Click here to access article by Nadia Kayyali from Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Information about J. Edgar Hoover continues to be leaked from confidential sources like this recently released document on Hoover in an unredacted form. With all these disclosures after his death in 1972, he has gone from a much celebrated FBI crime-busting hero of my childhood days in the 1940s and 50s to a very disturbed man today. Our ruling class directors now feel safe to reveal such information 42 years after his death. In this commentary I will discuss two aspects--1) the man himself and his usefulness to the ruling class, and 2) an inspection of the criteria used by government censors in redacting documents.
During his long career starting in 1919 with the Department of Justice (sic) he was very useful to the ruling class directors. When there was a lot of anti-capitalist political activity following WWI, he was directed to hunt down and harass many radical activists. He achieved such success in the their purge that he was steadily promoted until President Calvin Coolidge appointed him to head the FBI in 1924, and he continued in this role until his death in 1972. He was essentially used as a watchdog for any threats to the ruling class; and when he found them, he was employed as an attack dog.
He was not only used against left-wing radicals, but any liberal critics such as Congressmen, Senators, and Supreme Court justices who interfered with the insatiable appetite of the capitalist class for more wealth and, above all, power. Thus, during his long career he was worshiped by the media and their coverage of his activities was carefully controlled. They carefully concealed all the evidence of his rabid racism and his obsession with sexual matters. Thus, he destroyed the careers and/or lives of such people as Martin Luther King, John Lennon, actors Charlie Chaplin and Jean Seberg, along with many Black Nationalists, left-wing activists, student radicals, and anyone labeled as "communists".
His psychological problems with race and sex combined with left-wing activity played out with extreme viciousness against actress Jean Seaberg and psychiatrist Stuart Jeanne Bramhall who both had intimate relations with African-Americans. If you have any doubts about this, please read the horrifying stories of these two women: Jean Seberg (Played Out by David Richards) and Seattle area psychiatrist Stuart Jeanne Bramhall now political refugee in New Zealand (The Most Revolutionary Act).
Now that he as been dead for 42 years, the directors of the ruling capitalist class feel safe in releasing some of the truth about this very warped, but useful man. Hoover's long service to the ruling class is a dramatic illustration of how our masters will use anyone, no matter how disturbed, to protect their interests.
I also examined the two documents contained in the article: the earlier released redacted FBI document on King and the recently released unredacted document in order to get a clue as to what they consider a "threat to national security" which is always the reason government censors give when hiding their secrets. By enlarging the documents (on my PC computer by pressing Ctrl and + ), it appears to me that they were only trying to protect the FBI from criticism of their outrageous behavior.
