With Kennedy and Nixon,
conspiracy and paranoia both move squarely into the foreground.
For example, there isn’t one aspect of what happened at Dealey
Plaza in Dallas on the afternoon of 23 November 1963 that hasn't
thrown up some bizarre or sinister connection with the world of
organized crime, the CIA, the FBI, the Castro regime and the Kremlin.
There were apparently so many people out to get Kennedy that day
that it’s a wonder he ever made it off the plane.
Meanwhile, the official Warren Commission inquiry
into Kennedy’s death made a convincing case for its conclusion
that Lee Harvey Oswald had acted alone, shooting at the president
from a window in the nearby Texas School Book Depository. Even so,
by 1967 only one in three Americans still believed that Oswald alone
was guilty.
Since then, a steady stream of books, films, documentaries
and even computer games have restaged this single incident over
and over again, from a baffling array of perspectives. What has
emerged from this is a complex web of secret connections and intricate
relationships that offer a bizarre series of insights into political
power in the late 20th century.
Perhaps that’s the reason why nobody was
particularly surprised by Richard Nixon’s sudden resignation
over the Watergate scandal in 1974. The details may seem a little
fuzzy today, but the image of a corrupt administration struggling
furiously behind the scenes to draw public attention away from accusations
of political skulduggery remains as fresh as ever.
However, it was Nixon’s continued
assertion that he was in fact the innocent victim of malign conspiracies,
whether from the media or the liberal left, that really brought
conspiracy theory into the mainstream. When reports of Nixon's misdemeanours
started turning up in The Washington
Post, people started paying attention.
Conspiracy theorists everywhere consequently owe ‘Tricky Dicky’
a huge debt of gratitude.
Perhaps the time has come to start paying the
debt back by admitting that conspiracies are a fascinating and undeniable
fact of life.
Read on …
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