Bernie's Blog

Job Only Pays $300,000

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, December 18, 2012 1 Comment(s)

There is a woman in Tallahassee who makes $300,000 a year, maybe a little more, working for organizations that promote laws enabling people to murder 26 people in minutes, including 20 children. But that is not important. What is important is that this blog, if read by anybody, almost never produces comment, but this one will. You can ask almost any columnist what produces reaction, and they will tell you anything on gun control. It is right in there with Jimmy Breslin’s suggestion that dogs in New York be thrown in front of subways. The reaction from dog lovers was furious, but not orchestrated. Breslin’s outburst was too bizarre for a planned counter-offensive. But reaction to gun control is clearly organized, probably written by design by members of the National Rifle Association, who rarely give a real name.

They will write, as one moron from Texas who had the guts to appear on national TV said in reaction to the recent tragedy that had the school principal been armed, those kids would be alive. Now that is important, but unfortunately, too tame, too limited.

On a hunch, this blog has been interrupted to check out today’s Palm Beach Post and its excellent columnist, Frank Cerabino. A few months back he told us that one topic that always stirs emotions is guns.  

Sure as hell, Cerabino (pronounced Chur-a-bino) is writing today about guns, which assures, as he will be the first to admit, a bombardment of reactions, mostly attacking him for daring to link Florida’s absurdly permissive gun laws to such a sad event.

Back on topic. The guy from Texas says school principals should be armed. Wonderful idea, but limited. Why not give all the kids guns? 

Imagine, a high school with 2,000 kids, and every one packing a gun that shoots 100 rounds. As Cerabino writes today, there are people in positions of importance in Florida who boast that the state is a leader in concealed weapons permits. Just imagine the fun they would
have if all our school children were armed. Armed, but not dangerous, of course. What could be safer than everybody in this great country carrying a machine gun? Who would have the nerve to throw the first volley?

But since we are so outgunned when it comes to this topic, perhaps it is time to organize a group to resist the gun lobby. Maybe even find somebody willing to stand up for sanity for $300,000 a year. You might for a few takers for that thankless job.

On the Right Track at Last

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, December 11, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

Too bad it isn’t 25 years ago. That was a time when the lass editing this column was barely alive, if at all. It was also a time when a reporter, noting that plans were underway for a commuter train from Miami to Palm Beach, called the Florida East Coast Railway to find out why that railway, the perfect track through the old downtowns along the way, did not want the new service on its tracks. Asking for the company’s public relations department, he was told there was none. He was told somebody would call him back.

 


Somebody did, about two weeks later, and the somebody turned out to be the president of the FEC. An amiable fellow in a gruff sort of way, he said the FEC was a freight railroad, and wanted no passenger trains. Period. Today, after two changes of ownership (the current owner is Florida East Coast Industries), the answer would have been quite different, and had it come 25 years ago, all the money and energy that went into building Tri-Rail on the western CSX – the double tracking, the modern stations with overpasses and the improved signals – would have been directed to the FEC and Tri-Rail would serve the heart of downtowns along its route, and be a much busier service. And after 25 years, the economic development associated with it would be impressive.
 
Well, as the papers are telling us with increasing enthusiasm, that is beginning to happen. The first shot was the FEC’s announcement of a fast train from Miami to Orlando. The press has carried maps of prospective station locations, and land purchases by the railroad in the most important locations, including downtown Miami and West Palm Beach. Not only does the FEC, or its parent company Florida East Coast Industries, want passenger service, it wants it so badly it is willing to pay for it. That is pretty much unheard of these days. Just about all the rail commuter lines and long distance passenger service has been taken over by Amtrak or regional authorities like Tri-Rail. But the FEC is willing to foot the bill and the reason appears to be not so much the joy of running a train from South Florida to Orlando’s Disney World, but rather the enhanced value of the railroad’s considerable property along the route.
 
Almost immediately after the FEC’s announcement of its privately funded venture, All Aboard Florida, the very publicly funded Tri-Rail began discussing moving some trains over to the FEC tracks. That only makes sense, and initially need not be too costly if it uses an existing connection between the two tracks in the Pompano Beach area, and piggybacks the stations the FEC plans for Fort Lauderdale and Miami. North of Fort Lauderdale, Tri-Rail on its present tracks is useful. There is considerable commercial activity along the I-95 corridor in Palm Beach County. Existing stations, such as one near the Cypress Creek office complex, are nicely positioned. Tri-Rail need not abandon its present infrastructure, for it serves the Miami International Airport, but it would be less busy.
 
Ultimately Tri-Rail could expand north on the FEC. That would likely involve public/private financing to upgrade the railroad for much heavier and faster traffic. Some grade crossings, numerous on the FEC, would have to be eliminated or made safer, which would be a great benefit for the railroad’s freight activity. There has also been consideration of Amtrak running some long-distance trains on the FEC, especially north of Palm Beach where its coastal route to Jacksonville is far more direct than Amtrak’s current route through the center of the state. These other uses of its tracks are welcomed by Florida East Coast Industries, a sea change from 25 years ago.
 
After years of everybody knowing this transportation revolution needed to happen, it appears to be underway, and fast, maybe within two years. And yet the long-range benefits far exceed the short-term value of a good rail system. Areas near proposed stations are often seedy or undeveloped. We can foresee an explosion of office, hotel and high-rise residential development all along the FEC corridor. This has happened in many places where rail service has been modernized. Our guess is the FEC sees it more clearly than anybody.
 
This could be a big financial story for all of Florida’s east coast, maybe the biggest story since, well, since Henry Flager brought his railroad through more than 100 years ago.
The Irish are Coming. No, They’re Here.

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, December 04, 2012 No Comment(s)

It was the late 1970s, and being a great father, it was only natural to take the kid to see Notre Dame play at Miami. Notre Dame won easily that day, which was no surprise. The Hurricanes had not had a good football team in years; in fact there was thought to giving up the program. We felt sympathy for Miami. A lot of their players came from down here. We had followed some of them in high school. And the kid wasn’t crazy about Notre Dame. He thought they were a bunch of rah-rah hot dogs.

Then a strange thing happened. Howard Schnellenberger took over as coach and suddenly Miami wasn’t so bad. And after a season or so, we saw another Notre Dame team arrive at the Orange Bowl. And this day, miracle of miracles, Miami beat the Irish. Not just beat them. The final was 37-15. It was 1981. The quarterback, a Pennsylvania import named Jim Kelly, was obviously pretty good. We were thrilled. And even more thrilled when Kelly took Miami up to play Penn State, where he had wanted to go but they would not let him play quarterback. Kelly and Miami won that day, and we knew something special was happening with this team. They were really getting good. In fact, now a national power, Miami beat Notre Dame two of the next three years. We were fans.

Then something interesting happened. The kid got a Navy ROTC scholarship and the best school he got in was Notre Dame. He wasn’t that crazy about going. You know, the rah-rah hot dog stuff. But he went and soon became one of those hot dogs himself. Love for the Hurricanes disappeared almost instantly, especially as an intense rivalry developed between two excellent programs. He was near despair in 1985 when Jimmy Johnson’s Miami team mauled the Irish, 58-7, in the Orange Bowl. And estactic three years later, his senior year, when the Irish, under Lou Holtz, won at Notre Dame, 31-30, en route to its last national championship.

And now, after some painful seasons, the Irish are back and the kid, now a member of the Orange Bowl Committee, will be there, hoping for the first national title since his senior year. He won’t be alone. We have discovered over the years that Notre Dame has a big presence in South Florida. It goes back a long time. You can start with the Gore family, who owned the Sun-Sentinel for years. Six of former Gov. R.H. Gore’s children went to Notre Dame. Then there are the Zloch brothers, who came out of what is now St. Thomas Aquinas High School. Three of them played for Notre Dame. U.S. District Judge William Zloch was quarterback under Ara Parseghian. Since then there have been many players at Notre Dame. Autry Denson set a ND rushing record. The current punter, Ben Turk, is from St. Thomas.

And it isn’t just sports. Notre Dame has a dozen alumni clubs in the state, and its grads are prominent in every market. In Fort Lauderdale, Mayor Jack Seiler is a Domer. Florida’s Chief Financial Officer Jeff Atwater is another. Alabama is a lot closer to Sun Life Stadium but it is doubtful Notre Dame will be outfanned next month. The Irish aren’t just coming. They’re here.

Lincoln Brought to Life

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, November 27, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

Steven Spielberg’s film “Lincoln” is being described as a masterpiece. Maybe, but it is a limited masterpiece. As a story, in comparison to Spielberg’s other films, such as “Schindler’s List” and “Saving Private Ryan,” it is like comparing a halftime pep talk to a last-minute goal-line stand. As political history it is illuminating, focusing on a short period of time toward the end of the Civil War that has largely been obscured by the turbulent tapestry into which it fits. As a study of Lincoln, as the title obviously intends, it is brilliant, with superb acting, particularly in humanizing a man tormented both by a terrible war and personal problems. It captures his homely ability to tell amusing stories even in the most serious settings, stories that were often to the point of larger issues. That quality often perplexed those around him, even as they gradually recognized him as a leader of genius. That genius is now apparent in Lincoln’s vision, looking beyond the imminent end of fighting, taking action to ensure the end of slavery while it was still politically possible.

 

 
Unlike the aforementioned films, to fully understand “Lincoln” requires some historical knowledge, such as reading Team Of Rivals, upon which it is partly based. It is difficult today to appreciate the nuances of the 13th Amendment debate in the context of war, and the motivation of the strong personalities who took part in it. The film also leaves a dangling subplot – the tension between Lincoln, his wife Mary and his son Robert, over Robert, fresh from Harvard, wanting to serve in a war his mother desperately wanted him to avoid. The film leaves Robert in limbo. In fact, Lincoln eventually managed to get him a position on Gen. Grant’s staff near the end of the war. It was a nice Lincoln compromise, satisfying his son’s desire to wear a uniform in that epic conflict, while catering to his mother by putting him in a relatively safe position. Relatively, for Grant had some close calls and many generals, including Confederate heroes Stonewall Jackson, Jeb Stuart and Albert Sidney Johnston, died in battle. But it takes a sharp eye to notice, near the film’s end, an officer who appears to be Robert Lincoln standing amid Grant’s staff when Robert E. Lee surrenders.
 
The timing of this film is rich, as many have noted. Lincoln’s machinations in offering patronage jobs to members of Congress who had just been defeated, but whose terms had not yet expired, in effect buying their votes for his amendment, is compared to the maneuvering in Washington today. Politicians are taking note. Just this morning Sen. Dick Durbin, appearing on “Morning Joe,” quoted from the film  Lincoln’s line about showing the world “that Democracy is not chaos.” Maybe President Obama can take a page from Lincoln’s play book, practicing the art of statecraft. Promise his most ardent Tea Party opponents jobs as postmasters on Guam when they lose in the next election.
A Case Study In Privacy

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, November 20, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

Given the U.S. Constitution, this scenario could never take place. But just suppose a fellow becomes a top military guy and eventually is promoted to a very high government post. And then, through no fault of his own, he gets caught up in a bit of skirt with a much younger chippy and gets exposed when government agents tap into his and her e-mail accounts. His career, maybe his life, is ruined. Of course that could never happen, for it would constitute a massive invasion of privacy, utterly contrary to the way our country behaves. But just suppose it did. Then, all over the land, this land for you and me, women in bars would be asking men this question.
 
Woman: “Why would he take that chance, given his sensitive position and the fact that he is so much in the limelight?”
 
Man: “Have you heard of sex? Besides, he did not start it. Women always make the first move.”
 
Woman: “Who says?”
 
Man: “John says.”
 
Woman: “John who?”
 
Man: “He probably wouldn’t like it if I told you. Make him John Hancock. But he’s right. Every man knows this. Women invariably deny it.”
 
Woman: “They deny it because it isn’t true.”
 
Man: “See, you just proved my point. When a guy gets that big, whether he’s in politics, entertainment, sports or organized crime, women are attracted to power. It’s an aphrodisiac. A bartender, who had considerable experience in these matters, once told me that women were attracted to men in control. He said, and I quote, some women go for cops, some go for gangsters, some go for bartenders, thank God.
 
Woman: “Nonsense.”
 
Man: “Also, maybe his wife got too old. Women have an obligation to stay young and beautiful.”
 
Woman: “Men get old too.”
 
Man: “But it’s different. They also get distinguished. And rich. And powerful. And they still seek romance. Some young men like older women, up to about age 35. But not many men go after 60-year-old women. And maybe she changed from the devoted thing he married. Maybe she turned into a terrible-tempered size 42. Maybe she threw out his paratrooper boots.”
  
Woman: “Why would she do that?”
 
Man: “Because she could. And maybe she started complaining that he never puts down the toilet seat. Or routinely forgets to take out the trash. Or puts his beer glass in the sink instead of the dishwasher. Those little things create unbearable tension and make men welcome the freedom of adoration, especially if she’s 19. Maybe she threw out his La Salle tie.”
 
Woman: “He didn’t go to La Salle.”
 
Man: “You never miss a chance for marketing.”
 
Woman: “You’re salacious.”
 
Man: “You’re stupid. I like that in a woman.”
 
Woman: “I think you’re charming. It’s late and it’s dark out there. Why don’t you walk me to my car.”
 
Man: “Okay, but lay off the e-mail.”

 

Partying With The Bulldog

by Bernard McCormick Wednesday, November 14, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

 

Last night at YOLO Restaurant, the popular downtown Fort Lauderdale restaurant owned by Tim Petrillo, Broward Bulldog celebrated its third anniversary with a fundraising party. Notable among the anniversary presents was a $25,000 contribution from Michael Connelly, the acclaimed crime story writer. This is not Connelly’s first act of generosity to the independent investigative organization founded by Dan Christensen. Connelly contributed $10,000 to help launch the deal.
 
Why such interest on Connelly’s part? For starters, he knows the territory pretty well. In the mid-1980s, the St. Thomas Aquinas High School grad, not long out of the University of Florida, joined the Sun-Sentinel as a reporter. It wasn’t long before he was part of a team nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for its work on the tragic crash in Dallas of a plane which had flown from Fort Lauderdale carrying many local people. He left the paper in the early '90s and used his considerable experience as a police reporter to write his first book. The Black Echo was a big success, and Connelly, after almost 30 more books, is regarded as a master of the crime story genre. He was helped early in his career when President Bill Clinton praised his work. Obviously, he has made a few bucks.
 
Equally obviously, he knows the problems of the newspaper industry. Dan Christensen is among many experienced reporters who took early retirement (in his case 2009) buyouts, often against their will, as papers have cut back drastically. Understaffed papers have fewer resources for serious behind-the-scenes reporting. Enter Broward Bulldog (www.browardbulldog.org) to fill the void. Christensen and others regularly publish probing stories online, and some of the more important pieces have been picked up by the major dailies. They don’t pay much for the pleasure, however, and Broward Bulldog relies on advertising (not much) and the support of friends.
 
They are, for the most part, former newspaper people. Last night’s event included Gene Cryer, retired editor of the Sun-Sentinel; Jonathon King, former Sun-Sentinel reporter who, like Connelly, has turned to fiction; Kevin Boyd, who worked for The Miami Herald, Sun-Sentinel and the late Hollywood Sun-Tattler before entering the public relations field; and Buddy Nevins, former Sun-Sentinel political reporter who now does the Broward Beat blog and contributes to various publications, including a recent piece on Marco Rubio for Gulfstream Media Group’s magazines.
The Return of Honesty

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, November 06, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

 

By sunrise tomorrow, barring legal delays, we should know who won the election. And if we do, it will again be permissible to speak the truth. So when Republicans are asked if the storm and Gov. Chris Christie helped President Obama, they won’t have to dodge the question and say how their heart goes out to the poor souls who caught the right – meaning windy – side of a massive storm. If they lose they can simply say the S.O.B. killed us.
And both parties will be able to be candid about the economy. If President Obama wins, he can say he did not cause the great recession, and he did not cure it. But it is ending, and as economists have been telling us for four years, it pretty much ended itself. And barring an international catastrophe, things will continue to improve no matter who runs the country.
There has been so much distortion, and denial, on the political front for the last few years that it is hard to find a single issue where either side has been totally truthful. The one that hits closest to home, and has been hitting for several years, is the state of the economy. More than once we have mobilized the language to offset the incessant drum beat that things are terrible and the world is ending. Recall FDR’s famous line, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Our concern was that negative politicking affects all business by scaring people. And also, that it just wasn’t true.
Our magazine business, whose advertisers represent a broad section of South Florida’s economy, started to recover from a very bad 2008 at exactly the time the experts predicted we would hit bottom – and the stock market began recovering. That was the fall of 2009. Our business improved in each year since. Not much, only a few percent each year, but that is about what the forecasters expected. This year has been up and down, but mostly up. Then, when the unemployment numbers started improving, all heaven broke loose. Advertising contracts in September jumped more than 40 percent. In November, a stunning 85 percent. This almost assures that for the year we will be up at least 25 percent over 2011. Now contracts are not martinis, and there is always some erosion as people change their minds, but those numbers largely hold up.
This is not so much about us. We did not do things much differently from year to year. But it is about the confidence of the market, with businesses making plans for a year or two down the road. Happy days may not be here again, but the world has not ended. By tomorrow, both parties may have the honesty to admit that. 
The Paulsen Effect

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, October 30, 2012 No Comment(s)

Watching the recent presidential debate, in fact the entire presidential campaign that began four years ago, one is reminded of the late Pat Paulsen, who ran for president any number of times. His campaign was based on saying whatever worked at the time. Example:

Paulsen: “I was in Palm Beach yesterday. What a bunch of phonies. It is so good to be here in Fort Lauderdale with real people. This is where I want to retire someday.”
Interviewer: “But yesterday in Palm Beach you said you loved Palm Beach people, the real Americans compared to all the phonies in New York. You said you wanted to retire there. In fact, everywhere you go you praise the place you are in and knock the place you were in the day before. How do you account for that?”
Paulsen: “I was misquoted.”
Interviewer: “But they have you on film.”
Paulsen: “I was misfilmed.”

He managed to say such stuff with a straight face. Pat Paulsen, of course, was a comedian, a masterful satirist. The people running for president appear to be serious. But they take a page from Paulsen in that they seem unflappably comfortable in saying anything they think their audience wants to hear, even if it is diametrically opposed to what they said the day before.

Mitt Romney seems to be worse than the president in this regard, but both men seem able to balance contradictions with ease. Perhaps one pundit went too far the morning after the first debate when he said Romney is a liar and should be charged with perjury. Better to use a little of Pat Paulsen’s diplomacy and simply call Romney the biggest phoney who ever lived. And we actually liked his father, who was unfairly cast out of serious politics when he said he was “brainwashed” about the Vietnam War. That was the truth; everybody was brainwashed. That is another way of saying somebody lied.

Just because a man has no principle does not mean he can’t be a good president. Richard Nixon was a notorious liar and also a saccharine panderer to our lesser angels. Recall the line: “I’m glad you asked that question. Pat and I were talking about it at home just the other night. She was knitting a flag. I was reading the Constitution.” And yet people give him credit for opening up a dialogue with China and starting the warm relationship where they lend us all their money.

Distasteful as it may be, we ought to get used to candidates saying what they think we want to hear, even if it contradicts everything they said the day before. This scenario is no reflection on the current candidates, and we never called Romney a phoney.

1st Candidate: “I believe we need to help the middle class and let those of us fortunate enough to be wealthy pay a little more.”
2nd Candidate: “That goes for me, too. Except for the rich. I don’t want to raise taxes on anybody, and you can’t raise taxes on the rich without raising taxes on the middle class. I love the middle class, even if most of them are moochers looking for a handout.”
1st Candidate: “You just insulted the middle class.”
2nd Candidate: “No, you did. I love the middle class. And I never called them moochers.”
1st Candidate: “They have you on film.”
2nd Candidate: “I was misfilmed.”
1st Candidate: “You stole that line from Pat Paulsen.”
2nd Candidate: “No, you did. I stole it from a magazine writer.”
1st Candidate: “Then the writer stole it.”
2nd Candidate: “Writers never tell the truth.”
1st Candidate: “Do you ever tell the truth?”
2nd Candidate: “You can’t handle the truth.”
1st Candidate: “You just stole another line!”
2nd Candidate: “Did you say shoot all the immigrants?”
1st Candidate: “I never mentioned immigrants.”
2nd Candidate: “I never said you did.”
1st Candidate: “Oh, shut up.”
2nd Candidate: “You shut up.”
1st Candidate: “You have bad breath.”
2nd Candidate: “You have body odor.”
1st Candidate: “Your girlfriend smells worse.”
Moderator: “Gentlemen, screw you both. We are out of time.”
1st Candidate: “Ask the moderator if you don’t believe me. He just woke up.”
2nd Candidate: “What moderator? You mean that schmuck sitting there?”
1st Candidate: “You just called the moderator a schmuck.”
2nd Candidate: “I never said a bad word about anybody.”
1st Candidate: “It’s late. I hate debating. It’s beneath me. I’m going home.”
2nd Candidate: “Me, too. Let’s go out and have a drink. I never wanted to run anyway. The devil made me do it.”
Moderator: “Thank you gentlemen for this insightful exchange. And God bless America.”

 
The Morning Joe After

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, October 23, 2012 No Comment(s)

 

 

The great debate was over and it was time for an answer to the question all America has been asking: Is Mike Barnicle an O’Toole? We ask this because the great-great-grandmother’s name was Nora O’Toole, born around 1825 in County Mayo in that little island off the coast of England. You know, the place where Notre Dame plays Navy once in awhile. Nora O’Toole was the mother of Mary Ann Ryan, mother of Kate McNealis, mother of Sara Sweeney, whose son writes this blog.
 
The Barnicle rumor began about 10 years ago when we discovered, after about 150 years of separation, some O’Toole ladies of vintage, who happened to be originally from Clinton, Mass., which is where Nora O’Toole’s relatives wound up after the famine. Now Clinton is close to Worcester, home to Holy Cross and, at one time, Mike Barnicle. It made some sense then when one of the vintage O’Toole ladies said there was some kind of family relationship to Barnicle.
 
We figured sooner or later we’d bump into Barnicle and confirm that fact. Our family likes famous relatives, second only to wealthy ones, so along comes Barnicle as part of the “Morning Joe” show on MSNBC. It was at Racks Downtown Eatery + Tavern in Boca Raton’s Mizner Park. And did you know that the restaurant is not even owner Gary Rack’s primary business? The Cardinal Gibbons graduate is in the steel business with a fabricating plant in Boone, N.C., also home to Appalachian State.
 
Back on topic, the show was in Boca to cover the great debate last night, which if you can believe the people on the show, was a runaway romp for President Obama. And you usually can believe the show – at least people in Washington seem to feel that way. Although MSNBC is roughly the flip side of Fox News, “Morning Joe” makes an effort to listen, and comment intelligently, on both sides of an issue. Joe Scarborough is a former congressman from the Pensacola area and often proclaims himself a conservative Republican, Michael Steele, a frequent member of his posse, is former chairman of the Republican National Committee. Guests come from both sides of the aisle, such as Sen. John McCain, who along with Tom Brokaw and Zbigniew Brzezinski, was a star of today’s event. Brzezinski is no relation to the other co-host, Mika Brzezinski, except her father. They may be the only two people in the free world who can get the spelling of both his names right.
 
Although the show is heavily political, it lightens up with talk of sports, especially when guests come on with strong regional loyalties. Co-host Willie Geist started in sports broadcasting. It allows important and often partisan guests to come off as regular folks who appear to enjoy themselves as much as the host panel. If today was any example, they aren’t faking a bit, mingling and joking with the audience during commercial timeouts and weather sessions. It was just a lot of fun.
 
And we finally got to ask Mike Barnicle the question all America wants to know.
 
“Do you have the name O’Toole in your family history?” we asked.
 
“No,” he said.
 
Damn, maybe it was the Ryan side. After all, Pat Ryan once owned a bar in Worcester. We lost track of him in 1884.
The Silence of the Kennedys

by Bernard McCormick Tuesday, October 16, 2012 1 Comment(s)

Gaeton Fonzi died in late August. Arlen Specter died Sunday. Thus are gone within six weeks of each other two men whose paths crossed dramatically in connection with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. It was Specter, who as a junior counsel to the Warren Commission in the 1960s came up with the “magic bullet” theory, which was necessary to pin the crime on a lone assassin – Lee Harvey Oswald. It was Fonzi who, after interviewing Specter, was one of the first to write in a magazine article that the theory was impossible. Fonzi wrote how the normally smooth-talking Specter, stumbled and fumbled trying to explain his theory. Specter went on to a long career as a U.S. senator from Pennsylvania, but was increasingly dogged by the criticism that, intentionally or not, he had blown an investigation of monumental importance.
 
Fonzi later got a close-up look at the assassination as a government investigator for two congressional committees in the 1970s. What he saw convinced him that there was a conspiracy to kill JFK, and a second conspiracy, largely orchestrated by the CIA, to cover up the nature of the crime.
First, in Gold Coast magazine in 1980, and 13 years later in his book The Last Investigation, Fonzi described the frustration of trying to solve a murder, when at every turn agents of the U.S. government blocked a serious inquiry into the background of the crime of the century. That book had little impact when published, but over the years has inspired many researchers who used his work as a template, so that upon his death The New York Times called his book “an iconic work” regarded as one of the best ever on the assassination.
Still, some people wonder if we will ever know the full details of the crime and why it has been so difficult for conscientious investigators to explain. Only in recent years has it become apparent that one reason, if not the central reason, was that almost from the day in Dallas in 1963, Robert Kennedy, and by extension over the years the Kennedy family, did not want the truth known.
In books such as David Talbot’s Brothers and James Douglass’ JFK and the Unspeakable it has become known that Robert Kennedy sensed the nature of the conspiracy almost from the day it happened. One of his first calls was to John McCone, director of the CIA, asking if his agency was involved. McCone, a Kennedy appointee, clearly had no idea. He was out of the loop of the network of men who hated JFK for his refusal to attack Cuba and to agree to remove missiles from Turkey during the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.
It appears that Robert Kennedy also sensed that those behind the murder had connections to a group he was personally overseeing, men with a mission to kill Fidel Castro. And he may have known Oswald was an intelligence agent set up by the conspirators to appear to be a Castro sympathizer to justify an attack on Cuba. Since President Kennedy had agreed to lay off Castro, he feared that if Oswald’s role as a CIA asset became known, it could destroy the effectiveness of the agency, create huge problems for himself and possibly lead to a deadly confrontation with the Soviet Union. It was exactly such an attempt to defuse the Cold War that had earned him and his brother the enmity of those high in the military and the intelligence community. It is revealing (although it was not revealed at the time) that Robert Kennedy used back channels to tell the Soviets that he knew they had nothing to do with the killing, that it was a domestic conspiracy.
Robert Kennedy publicly said nothing. He may have feared for his own life, with some justification. But those close to him have said he privately monitored investigations such as New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison. There were also hints that if he became president he might attempt to get at the truth. He never got there.
Some of this remains speculation. But what is not speculation, and bears heavily on the argument, is a memo written by Robert Kennedy’s second in command, Nicholas Katzenbach, three days after the assassination. It was to Bill Moyers, the new President Lyndon B. Johnson’s assistant. It is among documents that have surfaced over the years. Initially, it did not create much of a stir. But, as more about Robert Kennedy’s thoughts become public, and in the light of 50 years of frustration is the search for the truth, the memo is dynamite. Among the paragraphs are these:
“The public must be satisfied that Oswald was the assassin; that he did not have confederates who are still at large; and that evidence was such that he would have been convicted at the trial.”
“Speculation about Oswald’s motivation ought to be cut off, and we should have some basis for rebutting thought that this was a Communist conspiracy or (as the Iron Curtain press is saying) a right-wing conspiracy to blame it on the Communists. Unfortunately the facts on Oswald seem about too pat—too obvious (Marxist, Cuba, Russian wife, etc.). The Dallas police have put out statements on the Communist conspiracy theory, and it was they who were in charge when he was shot and thus silenced.”
He recommended “the appointment of a Presidential Commission of unimpeachable personnel to review and examine the evidence and announce its conclusions.”
Katzenbach ended by advocating a quick public announcement to “head off speculation or Congressional hearings of the wrong sort.”
Keep in mind this went out just three days after the assassination, when Oswald was still supposed to be something of a lone-nut mystery.
Katzenbach, who died last May, was Robert Kennedy’s right-hand man. Can anybody believe that this went out without RFK’s knowledge and approval? To this observer, it makes it clear the fix was in from the beginning, and Robert Kennedy, almost surely, for patriotic reasons, was part of it.
Robert Kennedy was as much a victim as his brother, and it is hard to solve a crime when the victim does not want it solved.