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Did Camelot Have A Dark Side? (1998-01-13)
About this film
Seymour Hersh had just published The Dark Side of Camelot, about JFK's private life. On this show a Kennedy loyalist and a former Kennedy loyalist offer a deeply engaging exploration of whether, as their host phrases it, we are "talking about a weakness of character that affected Kennedy's competence or judgment as President of the United States." AS: "The Seymour Hersh book is a really ridiculous book. He is the most gullible investigative reporter, perhaps, in American history. He will believe anything so long as it discredits John Kennedy...." TCR: "I don't want to defend a bad book at great length, but [Seymour Hersh] said he interviewed more than a thousand people. I counted at least 25 of those interviews that are terrific. See, what the audience has to understand is that there has been a concerted effort by the Kennedy family, with the assistance of at least two prominent members of the former Administration, to keep historians from finding out who the Kennedys really were."
Directors & creators
Southern Educational Communications Association
Subjects
public broadcasting, AAPB, William F. Buckley Jr., Seymour Hersh, John F. Kennedy, The Dark Side of Camelot, Kennedy administration, presidential biography, investigative journalism, historical revisionism, presidential character, political legacy, presidential ethics, Stanford University
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