Robert Kennedys Assassination - Essay Example

Robert F. Kennedy’s Assassination The United s has seen leaders from the Kennedy clan who has made their each uniqueyet impacting mark on the nation’s history. It was not just the leadership that the Kennedy’s contributed in the history of the United States. There is a sense of eeriness though that envelopes 2 of the most prominent Kennedy’s in the US government. This is the fact that both John Fitzgerald and Robert Francis were assassinated. Both men died too soon before they can bring any further achievements not for themselves but for the nation. In one of the speeches that Robert Kennedy in 1962, he was quoted, "The future is not a gift: it is an achievement. Every generation helps make its own future. This is the essential challenge of the present.”1 It is truly a tragedy for the American government to lose leaders with advocacies like the 2 Kennedy’s. Robert Francis Kennedy (RFK) was filled with not just emotion but passion towards leading and serving the country and its people. Yet, just like his older brother John, RFK was assassinated. The will within the person to live is so strong that RFK only died more than 24 hours after the assassination.2 RFK was said to be just like his older brother to have both the brains, the heart and the capabilities to assume the presidency. Bobby, as RFK is fondly called, failed to achieve the coveted post despite the credentials that he has under his belt. The odds are very much going his way and Bobby was just a few more steps towards becoming the next American president. All was shattered a couple of minutes past midnight on the 5th of June 1968. His life was ended during his presidential campaign at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, CA by a gun shot. A man with a very promising future was killed by an assassin identified as the Palestinian-American Sirhan Bishara Sirhan.3 Since it was the period for the presidential campaign, media was all over the place. However, during the time of the assassination, cable TV was not yet introduced. TV channels like ABC and CBS have either just signing off or are already off the air. ABC, CBS and NBC resume its respective broadcast a few minutes after the assassination.4 During the 1960s, 3 leaders and considered influential people were assassinated, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Robert Francis Kennedy. All of the 3 assassinations were highly publicized. However, RFK’s assassination seemed to be more traumatic since it was the 2nd Kennedy assassination in less than half a decade. In the filed video coverage of RKF’s presidential campaign in 1968, the crowd’s jubilation was turned into panic and fear as the sound of the gunshot echoed in the atmosphere. According to Melanson et al: Cameras captured the frenzied struggle to subdue the attacker. They showed us the terrible vision of Robert Kennedy lying on the floor and bleeding profusely. To this day, many people believe that these same cameras captured the actual shooting (as the Zapruder film had done in President Kennedy’s assassination); some are insistent to the point of anger that it’s all in film…No photographic record of the actual shooting is known to exist.5 The picture of the blood-covered RFK lying on the floor is truly quite disturbing and heartbreaking. It is disturbing because of the graphical representation of a man respected and eyed to be the next president of a very powerful nation. One can think that the photo being published and circulated in media can be considered as an invasion of privacy. Even if the person involved in the picture is a public servant, such situation should be kept private as to reserve the dignity and respectability of the person. The picture of a dying man lying on the floor covered with his own blood can trigger so many emotions within a nation.6 Since the assailant was identified, the assassination case was considered closed. That is what the public was made to believe. People from different walks of life might agree or disagree with the previous statement. There are more skeptics however than believers towards the fact the RFK assassination is already a solved case. Looking at the scenario that happened at the Ambassador Hotel, at an instant one can conclude that the case is close as the killer was apprehended together with the murder weapon at the vicinity of the crime scene. 78 With the arrest of Sirhan Sirhan at the crime scene with the murder weapon, it seemed that justice is just within gasp for RFK’s family. The suspect was presented in court to face the allegations and was convicted. As the investigation was on-going, it was found out that the suspect was psychologically-disturbed, politically motivated and capable of executing a heinous crime like an assassination in a public place filled with a number of people. Even if this is the fact that the public was made to believe through the media, there is still a theory that there is more than one assassin present in at the crime scene and in the planning of the crime.9 The media gave the public a very intense visualization of the whole event. When stating whole event, it would be from the time that RFK addressed his last speech, to the assassination, the arrest of Sirhan Sirhan, up to the conviction and declaration of the case being solved and closed. Yet further research and investigation makes the once clear scenario becomes vague. The conviction all of sudden seem to be with shadowed with reasonable doubt. What have occurred in the assassination was not just killing another Kennedy; rather it was killing a person who could have made a very big difference not just in the administration but also on the economic sector as well. RFK’s assassination can be considered as the assassination of what could be a brighter and stronger America. Quoting Wernerhoff’s opinion towards Bobby Kennedy: Bobby Kennedy possessed a number of assets which would have significantly boosted the Democratic Party vote. There can be no doubt that he would have become the second Kennedy to defeat Nixon, who narrowly lost to John F. Kennedy in 1960.10 With the tragedy and a very speedy action from the law enforcement and also the judiciary, the people were at peace knowing that the assailant was captured and convicted. However, almost 3 decades after the assassination, media people and individual researchers are tasked to find out more information and exposes towards what truly occurred just a couple of minutes past midnight on the 5th of June 1968. There are theorists and researchers who believe that there is still a Pandora’s Box yet to be opened. A story is still left untold by the media and by the US government themselves. Bobby Kennedy’s assassination was left on the shadows of the doubt that still covers the earlier assassination of older brother JFK. The media are more focused on finding out the true story of the 1st Kennedy assassination that the 2nd assassination is seemed to be shoved aside for a meantime.1112 Further exploring on the emergence of the girl in the polka dot dress, why can’t the government open the RFK assassination case once more? One good reason for the case re-opening is that there is another persona involved in the crime besides the shooter. What is the role of the girl in the polka dot dress in the RFK assassination? Why was Sirhan the only suspect and the only person given focused not just by the government but also of the media? It seemed that there is a cover-up towards who the real assailants are for the killing. This was not the first time that an occurrence of a cover-up has popped into the minds of the public.13 There should at least be a re-investigation on to what have transpired at the Ambassador Hotel. The media seemed to be very conservative and careful towards exploring the case of RFK. What is stopping them? It should be them who would initiate something towards educating the public regarding the real events of the assassination in 1968. Even at the official website made for Bobby Kennedy, there was very little information towards the seen abnormalities in the investigation. One of the information that was quite disturbing was the event when evidences such as pictures and documents were destroyed a few months after the investigation.14 Where is the media when such discoveries were made? According to Bobby-Kennedy.Com: All four shots; the fatal penetration to the brain, the shot that passed through the right shoulder pad of the Senator's coat, and two additional bullets that entered Kennedy's body were all fired from the back and all produced powder residue patterns which indicated that they were all fired from a distance of only a few inches. Since RFK was walking towards Sirhan, and his body was always facing Sirhan during the shots even as he fell backwards it is impossible these shots originated from Sirhan's weapon.15 The media was truly involved during the event when the assassination was committed apparently by Sirhan. However, it should not have stopped there. After conviction, was it truly the closure of the case or was it just to silence the public from further knowing what is concealed in the official investigation? Does media participation ends at the funeral together with the victim? When something is considered by the judiciary as case closed, does the media have to stop there even if there are still loopholes present? Even at The Museum of Broadcast Communication, none much was said about further media coverage or participation about the RFK assassination. The article by Kevin Clark ended at the funeral. Should it be that way? Are there any clauses in the broadcasting or journal ethics that a media company is prohibited of doing any research towards what is considered to be given a very vague conclusion? The life of Robert Francis Kennedy ended up on a tragic note. Interest in reliving the investigation seems to be null. In 1966, he once said: Surely this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men. And surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.16 Let the present generation remember the legacy. May this inspire more people to investigate and critic what is written. Not everything in public is the truth, often there is vital information being kept. This is part of the American history. What has happened at the Ambassador Hotel in LA is American history. History is being taught in schools. But not all is concealed in paperback books. There are more data yet to be published and discovered. The media is a very useful tool in discovering different angles of a story. Let the media not be a hindrance or a co-conspirator for the cover-up of the information that the American public needs to know. Works Cited Ayton, Mel. Conspiracy Thinking and the John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King Assassinations. Accessed April 17, 2012. http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/ayton2.htm. Bobby-Kennedy.Com. Is everyone alright?. Accessed April 17, 2012. http://bobby-kennedy.com/rfkassassination.htm. Bobby-Kennedy.Com. Robert F. Kennedy. accessed April 17, 2012. http://bobby-kennedy.com/rfkpolicy.htm. DailyMail.Co.Uk. Bobby Kennedy Assassin Claims He Was Manipulated by a Seductive Girl in Polka Dot Dress. last modified April 29, 2011. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1381917/Bobby-Kennedy-assassin-Sirhan-claims-manipulated-seductive-girl.html. Ching, Juliet. The Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. New York, NY: The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc. 2002. Melanson, Philip H., Summers, Anthony, and John H. (INT) Davis. The Robert F. Kennedy Assassination: New Revelations on the Conspiracy and Cover-up. New York, NY: SPI Books. 1994. Newscasting: What Was Going On. Time.Com. June 14, 1968. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,900149,00.html. “Robert F. Kennedy Quotations.” JFKLibrary.Org. Accessed April 17, 2012, http://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Ready-Reference/RFK-Quotations.aspx. Wernerhoff , Carl. The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress: New Light on the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy. 2005. http://web.mac.com/len15/WAR_on_We_The_People/COINTELPRO_CLEARINGHOUSE_files/RFK.pdf. Read More