JFK and the Unspeakable Quotes

“If we go as far as we can into the darkness, regardless of the consequences, I believe a midnight truth will free us from our bondage to violence and bring us to the light of peace.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died & Why It Matters

“These brass hats have one great advantage in their favor. If we listen to them, and do what they want us to do, none of us will be alive later to tell them that they were wrong.”
― James Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“there is nothing so threatening to systemic evil as those willing to stand against it regardless of the consequences.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“July 23, 1962: The United States joins thirteen other nations at Geneva in signing the “Declaration on the Neutrality of Laos.” CIA and Pentagon opponents regard Kennedy’s negotiation of the Laotian agreement as surrender to the Communists. They undermine it by supporting General Phoumi’s violations of the cease-fire.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“What is unrecognized about JFK's presidency, which then makes his assas­sination a false mystery, is that he was locked in a struggle with his national security state. That state had higher values than obedience to the orders of a president who wanted peace.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died & Why It Matters

“It’s unbelievable—or we’re supposed to think it is—that a president was murdered by our own government agencies because he was seeking a more stable peace than relying on nuclear weapons. It’s unspeakable. For the sake of a nation that must always be preparing for war, that story must not be told. If it were, we might learn that peace is possible without making war.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“I am accused of being the enemy of America, and subject to the influence of a foreign country . . . and every act of my administration is tortured, in such exaggerated and indecent terms as could scarcely be applied to Nero, to a notorious defaulter, or even to a common pickpocket.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“Let both sides unite to heed in all corners of the earth the command of Isaiah—to ‘undo the heavy burdens . . . (and) let the oppressed go free.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“The international relinquishing of sovereignty would have to spring from the people—”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“In actual fact it would seem that during the Cold War, if not during World War II, this country has become frankly a warfare state built on affluence, a power structure in which the interests of big business, the obsessions of the military, and the phobias of political extremists both dominate and dictate our national policy. It also seems that the people of the country are by and large reduced to passivity, confusion, resentment, frustration, thoughtlessness and ignorance, so that they blindly follow any line that is unraveled for them by the mass media.”[30]”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“Compassion is our source of nonviolent social transformation.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“In his preface to the letters, Merton identified the forces in the United States that threatened a nuclear holocaust: “In actual fact it would seem that during the Cold War, if not during World War II, this country has become frankly a warfare state built on affluence, a power structure in which the interests of big business, the obsessions of the military, and the phobias of political extremists both dominate and dictate our national policy. It also seems that the people of the country are by and large reduced to passivity, confusion, resentment, frustration, thoughtlessness and ignorance, so that they blindly follow any line that is unraveled”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“metanoia”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“Let both sides explore what problems unite us instead of belaboring those problems which divide us . . . “Let both sides unite to heed in all corners of the earth the command of Isaiah—to ‘undo the heavy burdens . . . (and) let the oppressed go free.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“The CIA also claimed in retrospect that its surveillance cameras had failed to photograph Oswald on any of his five trips to the Cuban and Soviet Embassies. HSCA investigators were blocked by the CIA from access to its surveillance photos (Lopez Report, pp. 90-91). Yet even CIA witnesses were skeptical of the agency’s claim: “CIA officers who were in Mexico in 1963 and their Headquarters counterparts generally agreed that it would have been unlikely for the photosurveillance operations to have missed ten opportunities to have photographed Oswald” (ibid., p. 91). Also arguing against the CIA’s claim was its surveillance cameras’ success in taking pictures at the Soviet Embassy in October 1963 of the mystery man who was not Oswald, yet who corresponded to the October 8 CIA cable’s wrong description of Oswald as “apparent age 35, athletic build, circa 6 feet, receding hairline, balding top.” Freedom of Information lawsuits have forced the CIA to surrender twelve photographs of this man. These photos provide further evidence of an Oswald impostor. The CIA has never identified the man.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“this country has become frankly a warfare state built on affluence, a power structure in which the interests of big business, the obsessions of the military, and the phobias of political extremists both dominate and dictate our national policy. It also seems that the people of the country are by and large reduced to passivity, confusion, resentment, frustration, thoughtlessness and ignorance, so that they blindly follow any line that is unraveled for them by the mass media.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters

“One must give the CIA (and the assassination sponsors that were even further in the shadows) their due for having devised and executed a brilliant setup. They had played out a scenario to Kennedy’s death in Dallas that pressured other government authorities to choose among three major options: a war of vengeance against Cuba and the Soviet Union based on the CIA’s false Mexico City documentation of a Communist assassination plot; a domestic political war based on the same documents seen truly, but a war the CIA would fight with every covert weapon at its command; or a complete cover-up of any conspiracy evidence and a silent coup d’état that would reverse Kennedy’s efforts to end the Cold War.”
― James W. Douglass, JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters