Like a number of you, I was old enough to remember where I was and what I was doing when the news came that President Kennedy was assassinated. I was in my fifth-grade class at Hollin Hills Elementary School, and they turned on the TV that they normally only used for educational TV and Mercury missions. I remember that it was a grey Friday here in the DC area, very much like yesterday, actually.
The memory of JFK has taken on an outsized role in American current events during the half-century since. Candidates are compared to him, especially those capable of inspiring rhetoric (not naming any names), conspiracy theorists won't ever let drop their theories about his death, and the anniversary of his death is noted in the media each year, not just on the round-number anniversaries.
But it's time to move on. JFK, for all the inspiration he gave many Americans, was not a particularly consequential President, especially when compared to his successor. And if he hadn't been shot, he'd probably be dead anyway: he'd be 96 if he lived. Most of the country doesn't know where they were when JFK was shot, because most Americans are younger than 52 or so, which is about the youngest you could be and still remember any of that. Only those of us of a certain age remember, and maybe it's time for us to stop bothering everyone else with our recollections.
Rest in peace, JFK. And so long.
Open thread.
