Robert Rouse's Latest and Greatest!
Forty years ago today, the dream died again. Robert Kennedy, gunned down in a Los Angeles hotel kitchen, clutched a rosary handed to him by a busboy as he bled from a head wound. Amid shrieks of despair, his wife, Ethel, comforted him as his life ebbed away. His brother, President John Kennedy, was killed less than five years before. The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated two months earlier. By June 1968, violence from the inner cities to Vietnam was tearing the country apart, and had robbed the nation of three of its most inspiring leaders. Forty years later, the story of Robert Kennedy's life, cut short at 42, and the ripples from his brief, passionate campaign for the presidency remain powerful. He was killed celebrating his greatest triumph, winning the California primary as he fought for the Democratic nomination. The double blow of the King and Kennedy assassinations remains a raw wound for many who worked with them or were inspired by them. "We saw two bright lights snuffed out, our hopes and dreams shattered," recalled John Seigenthaler Sr., the former NBC anchor's father, who worked for Kennedy when he was attorney general.
Kennedy's 82-day campaign for the presidency, with its urgent themes of ending the Vietnam War, attacking poverty and bridging the racial divide, was a "noble moment, brutally truncated," said Todd Gitlin, a political writer and sociologist. Many voters this year say Barack Obama reminds them of John or Robert Kennedy, and Ethel Kennedy did not shy from that comparison. Wearing an Obama button at the recent RFK Journalism Awards in Washington, she said her husband and Obama "were cut from the same cloth - they reached out to people and inspired them."
Marked by substance
Kennedy's campaign was marked by substance, spontaneity and a willingness to tell audiences what they did not want to hear. That's a standard that may be difficult for Obama and his Republican opponent, John McCain, to match. But they are candidates of substance who have shown a penchant for independence - Obama, for example, rejected a gas tax holiday as a "gimmick," and McCain supported the troop surge in Iraq when many Republicans didn't want to talk about it. "These days, you don't find politicians telling people what they don't want to hear, but he did that all the time," Mankiewicz recalled. To grasp Kennedy's appeal, it's important to understand the chaos and divisions of 1968. Riots convulsed more than 100 cities after King was killed, and Army troops patrolled the nation's capital. Casualty rates in Vietnam soared much higher than in Iraq today, and the war and draft had alienated many young people.
Inspired hope
"He gave people hope when there was plenty of reason not to have hope," recalled Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-San Jose, a Stanford student at the time. At a rally in San Jose's St. James Park in March 1968, Kennedy drew 10,000 people, pledging to resist "the erosion of our national decency." "Poverty is indecent. Illiteracy is indecent. The maiming and death of young men in the swamps of Vietnam is indecent," he told the crowd. "It is indecent for a man to labor with his hands and back in the valleys of California, with no hope of sending his sons to college." Forty years later, Abramson said Kennedy's relevance for any political leader is clear: "He told it like he felt it, and pulled no punches. He challenged our complacency. He was a good listener and never spoke down to people. He was a remarkable leader." Too many similarities
Being very concerned of History repeating itself and worse When we were marking MLK's assassination I said Many around here want to hear nothing but positive and get very mad at me when I say just wake up look at the past and realize what we have before us. It is up to us to keep Obama alive. That is our duty our version of keeping hope alive. I keep telling people to remember MLK, RFK, and JFK. Remember what happened to them. It has all been excused and nothing adequately solved. You know conspiracy theories aside I believe those behind the right did it all and more. This mess will be much worse because events get larger not smaller as we progress.
I am very concerned It is all going to happen again only repercussions will be much more dire. Think positive but plan for reality. The right is not going to allow the awesome power amassed under Bush or their agenda into the hands of Dems thus putting and end to it. Forget about it. People should be smart enough to know what we are dealing with here.
The truth is never known and I am finding out that RFK's assassination was and still is a major cover up.
Knowing we never learned the truth behind the assassinations of MLK, RFK, and JFK, and knowing how openly corruptive and underhanded the right is today I am increasingly believing that the powers behind the right are behind the killings and I am willing to bet I'm right. I would like to know what you think about that? Knowing that and knowing those powers can not let the abusive power gained under Bush to get in the hands of Democrats I expect the right to do something underhanded to stay at the helm of these just beginning Forever Wars. As a last resort I fully expect those powers whoever they are to assassinate Obama too.
James Joiner
Gardner Ma
http://www.anaveragepatriot.com/
