You can know the truth as soon as it doesn't matter
WASHINGTON — It has been more than four decades, but Ben Barnes said he remembers it vividly. His longtime political mentor invited him on a mission to the Middle East. What Mr. Barnes said he did not realize until later was the real purpose of the mission: to sabotage the re-election campaign of the president of the United States.
It was 1980 and Jimmy Carter was in the White House, bedeviled by a hostage crisis in Iran that had paralyzed his presidency and hampered his effort to win a second term. Mr. Carter’s best chance for victory was to free the 52 Americans held captive before Election Day. That was something that Mr. Barnes said his mentor was determined to prevent.
His mentor was John B. Connally Jr., a titan of American politics and former Texas governor who had served three presidents and just lost his own bid for the White House. A former Democrat, Mr. Connally had sought the Republican nomination in 1980 only to be swamped by former Gov. Ronald Reagan of California. Now Mr. Connally resolved to help Mr. Reagan beat Mr. Carter and in the process, Mr. Barnes said, make his own case for becoming secretary of state or defense in a new administration.
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What happened next Mr. Barnes has largely kept secret for nearly 43 years. Mr. Connally, he said, took him to one Middle Eastern capital after another that summer, meeting with a host of regional leaders to deliver a blunt message to be passed to Iran: Don’t release the hostages before the election. Mr. Reagan will win and give you a better deal.
Then shortly after returning home, Mr. Barnes said, Mr. Connally reported to William J. Casey, the chairman of Mr. Reagan’s campaign and later director of the Central Intelligence Agency, briefing him about the trip in an airport lounge.
The only part of this kiss and tell story that is shaky is the Connally Connection. If Old Lantern Jaw was really freelancing in international diplomacy for his own personal gain, what the hell did he need Ben Barnes for?
Leaving that question aside, this has been a Conspiracy Theory that was easy to believe but impossible to prove for decades. The New York Times now provides persuasive evidence for it now that it can have no significant consequences, unless the Biden Government decides to prosecute Barnes for his part in the conspiracy. Not likely.
It is a valuable reminder that bullshit is not a 21st Century invention.
Comments
Dirty politics
to get ahead in that game you have to do the dirty work of your superiors
thereby climbing the dirty ladder toward the exalted role of having others
do your dirty work and look clean for the cameras
truth is considered foreign influence, world peace is a threat to national security
Remember...
Connally was in the limo at Dallas when Kennedy was shot.
His sleaze and criminal tendencies should never be underestimated.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Yellow ribbon fever
I can remember all the yellow ribbons tied around trees during the Iran hostage situation. Each night, the Evening News would post the number of days since the crisis began. It was obvious the main stream media did not want Carter reelected. The Kennedy wing of the Democratic party did not support Carter, either. I can recall some Democratic bigwigs saying that after 4 years of Reagan, people would flock to the Democratic party next election. Instead, people got the start of neoliberal/neocon policies that we are still living with today.
The number of days
Carter and Ted Kennedy: There was some bad blood that developed early on, in Carter's first year, 1977, when iirc word got back to TK that Carter had told aides after the election that he was happy to have gotten elected "without having to kiss Ted Kennedy's ass." More bad blood soon thereafter when Kennedy couldn't get Carter to agree on supporting his strong universal health care proposal in the senate, Carter the moderate preferring more modest legislation. Ds had a large 61-38 senate majority at the time.
Despite Carter's problems with Ted, also his unforced errors in insulting Speaker Tip O'Neill, Jimmy likely would have won against Reagan had his admin's negotiations to resolve the hostage crisis not been thwarted by the Reagan-Bush campaign.
@wokkamile The other wrinkle in
Still the mood at the time was that had the hostages been released, enough of those that voted for Reagan would have switched to Carter. Still it's difficult not to recognize Carter's poor performance, particularly in his third and fourth years and the difficulties in the US economy. The latter not attributable to Carter and they worsened under Reagan. The difference is that Reagan did economic "happy talk" and Carter was fact based.
too honest to be President
In other words, Carter was too honest to be President, as I've stated repeatedly ever since.
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
This wasn't
Tend to agree, but it was
wider and deeper than you suggest. Carter's political positions were far more conservative (Republican lite) and out of step with the majority of the Democratic party and Democratic voters at that time (1976). Not all that different from Nixon. The primary calendar gave him a leg up, but first it was his team's clever working of Iowa that put him at the top of national news coverage. (He didn't win Iowa. Was second to "uncommitted" with only 27.6% of the vote and prior to the other candidates having organized campaign teams.)
Thus, Carter started on the wrong foot with Democratic liberals and never self corrected (even seem to take delight in it).
Well not sure about
Re "Republican-Lite" on the issues (which might be a highly subjective descriptor), memory isn't too strong on that point, but doubt in 1976 -- when liberalism was still strong in the land -- that he would have openly or assertively advocated R-Lite programs during the D primaries. Carter campaigned more on marketing his personal story to voters -- a man of the New South, from the soil, and not beholden to DC special interests -- rather than an issues-oriented campaign in both the primaries and the general, iirc. He did hold his party together, both wings, so it's unlikely any R-Lite issues were greatly underemphasized in the campaign or were couched in more liberal-appealing language.
With hindsight, it's much
clearer how messed up the 1976 Democratic primary was for the party and the political positions of the party. Odd considering how well the party had done in the '74 midterms but continued to act spooked by the '72 presidential election. How weird it must be for younger people today to notice that the leading liberal Democratic contenders in 1976 were from AZ, ID, and OK (and IN if we include Birch Bayh) and the conservative was from WA.
The MSM helped
By contrast, liberals Frank Church and newly elected gov Jerry Brown, back then a liberal, got in way too late, well after Carter's momentum was almost unstoppable. Note too the absence in the race of two of the leading libs of the time, Ted Kennedy and Walter Mondale.
I liked Church and Fred Harris that year, but the former got in too late and the latter never got close to catching fire.
The MSM was a huge factor
in the D primary that year.
Less than two years in office and Jerry Brown thought he was ready for the big time. He was never liberal -- more quirky. An able enough administrator as the local and state level. He helped to muck up the '76 primary.
Frank Church and Mo Udall were my guys, but Fred Harris was also a decent pick. A stretch to go from the House to the White House for Udall. OTOH the sitting unelected POTUS at that time was a House to WH guy; so, it might not have been such a stretch that year.
The Kennedy wing of the D party were troublesome because they were more focused on electing Teddy instead of policy. Chappaquiddick closed that door.
Mondale was probably waiting to be chosen.
Mondale announced
The bridge wouldn't have been much of an issue in the primaries, but for sure in the general. But on that, it was '76 and the opponent would have been nice guy moderate Gerald Ford, not the far more bareknuckled Nixon or Reagan, and Rove and Atwater weren't running GOP presidentials at that time, so it would have been raised but would not have been a decisive factor in the race in my humble. Likely TK would have won that year as liberal proposals had not been discredited then. And weak opponent. Recall Jimmy barely won as Ford caught up in the final weeks. My 2 cents.
I wonder if Ben
ever raised any objections to the mission to his mentor once he knew what was going on. In any case, so nice of him to come clean 43 yrs later, as Carter is about to pass from the scene and is in no position to give his reaction.
Barnes was a boy wonder in Texas politics
-- Speaking as a Texan and a graduate of the University of Texas
I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.
Heh, TX pols
Hook e'm Horns, fire with fire
Forever ago, in either a magazine or a newspaper, which was all there was, maybe a tv guy such as Dan Rather, reported the whole hostage release was rigged and timed to favor Reagan.
News back then was truth, as this essay shows.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
October Surprise
I read Gary Sick's book on this a long time ago. He said it was Casey and implicated George HW Bush. He claims a quid pro quo in the arrangement with Iran not to release the hostages until Reagan was inaugurated was the beginning of the Iran-Contra deal. I was very suspicious of the timing of the release when it happened.
https://irp.fas.org/congress/1992_cr/h920205-october-clips.htm
There are quite a few mostly MSM articles at the link on the October Surprise.
Scene outside Japanese Embassy in Seoul Saturday
語必忠信 行必正直
Wow!
I have to admit this was the best short video on the demonstrations Saturday.
語必忠信 行必正直
are people truly oblivious to Robert Parry?
as if the facts uncovered in an abandoned women's restroom never happened.
Beat me to it.
lotta cloaks and daggers
I would see Carter
less as too honest than as too naive and inexperienced in the ways of Beltway politics. He brought too many of his Georgia Mafia with him to Washington, and they didn't know how things worked up north, and how rough it could get.
They didn't even know how to properly, respectfully deal with the Speaker of the House, a Dem whose help would be vital in shepherding legislation thru Congress, and with the leading senate Dem, Ted Kennedy, who apparently felt betrayed by Carter on private assurances about backing his bold health care legislation.
Honest guy, yes, but he may have put too much faith in his honesty carrying the day with the public which by '78-79 was being bombarded daily with stories of the peanut farmer's ineffectiveness and incompetence.
Totally agree --
inexperienced as a politician, naive, and surrounded with those of his ilk. Also poor political instincts which exasperate the inexperience.
How the hell did he reject his SoS, Cyrus Vance, in favor of that war mongering Zbigniew Brzezinski? An immigrant that only Allen Dulles could love.
RFK Jr is considering a 2024 run
Another honest man who seems to have worked more for the benefit of others than for himself. If he were to jump in the race I’d be in a bit of a quandary as to whether I would vote for him. Not because of any reservation I might have about the man, but because I would fear he would follow the well worn fate of both his uncle and his father if he were to win, and perhaps even just for running.
DC insiders would be apoplectic at the possibility of an actual populist do-gooder in the Oval Office, and are capable of just about anything. It could spoil their whole plan to rule the world and control every aspect of their subjects existence.
“ …and when we destroy nature, we diminish our capacity to sense the divine,and understand who God is, and what our own potential is and duties are as human beings.- RFK jr. 8/26/2024
He likely
And the fact that RFK Jr -- refreshingly for a member of the Kennedy family -- has openly talked about how a conspiracy of roughly the same forces killed both his father and uncle probably helps give him some added protection against such a similar event.
If he runs, he's got my vote..
How many years will it take till we find out that Trump
was just a patsy after all? He’s calling for his supporters to protest if he gets arrested, but i5% of them think it’s a trap to get more people locked up. They are saying that he has done nothing to help those who have been locked into solitary confinement or offered to help others with their legal bills. I don’t think trump has even been talking about this, but I haven’t listened to him so maybe I missed it. Most republicans have ignored this too or even called out that it was Obama who made it so they could be locked up before trial.
But for me it’s that no arrest warrants has been released and rumors are that the case has fallen apart. Just too many things that don’t add up in my mind to not consider this as being possible.
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt
Fitzmas again?
I guess we find out tomorrow.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.