Robert F. Kennedy Sr.: A Vision from the Mountain
Louis Conte | June 6, 2024
By Louis Conte, The Kennedy Beacon
Today, June 6, marks 56 years since the assassination of Senator Robert F. Kennedy.
Senator Kennedy was gunned down in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles on the night that he won the California and South Dakota presidential primaries. His campaign started as a long shot against the incumbent, Lyndon Johnson, the man who became president after his brother, John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in 1963.
Senator Kennedy ran for president because he opposed an unjust war, because he saw the government turning away from serving the people, and because he saw the people being turned against each other.
Senator Kennedy was opposed by his party and by the mainstream media. He decided to run his campaign by speaking truth to the people.
As his campaign gained momentum, crowds of Americans – every kind of American – flocked to him. He spoke to crowds of white people in the Deep South about racial injustice. He spoke against the war in Vietnam to groups supporting the conflict. Kennedy spoke to crowds of black people in inner cities and promised that America’s future would finally, fully include them.
Kennedy’s speech in Indianapolis on the night of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. is one of the most stunning examples of American leadership ever seen. As riots tore through inner cities across the nation, Kennedy spoke to a crowd of African Americans, bringing peace. Indianapolis did not riot.
Senator Kennedy was climbing the mountain to the presidency, energized by his vision of an America built on justice, community, peace, and democracy. He almost delivered us to that vision of America. Fifty-six years ago, he, and all of us, were denied that vision from the mountain.
Senator Kennedy’s assassination, along with the other assassinations of the 1960s, as detailed in the documentary Four Died Trying, altered the trajectory of the nation and profoundly undermined the people’s faith in government institutions. People no longer trust agencies such as the NIH, the CIA, or the FBI and believe that the government is run by unseen, unaccountable Deep State actors.
Remarkably, RFK Jr. has risen to the challenge of undoing the damage inflicted upon his family and his nation by running for president as an independent candidate. His campaign seeks to end the corrupt merger of government and corporate interests, reform and restore its institutions, and give the nation back to the people.
As we enter the final five months of the campaign of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the comparisons with his father’s campaign are striking.
RFK Jr. is also opposed by the mainstream media. He is also running against endless war, against a government that places corporate interests above the people, and against forces seeking to turn Americans against Americans.
Like his father, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. knows that the only way to pull the country together again will be by speaking the truth, not just to power, but also to each other.
We have much work to do to rebuild our nation, but Senator Kennedy’s vision of America from the mountain is still there for us.
We just need to keep climbing.
