AMERICA, STRIPPED OF ITS INNOCENCE

By Edwin Cooney

Today, November 25th, 2024, marks 61 years and 3 days since the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Bob Schieffer, one of the few newsmen living today who'd covered the assassination story, observed on CBS the morning of November 22nd, 2013, the 50th anniversary of the assassination:

"Americans awakened on the morning of Saturday, November 23rd, 1963 stripped of their innocence.”

I've believed that observation since that weekend. It seemed to be true at the time. After all, it wasn't until the shooting of President Kennedy that civil rights divisions hit their full angry intensity. It was after JFK's demise that the Vietnam War divided America under the very man, Lyndon Johnson, whom JFK had selected to succeed him. Next came Dr. King's and the late president's brother Bobby who were swept away. After that, Richard Nixon swept himself away by internalizing antiwar criticism by his "liberal" enemies.

Today we live in a socio/political society that has turned political opposition into criminality.

Not that the world had been perfect up until then.  After all, America had enslaved Blacks and committed wholesale genocide against Native Americans. Even religious prejudice was a part of America's story, but many of our accomplishments did overshadow our sins.

Still, America had saved its Union from a bloody and divisive civil war. Twice, America had saved the old world from itself. We had populated a continent through "manifest destiny” during the 1840s. We had established great unions strong enough to counter the forces of very wealthy corporations. We had mastered science enough to rid ourselves of disease despite the observation of the president of a major college who insisted that if God wanted us to be free of smallpox he wouldn't have invented smallpox! Fortunately, George Washington didn't agree and inoculated his troops against the disease.

America was blessed when it established the Red Cross and eventually internationalized it. Although Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley had been assassinated, their reputation was within the powers and potentials of their presidential offices. Meanwhile, Americans could relate to Jack Kennedy’s personality on their living room television sets and in  glamorous newspapers and magazines of the day.

Presidents were, of course, mortal, and one was even physically crippled, although intellectually and spiritually powerful. In the fall of 1963, the Secret Service and J. Edgar Hoover's FBI were certainly  dedicated to keeping this vital young president safe from any harm ---were they not!

Then came those six seconds in Dallas shortly after 12:30 central standard time. Within minutes, who was responsible became as significant as the deed itself!

Yes, there were still good and wondrous things yet to happen here in America. However, they wouldn't come with the anticipated expectation that they once did.

Before Friday, November 22nd, 1963, we expected the best to happen to us. Since that historic date we've been merely privileged, lucky if you choose, when wondrous things do occur.

Next week, the topic will be: we, the innocent!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY