Yale Holds Secret Spot in Bush, Kerry Pasts

Reuters | October 22 2004

BOSTON (Reuters) - Conspiracy theorists, rejoice: the man elected president on Nov. 2 will be a member of an elite secret cabal with tentacles that reportedly stretch into all layers of American society.

We're not making this up.

Despite their ideological differences, Democrat John Kerry and Republican George W. Bush share much in common. Each was raised amid wealth and privilege in the northeastern United States, and each attended Yale University in the 1960s where they joined the same secret society: Skull and Bones.

Founded more than 150 years ago, Skull and Bones is shrouded in the kind of mystery befitting the Gothic, Ivy League campus where its members meet behind closed doors in a windowless structure known as the tomb. It started admitting women in 1991.

Only 15 Yale students are tapped to join Skull and Bones each year. They spend their senior year forging close ties with fellow Bonesmen -- reportedly through the sharing of sexual histories and ceremonial rites -- and eventually become part of an elite association with friends in high places.

"Initiation rituals involve morbid admission of personal sexual experiences and coerced displays of sophomoric masochism and mystical mumbo jumbo, hooded robes and members carrying skulls," independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader said this month citing video footage of a Skull and Bones ceremony.

At a news conference in front of the tomb earlier, Nader urged both Bush and Kerry to answer questions about their involvement in the group, specifically about their code of silence and how their allegiance to Skull and Bones influences their oath to serve the country.

Author Alexandra Robbins, whose 2002 book "Secrets of the Tomb" was based on interviews with some 100 Bonesmen who broke their vows of secrecy to speak with her, agreed with Nader's concern about the role of Skull and Bones in a democratic society.

"It's disturbing that the presidential candidates are both members of (Skull and Bones) because it seems that they're prioritizing the interests of a secret society above the interests of the rest of us," Robbins told Reuters.

FRIENDS IN HIGH PLACES

Although conspiracy theorists have linked Skull and Bones to everything from the assassination of John F. Kennedy to the Watergate scandal, Robbins dismissed the paranoia and said the society is mainly an alumni network bent on getting -- and keeping -- power.

"The only agenda for Skull and Bones is to get its members into positions of power and then to have those members hire other members. It's a society of connections," she said.
Bush, whose father and grandfather were also Bonesmen, has done an expert job of relying on those connections throughout life, she said. Members invested in Bush's businesses and at least one was involved in his 1989 deal to buy the Texas Rangers baseball franchise, Robbins said.

In return, Bush has awarded Bonesmen with appointments in his administration. Among them, she said, are Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Bill Donaldson, Department of Homeland Security lawyer Edward McNally and Associate Attorney General Robert McCallum.

Kerry, on the other hand, has not exploited his Skull and Bones connections to the same degree -- or at least that's what Robbins' sources told her.

"If the past is any indication ... I would guess we would see fewer Bonesmen in a Kerry administration," said Robbins, who also graduated from Yale and belonged to another secret society, Scroll and Key.

Each candidate has referred obliquely to his membership in Skull and Bones.

In his 1999 autobiography, Bush wrote: "My senior year I joined Skull and Bones, a secret society so secret I can't say anything more."

When an interviewer asked Kerry what it meant that both he and Bush were Bonesmen, the Democrat replied, "Not much, because it's a secret."

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