SALON

Thursday, May 10, 2007 9:19 PM UTC

From Dallas to Baghdad

Even the media is getting sick of the lies.

By

Topics: Books,

I’m off and running on my national book tour, heading for my fourth city in four days, with eight more to go after that. Everywhere I go, there seems to be a new willingness to explore the crime that — more than four decades later — still haunts America. After Bush, the public — and even the media — is prepared to believe that the government is capable of any kind of treachery and deception. Of course, the idea that some elements of the U.S. government might have orchestrated the assassination of President Kennedy, in league with organized crime bosses, is still a mind-boggling notion to many people. But as I write in my book, the Washington elite — including Robert Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon — immediately suspected a foul conspiracy in Dallas. And although these political leaders chose, for different reasons, to keep their suspicions from the public, the American people, in their wisdom, soon reached the same conclusion. It was only the media elite who clung year after year to the increasingly tattered Warren Report. But, as I stumble from one TV and radio station to another, it’s clear that even the old media ramparts have been breached.

On the Fox 25 Morning News Show, a bright-eyed, blond host blurted out, “So Bobby Kennedy thought the CIA killed his brother — why did he think that?” (Or something to that effect; it’s all a blur when the TV lights hit you.) There was no snarky rolling of the eyes, just a tacit assumption that we all know the real story of Dallas has long been suppressed. On the rambunctious Howie Carr call-in show, later that day on WRKO in Boston, there were more surprises. As Bostonians know, Howie is no fan of the Kennedys. Before I went on the air, I was told that every time the host mentions the name Ted Kennedy, a Carr sidekick in the control booth rolls the tape of someone pouring a stiff drink. But Carr is a well-read guy when it comes to the Kennedy literature, as is much of his audience. Again, the assumption on the show seemed to be that whatever you thought of the Kennedys, something dark happened to JFK in Dallas — and we’re still being lied to about it.

As I’ve been saying on my book tour, it’s time for the American people to demand the truth. We deserve to know our own history. But the CIA continues to stonewall, in blatant defiance of the 1992 JFK Act, which compelled government agencies to release all documents related to the crime. This summer the CIA will go to court, once again, to block the efforts by Washington Post reporter Jefferson Morley (a friend) to learn more about the apparent role that Lee Harvey Oswald played in the agency’s secret war on Castro. The CIA has stubbornly refused to release documents about long-deceased agents like David Phillips and George Joannides who associated with Oswald, or were at least aware of his murky activities, in the months before the assassination.

What is the CIA still hiding?

David Talbot

Salon founder David Talbot is the author of the New York Times bestseller, “Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years,” and most recently, “Season of the Witch: Enchantment, Terror and Deliverance in the City of Love.” More David Talbot.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 31 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
New Yorker launches tool by Aaron Swartz to protect leaks: Strongbox, co-created by the late technologist, is an open-source drop box for leaked documents
244 points245 points | 10 comments
vote
Loaded terminology like "entitlements" and "welfare" skews the debate and alters America. How right-wingers use semantic tricks to kill government.
250 points251 points | 49 comments
vote
New Yorker launches tool by Aaron Swartz to protect leaks: Strongbox, co-created by the persecuted late technologist, is an open-source drop box for leaked documents
187 points188 points | 1 comment
vote
Obstruction will ruin the GOP: Playing politics and abusing the system can excite the extremes, but it's a recipe for long-term political disaster
59 points60 points | 8 comments
vote
Today in How Did I Miss This: Iowa GOP is pushing to cut the pay of the remaining Supreme Court Justices that voted for legalization of gay marriage.
59 points60 points | 6 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations