Trump’s Genius: Weaponize Real Coverups (JFK etc) to Build Distrust

Because Media failed to tell the truth sometimes, Trump claimed they lie all the time

Photo credit: Adapted by WhoWhatWhy from Thomas Quine / Flickr (CC BY 2.0) and US Customs and Border Protection / Flickr.

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Once upon a time, the term “deep state” — and the idea that one should be skeptical of what the government said — was not solely the province of the far right.

There’s a backstory to this bit of history that I’d like to share. It illuminates the dark, unexplored origins of the mania on which Donald Trump rode to power. 

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Years ago, not long after I became a journalist and started following my nose to wherever the scent of news led, I discovered to my amazement just how many historical events had never been fully investigated by law enforcement or other authorities. From the political assassinations of the sixties to the real reasons for the Iraq war, the gap between what we were told and what we suspected seemed limitless. (And still seems — take the alleged suicide of Jeffrey Epstein.)

Instead of candor, what I found were sanitized and often patently misleading narratives promoted by anointed public intellectuals who were given berths by the major media. (Only later did I familiarize myself with operations like Mockingbird, a CIA program to use journalists and other opinion-shapers to advance such ”official” narratives.)

Because of what I learned, I always pause this time of year to consider what is to me the biggest piece of unfinished investigative business before us: the death of John F. Kennedy. 

About half of Americans still accept the judgment of the Warren Commission appointed by Kennedy’s successor in the White House, though anyone actually studying the evidence can see that the “lone nut” story never made sense. 

This is why government officials keep revising the story, swearing in a new set of experts who swear to a new set of details, which radically contradict the previous ones. All to placate a skeptical public. Would you believe this story... No? Well, how about this version? Which of course makes the public even more cynical. 

Here’s a less complicated reason to doubt Lee Harvey Oswald’s guilt: According to those who knew him, Oswald, who claimed he was being framed before he himself was shot within 48 hours of JFK’s death, genuinely adored Kennedy. 

That admiration is not so surprising today. Notwithstanding the predictable attacks on his serial infidelities in and out of the White House, John F. Kennedy is looking better and better as time passes. 

Related: JFK in His Own Words: A Selective Sampler from His Speeches - WhoWhatWhy

He was, in retrospect, one of our boldest leaders ever, challenging a hard-right military-intelligence elite who were pushing a Doomsday nuclear strategy while benefiting from their association with the rapidly growing and lucrative “defense” economy. That’s the octopus-like “military-industrial complex” that Kennedy’s Republican predecessor, former Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, warned us against as he left office. 

JFK also pushed back at wealthy and powerful interests in general, which, then as now, had the virtual run of the seat of government. Although from money himself, he very much cared about and related to the average American. And the average American loved him for it.

His death, just over 1,000 days after he took office, mattered greatly and changed the trajectory of America forever. America became a much more troubled place, and disillusionment set in. The average person began to lose faith (and interest) in government itself. 

Understanding how and why he died seems more essential now than ever, as the battle for the soul of this country continues at fever pitch, and as a new administration, presenting itself falsely as in the people’s corner, moves rapidly to further advance the interests of the rich and powerful. 

I have spent about two decades conducting research and interviews on the JFK “cold case.” I continue to investigate it and, eventually, I’ll have some surprising revelations. 

My advocacy for openness and a willingness to explore major public traumas has also changed how many people listen to me — and what kinds of people they are. 

As a result of my last book, Family of Secrets — which presents a whole new history of the covert doings of the Bush clan, the CIA, the oil industry, banking, and much more — I amassed a disparate and sizable following. 

Unfortunately, while many of my readers were and are fair-minded, rational people, others who absorbed or sought to disseminate (with or without credit) my work operated from motives that I deplore. 

One significant group that took an interest in what I unearthed was the political hard right. Always eager to convince the public that the government is evil, they began seeking to weaponize the findings in my work and in that of others. They began adopting for their own purposes the previously nuanced and useful academic term “deep state,” and to present anything that did not serve their own interests as part of a giant conspiracy. 

One reason they were able to do so was that the establishment itself has often ignored — sometimes deliberately — the findings of independent-minded journalists and scholarly researchers who dig into these kinds of cold cases with an open mind. (As a result, the only demographic group that believes the Warren Report is whites with a college degree. Paradoxically, those who consider themselves “best informed” often aren’t.)

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Although this is little understood, I believe that work performed by thoughtful, agnostic individuals was essentially hijacked in the most cynical way possible. I don’t think I need to name names, but all you have to do is look at book titles and you’ll see how some very big names on the right jumped on prior research and steered it to their own audiences and for their own purposes. 

In recent years, this “conspiracy” material became highly popular on podcasts that grew vast audiences. People couldn’t get enough of this slant on history and current events. And no wonder. The very idea of nefarious doings by secret agencies provides a constant diet of escapism on streaming platforms. 

Trump apparently was turned on to the whole idea of a “deep state” by these individuals. Almost certainly he never read any serious books on these matters nor did he ever question the transformation of a nuanced academic term into a bumper-sticker slogan that represented something fantastic, evil, and omnipotent. 

The reality of course is much more complex. Understanding how and why the public often does not get the truth, or certainly not the full truth, about the most explosive and sensitive matters is a critical part of what both the educational system and the media ought to be attempting — but rarely do. 

It is much more profitable and lucrative to become an establishment historian or journalist, seemingly rational and candid, but actually perfectly willing to perpetuate official myths and help cast doubt on serious investigators. Nothing to see, folks, move along, move along. 

So that’s where we are: a world where Roger Stone, Tucker Carlson, RFK Jr., Tulsi Gabbard, and others close to Trump and MAGA embrace the topic — all are outspoken in professing their belief that JFK was killed by his own national security forces, not Russia’s. And where the liberal establishment keeps its distance from any attempt to shine fresh light on the founding events of 21st-century America. 

I would argue that this is one of the reasons Trump won. A growing percentage of the public believe they’re being lied to. And I would argue that they are. But my position is a nuanced one. The establishment does provide correct information about most subjects most of the time (like the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines that, careful analysis shows, saved many thousands of lives). 

However, during the unprecedented crisis triggered by the political assassinations of the 1960s — JFK, RFK, MLK — the self-serving establishment closed ranks and chose not to pursue leads that would further jolt an already shaken body politic, ultimately leading to layers of lies.

To effectively challenge decades of establishment cover-ups, one must be able to distinguish between blatant falsehoods and accurate, if highly unpopular, information. And so liberals are, like MAGA people, living partly in a fantasy world when it comes to some crucial matters. 

This growing belief gap also helps explain how easy it was to rouse a segment of the electorate to believe that the entire establishment was lying and conspiring around a health emergency. To be sure, there were missteps and at times deliberate dearth of candor. But overall, what we were being told about COVID-19 vaccines was true. 

Today, we have Donald Trump returning to the White House, propelled by this lack of trust in government experts, and we have a full retinue around him of those who capitalized on and likely will continue to stoke that distrust, empowered to do all manner of mischief. Because, when there is no trust, the cynical will exploit every opportunity. (Historians of the death of democracies agree that would-be dictators take special care to undermine trust in the media and the administrative state before they seize the actual levers of power.)

By ignoring the truth, the establishment became an inversion of the boy who cried wolf. When it tells the truth, which is actually quite often, a segment of the public simply doesn’t believe what the government is saying. 

If you still doubt that powerful interests seek to control everything, take a hard look at the efforts of the man who arguably has arranged for Trump to regain power: Elon Musk. Whereas some may have labored in the shadows over the years to hide their self-serving and anti-democratic actions, today such manipulation can be done openly. 

The irony is that the very voters worried about “the swamp” have just trucked in enough muck to ensure that it may never be drained.

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