H.L. Hunt's Dallas of the Early 1960s: Hateful, Terrifying, and Waiting to Kill Kennedy

At the dawn of the decade of the 1960s, America was on the verge of becoming a more enlightened place. The government was legislating racial tolerance and integration; the super rich were being forced to pay their fair share of taxes. Congress, by an overwhelming vote, passed a bill granting poor schoolkids free milk in public schools (try getting that one passed in today's Tea Party congress). In an age of frightening nuclear threats, we elected a President determined to end the Cold War instead of trying to win it. As the charismatic President's popularity grew, he turned the country toward the left. He tried to make it a more peaceful, equitable place. But not all of America was under his spell. In fact, the pillars of one oil-drenched, commie-baiting city hated him. Dallas, the city where he died such a brutal death, was a viper's nest of right-wing power, hate, and terror. And the scariest snake, Haroldson Lafayette Hunt, just happened to be the richest man in the world.

Hunt made a fortune in oil and with his billions he turned Dallas into his own playground. Very little of importance that happened in the city did not have his stamp on it. The leading newspaper, The Dallas Morning News, was run by Ted Dealey, a Hunt lackey. The Dallas Police Department, at Hunt's insistence, required its members to be white, male, and preferably members of the Ku Klux Klan or the John Birch Society. Hunt paid for his own right-wing hate radio show (forerunner of Rush Limbaugh, a man Hunt would have admired immensely). It was called "Facts Forum," and it virulently lashed out at taxation, the U.N., gun control, and immigration (sound familiar). Hunt later changed the name to "Life Line," when he incorporated conservative Christianity into the show. In private Hunt referred to African-Americans as "niggers," and he angrily cursed the Supreme Court's integration rulings. He abhorred the fact that blacks had the same voting rights he did, so he wrote his own novel called Alpaca, and forced Dallas libraries and bookstores to stock it on their shelves. Alpaca is Hunt's megalomaniacal fantasy world in which a small super-wealthy class rules everything. The rich have more votes than commoners, and are able to buy as many votes as they choose. There are no public schools or government-run services of any kind. There is no Social Security or Medicaid to protect the elderly, and tax breaks for oilmen are part of the Constitution. It is more than harmless right-wing lunacy; it is a quasi-fascist state run by threat of terror, where the common person is always subservient to the few rich oligarchs. (Think it can't happen here? Think again. This is exactly the kind of country Republicans want today.) Hunt even bought and paid for his own Congressman, Bruce Alger, the only member of the House who voted against that milk subsidy for kids.

Hunt despised President Kennedy, and once told a confidante that the only way to get him out of office was to "shoot him out." The day before the assassination, Jack Ruby and a convicted killer named Jim Brading were seen in the Hunt Oil headquarters in Dallas. What were they doing there? No one knows for sure. But later that same evening witnesses place Ruby at the Cabana Motel with a large bag full of cash. He handed it out to CIA operatives Frank Sturgis and E. Howard Hunt. On the day of the assassination, Brading was detained by Dallas Police in Dealey Plaza (site of the JFK murder). When asked what a convicted killer on parole from California was doing at the site of the murder of the century, Brading replied that he merely wanted to use the phone in an adjacent building. The building just happened to house a vacant office leased by the Hunt Oil Corporation.

Hunt was a racist, a bigamist, and a power-mad sociopath who once told LBJ's mistress, "I'm the richest man in the world; I can do any damn thing I want." And while his vision for America once seemed too crazy to contemplate, it is at our doorstep again. Don't believe me? Vote Republican and find out for yourself.

The Characteristics Of Pychopaths Resemble...Well, You Know Who

Many on the left, like me, cannot understand the anti-social, anti-science, anti-everything positions taken up by the right wing in America today. For instance, it is obvious that stricter gun control laws are needed in this country. Deaths by handgun numbered over 10,000 last year...five times more than all the other nations of the world combined. Yet the fanatical right blocks any and all attempts at background checks and assault weapons bans. What is wrong with these people? Do they have some personality flaw which inhibits common sense and blocks any measure which would enhance the greater good? Turns out, YES they do have personality disorders. Rob Kall of OpEd News really nails it on the head with a new article that appears in today's edition. He outlines the five traits of a psychopath; see if you recognize anyone you know:

"1- The first thing they'd do is to attack rules and regulations that require people to be civil, honest, ethical, fair and respectful to all others. They would attack the rules and regulations by attempting to characterized them negatively. They would use their charm and ability to lie with a straight face to persuade people that rules and regulations were designed to take away their freedom, to allow government to make more money, to take money away from hard working people.

2- Next, they'd create a cult of individualism, extolling the rights of a person to live as an individual, with the freedoms to be an individual. Think Ayn Rand-- her characters and followers. This is a manifestation of narcissism, distorted to look like something special. It's not. Humans evolved as members of small communities and groups. That is the natural way that humans have lived for hundreds of thousands, even millions of years, if you include our predecessors.

3- They'll sell the 'I Did It On My Own' Story. Being loners and narcissists who want to get all the credit, who believe that they are the best in the world, Psychopaths would do all they could to sell the narrative that people make it on their own, that the idea that government or the commons, or social networks or social safety nets make a difference. They would mock people who suggest that it takes a village, or that millionaires made their millions with the help of the society around them.

4- Oppose Democracy, Fair, Honest Voting and voting rights for all. Psychopaths may love hierarchy and the domination associated with it. They love the challenge of rising to the top and the game of getting there. Democracy is an inconvenience that can create an egalitarian environment of fair play and just rules. That's no fun. Psychopaths would love to see those kinds of inconveniences done away with. So they'll try to muck up the voting system, try to take away direct representation and direct elections. They'll rig the system -- think gerrymandering-- and yes, both major parties do it. It's bi-partisan. They'll change the rules so that they give extra advantage to those with extra power and money, especially to those who will cheat. And they'll do all they can to take away the right to vote, especially people who will oppose their selfish interests.

5- Damage the Environment: Psychopaths, being self-centered and narcissistic, and not caring about laws or rules or consequences or other people are going to be more likely to abuse and damage the environment. Who cares if the water is polluted downstream as long as the psychopath can buy bottled water for his or her mansion? Who cares if climate change will disrupt the lives of billions and cost trillions if there's a profit to be made?"

Stated flatly, Republican politicians are psychopaths. They have no consciences. They care only about their well-being. If that means accepting money from billionaire psychpaths in order to further their careers, so be it. If that means endangering our safety, our justice systems, our democratic processes, who cares. As long as the psychopath gets his, damn everyone else. It's a dog-eat-dog world, and he is in it for himself. And it would be humorous if it weren't so dangerous. Because these people rule the U.S. Congress and state houses all over the country. It's as though we have elected criminals to run our justice system. It's like allowing wolves to protect the hen house. Or pedophiles to baby sit the nation's children.

This begs the question: are psychopaths born or made? Do they have a malignant gene which makes them so evil? Or are they victims of an abusive environment? Did they grow up in totalitarian homes, devoid of love and lacking in ambitions other than money and power? Were they abused? Psychologists tell us that the physically, emotionally, and mentally abused child suffers a "break" from normal development. He grows up lacking compassion and concern for others; he trusts no one, and self-survival is his only value. He learned early on that it does not pay to be kind, to contribute to a better world, to care for others. After all, no one ever really cared for him.

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-presidents-mortician-tim-fleming/1117253323?ean=9780988829077

Two Recommended Books Explore The Damage Capitalism Causes

As the rich get richer, the middle class fades, and the poor are ruthlessly demonized by the rich, America is becoming that most evil of capitalist states—a place where a few uber-rich feast at the table while the rest of us struggle for scraps. In such a state, the elite few who possess nearly everything can purchase most anything, including the government and the media. Consequently the state is run for the benefit of the wealthy few at the expense of the many. Sociopaths in positions of power in the corporate and political worlds partner to form a sinister alliance. Privatization of all functions of government and deregulation of business practices become the rallying cries. As Mussolini declared, “Fascism should rightly be called coporatism, as it is the merger of corporate and government power.”

Republicans and their billionaire donors are trying mightily to make America this kind of state today. In this model, capitalism becomes more than free enterprise; it is the iron wall separating the ultra wealthy from the rest of us. It is the means by which stark income inequality can become permanent.

Two books I recommend reinforce this notion. Thomas Piketty’s “Capitalism In The Twenty-First Century” uses economic numbers to make an scientific case for the destructiveness of the current version of American capitalism. The means and opportunities by which the common person can access middle class status are being cut off, intentionally and rigorously, by the 1% who control 55-60% of all the wealth of the country. And this “socioeconomic gulf” is widening.

Likewise, Naomi Klein's book Disaster Capitalism warns of the evils of capitalism in the 21st century. She argues that deregulation has been extremely profitable for those at the top but something of a disaster for those at the bottom.

No surprise there, but Klein does imply that there is more than simple economics at work. Governments in league with corporations around the globe have employed something called the “shock system.” This system uses crises or calamities to pass laws that implement destructive capitalist policies. She cites examples from Asia, Latin America, and Russia, but the same could be said for our own 9/11 catastrophe that led to the unwarranted invasion of Iraq. The greed and corruption that followed was unprecedented. War profiteers and contractors got rich, and the commoner was left to ponder how his pockets got picked. Same with the Wall Street meltdown and bailout in 2008. It nearly destroyed our economy, but in the end the taxpayer funded billionaires who put another one over on us.

Klein is quoted in the latest edition of OpEd News as saying, “If we want to understand how this system has swept the globe from Latin America to Russia to this country, we need to understand the incredible ‘utility of crisis’ to this project, because the great leaps forward for this project have taken place in the midst of and during the immediate aftermath of some kind of a shock. The extreme cases that I discuss in the book are wars, terrorist attacks, natural disasters...the most common shocks that have created the context for pushing through these very unpopular policies in a way that economists often call economic shock therapy. The first shock is the economic crisis; the second shock is the economic shock therapy.”

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-presidents-mortician-tim-fleming/1117253323?ean=97800988829077

British Writer Reviews The President's Mortician

Several weeks ago I received notice from my publisher that a British journalist was trying to track me down. His name is Garrick Alder, and he writes for a UK publication called Lobster. It appears quarterly and is billed as a on-line magazine which deals with "politics, parapolitics, and history." In addition to book reviews, there are articles about conspiracy theories, economics, global politics, and contemporary history. My book caught Alder's eye, and the subject matter has stimulated many correspondences between us. His review appeared yesterday, and I have posted it in full below:

"The publication of Tim Fleming’s book marks, to my
knowledge, the first real attempt to (forgive the phrase) put
flesh on the biographical bones of John Melvin Liggett, a
shadowy character whose apparent connections to the JFK
assassination are discussed in my own ‘Doubles and
Disinformation’ in this issue of Lobster.

"There is good news and bad news about this book. The
bad news is that, despite the author’s first-hand research into
Liggett’s life, his book is so heavily fictionalised as to count as
a novel. The good news is that it’s actually well worth buying
and reading despite this. Fleming is a devoted JFK researcher
and writer, and runs a worthwhile blog1 about US politics from
a leftist perspective in general and the JFK killing in particular.

"The narrative of The President’s Mortician is compelling
and convincingly unpredictable, despite being entirely based
on a completely bogus ‘McGuffin’ (the murder of a fictional
character by the real-life Liggett and the characters’ attempts
to solve the case). Of particular interest to researchers will be
the ‘book within the book’ setting out one of the characters’
interpretation of the assassination and its consequences. It
came as little surprise to me when Mr Fleming confirmed in an
e-mail conversation that this metatext was an excerpt from his
own unpublished writing, and I recommend that he pursues
finding a publisher for it. He also told me that he had originally
planned a non-fiction biography of Liggett. This is maddening
(to me, at least) because it means that we are left to sift
through a cast of fictional, composite and real characters and
events with no idea of which is which. For instance: Liggett’s
youthful participation in David Ferrie’s Civil Air Patrol outfit and
his recruitment by the CIA therefrom. This is plainly of key
importance to understanding Liggett’s life but I have no idea
whether it’s real or pretend. Mr Fleming’s characters are all
equally well-drawn and rounded, making it even more difficult
(although I have a strong suspicion that the wholly-fictitious
characters are the ones with a noticeable tendency to ‘infodump’
in order to move the plot along in leaps and bounds).

"And some of his work is plainly a synthesis of his own reading
and beliefs. For example, one character anachronistically
provides an unattributed précis of David Lifton’s Best Evidence,
fifteen years before it was published.

"Mr Fleming has expressed his hope that The President’s
Mortician will stimulate others to carry out their own research.
In the sense that it tantalised me so much that I want to pick
up the phone and hammer the Internet until I have tracked
down his primary sources (whom he declined to identify in any
way) and bled them dry of information, he can count his hopes
fulfilled. Others will perhaps be more sanguine about the
matter: perhaps, at this distance, a novelist has more hope of
untangling Liggett’s life than anyone else.

"Liggett himself moves through the novel like a predatory
fish in a muddy river, glimpsed here and there as the action
unfolds, but rarely surfacing. The key points of interest to
researchers are the two chapters which describe Liggett’s
alteration of JFK’s body and the way in which a second body
was used as a ‘stand-in’ for the dead President while
Kennedy’s real body was doctored. Mr Fleming plainly knows
his stuff on the real-life witnesses and events relating to JFK’s
post-mortem handling and manages to weave them into a
coherent narrative.

"While by no means an expert on this aspect of the
assassination, I found Mr Fleming’s portrayal of proceedings
very interesting indeed and (as far as I can ascertain without
in-depth research) somewhat credible. For instance the
photographer at JFK’s autopsy told the Assassination Records
Review Board that the pictures she took were not the ones
later released by the National Archives and that Kennedy’s
body had been in a very different state when she saw and
photographed it. I asked Mr Fleming whether his
reconstruction of the events of that night was based on
evidence or imagination. As I had anticipated, he did not
respond to this question, and I respect his choice to remain
silent on the matter. I therefore conclude that the ‘body
alteration’ narrative is a mixture of both fact and fiction – and
none the worse for that. I enjoyed it so much that I read the
whole thing in one sitting. Researchers will find this book at
best a thought-provoking and stimulating read and at worst a
frustrating hybrid of truth and fiction. Either way, I would say
that it deserves to be read by anyone interested in this aspect
of the assassination controversy."

--Garrick Alder

Read more at http://www.amazon.com/Presidents-Mortician-Tim-Fleming/dp/098882907X

Bundy Champion Rand Paul Now Exposed For What He Really Is

All those right-wing politicians and FNC (Fascist News Channel) commentators who sang the praises of racist Nevada cattleman Cliven Bundy have now been forced to eat crow. How do right-wing idiots eat crow? Like cowards. They issue statements (not in person, of course, because they can’t face tough questions) which mildly and obtusely distance themselves from talk like “I know this about theNegro…they was better off during slavery. They didn’t get no more freedom.”

The grammar is almost as horrifying as the pro-slavery stance. And all right wingers who came to Bundy’s defense should forever wear the stench of his ignorance and hate. That means you, Sean Hannity. How did Hannity handle Bundy’s remarks? He simply ignored them. Now Hannity has never heard of Cliven Bundy. He’s no longer the gun-toting hero of the Old West, shooting it out for the glory of Old Glory. He’s persona non grata now. But we should never let Hannity off the hook for this. He should be forever linked to right-wing hate and racism.

Same goes for Rand Paul. Paul call himself a Libertarian, and now we know what a Libertarian really is: a gussied up right-wing extremist. Libertarianism has always been nothing more than Fascism with a facelift anyway, a system that promotes the absolute reign of corporations and free- market oppression of the poor. And a disdain for minorities. Paul was out front with Bundy before Cliven opened his racist yap. Now Paul can’t be bothered with him. But Paul has given his opponents ammunition. They can associate Paul with Bundy forever. I can see the campaign ads now—Paul praising Bundy, and quick cut to Bundy telling us his views on the Negro.

Bundy and his militia crazies should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. They are welfare cheats who have grazed cattle at the taxpayers’ expense long enough. It’s time for Bundy to stop sucking at the government’s teat and looking for a handout. You would think right-wing politicians and media would excoriate welfare queens like Bundy. I guess their hypocrisy knows no bounds.

http://www.amazon.com/Presidents-Mortician-Tim-Fleming/dp/098882907X

Democracy Is Dead According To New Study

The signs are all around us. America is becoming a plutocracy. The rich get richer and have more influence over those who govern. That's a nice way of seeing that politicians, judges and media are becoming like hookers. They are for sale, and the johns are billionaires like David Koch and Sheldon Adelson. Even the Supreme Court no longer looks out for the greater good. Its recent decisions make it easier for money to corrupt the political process. What does it mean for democracy? It is on its death bed, according to a study released by Princeton University.

Political science researchers and academicians Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page used data drawn from over 1,800 different policy initiatives from 1981 to 2002 to conclude that rich, well-connected individuals on the political scene now steer the direction of the country, regardless of or even against the will of the majority of voters.

"The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy," they write, "while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence."

As one illustration, Gilens and Page compare the political preferences of Americans at the 50th income percentile to preferences of Americans at the 90th percentile as well as major lobbying or business groups. They find that the government--whether Republican or Democratic—-more often follows the preferences of the latter group rather than the first.

If we stay on the present course, all of America--its institutions, its government agencies, its land, its telecommunication companies, its media outlets, its transportation modes, its very essence--will be controlled by a few wealthy elites, to whom we will all be beholden. What kind of a nation would you call that? Fascism.

Jack Ruby predicted this in 1964 when he was asked who was behind the JFK assassination and why it took place. He uttered the now frighteningly prescient words, "So that a whole new form of government will take over America."

http://www.amazon.com/Presidents-Mortician-Tim-Fleming/dp/098882907X

New Darling Of The Right, Cliven Bundy, Exposes Himself As A Racist

Here in the St. Louis area we have a name for ignorant, backwards, illiterate, hillbilly racists. We call them "hoosiers"; no, not necessarily Indiana natives, but people who have cars in their yards and might be missing a few teeth. The wheel is still spinning in their heads, but the hamster has died. They use bad grammar, they hate Obama, they want to end welfare (except for the government handouts they receive), and they gripe about "nigras." Now we know Bundy (no, not Ted Bundy, though he was infamously a Republican too), the deadbeat Nevada farmer on government subsidies and the newly adopted hero of FOX News commentators, is a good ol' fashioned hoosier. What he said yesterday earned him that sobriquet. Here's what he said:

"I want to tell you one more thing I know about the Negro...because they were basically on government subsidy, so now what do they do? They abort their young children, they put their young men in jail, because they never learned how to pick cotton. And I've often wondered, are they better off as slaves, picking cotton and having a family life and doing things, or are they better off under government subsidy? They didn't get no more freedom. They got less freedom."

I read this aloud to my wife, and she gasped. Then we were quiet a moment and reflected on the horror that there are millions just like him out there, wandering the villages of America, armed to the teeth, spouting hatred, and waiting for the overthrow of the American government. Their twisted logic, regressive politics, and open hatred would be funny if they were not so dangerous. And they admire Cliven Bundy for his views and his actions.

If you haven't heard, Bundy for years has grazed his cattle on government property. When the government took a stand, Bundy forced an armed standoff. His racist Montana neighbors rushed to the scene, guns drawn, and, to avoid a firefight, government agents backed down. Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly proclaimed Bundy a hero. I wonder how FOX News will sheepishly back away from Bundy's latest comments.

The incident speaks to a larger conflagration that plays out in the right-wing extremist's head: a new Civil War. They want to bring down the government, by force if necessary. We dismiss the innate hypocrisies of their fantasies at our own risk. While waving the flag they tell us that America's government is the enemy; while decrying the state's handout, they have no problem with the dole they get; while making over the Founders as gun-toting, lawless fanatics, they ignore the fact that Washington put down insurrectionists who failed to pay taxes. Forget all that. What should worry us is that they want to kill all those whom they perceive as internal enemies--liberals, blacks, females, Latinos, immigrants, Democrats...you know, the majority of us.

Georgia just enacted laws which would allow guns in churches, ballparks, airports, schools and taverns. Hoosiers can be harmless when they are unarmed. But this is America in the 21st century, and these Bundyites are violent sociopaths who are packing heat. They may not be as smart as us, as evolved as us, or as democratic as us, or read and write as well we do, but they'd like to make up for their inferiorities by killing us. And someday they just might organize a militia which will do just that.