Carol, in that case we're talking (a) a time in which the private affairs of politicians (and illness would be one of those) were off-limits to reporting; (b) something that isn't a factor in their performance as a politician; (c) something that isn't a major crime involving massive premeditated murder; and (d) something that actually *was* fairly widely known if you'd seen him in the flesh, it just wasn't explicitly pointed out to the newspaper-reading public who hadn't been to see him in person, so if you weren't really interested in him then you wouldn't have found out.

Whereas in this case we have (a) a time in which even minor slips by politicians are well newsworthy, never mind premeditated mass murder; (b) something that would put Bay of Pigs, Cambodia and Watergate right in the shade; (c) premeditated mass murder; and (d) something that not one person in the "conspiracy" has been prepared to talk about.

In other words, the comparison simply doesn't hold, I'm afraid.

Graham.