I wish to extend my Congratulations to my opponent and incumbent, Kristen Pence, on her victory in retaining her seat on our local school board!

I’d like now to address Mr. Bianchini regarding his November 8 write-up.  While I guess it is likely that someone by the name of “Leslie Matthews” chairs a group called “Mothers for Liberty” and is employed at Christendom College, I believe you were reporting on me.

I must clarify — I am “Leslie Mathews” – an employee of Christendom College and Founder and Chair of the Mom’s for Liberty, Warren County, VA Chapter, a fairly new, powerful, and strong parental rights organization in America.  During and after my campaign for the school board, the above-mentioned info seemed to be of huge interest to some, so I wanted to enlighten you a bit.

The online group — “Save Samuels” chose to make its opinion known regarding certain candidates, who they claim did or did not support our local library, and in my opinion, turning our latest local election into a fiasco! Other organizations, such as the Browntown Community Center, piggy-backed off the “Save Samuels” group when forwarding this group’s “online packet” out to their email recipients, and there were some campaigners who were asking voters if they would like a “sample ballot” listing the names of the candidates who supported the library (see attached).

Mr. Bianchini, although you reported that Moms for Liberty came about just before the issues surfaced in our local library, I regretfully inform you that I nor Moms for Liberty, Warren County, VA, can rightfully take credit in bringing forth the awareness of the filth that was at our children’s reach in our Samuels library!  I wish to take this opportunity to thank those who brought this issue to light and for pursuing new procedures through efforts to protect our children!

We members of Moms for Liberty consist of parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles who stand for parental rights and who will fight to protect the very innocence of our children’s minds, hearts, and bodies!  If that means, when choosing to be candidates in local elections, we have our names listed in opposition to others’ views and/or that our names aren’t shaded in on a sample ballot because of this — then so be it!  Almighty God warns – Woe, to those who harm and disregard the protection of the children, it would be better to tie a millstone around their neck and toss them into the depths of the sea!  I take His warnings seriously, and I never give a false indication of where I stand or whom I affiliate with. I thank you, Mr. Bianchini, for taking notice, but I suggest you dig deeper next time on the affiliations of others so you have a much more accurate report.  (see attachment).

My run for the school board seat was very good, and I want to thank those who supported me and my endeavors.  The numbers speak volumes and give hope that several South River folks still remain morally steadfast and will press forward for our children’s educational best and the future of America.  For that, I am sincerely grateful!

Mrs. Leslie Mathews
Warren County

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in the letters published on this page are solely those of the respective authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the Royal Examiner’s editorial team, its affiliates, or advertisers. The Royal Examiner does not endorse or take responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or validity of any statements made by the authors. The statements and claims presented in the letters have not been independently verified by the Royal Examiner. Readers are encouraged to exercise their own judgment and critical thinking skills when evaluating the content. Any reliance on the information provided in the letters is at the reader’s own risk.

While the Royal Examiner makes every effort to publish a diverse range of opinions, it does not guarantee the publication of all received letters. The Royal Examiner reserves the right to edit letters for clarity, length, and adherence to editorial guidelines. Moreover, the Royal Examiner does not assume any liability for any loss or damage incurred by readers due to the content of the letters or any subsequent actions taken based on these opinions.

In submitting a letter to the editor, authors grant the newspaper the right to publish, edit, reproduce, or distribute the content in print, online, or in any other form.

We value the engagement of our readers and encourage open and constructive discussions on various topics. However, the Royal Examiner retains the right to reject any letter that contains offensive language, personal attacks, or violates any legal regulations. Thank you for being a part of our vibrant community of readers and contributors, and we look forward to receiving your diverse perspectives on matters of interest and importance.

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There are certain days in our nation’s history that are simply more important than others. These days tend to be ones that have changed our nation for better or worse. These are turning point days and generation-defining dates.

For my generation, Gen X, that date is Sept. 11, 2001, as we were in high school or early 20s. It seems like everything in my memory is categorized as either pre or post 9/11. For my grandparents that day was Dec. 7, 1941; it was scarred into their memories and completely changed their lives forever. While my Baby Boomer parents have felt the effects of 9/11, the day from their youth that left a scar happened 60 years ago this month, for on that day the very popular President John Kennedy died, but even more importantly, so did our nation’s innocence.

On that tragic November day, Kennedy and his wife had been in Texas along with his V.P. Lyndon B. Johnson for a few days to kick off his southern campaign tour for reelection. Kennedy knew he had a fight in Texas as he had just recently proposed the Civil Rights Act. Kennedy had avoided getting too involved with Civil Rights earlier in his presidency because Southern Democrats had opposed it, and any support could break up the party. Yet after the 1963 March on Washington and the assassination of civil rights activist Medgar Evers, Kennedy knew it was time to take up the fight. His goal on this southern tour was to try to hold the party together while trying to get support for his bill. Yet while in Texas he spent most of his time talking about the economy and military preparedness, topics much more comfortable for his southern audience.

After speaking in Fort Worth, the presidential party flew to Dallas and rode in multiple convertibles on their way to The Trade Mart. As they drove through Dealey Plaza around 12:30 p.m., shots rang out as they passed the Texas School Book Depository. President Kennedy was hit.

Before Kennedy was pronounced dead at 1 p.m. at Parkland Memorial Hospital, Dallas police arrested Book Depository employee Lee Harvey Oswald. Our nation came to a halt as word spread over the airwaves.

After his death his wife would refer to Kennedy’s presidency as Camelot, capturing the feeling of most of the nation. His good looks and charisma added to his leadership and strength had captivated America. Even today he is still considered one of the most popular presidents ever. In fact, when I poll students, he usually makes the top ten. While the loss of such a popular president was tragic, what was even more tragic was America’s loss of innocence which opened the door to civic mistrust and a lack of faith in our country.

President Johnson, who was sworn in aboard Air Force One just two hours after Kennedy was killed, ordered an investigation into the assassinations of both Kennedy and Oswald. Oswald was shot and killed by Dallas night club owner Jack Ruby a week after being charged for the Kennedy assassination. The Warren Commission, headed by Chief Justice Earl Warren, included two senators, two representatives, a former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, and the former U.S. High Commissioner for Germany. During the investigation the American public believed the government’s story of the lone shooter, but after the commission released its findings, that all changed. While the more than 800-page report initially calmed most people’s fears, it did not completely remove them. While most Americans believed Oswald was the shooter, it was becoming a common perception that he had not acted alone.

The big change began in 1966 with the release of three separate independent investigations. First was Mark Lane’s Rush to Judgment that questioned the accuracy of the Warren Commission. Next was an investigation by New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison who saw a conspiracy and coverup in the shooting (the Bases for Oliver Stone’s JFK). Finally, Life Magazine released the Zapruder film which was an amateur video which called into question if Oswald acted alone. Americans became so consumed with the new reports that 20 years later when Newsweek took a poll, 74% of Americans did not trust the Warren Commission.

Kennedy’s assassination was a game-changer in our nation’s history. For the first time the majority of our nation did not believe the government. Before this, for the most part, Americans believed the government was telling them the truth, or if not, it was for a good reason. Now America had lost its innocence. If the government had lied about this, what else were they lying about? Our nation entered one of its darkest hours as our own government became the bad guy. The assassination was just the beginning of a long dark road.

Shortly after, came Vietnam War protest in the streets and antigovernment sentiments. The Watergate scandal and the presidential resignation of Richard Nixon made Americans more suspicious and less confident of their government. Events like the Iran hostages made it seem like maybe we were losing the Cold War if we could not even get our hostages out of a far less powerful country like Iran.

Fortunately, the 1980s did relieve some of the stress and brought back some faith in America once more. The problem is we did not come all the way back. Since the 1960s and ‘70s patriotism and American faith have fluctuated. Personally, I do not believe we will ever be as confident in our government as we were pre-1963. That door is closed. As a historian, I wonder if maybe we should have never completely trusted the government; they have never been completely truthful. But as an American, I am disheartened, for I long for the days when we felt our government was always on our side and looking out for our best interests.

James Finck, Ph.D. is a professor of history at the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma. He may be reached at HistoricallySpeaking1776@gmail.com.

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As the beginning phase of the grade separation project of the Rockland Road overpass begins with the relocation of utilities, neighbors in the area are beginning to see just how much of an inconvenience this project is going to be, and some wonder what is the true value.

Yes, there were a number of hearings prior to reaching the current stage of progress, but when dealing with entities such as Norfolk Southern, Vdot, the Port of Virginia, and the Warren County BOS, looking at a gift horse in the mouth. I, like others, have never heard reasonable answers to often-asked questions, just how badly this improvement is needed to improve our quality of life in the Rockland area.

Some of those include.

• Emergency access during construction- With the fire and rescue station located less than a mile from the railroad crossing, will there be some sort of provision to allow access during construction, or will they have to make the 6-mile detour around Fairground Road to respond?

Keep in mind, there are probably less than 200 residences from the railroad tracks to the intersection with Bennys Beach Road including the residences of Bennys Beach and Windy Hill. From Bennys Beach to Fairground Road only has maybe 4 property owners.

• Rockland Road from Bennys Beach to Fairground Road- This rural road is far from Vdot standards, with narrow widths, blind hills, sharp turns, no shoulders, and rock outcroppings that challenge normal traffic volume. Now, all 200 residences are forced to use a road that is dangerous as is, with more opportunity for something bad to happen, especially with about 8,000 dump trucks importing fill material to build the ramps to the bridge. It would be a shame, although a real possibility, that this railroad crossing claims serious injury or, worse, a life due to the detour.
• Rocklands Rural Character slowly diminishes- The railroad tracks have always separated the industrial portion of Warren County to the rural portion. This project, with its 40-foot-wide roadway and bridge, will still get you to the rural part of the county, just quicker and without delay due to a train blocking the tracks. It still ends in a 20’ wide rural unimproved roadway, but at least the major expense of further development is out of the way and opens the door for more development.

So with that, what are the benefits?

Norfolk Southern will no longer hear complaints about blocking the crossing to change out crews or to let other trains pass. My experience is when the port or other businesses with sidings along that section of track block the crossing it is only for short intervals while building the train.  Norfolk Southern also benefits so that if and when they do install a third rail, there will be fewer obstructions in their way.

The Port of Virginia comes out with less complaints from the community, more flexibility in using the mainline tracks in building their trains, and kudos for providing the grant that allows for such a project to be done. There are other communities in the county that don’t have a choice of another route out if the train blocks their crossing (Shenandoah Shores) and probably won’t until some entity grants funding for such.

Warren County and the BOS no longer have to field complaints about blockages and will now have an important and expensive piece of the puzzle needed to increase the development of this area of the county. All that will be left to do is install a bridge over the river to make a loop to Shenandoah Shores (giving them another way out), and the entire area becomes a target for development.

We, as residents, once we tolerate the 18-24 months of construction inconvenience and the project is completed, get the benefits of no-hassle egress to and from 522, a utilitarian highway overpass leading to our rural country setting, and most likely even more through traffic.

A boondoggle is defined as ‘work or activity that is wasteful or pointless but gives the appearance of having value.’ Not really having comments, suggestions, or opinions addressed or otherwise coerced is a form of being railroaded.

Have we been railroaded or boondoggled with this project?

17 Year Rockland Resident

David Anderson
Warren County

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in the letters published on this page are solely those of the respective authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the Royal Examiner’s editorial team, its affiliates, or advertisers. The Royal Examiner does not endorse or take responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or validity of any statements made by the authors. The statements and claims presented in the letters have not been independently verified by the Royal Examiner. Readers are encouraged to exercise their own judgment and critical thinking skills when evaluating the content. Any reliance on the information provided in the letters is at the reader’s own risk.

While the Royal Examiner makes every effort to publish a diverse range of opinions, it does not guarantee the publication of all received letters. The Royal Examiner reserves the right to edit letters for clarity, length, and adherence to editorial guidelines. Moreover, the Royal Examiner does not assume any liability for any loss or damage incurred by readers due to the content of the letters or any subsequent actions taken based on these opinions.

In submitting a letter to the editor, authors grant the newspaper the right to publish, edit, reproduce, or distribute the content in print, online, or in any other form.

We value the engagement of our readers and encourage open and constructive discussions on various topics. However, the Royal Examiner retains the right to reject any letter that contains offensive language, personal attacks, or violates any legal regulations. Thank you for being a part of our vibrant community of readers and contributors, and we look forward to receiving your diverse perspectives on matters of interest and importance.

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How many of us observe Thanksgiving Day as a day of turkey, pumpkin pie, and football, with some thought to the Pilgrim’s Thanksgiving (1621), but give minimal thought to God’s blessings?  Thanksgiving should be much more.

We know we’re to express thanksgiving often: “In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5:18), but we often don’t.  Yes, Thanksgiving Day was created when America was truly Christian, before cultural Marxism’s (wokism) assault.  Even so, Thanksgiving remains a federal holiday in which we can express our gratitude for God’s blessings and others’ favorable actions toward us.

Gratitude – expressed through thanksgiving – is an esteemed virtue within Christendom.  Virtues are God’s standards of moral goodness/moral excellence concerning how we’re to live, as opposed to Satan’s standards of vices and sin.  Gratitude is a subset of “love,” that virtue most identified with God: “He who (doesn’t) loves (doesn’t) know God, for God is love” (1 John 4:8).

America’s Thanksgiving originated from Western Civilization, with its Biblically based Judeo-Christianity moral values.  Ancient Israel included a sacrifice of thanksgiving to God.  “And the LORD spoke to Moses saying…  And when you offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving to the LORD, offer it of your own free will” (Leviticus 22:26, 29); and “(It’s) good to give thanks to the LORD…” (Psalm 92:1).

New Testament examples of thanksgiving follow: “And let the peace of God rule in your hearts … and be thankful”… “Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving” (Colossians 3:15; 4:2), and “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness … because, although they knew God, they (didn’t) glorify Him as God, nor were thankful …” (Romans 1: 18, 21).  I’ve read, “Thanksgiving is Trinitarian… that God the Father is the object of thanksgiving, God the Son is the person through whom thanksgiving flows, and God the Holy Spirit is the source of thanksgiving.”  When we fail to practice the spirit of Thanksgiving, we become like ingrates and gluttons.

While colonial America observed thanksgivings, President Washington was the first president to designate (1789) the last Thursday in November of that year as a day of “public thanksgiving.”

Other presidents intermittently declared days of thanksgiving until Thanksgiving Day crusader Sarah Hale convinced President Lincoln to declare (1863) an annual national day of “Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens,” for the last Thursday in November, calling on the American people to also, “with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience… fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation.”

Most Americans came to accept the first Pilgrim’s Thanksgiving (1621)  – with its symbolism and despite its controversy – as America’s first Thanksgiving, as described in Plymouth Colony Governor William Bradford’s Of Plymouth Plantation and Plymouth founder Edward Winslow’s short account written in December 1621 and rediscovered in the mid-19^th century.

Happy Thanksgiving!  This federal holiday – our national tradition for recognizing gratitude – is our opportunity to thank God forthrightly for His blessings bestowed upon our Constitutional Republic, our families, and ourselves.

Donavan “Mark” Quimby
Shenandoah Christian Alliance

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(Writer’s note: this was written in 2006. Small edits acknowledging the passage of time since are included toward the end of this updated version.)

I was playing quarterback in a high school intramural flag-football championship game around 1:30 p.m. on Nov. 22, 1963. The game went into overtime as the class time ground into its last minutes. My team needed a score to even the alternating possession OT (we were ahead of our time) and extend things to the following day. Impatient, I lofted one deep and up for grabs – like Brett Favre occasionally does – that some defender out-jumped my guy for.

BANG! We lost, no tomorrow.

Little did I know that the bang of defeat that had just gone off in my head was the mere echo of a much louder bang that went off almost simultaneously some 1,330 miles to the southwest.

That other bang I had yet to hear was one of another kind of defeat that I will, it seems, carry with me to the grave.

Somewhat dejected I headed back to the locker room to shower before heading to my fifth period English class. Someone ran out of the locker room to meet us and said, “The president’s been shot!” Bullshit, that kind of thing doesn’t happen except in history books, I thought, “That’s not funny,” I said.

Inside the Alexandria, Virginia high school, not eight miles from the White House, things seemed normal as I prepared to shower. No solemn faced coaches, no lock down to protect then Republican House Minority Whip Gerald Ford’s sons. “The president’s been shot” was lost beneath what seemed normal adolescent, locker room banter. I began to return to a 15-year-old’s reality: sport, the thought of the girl’s locker room on the other side of a thick cement wall.

Then the PA system crackled and the locker room went unnaturally silent as the principal’s voice, not a secretary’s, asked for attention. A chill went down my spine, perhaps as a subconscious premonition that things were about to change in previously unimaginable ways flashed along sub-atomic particles throughout my brain. The tone first, then the words “President Kennedy has been shot” gravely confirmed what I had immediately denied as a plausible reality. One kid, a little red around the edges for that suburban Alexandria high school said something to the effect of “good.” Though we were casual friends and recent teammates, I started swinging and we went into a pile on the floor only to be quickly pulled apart by classmates and coaches. I had never wanted to damage someone as irrevocably as I did at that moment and the two of us never spoke again, leaving a silent distance between us that precluded the necessity of re-engaging that primal impulse toward some sort of irreversible destruction.

President Kennedy leaves the White House for the final time. JFK photo sources, credits: Public Domain; White House Photographs; John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston; Robert Knudson; Paul Vathis; Abraham Zapruder; “The Men Who Killed Kennedy” Nigel Turner-produced British TV documentary series; AP; Roger Bianchini at Newseum, Washington D.C.

The emotions were immediate, deep and apparently ran in the family. I didn’t find out until years later that at almost the same moment, following a similar remark, my father, a WW II Army veteran who had lived through Normandy and the Battle of the Bulge, was decking a total stranger in a D.C. medical building on I Street where he was waiting for my mother to complete a routine checkup.

Across the Potomac River, we sat quietly in our classrooms: no teaching, no discussion, no emergency mentoring. We sat alone, grappling with our thoughts, as was our teacher. The principal came on again and said the president was dead. The reaction was subdued except for a girl named Jacqueline Kennedy – though I think she spelled her first name differently than the president’s wife. Spelling aside she went off, sobbing, hysteria rising. The teacher took her outside the room to settle her down. Didn’t work, she ended up in the infirmary. I sometimes wonder what happened to Jackie Kennedy, my classmate. How did she ride out that 15-year-old’s identification with the now blood-stained Queen of Camelot?

Forty-odd years later I know that day was the measurable beginning of the direction of the balance of my life. Despite the immediate profundity of a presidential assassination, I couldn’t have recognized that JFK’s violent death would lead directly through a five-year span of political upheaval between my formative 15th and 20th birthdays. This and three other domestic assassinations – of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert Francis Kennedy – seemed to earmark the time through a litany of foreign political intrigue, murder and assassination that always seemed to lead in one direction – to the right, toward war, toward implicit corporate profiteering from war, toward social division, toward lies.

That is my perception, my belief – the bad guys won. That is my psychological watershed. Rather than living under the auspice of a state favored by both man and God, I was floating through the most recent episode of civilization in decline, fueled by greed, power, murder and conquest.

It took all of those next five years for me to begin to appreciate what had begun during that that lost football game. By 1969 it was becoming apparent that a hopeful youth-driven world counterculture, as well as the best and the brightest within the world political system reflecting or inspiring the social idealism that characterized that counterculture, the Americans named above, Salvadore Allende, Alexander Dubcek, Patrice Lumumba, Che Guevara and others, were beaten.

Around the world we had lost.

We would either be annihilated or assimilated – a foolish, inaccurate footnote to American and World History X – the fiction written by the winners.

I left Alexandria in 1967 for college. I moved from the specter of the federal capital to Richmond, the historical capital of the American Confederacy that had fought the ascendance of that federal system just over a century earlier. In retrospect it seemed an unconsciously profound symbolic move. Though I was through and through a son of the federal government in whose shadow I was raised by two parents it employed, I was soon to become suspicious, some would say paranoid, about its machinations, its intent, its history.

I followed my intellectual instincts for the next five years, studying sociology and psychology – how society and the human mind work. I guess I wanted to know why I had grown so alienated from the culture in which I lived. Was I crazy or did I live in an insane world? I learned things about myself and my society between 1967 and 1973 and most of what I learned took me back to the day my team lost that high school, intramural football game.

In college I learned that three days before John Kennedy’s inauguration, his predecessor, Dwight David Eisenhower, made an astonishing observation in his farewell address to the nation. I had grown up thinking of Eisenhower as a doddering, old, golf-playing general rewarded with the presidency for a job well done holding the Allied war effort together in Europe during World War II. My interest in the fate of his successor led me to a different view of Eisenhower. It began with that farewell address of Jan. 17, 1961.

Presidents Kennedy and Eisenhower at Camp David, April 22, 1961, five days after the first crisis of JFK’s presidency, the failed CIA-sponsored Bay of Pigs invasion.

On that day Eisenhower, the West Point graduate, career military man, general and president who led his country and its allies, first against Nazi Germany and then through the height of the Cold War with the Soviet Union, told his nation that the greatest threat it faced as he prepared to leave office was that born of its own military and corporate institutions in a profoundly changing American landscape.

“This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience,” Eisenhower told the American people of the corporate, political, and military landscape that had arisen in the wake of World War II. “The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist,” Eisenhower concluded.

The career soldier turned politician had apparently not thought it a sin to normalize relations with the Soviet Union, then our recent military ally, and reduce the rapidly expanding American military budget. This belief, according to Eisenhower biographers, led to much behind-the-scene infighting with the evolving military and industrial institutions Eisenhower spoke of at the end of his eight-year presidency.

Less than three years after Eisenhower’s dour warning, his successor had his head blown off in the streets of Dallas, Texas, while I played football a half a continent away. That successor, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, had also bucked the American military-corporate apparatus during his presidency, and perhaps fatally, more directly and in more immediate situations than Eisenhower had.

First, just three months in office Kennedy refused to commit to direct American military involvement during the 1961 invasion of Communist Cuba by a CIA-trained militia despite the urging of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and CIA Director Allen Dulles. As a result of the intelligence misinformation and personal coercion he endured during that experience, Kennedy fired Allen Dulles as director of the CIA. He also developed enough distrust of the U.S. military command to avoid the armed, likely nuclear confrontation they suggested over Cuba during the missile crisis less than two years later.

President Kennedy addresses the nation on live television during the Cuban Missile Crisis, when the U.S. and Soviet Union came to the verge of nuclear war according to later unclassified Soviet intelligence documents. It appears that Kennedy and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s willingness to negotiate a mutually satisfactory compromise – that the Soviets pull their offensive nuclear missiles out of Cuba, and America would dismantle its offensive nuclear missile bases from the Soviet border in Turkey – averted a potential nuclear holocaust.

Kennedy is even reported to have stated the intention of scattering what was threatening to become a rouge intelligence agency resistant to presidential oversight “into a thousand pieces” following a 1964 re-election that seemed a sure thing.

A great deal of debate still exists over whether Kennedy was planning implementation of another post-1964 election plan that would have flown further in the face of Eisenhower’s originally-named American “Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex”. That much-discussed plan was a lessening of direct American involvement in Vietnam. That involvement in the fall of 1963 was 16,000 “advisors” compared to the half million combat troops that would be sent there after his death. If true, as key Kennedy insiders assert, that plan reflected JFK’s growing belief that the Vietnam conflict was ultimately a civil war that would have to be won or lost by the South Vietnamese themselves – a decade and the bulk of 65,000 American and two million Vietnamese lives later that belief proved correct.

Many years after the fact I heard a European investigative report that quoted Kennedy archives indicating his ambassador to South Vietnam, Henry Cabot Lodge, reporting back to Washington that presidential directives relayed through the embassy in 1963 ordering CIA operatives in country to back off of aggressive covert actions, including assassinations, were simply being ignored in the field. I wondered then if those “rouge” CIA elements had an inkling those directives would soon change despite Kennedy’s overwhelming popularity as the 1964 election approached?

No, probably just a coincidence that Kennedy was soon shot down like a rabid dog on a parade route whose path had been realigned that day to go down Elm Street in front of the Texas School Book Depository in a town whose mayor was reportedly the brother of Allen Dulles’s former military liaison officer.

Coincidence too, I expect that a former Marine named Lee Harvey Oswald worked in that School Book Depository. Oswald was the prodigal American son, who had “defected” to the Soviet Union with a perfect command of the Russian language following his assignment to a top-secret American military intelligence base in Japan from which American U-2 spy flights were launched over the Soviet Union. Later, the prodigal son would reconsider that defection – perhaps because the Soviets thought he was an American spy and kept a close check on him. I sometimes wonder at the benevolence of a nation that would welcome back its prodigal son with camera equipment to start a “new” career, rather than a little prison time for his alleged departure with top-secret information that was claimed to have compromised America’s U-2 spy missions. But how could his native land stay mad at the whimsical Oswald, who despite his highly public pro-Castro activities in New Orleans, cultivated associations with a number of right-wing, anti-Castro associates based in both New Orleans and Miami as he “floundered” philosophically in the years between Russia and Dallas?

Above, JFK and Ike at Camp David in the days after the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba – likely when the sitting president found out he had been lied to by the CIA about the previous president’s authorizations, or lack thereof, for a CIA-sponsored invasion of Cuba. Photographer Paul Vathis wrote ‘They looked so lonely.’ Below, Vathis’s photo juxtaposed on the wall of the Newseum in D.C. with mob-connected Jack Ruby’s silencing of Lee Harvey Oswald, who died claiming he was set up as a patsy in the JFK assassination.

Pondering these things after launching my own college term paper research on the JFK assassination in 1969, I told my mother, “There are circumstances leading a lot of people to think your old (CIA) bosses were behind it.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised, the way they talked about him,” the former secretary of one of the deputy directors surprised me with a frank appraisal of her early 1960s superiors at the top of the American intelligence apparatus.

And now 59 years gone from that day in 1963, I remain the paranoid-tinged, conspiracy freak sitting alone in the dark corners of dark bars, reflecting on the familiarity of low times and low lies glowering at me from the “enduring freedom” of a television screen hovering slightly above my still focused eye.

And now I recall, as I did in 2006 when this personal memoir was written 43 years gone from that long-lost childhood football game, I find myself still choking down one final coincidence – that the U.S. president (George W. Bush) gesturing at me from that TV screen, circa 2006, explaining the necessity of this country’s ongoing military-industrial occupation of Iraq, one of the world’s two primary oil fields, and the ultimate evil of its oil-rich neighbor Iran, is heir to a family legacy the roots of which run deep into Texas oil, American politics, and the directorship of the CIA.

Roger Bianchini
Front Royal, Virginia

(Writer’s note: First published on November 22, 2013 as part of a pull-out section of the Warren County Report on the ongoing significance of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy 50 years later.)

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“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13)

Do you want to give your family (especially your kids) an experience they will remember forever? By all means, set aside a few hours to visit the nearby Marine Museum at Quantico, VA… a few miles south of DC, just off I95 or US 1 (less than a 90-minute drive from Front Royal).

This is an ideal way to show the entire family (in a first-hand, up close and personal look) just how much has been done (and is being done) worldwide by a relatively small group of dedicated, patriotic Americans who understand the meaning of loyalty to our country and their comrades and the necessity for the discipline and commitment to make this nation safe for you and I and future generations still to come.

The displays are “life-size and lifelike” and bring the viewer into the moment that is being displayed, making you feel like you are actually there… you need very little imagination to experience the artillery fire and the cannon shells, and you get an intimate view (and sense of sharing) of the hardships that are/were endured in repelling our nation’s enemies and protecting this country that we all love and honor.

Today, there are those who try mightily to disparage our progress as a Christian nation founded on Judeo/Christian values who would likely be unwilling to lift a finger to defend this nation and our values…  but the Marines do not subscribe to that “hogwash.” The Marines’ love of country and willingness to make the ultimate sacrifice for their families and yours is seen and felt everywhere, from the burning hot beaches in the South Pacific to the freezing winters in Europe, Korea, and some of the far-most reaches of the world.

When you have the privilege to see how much effort, blood, and dedication has been given (and is being given as you read this) for a country that is constantly under attack internally from such a large number of eternally ungrateful liberal leftists, you cannot but feel an even greater sense of gratitude for the efforts and sacrifices made by a few good men and women.

A visit to the Marine Museum is a wonderful destination and outing for any family and will be something talked about for many years to come.

Do yourself a favor and schedule a trip to visit the Marine Museum today for you and your family and friends. Don’t forget to bring your camera (you can bring lunch but there is food aplenty in the cafeteria). As an extra bonus, there is no charge for entry or parking, and the Museum is open every day except Thanksgiving and Christmas Day from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Dale Carpenter
Shenandoah Christian Alliance

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