Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 1, 1992 TAG: 9202010400
SECTION: SPECTATOR PAGE: S-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MICHAEL E. HILL THE WASHINGTON POST
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
`48 HOURS' IN DALLAS FOR JFK REPORT
This week Dan Rather returns to the scene of the crime.He'll be back in Dallas, where he was on Nov. 22, 1963, reporting for CBS, when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated.
Rather's visit there will be part of "48 Hours" (Wednesday at 10 p.m. on WDBJ-Channel 7 in the Roanoke viewing area), which will attempt to sift and sort the pieces of evidence in the assassination.
For a mainstream journalist these days, that means talking to, and maybe taking on, filmmaker Oliver Stone.
For it is Stone's film "JFK" that has succeeded in focusing and galvanizing skepticism about the official version of the assassination. Suddenly the debate is on: Stone has been all over the TV magazine and talk shows, and efforts are being made to unseal archival material related to the Warren Commission and congressional investigations of the assassination.
There has been abundant criticism of "JFK," with many journalists who have followed the story and other authorities in the field claiming that any number of Stone's points don't fly. It's all made for the most intense debate about the assassination in many years, and it has prompted this edition of "48 Hours."
Rather, who was a reporter feeding information to Walter Cronkite on the day of the assassination, has kept current on the killing and politely distances himself from Stone's interpretation of events.
"I have no argument with Stone," said Rather. "His is a different craft. He's an artist. We have different value systems, goals and approaches to things."
Rather has taped a two-hour interview with Stone, portions of which will be a part of the program. A "48 Hours" spokeswoman said the interview session was cordial. The CBS anchorman will also revisit Dallas and the key locations involved in the assassination.
Rather, who prides himself on having read all 26 1/2 volumes of the Warren Commission report, said his approach to the program would be that of an unbiased presenter of evidence, trying to give the viewer a basis on which to evaluate information about the assassination.
"I'm trying to be an honest broker of information," Rather said. "I want this to be a neutral examination of the record, concentrating where possible on the known facts.
"There are thousands of unknowns, of course. I want to deal responsibly with what we know, what we think we know and what we know we don't know about the assassination."
A CBS documentary in the mid-'70s went further than that, largely concurring with the findings of the Warren Commission that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in shooting Kennedy.
"JFK" points broadly to a conspiracy including many individuals and interests.
Rather suggested that much of what can be conveyed by film is driven by emotion. "A good filmmaker," he said, "never mind a great one, can take the kind of rich material of the Kennedy assassination and make it into a very good drama, which, whether he intends to or not, can be manipulative of emotions."
Perhaps heightening the impact of "JFK" is the fact that so many Americans seeing the film were not even alive at the time of the assassination or are so young as to have no clear memory of the event and its aftermath.
"Almost a third were not alive then," said Rather. "Put that together with those alive but with little memory of it, it gives you an idea how later generations are susceptible to having their emotions manipulated. And whether that manipulation is done knowingly or unknowingly, I feel strongly about giving people as many facts as you can so they can make up their own minds."
The idea of making public material sealed away in the Archives intrigues Rather, but he does not expect dramatic revelations should the files be opened.
"I don't think there'd be anything explosive found," he said. "I think there's a risk of raising expectations too high. I simply don't know. I'd love to be shown wrong, but I think it may be that there may not be much in them."
He added, "We know a lot, and that's what I want to concentrate on [on `48 Hours']. And there are those things we don't know, and many we will never know."