I must share the flood of emotions upon seeing “Bobby” today, the movie about Robert F. Kennedy and the day he was assassinated. First, there was the image from my youth of the Kennedy brothers, the very embodiment of humanity’s ideal. My Uncle Willie, the mayor of Hazard (and a proud Republican, but NOT in today’s ideological sense of partisanship, see below), in addition to teaching me about Churchill, Roosevelt and Khrushchev gave me a commemorative coin stamped with JFK’s “Ask not what your country can do for you, rather what you can do for your country.”
Then November 22, 1963. The third grade teacher was called away then came back crying and told us we’d be going home early as President Kennedy was shot. It was a cold, gray late fall day, the kind all such seasonal days were back then, before we ever heard of “global warming.” The neighbor boy and I would feign shots at one another in our front yard, keeling backwards as we shouted “SPY!” My parents were visibly upset, but as kids we did not sense the utter destruction of hope, of purity of thought and purpose that was to befall the idealist followers and believers of JFK’s mighty vision.
That Christmas came, and a few more, before the full fruits of a disillusioned generation blazed its way across the TV screen and headlines. Pinko protestin’ hippies, all of em drugged out on LSD or marijuana were, in my mind, evil, bad, the antithesis of “apple pie and Chevrolet.”
I had heard something about another Kennedy, Bobby, who was running for President. I had little inkling then of all that he stood for: a nation united by compassion, charity and justice. The morning of the first day of summer vacation my parents had a shocked glaze as they came out of their bedroom: young Bobby’d been shot, shot by someone called Sirhan Sirhan, which seemed then and seems even now so surreal.
The movie brought all this back to me, but then something truly awoke me. UNCLE WILLIE! As mayor of Hazard he ushered Bobby around the Eastern Kentucky’s coal fields, meeting the poorest of America’s poor, so Bobby could see first hand Appalachian poverty. There he was in the actual footage, with his brown hat and thick black glasses of the day Uncle Willie hosting Bobby Kennedy, which was old news to me as I’ve seen the black and white photo Uncle Willie was always so proud of. http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/archivefiles/2004/08/when_kennedy_ca.php
The thing is this: compassion, the idea of using tax dollars, our pooled resources, to alleviate others’ suffering is neither a Democratic one nor a Republican one. My uncles, my dad, all favored such action, and they represented both parties. Politics back then was more gamesmanship than the ideological fight (to the political death) end that it has become today.
Hope died that June day with Bobby’s death and America has never truly recovered. It is partly why we are constantly wondering how we drifted away from what we wistfully recall as the good ol’ days, when there was honor, modesty and deference—to the government and to each other.
Instead we’ve allowed the airwaves to be as polluted as our skies with trashy programming and even trashier, and evermore dishonest, so-called news and comment shows. Irreverence is the new standard in entertainment, in news reporting, and in politics. We flail about helplessly, unable to stop our slide down the slippery slope of self-justification that has made us sacrifice any claim America once had to moral leadership.
Decent Americans feel it and see it yet feel powerless to change this sense of hopelessness that has its roots in those Kennedy assassinations. We still see no way out.
Worse, we’ve mostly stopped searching.
Rfd 12/17/06
Then November 22, 1963. The third grade teacher was called away then came back crying and told us we’d be going home early as President Kennedy was shot. It was a cold, gray late fall day, the kind all such seasonal days were back then, before we ever heard of “global warming.” The neighbor boy and I would feign shots at one another in our front yard, keeling backwards as we shouted “SPY!” My parents were visibly upset, but as kids we did not sense the utter destruction of hope, of purity of thought and purpose that was to befall the idealist followers and believers of JFK’s mighty vision.
That Christmas came, and a few more, before the full fruits of a disillusioned generation blazed its way across the TV screen and headlines. Pinko protestin’ hippies, all of em drugged out on LSD or marijuana were, in my mind, evil, bad, the antithesis of “apple pie and Chevrolet.”
I had heard something about another Kennedy, Bobby, who was running for President. I had little inkling then of all that he stood for: a nation united by compassion, charity and justice. The morning of the first day of summer vacation my parents had a shocked glaze as they came out of their bedroom: young Bobby’d been shot, shot by someone called Sirhan Sirhan, which seemed then and seems even now so surreal.
The movie brought all this back to me, but then something truly awoke me. UNCLE WILLIE! As mayor of Hazard he ushered Bobby around the Eastern Kentucky’s coal fields, meeting the poorest of America’s poor, so Bobby could see first hand Appalachian poverty. There he was in the actual footage, with his brown hat and thick black glasses of the day Uncle Willie hosting Bobby Kennedy, which was old news to me as I’ve seen the black and white photo Uncle Willie was always so proud of. http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/archivefiles/2004/08/when_kennedy_ca.php
The thing is this: compassion, the idea of using tax dollars, our pooled resources, to alleviate others’ suffering is neither a Democratic one nor a Republican one. My uncles, my dad, all favored such action, and they represented both parties. Politics back then was more gamesmanship than the ideological fight (to the political death) end that it has become today.
Hope died that June day with Bobby’s death and America has never truly recovered. It is partly why we are constantly wondering how we drifted away from what we wistfully recall as the good ol’ days, when there was honor, modesty and deference—to the government and to each other.
Instead we’ve allowed the airwaves to be as polluted as our skies with trashy programming and even trashier, and evermore dishonest, so-called news and comment shows. Irreverence is the new standard in entertainment, in news reporting, and in politics. We flail about helplessly, unable to stop our slide down the slippery slope of self-justification that has made us sacrifice any claim America once had to moral leadership.
Decent Americans feel it and see it yet feel powerless to change this sense of hopelessness that has its roots in those Kennedy assassinations. We still see no way out.
Worse, we’ve mostly stopped searching.
Rfd 12/17/06
1 comment:
I am glad to see your blog concerning Robert Kennedy's visit to Hazard, KY.
I remember it well. At the time I was a high school senior and worked for the cable television station in Hazard. Following his visit to the Liberty Street area of Hazard, Kennedy went to the cable tv studios and taped an interview with your Uncle Willie and Bill Gorman. I was the camera operator that day in the studio and remember it well.
Also, prior to the interview, I was with Willie, Bill, and Kennedy as they toured Liberty Street. Here is a link to a picture showing your Uncle Willie, Kennedy, and myself, during the Liberty Street tour. Willie has Kennedy by the arm as they walked. I am in the cable-knit sweater to the left.
http://hazardkentucky.com/2000/robert25.jpg
Many other images of this event, including several of your Uncle Willie are available on this site.
This next image shows your cousin Eddie (with dark hair and glasses, in the middle).
http://hazardkentucky.com/2000/robert23.jpg
Mike Levinson
Hazard, KY
levinson@iglou.com
BTW, I was a fraternity brother of Harding and Joe at UK (Sig Ep).
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