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CHAPTER 1

Exonerating the Clintons

Trying to figure out who was behind the assassination of John F. Kennedy, Jr., is nearly as complicated and controversial as untangling the dark web of forces behind his father's slaying. In looking at the evidence though, there appears to be two primary lines of thinking that could lead us to logically conclude that some powerful people wanted this man dead.

The first area we will explore is John F. Kennedy, Jr.'s, desire to enter the world of politics, something he had shunned his whole life. If this was true, it would put him in the way of some potentially dangerous people who had their own designs on obtaining the reins of power.

Second, it appears likely that at the end of his life, JFK, Jr., was becoming increasingly aware that the C.I.A. organized the assassination of his father. This fact may have been why he became a publisher, to have a platform to expose the truth to the world, and bring to justice those still alive who planned his father's execution.

Let us first explore the possibility that John F. Kennedy, Jr., was seriously considering running for governor of New York, and eventually president. This, according to his closest friends, was exactly what was on his mind in the last months of his life. His assistant at George, Rose Marie Terenzio, told People in a July 2016 cover story that he was planning on running for president. After Republican New York Senator Alphonse D'Amato told Kennedy he should run for mayor of New York City, he apparently laughed it off. After this encounter with D'Amato, Terenzio asked why he would not want to consider it. His answer pointed to a much loftier goal, a shrewd political calculation that would have made his father proud.

"Well, Rosie, how many mayors do you know that become President?" Kennedy said to Terenzio. "I was so shocked I didn't say anything. Then he smirked as if to say 'That's not the road you go down. We'll see what happens.'"

The mayor of a city is not a large enough platform to stage a run for the White House, no matter who you are. However, the U.S. Senate, or being the governor of a prominent state like New York could have been just the stepping stone that he had in mind to launch his presidential bid, likely in 2004. In fact, several of his friends knew he was seriously considering running for governor. The next election for governor would have been in 2002. He would have faced George Pataki, who at that time was seeking a third term. Most people voting that year did not vote for Pataki, as he garnered an unimpressive 49% of the popular vote. He largely ran on his record of leadership during the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in New York City. The one candidate who could have counteracted this appeal would have been JFK, Jr., a longtime resident of New York City. Kennedy probably would have personally known many of the people who died in the attack, and likely would have aided in the recovery. There is no doubt that his potential appeal as a candidate no matter what office he ran for would have energized New York State Democrats like no one else. A fellow Democrat from New York, Mark Green, mulling over his own run for the Senate, conducted a private poll in 1997 to see who Democrats liked the most within their state. "He was by far the most popular Democrat," Green said. "He had the highest favorable-unfavorable spread; 65% of Democrats rated him favorably and 10% rated him unfavorably." Former New York State Democratic Chairman John Marino said that if Kennedy ever ran for office, "it would have been, goodbye, anyone else." Such a campaign would have been much like when his uncle Robert Kennedy won his New York U. S. Senate seat by an impressive 10-point margin, 53% to 43%, over incumbent Republican Kenneth Keating in 1964. Assuming Kennedy won the election in November 2002, he would have become New York's 54 governor on January 1, 2003.

Would a short time in Albany be enough to run for president in 2004, to prevent George W. Bush from getting a second term? Many of our presidents at one time were governor of New York, often for very shorts stints. Martin Van Buren, our nation's 8th president, was only governor for 3 months from January 1, 1829, to March 5, 1829. Grover Cleveland, the 22 and the 24 president, was only governor for one year when he announced his candidacy for president in 1884. Theodore Roosevelt spent only one year as governor as well before agreeing to run with William McKinley as his vice-presidential nominee in the election of 1900, after which he ascended to the presidency a few months later following McKinley's assassination in September 1901. Franklin Roosevelt was in the middle of what would be his only term as governor when he began his campaign for president in the early 1930s. We could even mention Democrat Samuel J. Tilden, the 25 governor of New York, who spent only one year as governor before accepting the nomination of his party in the summer of 1876. Most historians agree the presidency was stolen from him later that year in a corrupt deal worked out in the Congress that gave the presidency to the Republicans, otherwise he would have become the nation's 19 president.

Also in that People article was the testimony of Gary Ginsberg, a friend from their time together at Brown University, as well as a business partner who helped Kennedy start George magazine. Ginsberg was with Kennedy the night before he died and had this to say about his mindset. "By July 1999, I think he could take great comfort that he had started and led a successful business, had fulfilled his mission to cover politics in a colorful, non-ideological way that would make it appealing for people who had never bought a political magazine before, and was now in a position to do something new." According to Ginsberg the New York Senate seat was also on his mind but eventually decided against that path, out of deference to first lady Hillary Clinton, a friend and fellow Democrat. "He had been thinking about running for the N.Y. Senate seat. He even had meetings about it that spring, but by July had concluded he would focus his attention on running for governor of N.Y." The next election for governor was 2002. His longtime friend felt this was a better fit for him anyway. This is an important point we need to make here. Kennedy had decided against running for the Senate. Many have laid the blame at the feet of the Clintons for this assassination. The fact that he was making it clear he had no intention of running against Clinton is no small point. "By temperament and interest, John, I think, realized he was far more suited to being a governor than a legislator. He knew from running George that he could be an inspiring, strong chief executive of a state, setting the tone for government and successfully running a complex operation," said Ginsberg.

We need to establish clearly that Kennedy posed no political threat to Hillary Clinton in 1999 because he had decided not to run against her for the Senate nomination. This removes the only motives the Clintons would have had to conspire to kill him. It was clear that Kennedy had no intention of joining the race if it meant going head to head against the Clintons. There was a mutual respect and admiration that existed between both families that dated back to a fateful encounter during the Kennedy presidency. On July 24, 1963, 16-year-old Bill Clinton shook hands with JFK at the White House Rose Garden. Clinton was in Washington to attend activities sponsored by the American Legion Boys Nation program. The future president said it was that handshake that inspired him to want to enter a life of public service. Clinton was part of a group of 100 teenage boys representing their home states as they spent a week in the capital visiting with Secretary of State Dean Rusk, debating issues, passing mock legislation, and staging elections. This event meant so much to Clinton that just six months into his own presidency, Clinton staged a reunion at the White House in July 1993 to mark the 30-year anniversary of the famous handshake. About 70 "alumni" and their families showed up to have breakfast with the president, and make a pilgrimage to Arlington National Cemetery to visit John F. Kennedy's Eternal Flame gravesite. This no doubt brought back some difficult memories of the assassination for President Clinton who said he was "heartbroken" when he heard the news. His reflections were part of an NBC special report on November 22, 2013, titled "Where Were You?" Clinton recounted a special bond he and Hillary Clinton shared with Jackie Kennedy, and how she was a key early supporter of his run for the presidency.

"Later in her life, after I became president and even when I was running, Hillary and I became friends with her. For reasons I never fully understood, she supported me in the primary in 1992, and she came to one of my early events in New York. One of my prized pictures is sitting with her at dinner in the summertime in Martha's Vineyard. I just loved her, and Hillary really was close to her." Clinton, like so many of his generation, respected and idealized the Kennedy family. "In a way they symbolized our growing up, our aspirations. For my whole generation, the first time we looked at politics, there they were, and we liked what we saw. In her case, because I really got to know her, the more I knew her, the more I liked her."

It is also important to note that in his first year in office, President Clinton appointed JFK's sister Jean Ann Kennedy Smith to serve as United States Ambassador to Ireland. She was quickly confirmed by the Senate, and stayed at that post for his entire first term. The connection between the families extended even beyond death. After JFK, Jr.'s, plane crash, a private funeral mass was held for Kennedy and his wife, on July 23, 1999, at the Church of St. Thomas More in Manhattan. This was where Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis had worshipped. Among the 300 invited guests for this closed ceremony were President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton.

That respect and admiration between the two families extended to John F. Kennedy, Jr. His friends confirmed he had no interest in running for the U.S. Senate in New York to replace Daniel Patrick Moynihan if it meant running against Clinton. It would simply never happen, nor would he make any public statements to suggest he would ever oppose her. Joel Siegel of the New York Daily News interviewed some of Kennedy's friends the day after JFK, Jr.'s, plane went missing. They spoke anonymously to allow them to be quite candid about the issue of his potential entry into the Senate race. One friend put the timetable for his entry into politics "within five years," confirming the timetable mentioned above for a 2002 race for governor, and/or a 2004 run for the presidency. Another friend said he was considering the Senate run, "but the Hillary thing quickly ended it." Journalist Lawrence Leamer confirmed Kennedy's reluctance to go against Clinton in his book Sons of Camelot. He said that if Clinton wanted to run he would not fight her, and instead turn his political ambitions elsewhere. "He was too much of a gentleman," Leamer said.

There is one final point about why the Clintons would never want to assassinate JFK, Jr. Leamer points out that Kennedy's political magazine, George, never covered the Clinton sex scandal that plagued the second half of the Clinton presidency. Perhaps because of his father's similar behavior in this area, the younger Kennedy was willing to overlook this in President Clinton. Whatever the reason, the Clintons were thankful for the support that Kennedy demonstrated within the pages of George.

An anecdote during the Monica Lewinsky scandal best shows the support JFK, Jr., was giving to the Clintons, and closeness of the families. People reported this story on July 19, 2016.

"I was working in the White House when the Monica Lewinsky scandal was going on," Paul Begala, a one-time Clinton aide and current CNN political commentator, tells People in this week's issue. "I had a fax machine which very few people had the number to. It starts kicking in, and there's no cover sheet, just a page – it was John."

"It just said, 'Dear Mr. President, I sat under that desk – there's barely room for a 3-year-old, much less a 21-year-old intern. Cheers, J.K.' Typical John." Kennedy was, of course, referencing the famous image of him under the Oval Office desk taken while his father, John F. Kennedy was President. Clinton, who was being impeached on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice over his testimony about the Lewinsky affair during a sexual harassment lawsuit, laughed when he saw Kennedy's note.

"I showed the President and he laughed his butt off," says Begala. "It was so gutsy. And he was the perfect person to bring a little levity."

Therefore, it truly seems preposterous and counterintuitive to suspect that the Clintons could have conspired to kill this man given the mutual respect and admiration between these two families, as well as the fact that Kennedy posed no threat to Clinton, never having entered the Senate race, or having any intention to do so. In fact, the whole concept that the Clintons were behind Kennedy's assassination is more akin to misinformation, deliberately placed in the fringe media to distract attention from the real forces behind his assassination. It is reminiscent of theories for the JFK assassination that Fidel Castro, or the Russians, conspired to kill Kennedy, which have no real basis in fact. Removing the Clintons as possible conspirators is also enormously helpful to allow us to pin the blame on a much more likely force behind JFK, Jr.'s, assassination, namely the C.I.A.

The C.I.A./Bush Motives

John F. Kennedy, Jr., posed a dual threat to the Bush family and the C.I.A. First, Kennedy was on the verge of exposing the role that the Bush family played in his father's assassination. As I will explore, the agency was more than willing to kill people to cover up this secret, as they had done in 1968 with the assassination of Robert Kennedy. Given this knowledge that George H. W. Bush played a role in the JFK assassination, JFK, Jr., had an intense interest in keeping another Bush out of the White House. A run for the presidency, or the vice presidency in 2000, or even 2004, would put him head to head against Texas Governor George W. Bush, who was beginning his campaign for the presidency in 1999. There would be no greater obstacle anywhere in the United States to four or eight years of a Bush presidency than John F. Kennedy, Jr. I will first establish the role the elder Bush played in the assassination of President Kennedy, and how he was in Dealey Plaza on the day of the shooting. Then I will demonstrate how JFK, Jr., became aware of this and was going to expose the truth just before his death in July 1999.

A third aspect to this case is the intergenerational hatred towards the Kennedys on the part of the C.I.A. that goes back to the botched Bay of Pigs in April 1961. We will explore how the timing of JFK, Jr.'s, assassination can be traced back to his father's administration's animosity towards the agency. Killing another Kennedy would be nothing new for this agency.

A sudden interest in politics

Up until 1999, John F. Kennedy, Jr., had no interest in running for office, despite repeated speculation, and the knowledge that any such campaign would have been met with instant approval. On July 19, 1988, at the age of 27, he gave a rousing speech to the Democratic National Convention, introducing his uncle, Senator Edward Kennedy. The speech was well received as he harkened back to his father's nomination in 1960. "Over a quarter of a century ago my father stood before you to accept the nomination for the presidency of the United States. So many of you came into public service because of him. In a very real sense because of you (meaning his uncle) he is with us still, and for that I am grateful," he said to a rapt audience in Atlanta. "I owe a special debt to the man his nephews and nieces call Teddy, not just because of what he means to me personally, but because of the causes he's carried on. He has shown that an unwavering commitment to the poor, to the elderly, to those without hope, regardless of faction or convention is the greatest reward of public service." It was a full two minutes before the assembled delegation would let his uncle give his speech, while many wiped tears from their eyes.

After this entry onto the public stage, many political observers felt the young Kennedy heir to the throne would plan a run for a Congressional seat. The age to run for Congress is 25 years-old according to the Constitution, and the next chance to run for Congress would be in 1990 when he would be 29 years-old. This would follow the path set by his father, who won a Massachusetts Congressional seat in 1946 at age 29. It was not to be. Kennedy spent the next 11 years denying any interest in running for office. Even later that year when he was named People Magazine's Sexiest Man Alive, he deflected these rumors, as did members of his family. Senator Kennedy said he believed that his nephew would one day be involved in public affairs. "Not necessarily running for office, but trying to make some sort of contribution." Cousin Robert Kennedy, Jr., said, "He has a tremendous sense of duty and responsibility. Whenever any of the cousins need help on one of their [charity] projects, John always participates."

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Excerpted from "Exploding the Truth"
by .
Copyright © 2017 John Koerner.
Excerpted by permission of John Hunt Publishing Ltd..
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