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Commentary By James Piereson

Life of a Lone Gunman

Culture Culture & Society

REVIEW: ‘The Oswalds: An Untold Account of Marina and Lee’ by Paul Gregory

It has been nearly six decades since President John F. Kennedy was cut down on the streets of Dallas by rifle shots fired by Lee Harvey Oswald, a "nut" and a "loser" by some accounts, but also a Marxist, defector to the Soviet Union, and admirer of Fidel Castro. The event shocked the nation and disrupted complacent assumptions about the stability of the American order. The assassin, whatever his motives might have been, delivered a blow to the American psyche with effects that lingered for years afterwards.

The evidence condemning Oswald was overwhelming and summarized in detail in the Warren Commission report on the assassination. That evidence would have convicted him in a trial if he had not been assassinated himself by Jack Ruby. The commission found that Oswald fired the shots that killed President Kennedy and that he acted without assistance from anyone. The commission speculated that Oswald shot the president mostly for personal reasons: He wanted to prove that he was "somebody" and to make a name for himself in the history books.

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James Piereson is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

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