JFK, Wall Street, Neocolonialism, and Peace

[Aidoneus]

I just finished reading Donald Gibson's Battling Wall Street (1994) yesterday. I found some extended excerpts (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/02/1 ... ncy-Part-1 and http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/02/1 ... ncy-Part-2) after listening to an interview with Webster Tarpley (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ropqyzCx9sA), which lead me to getting the book through an inter-library loan. (The book is long out of print, though I think a new edition will be out soon.) Rather than focus on the assassination, Gibson restricts his book to the subject of Kennedy's national and international policies for economic development, and the opposition he encountered from Wall Street financial interests, followed by how his efforts to encourage long-term industrial investments and tax breaks in the U.S. and for aid to underdeveloped nations were canceled--especially by IMF-style mandated austerity to support interest payments to Western finance.

Combining this book with the revelations in James Douglass' JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He died and Why it Matters (talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srstQVfVNEM and review: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/01/1 ... NSPEAKABLE), which details some of Kennedy's back-channel dialogs with Khrushchev (circumventing his own administration by using the Pope) to end the nuclear arms race and achieve peace, has deepened my appreciation of JFK and contemplation of what sort of world might exist had his ideas (e.g., Alliance for Progress) been carried forth over the last 50 years. (BTW, one can ignore the assassination half of this book and still be impressed with the information uncovered through recently declassified government documents.)

I do not believe we will ever have a definitive answer for JFK's assassination--pick Oswald alone, Mob, CIA, LBJ, Cubans, etc., etc. After 50 years of investigation and speculation about the assassination, it seems more important to me to understand how "everything changed" and how the world got to where we are now. I guess I should now put on my flame-retardant suit.

[Aidoneus]

Perhaps there does not exist much interest here in this topic, but I really can't stop myself from mentioning one more out of print book. The Will Be Done: The Conquest of the Amazon: Nelson Rockefeller and Evangelism in the Age of Oil (review: http://articles.latimes.com/1995-05-14/ ... ockefeller) is extraordinarily well researched and an excellent source book for anyone who is interested in the history of neocolonialism in Latin America.

I will now disappear...poof!

[Fedya]

I was born in 1972. Can we finally move past the 1960s, and the whole idea of the Camelot nonsense and the rest of everything that happened between Kennedy's assassination and Nixon's resignation is supposed to be a cultural touchstone for all of us?

We can start by not using the obnoxious -gate suffix for every single scandal out there.

[DrStraw]

I was born in 1972. Can we finally move past the 1960s, and the whole idea of the Camelot nonsense and the rest of everything that happened between Kennedy's assassination and Nixon's resignation is supposed to be a cultural touchstone for all of us?

We can start by not using the obnoxious -gate suffix for every single scandal out there.

I was born in 1952. So let's forget all about WWII and the holocaust because it happened before I was born. Of course, it is nonsense of me to say that, just as is your statement. We cannot forget history without risking repeating it.

I do agree with you comment about -gate, however.

I had not replied to the original post not because I don't find it interesting, but because there is so much contradictory evidence out there that it is hard to know where to begin. Many of the "controversies" are established fact if you care to do the research but it is considered politically incorrect to bring that up, so why bother on a Go forum?

[Aidoneus]

I had not replied to the original post not because I don't find it interesting, but because there is so much contradictory evidence out there that it is hard to know where to begin. Many of the "controversies" are established fact if you care to do the research but it is considered politically incorrect to bring that up, so why bother on a Go forum?

Yeah, that's why I restricted my post to pointing out information about JFK's policies and actions as recently disclosed through declassified government documents.

Nevertheless, this does not seem to be a good forum to bring up history topics, even in an Off Topic thread. So, I will not initiate any more economics/geopolitical threads here. Back to Go.

[logan]

Forum Rule #2. Controversy
Religious, political, and sexual topics are not allowed.

[Aidoneus]

Forum Rule #2. Controversy
Religious, political, and sexual topics are not allowed.

I'm sorry, I should have known better. It won't happen again.

[goTony]

Forum Rule #2. Controversy
Religious, political, and sexual topics are not allowed.

Well the three most interesting topics are out..... I guess we can talk about GO.

[Aidoneus]

Forum Rule #2. Controversy
Religious, political, and sexual topics are not allowed.

Well the three most interesting topics are out..... I guess we can talk about GO.

Just don't compare Go and Zen, ask about Go politics, or, in your case, even think of asking about women and Go!

[skydyr]

We can start by not using the obnoxious -gate suffix for every single scandal out there.

I do agree with you comment about -gate, however.

Unfortunately, I think we're destined for a time when people refer to Watergate-gate.

[Uberdude]

I temper my annoyance at everything-gate with the hope that eventually a company or institution called 'The Garden" gets embroiled in a scandal.