John McCain: Should humans keep secrets forever?

Jul 28, 2022 Features / Columnists, Freddie Kissoon

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Kaieteur News – One of the most known US senators in the 21st century was John McCain. At the height of his global fame, the New York Times (NYT) ran a news item in 2008 about a deadly conflict of interest story involving McCain. He had an affair with a woman who was a lobbyist at the time. NYT named the lover.
McCain and his wife denied it. The man in charge of preparing McCain’s PR on the issue was his closest aide and advisor, Steve Schmidt. Fourteen years after protecting McCain’s reputation, Schmidt in May 2022, admitted that he lied to protect McCain, McCain and his wife lied to the world, and that McCain admitted the affair to him because Schmidt was his trusted lieutenant entrusted in sugar-coating McCain’s indiscretion. In his confession, Mr. Schmidt apologised to NTY for his denial of what the paper published. Mr. Schmidt also said that McCain’s daughter harassed him to suppress the story.

This is the second major, recent revelation about a famous global personality that has now entered the ledgers of history. After the death of Michael Jackson, a boy who gave testimony at his sex trial in which he denied having sex with Jackson as an underage boy, later told the world it was true that he did have illegal sexual activities with Jackson when he was a minor.
Long after his death, the biographer of J. Edgar Hoover informed the world that Hoover was a closet homosexual. Two things easily come to mind. In that bygone age, homosexuality was rejected by mainstream America so Hoover as the FBI chief was susceptible to being blackmailed. Secondly, it is possible that Hoover must have killed many of his lovers who tried to blackmail him.
These stories lead you to the question –should humans take secrets to their grave and leave intact the legacy of known personalities when in fact those legacies were not as rosy as it is painted? This is a sensitive issue that makes the work of the historian difficult. It is a judgment call as to when to record details of a sordid life by those who are dead and gone and society still thinks they were angels.

One of the ways of getting around this dilemma is the writing of biography. The biography is meant to tell the unabridged life story of the person under review. If a biography is going to make any sense and have a market it has to be a complete portrait. If a biography is a saccharine canvas, then expect others to come forward and fill in the gaps of wrong-doing that were left out.
Autobiographies are seldom reliable soil from which to record history. The person paints a glowing picture of him/herself and omits embarrassing details. Barack Obama comes to mind. In his memories he does not tell the tale of what a handsome embracer he was of Wall Street companies and how identical his foreign policy was to all his predecessors.
I haven’t read Clement Rohee’s autobiography for the simple reason that I am not paying 63 American dollars for it. That is way too expensive. Once I borrowed a copy and digest it, I will be compelled to reflect on the lacunae because I have followed Mr. Rohee’s entire career since we started out the same time in politics.
People who have dark secrets for those who have died should record history and the historian, not even for a fraction of a moment, should be concerned with how angry family members become. The role of the historian is to pass on knowledge to future generations.

Once you talk about the recording of history in Guyana, Forbes Burnham comes to mind. Burnham’s hegemony from 1964 to 1985 reminds me of World War 2 (WW2). The stories about WW2 will never end. The world will continue to see books and movies about WW2 long into the future. The latest is the movie Operation Mincemeat, a true story of how British intelligence deceived Hitler.
The sordid but true tales of Burnham’s hegemony will never be completed because there are too many. Burnham destroyed the lives of untold numbers – businessmen, farmers, lawyers, professionals, academics, public servants, among others. Not even one percent of Burnham’s atrocities have been put into print.
The only book that described Burnham’s reign of terror is that seminal publication, Justice: The Struggle for Democracy in Guyana, 1952- 1992 by then editor of the Catholic Standard and Jesuit priest, Father Andrew Morrison. In future articles I will tell readers of my experience with Burnham, the Stabroek News under DeCaires and Fitzpatrick, what I know about the Buxton massacre, the corruption in the APNU+AFC government and more.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)

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