Half a century ago today, the last great president of our country was cut down in Dallas, Texas while fighting for a future that ended as soon as he passed away. His sudden death has forever marked the minds of all Americans, similar to other tragedies like the Columbia Shuttle Disaster and 9/11.
Today a specter of conspiracy theories looms over politics. Do they exist? Which of them are valid if any?
I believe that there was a conspiracy behind the assassination of President Kennedy because of the tremendous amount of evidence that has come to light about the government cover-up coupled with the amount of powerful forces who wanted Kennedy gone.
According to a 2009 CBS News poll, 76% of Americans believe that President Kennedy was killed by a conspiracy. That supermajority is striking because it is hard to get that many Americans to agree on anything.
Two veteran political figures recently published books containing new information about evidence surrounding JFK’s death.
One of the books, titled “They Killed our President: 63 Reasons to believe there was a conspiracy to assassinated JFK” by former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura, brings to light new information from the deathbed confession of E. Howard Hunt, one of the famous Watergate burglars. According to the audio tape recordings, E. Howard Hunt confessed to being part of the “big event” to his sons Howard St. John Hunt and David Hunt.
Another recently released book worth mentioning is “The Man who killed Kennedy: The Case against LBJ” by political operative and self-proclaimed “GOP hitman” Roger Stone. He worked for Nixon, Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and helped stop the Florida recount in 2000 for George W. Bush.
His case against Lyndon Baines Johnson isn’t a new one, but he makes clear on his few radio and TV appearances that his book contains many primary sources about the lead up to and after the assassination.
One example is the conversation he claims to have had with Richard Nixon. He asked the former president his opinion about the assassination multiple times, and he claims that Nixon, after a few cocktails, finally mentioned that “The difference between LBJ and me was we both wanted to be president, but I wouldn’t kill for it.”
This claim by Stone adds context to Nixon’s statement, recorded on the famous White House tapes, that the Warren Commission was “the greatest hoax ever perpetrated”.
While radio host Jim Engster asked pointed questions for Stone’s claims, his answers had such detail and gravitas behind them that it sounded eerily true. When Jim Engster asked how LBJ could get away with it, Stone claimed that it is important to point out that the entire establishment wanted Kennedy gone.
From the CIA, to the FBI, to the big Texas oil men, to the military industrial complex, to the mafia, to the Cuban exiles, to LBJ, to Nixon, and to the private banking cartel of the Federal Reserve, everyone wanted Kennedy gone, and they were not going stop each other or turn on each other if any of them acted.
One unusual thing Stone does mention is evidence of another gunman involved with fingerprint forensics. Malcolm Wallace was a former marine and loyal supporter of LBJ; Stone cites the fact that his prints along with Oswald’s were the only prints in the School Book Depository on the 6th floor.
Malcolm Wallace was never subpoenaed to testify on the House Select Committee on Assassinations, which was set up to investigate the possibility of conspiracies behind the Kennedy and the Martin Luther King Jr. assassinations, in 1976 because he died in a car accident in 1971.
The one thing that fuels the idea of a cover-up is the fact that the CIA still has about 1,100 JFK assassination related documents classified under threat of national security.
I agree with them, for if the American people knew the truth, I predict there would be a revolution before Christmas. As Oliver Stone’s film JFK’s protagonist Jim Garrison said in his closing arguments to the jury, “Do not forget your dying king.”
Joshua Hajiakbarifini is a 24 year old political science and economics senior from Baton Rouge.