ve taken the time to educate myself better, though, as you suggest. I want her to have the right to live her life as she sees fit. I trust her judgement; she’s a fine, intelligent person - and this is really hard. Literally nobody would choose to go through this in order to compete at synchronized swimming in high school.
I am not sure I need to “get it” in whatever degree of understanding or friend or family experience. I DO need to learn to accept it. That single issue is far more complicated and the difference in someone’s pretrans experience and my preteen/post teen experience, means I will never completely get it but I sure can learn to accept someone who is different in that regard.
Bless you, KR, for your being your daughter’s strong advocate! My great-nephew is trans and is so happy now. He despised his breasts as a teenager and felt “inadequate” as a girl. The entire family rallied behind him, which is amazing considering since his grandparents were Repubs. But, they love him for no matter what. That, is the key for a happy and successful person anyway, right?
I’m so happy to hear of another supportive family, Marlene. I think that’s the biggest variable in good or bad outcomes.
KR, thank you for your non-judgmental and factual response. Your family is indeed fortunate to have you, and your approach will assist in your daughter's safe transition.
Nancy, thank you. It’s a simple thing, but your support means a lot to me.
Thank you for responding to the inaccurate statements made by Mr. Katz. There are some very young children who experience a sense of being the "wrong" gender at a very young age, much to young to have been influenced by media.
Here's an article includes a lot of valuable information including an extensive list of sources on which the article is based:
"Young children do not get medical transition treatment, but they do have feelings about their gender and can benefit from support from those around them. “Children start to have a sense of their own gender identity between the ages of 2 1/2 to 3 years old,” Olezeski said." {snip} “Research substantiates that children who are prepubertal and assert an identity of [transgender and gender diverse] know their gender as clearly and as consistently as their developmentally equivalent peers who identify as cisgender and benefit from the same level of social acceptance,” the AAP guidelines say, adding that differences in how children identify and express their gender are normal." https://www.factcheck.org/2023/05/scicheck-young-children-do-not-receive-medical-gender-transition-treatment/
I think it's pretty clear Mr. Katz is here mostly to sell his book. Commercial spam.
Oh really? I’m taking time out from my business to write several responses to sell a couple of books at the most and not one most likely while I could be engaging my day business with a 10 times or more rate of return. Maybe you are remiss that you haven’t written a book perhaps? Having said that and since you brought the matter up, it does rely on humor and satire along with illustrations something you don’t often find in detailing the goings on of the worst president in US history. And if you want a copy, I’ll personally autograph it at no extra charge. How does that grab ya? And just for you, I’ll pay the shipping.
You may not have meant it this way, but there seems to be in your writing a near association of society breaking apart and transgender issues. I believe that the story is far more complicated than that. American society is in a state of extreme tension at this moment as a result of a complex interplay of complex issues and extreme changes brought on by the (historically) rapid rise of technology.
In the last forty years there has been massive change in American life. The steady rise upward in economic and thus social status of a multitude of Americans has been rudely closed off. Part of it is extreme concentration of wealth and part is due to the huge changes in economic uncertainty brought about by the infiltration of technology into our lives. To focus on the effects of gender issues in sports is akin to being angry that a picture is hanging crookedly after an earthquake ha shattered much of your house.
Nobody reacts well to massive change. The right is fixating on gender issues, book banning, “immoral” teaching of American History as stalking horses for the major problems America faces - a widespread breakdown in family life, the diminishment in the spread of jobs that pay well, a sharp and extremely troubling rise in suicide, most especially by teenagers, a resurgence in open and blatant racism after Obama’s Presidency and a drug use problem that has spiraled out of control.
There is a dangerous number of citizens now who have chosen the path of extreme individualism over the sticky but worthwhile struggles of belonging to a real community. They are lonely and afraid and and that leads to a heavy burden of anger - the dominant emotion in American public life today Add 400 million guns to that mix and you have an exponential increase in the threat of a social earthquake.
The political apparatus is trying to con Americans into believing that there is some magical path back to the simplicity of the Fifties, when POC knew their place, the economy was always strong, men were men and women were subordinate and so on. They want us to vent our fears and anger on issues of gender and sexuality because they do not have a fucking clue how to address the really big issues, some of which I listed above. They are delighted to see people twist themselves into pretzels over conspiracy theories that have become more and more ludicrous with each decade.
Unless this downward spiral into inanity is aborted, how will AI be thoughtfully addressed? How will climate change be reduced from apocalypse to disaster? How will the structural weaknesses in the American form of government - from elections to the Supreme Court - be muted? How will the dragon of financial inequality be slain?
Fundamentally America is hampered by a crippling imbalance. The ratio of thoughtful adults to mere grownups is getting smaller by the day.
Eric, that’s an excellent analysis. Well said!
I always wonder when the Republicans harken back to the magical 1950s what they think of the tax policies then that permitted such an explosion of the middle class post-war.
What an excellent point! A 91% top marginal rate brings a basic sense of fairness that people can feel.
Eric, magnificently stated. Amen.
Thank you.
That is very kind of you.
I'm curious, Bill. Who is manipulating what children, and what are they doing to manipulate them? Where are you seeing IMAB (Identified Male at Birth) children transitioning just to play on IFAB (Identified Female at Birth) sports teams? I know a fair number of people whose children have either identified as "gender fluid" with their expressions of gender or as those who are more "textbook" gender dysphoric that have supported them as loving parents. In none of these cases was participation in sports any part of the equation.
Ally, I’m not an expert here. I have always supported women in every aspect and guys slipping through the proverbial gate to play against women don’t set well with me and never will. And I’m frankly miffed why more women don’t get it. Perhaps because it’s a brand new (well not brand new) but new issue to address. Again, may we say what’s good for the goose is good for the gander? You will not likely see a trans man (biological woman) playing against men because they couldn’t compete. And if this simple point can’t be understood, I rest my case. I’m not going to stop being supportive of women on this issue. The guys that are signing on to women’s teams are gaming the system.
Bill Katz, you said that "guys that are signing on to women’s teams are gaming the system." Can you give any examples of guys signing on to women's teams? I have heard this before and would like to know the actual statistics. Thanks in advance.
I'll take your suggestions and I am, right now, actually smelling the coffee. And we are, right now, doing exactly what you said -- we are behaving as rational folks and having this discussion! As for the "woke" stuff, I do wish we had a better sense of where government should and should not be involved. For instance, even though the we get to see the results, live, on sports channels, how a private sports organization handles transgender issues should be entirely up to them. Since it's not a good issue for legislative action, there's no way to "win" a fight to pass or defeat it.
I note with interest your silence in the face of clear evidence that nearly everything you wrote is wrong. But then, you were really just posting that to hustle your book, weren't you?
I don't believe that transgender females should be competing in women's sports. However, I don't think that it is based on a "fad." These people have genuine gender issues, based on biology, that simply don't fit the norm as traditionally understood.
Richard, the Olympics has had rules on the participation of trans athletes since 2003. The Tokyo Olympics in 2021 were the first instance of trans athletes participating - it took almost 20 years. Male to female transition doesn’t magically make trans women dominate Olympic sport, never mind high school athletics.
https://www.transathlete.com/olympics
Our increasingly open society is allowing people to live openly their true experiences for the first time. Personally, I don’t think it hurts anybody, and is no one’s business but their own. Transition is so hard. Nobody would choose that, given another path.
Not to mention the nepotism, which probably wouldn't fly these days.
LBJ and Nixon both deployed J. Edgar Hoover on their political enemies.
No, Robert F. Kennedy was not a counsel to the McCarthy Committee. The McCarthy Committee, officially known as the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, was led by Senator Joseph McCarthy and conducted investigations into alleged communist infiltration in the United States during the early 1950s.
Robert F. Kennedy, the younger brother of President John F. Kennedy, had a notable career in politics and law. However, he did not serve as a counsel or have any direct involvement with the McCarthy Committee. Robert F. Kennedy initially gained prominence as a counsel to the Senate Subcommittee on Investigations, which focused on labor and management corruption in the late 1950s.
Later, Robert F. Kennedy served as Attorney General of the United States from 1961 to 1964 during his brother's presidency. He played a significant role in various policy initiatives, including civil rights, organized crime, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.
He worked for McCarthy in 1953. One source of many, in addition to Wikipedia, is a piece in the “American Experience” series on PBS.org entitled “RFK’s Enemies.”
And people make mistakes especially in the initial stage of careers — maybe? I’m not defending him. I agree that the patriarch of the family made a deal with the devil and it came back in a terrible way. Almost a Shakespearean tragedy.
Joseph Kennedy was the devil incarnate and just an all around piece of garbage. It’s the women who married into the family who suffered the most, beginning with Rose. That SOB husband of hers put their “special” daughter in an mental institution, without his wife’s approval. Their children were aghast! It prompted their daughter, Eunice Shriver, to start Special Olympics which has become an international and a national event.
Ellen D, please name the Author & Book title of the Bio; I am so used to HCR's citation to sources & detailed annotations. Thanks.
Jonathan Eig’s newly released biography of King. See the Guardian’s review of May 27, and also an article in The Atlantic (July/August 2002), available online, for just two of many sources.
Thank you Ellen; I will review the cited sorces. That's an old habit of mine from trial work; I check the citations & the "pin cites".
I read 'The Guardian US' 5/27 article which contains some details of MLK's arrival at Dexter Baptist Church circa 1955 & his joining of boycott to support Rosa Parks at the start of 1956. Robert Kennedy became the Nation's AG over 5 years later afterJFK's inauguration .That leaves at least 5 yeats of the FBI's anti-MLK, unspecified sabotage of MLK ... PRIOR to Robert Kennedy's alleged "authorization".
First rule of behavioral science & form instruction to jurors "association is not causation".
A pinpoint citation, often called a pincite, is necessary to point the reader to specific the page(s) within the case. Pincites are placed after the page on which the case begins, separated by a comma and a space. A pincite may consist of a page range or multiple pages that are not consecutive.
Which biography are you referring to? The new one on J. Edgar Hover?
Tearing off the veil of myths to expose the truths and realities is important to remind folks that revisionist history is not a new thing. If that makes you unpopular then people are not thinking. They are swallowing propaganda whole. Thanks for bringing this up.
Ellen, I did not know all this, but Wikipedia gives a different version, which seems more in character with RFK to me: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_F._Kennedy
In December 1952, at his father's behest, Kennedy was appointed by family friend Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy as assistant counsel of the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Kennedy disapproved of McCarthy's aggressive methods of garnering intelligence on suspected communists. This was a highly visible job for him. He resigned in July 1953, but "retained a fondness for McCarthy". The period of July 1953 to January 1954 saw him at "a professional and personal nadir", feeling that he was adrift while trying to prove himself to his family. ... After a period as an assistant to his father on the Hoover Commission, Kennedy rejoined the Senate committee staff as chief counsel for the Democratic minority in February 1954. That month, McCarthy's chief counsel Roy Cohn subpoenaed Annie Lee Moss, accusing her of membership in the Communist Party. Kennedy revealed that Cohn had called the wrong Annie Lee Moss and he requested the file on Moss from the FBI. FBI director J. Edgar Hoover had been forewarned by Cohn and denied him access, calling RFK "an arrogant whippersnapper". When Democrats gained a Senate majority in January 1955, Kennedy became chief counsel and was a background figure in the televised Army–McCarthy hearings of 1954 into McCarthy's conduct. The Moss incident turned Cohn into an enemy, which led to Kennedy assisting Democratic senators in ridiculing Cohn during the hearings. The animosity grew to the point where Cohn had to be restrained after asking RFK if he wanted to fight him ....
An ugly truth which aligns with Papa Kennedy’s position communism is worse than fascism!
Roy Cohn’s lessons:
#1: All publicity is good regardless of how negative it is.
#2: When attacked attacked back harder. When sued counter sue for more.
#3: NEVER apologize.
#4: Whatever happens claim victory.
#5: You do not have to believe what you say.
Trump may have a below average IQ, but he learn RC's lessons well.
If Roy Cohn did not epitomize evil no one has.
Harvey, Sounds like Faux News business model.
He is right
I'll add him to the GOP Warlock list.
Donald accused the Democrats holding a witch hunt, he being the witch - is he projecting again ?
The most commonly accepted etymology derives warlock from the Old English wǣrloga, which meant "breaker of oaths" or "deceiver"[2] and was given special application to the devil around 1000.[3] In early modern Scots, the word came to be used as the male equivalent of witch (which can be male or female, but has historically been used predominantly for females).[4][5][6] The term may have become associated in Scotland with MALE WITCHES due to the idea that they had made pacts with Auld Hornie (my note: remember pussy grabbing and that horney old devil - Epstein ?) and thus had betrayed the Christian faith and broke their baptismal vows or oaths.[7] From this use, the word passed into Romantic literature and ultimately 20th-century popular culture. A derivation from the Old Norse varð-lokkur, "caller of spirits", has also been suggested,[8][9][10] but the Oxford English Dictionary considers this implausible due to the extreme rarity of the Norse word and because forms without hard -k, which are consistent with the Old English etymology ("traitor"), are attested earlier than forms with a -k.[11] - witch hunt" - wikipedia
The British called the American revolutionaries Yankees. Subsequently the Americans owned the epithet and sang Yankee Doodle as they attacked the British.
So lets own the epithet Witch Hunt
because Donald has graduated from Flim Flam Man to Warlock by definition. We can beat the evangelicos to the punch. I'm tired of trying to be like the Quakers and be gentle and peaceful . I don't think that is appropriate behavior anymore with cowardly Republican bullies. It's time to fight fire with fire.
And by fight fire with fire, by that you mean...? What, become cowardly Democrat bullies? Or were you thinking more in terms of fire arms?
Warlock really fits for Trump.
I meant doing nothing physical .
I was thinking of referring to individual and collective Republicans as warlocks when they use name callimg and, character assassination to misinform and manipulate their followers. I don't believe in witches. I suspect that now-a-days women who are considered "sensitive" may have a well developed sense of what event or behavior to expect. I
But if Donald's behavior or words fit the definition of warlock, let's use it and just see how they wiggle out of that one. But in this case, we'd be justified.
Those things you mention that they do: name calling, character assassination and deliberately misinforming and manipulating their followers. That’s a Warlock or a bad Witch. There are good witches too. Those who with no one knowing, seek to improve your life by their actions.
Thank you, Heather for sharing the 1943 War Dept pamphlet !!! It describes exactly what is going on before our very eyes!!! We MUST work hard to get out the vote in spite of the GOP gerrymandering and voter restrictions. Our Democracy and freedoms depend on our votes. I will crawl to the polls if I have to do so!!!! We are truly on the edge of the
destruction of “by the people and for the people”. It is terrifying and, Heather, thank you for giving us such a definitive description of the horrific this fascism virus that is oozing it’s way into our lives germ after germ and drip by drip!!!!! 😳
Nina Truslow McKee
I thought about Memorial Day. I thought about the people who gave up their lives for our freedom. Then I thought what about our people in Congress fighting for our freedom, right now, their only weapons being our laws, clear thinking, and trying to hold their calm. That is a real war too. I thought of them on Memorial Day. My heart goes out to them. It must be nearly intolerable.