Friday 22 November 2013

JFK’s assassination was a tragedy for the Right: discuss

I’ve been carefully avoiding British television’s wall-to-wall coverage of the 50th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination. I gave up believing in the conspiracy theories 20 years ago, I’m sick of the saintly sex-maniac being used as a symbol of successful soft socialism, I’m tired of the same old stock footage of blacks being mistreated in Alabama (we know, we know), but mainly I’m bored with the standard narrative that Kennedy’s untimely death robbed America of a vibrant young crusading civil rights leader who, had he only been allowed another five years in power, would have brought peace to the world while transforming the US into a cuddly, compassionate, Swedish-style, high-spending, social democratic nirvana. As this video essay by Tim Stanley suggests, a Kennedy second term would have been a distinctly sticky affair (and not just as a result of sexual activity):

The real tragedy of Kennedy’s death (apart from Jackie ending up married to that sleazy thug Aristotle Onassis) was that it ushered in Lyndon Johnson, a far more effective politician, who, as Tim Stanley points out, was able to bulldoze through his disastrous Great Society legislation because of the outpouring of grief and guilt which followed Kennedy’s death (Stanley glosses over the fact that the worst of America’s 1960s race riots took place after LBJ had spent billions of dollars “helping” American blacks – as Ronald Reagan once said, the nine most terrifying words in the English language are “I’m from the government and I’m here to help”).

If Kennedy himself had been responsible for unleashing even a fraction of the economically and socially ruinous raft of policies which his demise made possible – and had thus personally borne the blame for their failure - it’s possible that Americans wouldn’t have subsequently saddled themselves with young, plausible, gum-flapping, left-wing Kennedy-lite “healing” figures such as Bill Clinton and Barack Obama as national leaders. I also suspect that the Democratic Party wouldn’t have turned itself into the divisive, urban, anti-white, anti-South, anti-business, left-wing, identity-politics party which it became in the late 1960s (and which it essentially remains to this day). That, in turn, might have meant that the Republicans – unburdened by the Kennedy myth - wouldn’t have tacked as far to the left as they did under Nixon. By the time Ronald Reagan became President, the Left had tightened its grip on government and the media to such an extent that, while Ronnie was able to get the economy moving again by deploying his breezy, confident personality, he actually did relatively little to curb the power or size of government – The Gipper never got public spending under control, which did for his immediate Republican successor.

The result of the Kennedy myth was to shift American politics decisively to the Left. Because JFK died so early in his reign, Democrats have been able to present him as far more left-wing than he actually was (he really wasn’t – people get confused by the leftiness of the LBJ administration and by the success red-bating, gangster-busting Robert Kennedy made of reinventing himself as a feelgood hippy peacenik) and by pretending that 1963-1968 would have been a Golden Age if only JFK had survived. The American Right has had to operate in the shadow of that myth for 50 years – and because the myth-creating left control the media and academia, there’s no sign of it abating any time soon.

If JFK had lived, there might very well have been no need for a Tea Party - and America might not currently have a Big State President who seems actively to despise his own country and most of its people.

5 comments:

  1. I'm confused....we would still have had White Southern Racism in Detroit, Boston, New Jersey and southern California if Kennedy had lived?

    Most "civil-rights" legislation only pertained to Confederate states...last vestiges of the occupation. That's why, for example, Indiana can require it's citizens to produce a picture ID at a polling station...and no State in The South can. Despite the recent Supreme Court decision the Feds are still suing us.

    I'm up to my eye-teeth with Kennedy and the creepy self-absorbed fascination that his assassination holds over baby-boomers.

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    1. I feel your pain, e.f.

      I've much enjoyed the left-wing argument that asking black voters to provide any form of ID amounts to racism. I can;t think of a better recipe for corrupt electoral practices. Apart from that it's probably best if anyone who can't remember to bring ID, or doesn't understand what ID is doesn't vote.

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  2. Benjamin Zephyr Zodiac24 November 2013 at 10:54

    On dis very day in downtown Dallas,
    So Bruddas I and I would say,
    Was occurrin' a drive-by shooting brutal and callous
    As de King him leave him palace
    Fet to pass through de streets of racialistic malice
    An' wave to de crowd along de way.

    Suddenly, me bruddas and sistas, a shot ring out
    An' bust him right up in de head
    Some gangstas wid a Uzi an' AK 49
    Done gatted him up big time,
    An' I n' I would say dis was a crime
    Cos' befo' too long he was completely dead.

    An bruddas and sistas of all races and sexes
    Was gwan to be sad fe dat day in Texas
    Dat robbed we bruddas of hope across de nashun
    Fe de Camelot Prince dat was gwan rid de world of discriminashun
    By endin' de policy of segregashun
    Which robbed us an' our ancestas of de chance of an educashun,
    Instead of a fate of incarcerashun an' bein' put on probashun
    Fe crimes we nevah dun, except on de odd occasion.

    An bruddas dis was surely de work of de CIA,
    Dat rob us of de champion of we rights dat day
    A fascism' conspiracy, quickly explain away
    By de Warren Commishun, fe to whitewash was dem goal
    An' dem tell us dere was no soldier gangstas firin' from da grassy knoll
    Wid grenades and surface to air missiles dat took dere toll
    On de President's head, an also him throat
    An' tore a big hole in Guvnah Connally's coat.

    Instead, dem pin de blame on some weird skinny white dude call' Lee Harvey Oz
    Which was convenien' for dis reason becoz
    Anuvvah honky gangstah callin' himself Jack de Rube
    Dun gatted de fall guy live on de Tube.


    Rat a tat tat, Rube put him on him back
    Wid a bullet in de gut, de Oz was whacked
    In a courtyard dat was packed
    Wid Babylon an' hacks
    An not one of dem attacked
    De gat totin' Rube in his light coloured mac.

    50 year is gone, bruddas, since dat desperate day
    An still de troof is just as far away
    An de lyin meeja tell us dat JFK was a phoney
    Dat have more bunga bunga dan Silvio Berlusconi
    An have him trousahs more often off than on
    But what me say bruddas is dat our hope was gone
    Dat day in de place dem call Dealey Plaza
    Dat took de life of de nation's father.
    .



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  3. At the end of the debacle at Brisbane, Benjamin Zephyr Zodiac returns and sprinkles star-dust. An absolute classic. No more dark thoughts. You have provided an old person a reason for going on. This is brilliant.

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  4. From the beginning of 2014 would it not be a good thing if the world media declared a blanket ban [a moratorium, effectivelly] on any mention of JFK, Marilyn Monroe, The late Princess of Wales, Tutankhamun and that horribly sleazy British comedian called Russell something. For Christ's sake, give us a break.

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