- The president's speechwriter Horace Busby and Judge Homer Thornberry arrived. Johnson explained that he’d ordered the Secret Service to protect House Speaker John McCormack because he was worried about a government-wide coup. That afternoon the Soviets had made a show of good faith by turning over a complete dossier on Lee Harvey Oswald’s activities during his years in Moscow. Johnson was relieved but not settled. “Maybe they’re out to get us all,” he said. He was going to keep the armed services on alert. He wasn’t sure the assassination was the work of just one man. He worried about conspiracy theories, too. He talked about how Lincoln’s assassination still had unanswered questions: “… Damn sure that kind of mystery doesn’t happen here. I’m going to make sure there isn’t one damn question or one damn mystery that isn’t solved about this thing. You can be sure of that … not one damn unanswered question.”
flagamuffin, b_b and insomniasexx -- I found this made a nice accompaniment to the What Happened on the Flight From Dallas piece that insom submitted a while back. Enjoy.
Thanks for shouting me out on this. You are absolutely right about it being a good companion piece. The entire situation is so surreal. I can't get over it. I caught a documentary on TV this past Thursday night that had the typical story of the shooting, Oswald, etc. and the more I learn about the tiny details of those few days the more intrigued I am. It's endlessly interesting and there are so many angles to look at.
An intimate portrait of the aftermath in the home of the new president. While traveling this weekend I was engrossed in this post by humanodon. My general knowledge on the sheer number of assassination attempts on U.S. presidents was lacking, as I found the article shocking. Dickerson's article is a timely underscore to but one of the incidents. I found the level of paranoia, fear, and lack of intelligence (information) Johnson was expressing to be an interesting juxtaposition to the aggressive information omnipotence people are increasingly ascribing to the executive branch in light of the Snowden revelations about our intelligence services.
I found the level of paranoia, fear, and lack of intelligence (information) Johnson was expressing to be an interesting juxtaposition to the aggressive information omnipotence people are increasingly ascribing to the executive branch in light of the Snowden revelations about our intelligence services.
-My guess is that the more data you have, the more paranoid one becomes. Unless you have an absolutely clear picture of intelligence, you are somewhat forced to be "paranoid." You have to color in the missing bits of information. You have analysts that are supposed to do this for you and paint you the most accurate picture possible, but when you know that the truths you are being told are narratives constructed by minimal amounts of data, anyone would be a bit paranoid.
Yeah, and I don't mean to suggest that I think that a sitting president now wouldn't be gripped by fear and bewilderment in a crisis, -that's why I juxtaposed it with what we ascribe to current presidents utilizing the current intelligence capabilities. I mean, George W. received a report in hard copy on his desk entitled 'Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US' and he looked damn confused while reading My Pet Goat...