Word: oswald
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...inflexible rule of journalese is that American assassins must have three names: John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, James Earl Ray, Mark David Chapman. This courtesy of a resonant three-part moniker is also applied to other dangerous folk. This is why the "subway vigilante" is "Bernhard Hugo Goetz" to many journalists who consider him a monster, and just plain "Bernhard Goetz" to almost everyone else. Another rule of the language is that euphemisms for "fat" are understood too quickly by the public and are therefore in constant need of replacement. "Jolly," "Rubenesque" and the like have long been abandoned...
...shows have enhanced the public's understanding of issues and its appreciation for the specific accomplishments of public figures. Others, however, have blatantly treated speculation as fact, or even knowingly distorted the truth to advance a cause or enhance a dramatic scene. ABC's The Trial of Lee Harvey Oswald presupposed that President Kennedy's assassin was not murdered by Jack Ruby, then argued the case that Kennedy was slain by a conspiracy. CBS's Kill Me If You Can played down the crimes of Sex Offender Caryl Chessman and dwelt on his slow, gruesome execution in the gas chamber...
When Kennedy was shot, Moscow firmly believed that the assassination was a scheme by "reactionary forces" within the U.S. seeking to damage the new trend in relations. The Kremlin ridiculed the Warren Commission's conclusion that Oswald had acted on his own. There was widespread speculation among Soviet diplomats that Lyndon Johnson, along with the CIA and the Mafia, had masterminded the plot. Johnson was anathema to Khrushchev. Because he was a Southerner, Moscow considered him a racist (the stereotype of any American politician from below the Mason-Dixon line), an anti-Soviet, and anti-Communist to boot. Further, since...
...which claims that bald is beautiful. Bald men are alleged to be volcanoes of libidinous energy. Think of Yul Brynner, think of Kojak, think of Picasso goatishly chasing girls at 90. But despite such supposed proclivities, bald men are also said to look wise (think of Henry James or Oswald Spengler) and statesmanlike (John Glenn?). All well and good, but prejudices persist. Given a choice, Frank Sinatra decided on hair transplants, and Burt Reynolds acquired a toupee. When are we likely to elect our next bald President...
Entrants in this dense and unprecedented volume range from the heroic to the villainous, from Albert Camus to Lee Harvey Oswald. Mallon welcomes them all to his vast storehouse. Some neighbors provide deep ironic contrasts: Anne Frank tells her diary, "I twist my heart . . . so that the bad is on the outside and the good is on the inside and keep on trying to find a way of becoming what I would like so to be." Four pages later a Nazi architect bitterly considers himself in the third person: "Hitler . . . would have been keenly delighted by the role Albert Speer...