USA: Block or unseat Hoover

The Ubbergeek

Hoover, head of the FBI (and creator - I am not too knowledgeable on it's history?). Infamous, polarizing figure. 'Driven' in his quest to fight off Communism, associating homosexuals with the formers (while being possibly one himself), blind to the Mafia's rise and an all round asshole to say the least, if not a Beria-grade freak. The guy was hated and for good reasons, and was not a good thing for Washington's political health.

Your mission is to block him from ever taking over (or creating OTL's) the FBI, or to have him removed from head if not jailed or killed...

Maybe someone knowing the real deal on him, dirty secrets... Or he goes too far, like snooping on Army people...

What would be the consquences of No (More) Hoover, as well? No OTL FBI as we know it, other.. targets? Another hardliner would take over anyway? Political fallout of the fall of Hoover?

Any ideas, remarks, comments, insights?
 

mtg999

Paul V McNutt said:
If the gay and or transvestite stories were true I could see him being blackmailed into resigning.
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It is often assumed that the reason Hoover was so overly lenient to the Mafia was because they have incriminating photos and blackmailing him.

But you definitely have a point. Given that Hoover was disliked by quite a lot of influential people, it is quite surprising that no one decided to enlist the help of one of the other investigative/intelligence services (CIA, various state police forces, etc) to find blackmail material on him. Given the rivalry the FBI has historically had with various other branches of law enforcement, it shouldn't have been too difficult to find people willing to co-operate against Hoover.
 
Emperor Norton I

Emperor Norton I

Hoover wasn't a crossdresser. Perhaps a homosexual or perhaps a bisexual (which was all the same to his generation regardless).

It's easy enough to unseat Hoover. LBJ renewed his tenure when it was up in 1965(?), and when he was otherwise of retirement age. Kennedy would not have, if he could have helped it.
 

The Ubbergeek

Emperor Norton I said:
Hoover wasn't a crossdresser. Perhaps a homosexual or perhaps a bisexual (which was all the same to his generation regardless).

It's easy enough to unseat Hoover. LBJ renewed his tenure when it was up in 1965(?), and when he was otherwise of retirement age. Kennedy would not have, if he could have helped it.
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But is it possible earlier? I looks at Senator Mcarthy, who got stopped as he crossed a line what, in... 59?
 

Orville_third

Banned
Here's an idea. First off, make the most famous Chicago Tribune headline true. Second, have Dewey insist on the FBI going after the mob. Hoover balks, but Dewey's old buddies in New York go after them. Anti-communist or not, Hoover ignoring Dewey's wishes means he's likely to be out of there. Of course, who would get Hoover's files?
 

UncleDynamite

Emperor Norton I said:
Hoover wasn't a crossdresser. Perhaps a homosexual or perhaps a bisexual (which was all the same to his generation regardless).
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Maybe bisexual, Dorothy Lamour admitted after his death that she'd had an affair with him.

Of course, he could have just been straight and we place too much stock into rumors and hearsay.
 
Emperor Norton I

Emperor Norton I

UncleDynamite said:
Maybe bisexual, Dorothy Lamour admitted after his death that she'd had an affair with him.
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Therein lies an issue: there are women who say they had a relationship with Hoover. On the other hand, many homosexuals, especially (especially) during that era dated and had sex with women as it was expected and what they wanted themselves to enjoy. And of course he could have been a bisexual.

I do believe Hoover was one or the other. For as conservative and rigid a man as he was and the way men of that era acted, some of his behavior is very suspicious.
 

UncleDynamite

Emperor Norton I said:
Therein lies an issue: there are women who say they had a relationship with Hoover. On the other hand, many homosexuals, especially (especially) during that era dated and had sex with women as it was expected and what they wanted themselves to enjoy. And of course he could have been a bisexual.

I do believe Hoover was one or the other. For as conservative and rigid a man as he was and the way men of that era acted, some of his behavior is very suspicious.
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I don't think we'll ever know for sure.
 
Simon

Simon

mtg999 said:
But you definitely have a point. Given that Hoover was disliked by quite a lot of influential people, it is quite surprising that no one decided to enlist the help of one of the other investigative/intelligence services (CIA, various state police forces, etc.) to find blackmail material on him. Given the rivalry the FBI has historically had with various other branches of law enforcement, it shouldn't have been too difficult to find people willing to co-operate against Hoover.
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Mutually assured destruction? I'm guessing that if the stories of him collecting dirt on people in positions of influence are true it's possible that he was able to collect enough of it before people started getting annoyed/felt threatened enough by him to go looking into his personal life that if anyone tried anything he could cause all sorts of problems.
 

DTF955Baseballfan

How about a president who knows he's dying, is near death and willing to admit it, firing him and taking the fall for it? Hoover can't harm a dead man, after all.
 
Magniac

Magniac

Emperor Norton I said:
It's easy enough to unseat Hoover. LBJ renewed his tenure when it was up in 1965(?), and when he was otherwise of retirement age. Kennedy would not have, if he could have helped it.
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Not to reduce this to the old "LBJ knew about real institutional power, JFK was in over his head" trope, but Hoover reached mandatory retirement age exactly as the 89th congress was coming in. A reform president kicking him right then isn't worth the trouble it'd cause on the Hill. And a reelected Kennedy should tread more cautiously as a reform president than old moodswing ever did.

Also, hard to believe now, but there was really no acknowledged reason in mainstream American politics to dismiss Hoover at that point.

And worse: In a Dallas-less world, everyone will see how Hoover's tenure becomes stronger once the ghettos start burning (whereas IOTL he was still costing along on the importance of being chief cop in the wake of the assassination).

This is all before we get into Hoover's dirty grey area of manipulating politicians for his own advantage.
 
Emperor Norton I

Emperor Norton I

Magniac said:
Not to reduce this to the old "LBJ knew about real institutional power, JFK was in over his head" trope, but Hoover reached mandatory retirement age exactly as the 89th congress was coming in. A reform president kicking him right then isn't worth the trouble it'd cause on the Hill. And a reelected Kennedy should tread more cautiously as a reform president than old moodswing ever did.

Also, hard to believe now, but there was really no acknowledged reason in mainstream American politics to dismiss Hoover at that point.

And worse: In a Dallas-less world, everyone will see how Hoover's tenure becomes stronger once the ghettos start burning (whereas IOTL he was still costing along on the importance of being chief cop in the wake of the assassination).

This is all before we get into Hoover's dirty grey area of manipulating politicians for his own advantage.
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It wouldn't be dismissing him. It would be letting him leave. Keeping Hoover on was be the active effort, not letting him go in 1965; Hoover was already set to retire, and they had to actively exempt him from it. Hoover retiring is the passive action.

And it opens up a lot for the Kennedy administration. Hoover is a potential danger, and he is neutered. Because his retirement is compulsory and expected, it will not be an issue nor fight that could be turned against them politically. The Kennedy administration will also get to appoint his successor, which means Kennedy can get someone loyal and can tap into any of the potential power Hoover had to use at the administration's discretion. There are a few components to that. Two that come to mind are that he could actively use the FBI to assert pressure (politically or otherwise) and carry out activities perhaps Hoover would not be happy about like the effort against organized crime and the effort for justice concerning Civil Rights and the people involved, and the other being that just the worry of what that FBI could have on them could have a psychological effect on politicians which could help the Kennedy administration.

(And I do know that the FBI was involved in Civil Rights and taking down the Klan, but I could see a post-Hoover FBI being more so. I think Hoover's interest, besides being directed by Johnson, was based on viewing the Klan as Un-American)
 
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DValdron

Craig said:
Especially when said rumors are deliberately peddled as Disinformation to those long on naiveté and short on life experience.
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People like to gossip, that's all. Giggling about which side of the bed someone falls on is a universal human constant. The notion that he might have put on a dress has a cachet.

But there are many good and worthy people who are gay. Sexual orientation doesn't seem to have any correlation with human worth, it doesn't tell us whether a person is honest, or compassionate or just, or what measure these qualities hve.

That Hoover was likely gay in his private life isn't really here nor there, and whether he indulged in transvestism and if so to what extent... don't mean much in the scheme of things.

What is relevant about Hoover is that he was a vile sack of shit who delved into blackmail, smear tactics, and abused power. He was a shallow, venal little nobody who made a career of ruining lives. He had no compassion, no decency, no integrity or sense of justice. The only good thing I can say about Hoover is that at least he didn't do more damage. There are men whose passing from the world we must regret, Hoover was not one of those.
 

asnys

Orville_third said:
Here's an idea. First off, make the most famous Chicago Tribune headline true. Second, have Dewey insist on the FBI going after the mob. Hoover balks, but Dewey's old buddies in New York go after them. Anti-communist or not, Hoover ignoring Dewey's wishes means he's likely to be out of there. Of course, who would get Hoover's files?
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Dewey apparently promised to appoint Hoover to the supreme court if he was elected. Which seems all kinds of weird to me - why would Hoover even want to be on the SCOTUS? - but I read it in a reliable source (a bio of Truman).
 
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