It's not the crime; it's the cover-up

Yet another batch of JFK files out today.  I always find it interesting to learn what was redacted in earlier versions of the same document: what was the big scary secret they felt they had to protect?  Often, it turns out to be about protecting egos and reputations.  One new piece today: previously redacted sections of a memo showing Oswald to be in Mexico City at the Soviet embassy indicate that (1) he was talking to a man in the KGB assassination department, (2) that fact had been reported to James Jesus Angleton, the legendary genius paranoiac sociopath in charge of CIA counterintelligence, and (3) Angleton didn't act on the information.  A simple heads up might (I repeat might) have changed history.  So what were they hiding?  The Russian connection?  Or the fact that Angleton blew it?  We've already known about a Russian connection, although I can understand trying to get people to not jump to a conspiratorial conclusion and worsen the Cold War.  I've read that LBJ was personally convinced the Russians were involved, but didn't have the evidence or the inclination to push the point.  The Warren Commission, "for its own good and the good of the country" was led to its conclusions--and set up a cottage industry for conspiracy theorists.  Whatever.  If the Russians did do it, we'd have proof by now: enough of the KGBs files leaked out around the end of the Cold War that something that big couldn't remain hidden.  (Although I'm sure there are some Americans who will always remind us that absence of evidence isn't evidence of absence.  It's in their interest to keep the meme alive.)  So I can't help but wonder how much of the "conspiracy" surrounding the JFK investigation was an attempt to bury the fact that those who were tasked with keeping the president alive weren't doing their job very well.  Cover Your Ass--a common rule in any bureaucracy.

The same is probably true of 9/11, as well.  We already know that people failed to communicate and connect the dots.  There was evidence of what was coming, but the alert wasn't sounded.  So today people read it as evidence to enable (or commit) a crime, when it makes more sense to read it as bad analysis, people taking advantage of a disaster, and a lot of CYA.  Hanlon's razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."  In my experience, there is much more stupidity in the world than competent (let alone super-competent) villainy.

New batch of JFK assassination files: Oswald in Mexico City and the Watergate burglars - The Washington Post