* A Supreme Court confirmation hearing in 1981 was the first to be televised live. It was that important—and historic: the confirmation of Sandra Day O’Connor, the first woman Supreme Court justice. BTW, the vote was 99-0. That was then.
* It remains surprising, if not shocking, that there has never been a movie made of the amazing and tragic career of Dorothy Kilgallen, who was one of the most widely known journalists in the world and a multi-media star. Ernest Hemingway called her “the most powerful female voice in America.”
She also met a beyond-suspicious death—in the context of pushing back against the popular scenario that “Oswald alone” was behind the JFK assassination. She had recently visited New Orleans and had plans to return in pursuit of a Mafia lead. Her phone had been tapped and she was under FBI surveillance.
Kilgallen covered the Jack Ruby trial, secured–via her fame and assertiveness–two interviews with Lee Harvey Oswald’s killer and then outraged the FBI and the Warren Commission by secretly securing transcripts of Ruby’s testimony to the commission and publishing them before they were officially released. She included information ineptly ignored or redacted by the Warren Commission. Maybe Oliver Stone would be interested.
* “I believe free speech is a societal imperative for a functioning democracy. … Twitter needs to be transformed as a private company.” That was Elon Musk, whose hostile takeover bid ($43 billion) has been rebuffed so far by Twitter.