Things get decided based upon willpower

Well, I pretty much stopped reading Bugliosi's book.  There's a lot more to go, but it no longer interests me.

Something else has gotten my attention.  It is so clear that the conspiracy types are wrong, yet why is it that they have managed to convince the majority of the population that there was a conspiracy to assassinate President Kennedy?  It comes down to persistence, which related to willpower.  They willed it that way, and brought it into being.  Without their continuing pounding on this idea that it was a conspiracy, the polls would look a lot different.  Even more, there wouldn't even be any polls if these people were ignored, discredited, or silenced.

Let's take that last phrase piece-by-piece.  First of all, they wouldn't allow themselves to be ignored.  Their persistence assured that they were listened to by at least a few.  Their fervor increased the persuasiveness to make that more than a few.  So, they weren't ignored---it was considered a legitimate issue.  Yet, it was the defenders of the Warren Report that ignored their critics, and this was a ghastly mistake.  Those who created the report should have defended it vigorously, yet they refused to answer their critics.  This only compounded the problem.  The Warren Report's credibility suffered.  Secondly, if there was an active attempt to discredit the critics of the Warren Report, it may well be possible that their viewpoint would never have gained traction.  Finally, since the critics were largely dishonorable, it should not have been too difficult to silence them.  People would not as likely take proven liars seriously.  The failure to address the critics, combined with critics persistence enabled this to grow beyond all reasonable bounds.  In short, it was a matter of will.  The critics had it, the Warren Report people did not.

Given that success of discrediting the Warren Report, what else has happened in history that is so false that managed to be accepted as true without any evidence of fact?  It could well be that we are suffering under a number of false premises pushed upon us that have no basis in validity.

It seems that this culture seemed to start going downhill back then.  Could it be that the refusal to defend the honorable and exalt the dishonorable that has sent us on this path downward?  The passivity in the face of a vicious assault is the primary observable, but what drove this passivity?  Did those people somehow lose their moral confidence?  Why didn't they defend what was right?

The death of Kennedy wasn't what hurt us the most.  What hurt us the most was the refusal to defend good against evil.  This requires will and moral self-confidence.  Thus, our problems may have deeper roots than this one mere event.

If there is going to be any turnaround in our society, we are going to have to get that back.  With the confidence in the right, the moral willpower will exist to turn back evil.  Without that, we are lost.