BOOK REVIEW -- "Reclaiming History" By Vincent Bugliosi (Part #1)
David Von Pein
=====================================================
"RECLAIMING HISTORY:
THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY"
AUTHOR: VINCENT BUGLIOSI
=====================================================
USA Release Date: May 15, 2007.
Published by W.W. Norton & Co.
1,664 Pages (plus 1,128 pages on accompanying CD-ROM).
40 Chapters, Plus Introduction.
32 Pages of Photos/Illustrations.
6 Pages of Charts/Diagrams.
71-Page Index.
Hardcover.
Book Website:
http://www.reclaiminghistory.com
Interviews with Vincent Bugliosi re. the book:
http://www.fora.tv/fora/fora_clip.php?cid=917
http://www.fora.tv/fora/fora_clip.php?cid=965
http://www.fora.tv/fora/fora_clip.php?cid=994
http://www.kmox.com/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=729008
http://www.wnyc.org/shows/lopate/episodes/2007/05/15/segments/78931
=====================================================
I can remember thinking to myself many years ago....if I could choose
just one person on the face of the globe whom I would want to have
write an in-depth book on the JFK assassination, that one person would
be Vincent T. Bugliosi.
"Reclaiming History: The Assassination Of President John F. Kennedy"
was published by W.W. Norton and released on May 15, 2007. (The
release date was moved up two weeks from the originally-announced
publishing date of May 29, 2007, which would have been JFK's 90th
birthday.)
Written over the course of a 21-year period by former Los Angeles
Deputy District Attorney Vincent Bugliosi, "Reclaiming History" was a
daunting project indeed.
This massive 1,664-page book is accompanied by a CD-ROM, which
contains an additional 958 pages of endnotes and another 170 pages of
source notes. So the total number of pages adds up to a mind-blowing
2,792. (And that figure can be increased still further if the 32
unnumbered pages of photos are figured into the total; so that would
put the final page count at 2,824.)
When counting the endnotes on the CD-ROM, this mighty publication logs
in at 1,535,791 total words....an impressive stat by anyone's
standards. (I didn't count every word myself, mind you; Bugliosi
provides that statistic in one of the book's footnotes.) And what
makes that seven-digit figure even more impressive is the fact that
almost all of those 1.5-million words were written out in longhand by
Mr. Bugliosi on Vincent's ever-present yellow legal pads.
In this era of computer word processors, I cannot imagine an author
writing a gigantic book like this one (or any book, for that matter)
in longhand with a #2 pencil. But evidently Mr. Bugliosi did just
that....which, in my view, makes me respect Vince's dedication to this
JFK subject all the more. (And the company that supplied Vincent with
all those yellow legal pads must be in 7th heaven now. Because Vince
probably kept that company afloat for two solid decades all by
himself, with his large refill orders!) ~grin~
The endnotes are essential reading, containing many excellent anti-
conspiracy arguments put forth by the author. The nearly 1,000 pages
of endnotes on the CD-ROM also include several "clickable" Internet
weblinks, providing still more information about certain sub-topics,
although some of the links are non-functioning ones, being broken via
the line structure used on the PDF document on the CD, necessitating a
copy-and-paste into a separate browser.
An Audio-CD edition of "Reclaiming History" is also available
(produced by Simon & Schuster). The audio version includes 15 compact
discs, which contain approximately 18 hours of abridged material from
the book, very nicely read by actor Edward Herrmann. The CD-ROM full
of notes is not included with the audio package, however. .....
http://www.simonsays.com/content/book.cfm?tab=1&pid=526698
A five-minute excerpt of the "Audiobook" version of "Reclaiming
History" can be accessed for free at the following webpage:
And as of this writing, Tom Hanks' production company (in conjunction
with Home Box Office) is working on finalizing a deal that will bring
"Reclaiming History" to the TV screen, in the form of a 10-part
television miniseries.
In addition to the HBO miniseries, a companion documentary special is
also in the works, wherein Mr. Bugliosi will appear on camera to
thoroughly debunk all of the various conspiracy theories.
Bugliosi told "Daily Variety": "Many more people will see the
miniseries than will read the book. With the integrity that Tom
{Hanks}, Gary {Goetzman} and Bill {Paxton} bring, I think that we will
finally be able to make a substantial dent in the 75% of people in
this country who still believe the conspiracy theorists."
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117966398.html?categoryId=14&cs=1
This book, which was originally going to be titled "Final Verdict",
was delayed for several years after its November 1998 release date was
postponed. As of 1998, the book was slated to have 'only' 992 pages.
Obviously, Mr. Bugliosi found a lot more to say about the case during
those interim nine years....and found a few more conspiracy theories
to destroy in the process.
If I were being forced to come up with a very brief two-word
description of this book, I think I would probably choose the words
"Staggeringly Comprehensive". For example, "Reclaiming History"
contains more than 10,000 source citations, including 1,557 in the
first chapter alone ("Four Days In November"), plus another 1,627 in
the "Lee Harvey Oswald" chapter.
To illustrate the grandness of that number, the 888-page Warren
Commission Report (which is stocked with an extremely large number of
citations) has approximately 6,500 source references in it. But that
number is dwarfed by Bugliosi's five-digit stat.
Mr. Bugliosi has meticulously examined and scrutinized the entire JFK
assassination case here -- from Lee Harvey Oswald, to Jack Ruby, to
J.D. Tippit (despite the lack of a specific chapter with Tippit's name
attached to it; however, the details of the Tippit murder are
chronicled very nicely in Chapter 1 and also over the course of
several endnotes located on the CD-ROM disc), to all of the physical
and circumstantial evidence, to the witnesses, to the autopsy, to the
Warren Commission, to the HSCA, to the ARRB, and also to the enormous
number of inaccurate conspiracy theories that have populated the
landscape since 1963.
And Vince Bugliosi (who I'll refer to as "VB" many times throughout
this review) has assessed this massive amount of information with his
usual style of common sense, logic, thoroughness, and fairness....and
has reached the conclusion (which I have fully agreed with for many
years) that Lee Harvey Oswald, alone, shot and killed President
Kennedy and Dallas police officer J.D. Tippit on Friday, November 22,
1963, in Dallas, Texas.
Given the evidence that VB has sifted through (again and again), there
is no alternate conclusion even possible, other than to accept the
original 1964 conclusion of the Warren Commission, i.e., Oswald was
the sole assassin that day in Texas so many years ago.
Mr. Bugliosi has done something that no one else has done prior to the
release of "Reclaiming History" -- he has taken each major conspiracy
theory (and many minor ones too) and has looked beyond just the
SURFACE ALLEGATIONS of conspiracy to dig deeper into them and reveal
the inherent illogic, inconsistencies, and internal contradictions
that exist in EVERY THEORY (without a single exception). It's a
magnificent accomplishment by Bugliosi, in my opinion.
I've been interested in the JFK assassination since reading the first
book I ever owned on the subject, David Lifton's "Best
Evidence" (1980), which is a pro-conspiracy book that Mr. Bugliosi so
thoroughly demolishes in Chapter 21 of "Reclaiming History" that it
will make everyone wonder how on this Earth Lifton's book ever made it
to the New York Times Best Sellers list.
In any event, during those many years since perusing Lifton's nonsense-
filled tome, I've amassed a pretty decent amount of knowledge with
respect to the events of November 22nd, 1963.
But even with a fairly vast amount of information stored up in my
memory about the case, I still learned many additional details
pertaining to that tragic day in Dallas by reading "Reclaiming
History". One example being Vincent's "discovery" of a second soft-
drink machine within the Book Depository (see pages 957 and 958 for
details; and also check out the official Warren Commission "Document"
designated "CD496; Photo #7" for proof-positive of the existence of
this long-overlooked Dr. Pepper machine).
"Reclaiming History" could almost be considered more of a "John F.
Kennedy Assassination Encyclopedia", rather than a mere JFK "book".
The heft and all-encompassing scope of this tome are certainly
"encyclopedic" in nature, to be sure.
For years to come, these individual chapters are bound to serve as
useful reference material for researchers regarding specific sub-
topics within the vast landscape of the JFK case. Hence, some
redundancy can be found throughout the book's text. But, in my
opinion, it's required repetition.
Vincent's extensive and far-reaching knowledge of this whole case,
coupled with his rational mind and logical way of evaluating evidence,
is pretty much akin to turning a kid loose in a candy store.
I get the sense that VB is having a ball as he works his way from one
unsupportable conspiracy theory to the next in the second half of this
book, thoroughly reducing each and every theory to a pile of dust. And
in most instances, even the dust doesn't stand a chance, as Vince
blows that away as well.
When conspiracists go about the formidable task of attempting to
dismantle Mr. Bugliosi's 21 years' worth of lone assassin-favoring
research, I get the feeling that those "CTers" will, in essence, be
trying to put out the Great Chicago Fire with a Dixie cup full of hot
water. Such meager conspiracy-rescuing attempts won't be of much use
at all.
Bugliosi began writing this book shortly after he successfully
"prosecuted" President Kennedy's accused murderer during a 21-hour
televised "Docu-Trial" produced in 1986 for the Showtime cable-TV
network, "On Trial: Lee Harvey Oswald".*
* = The webpage linked below features many interesting verbatim text
excerpts from the "mock" LHO trial, including almost every single word
of Mr. Bugliosi's "final summation" to the jury:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/b3a8181c73cfa095
The Showtime Docu-Trial featured a real judge, a real jury from
Dallas, two real lawyers battling it out in court (Bugliosi vs. famed
defense attorney Gerry Spence), and real assassination-related
witnesses as well, including Ruth Paine, Wesley Frazier, Marrion
Baker, Cyril Wecht, Johnny Brewer, Charles Brehm, and many others.
Bugliosi believes that the '86 Docu-Trial is "the closest thing to a
trial that Lee Harvey Oswald ever had or will have" (a VB quote from
late 2005).
For me personally, another extraordinarily-informative and
entertaining part of "Reclaiming History" is when author Bugliosi puts
on display his amazing ability to (as the publisher [W.W. Norton]
phrased it) "draw startling inferences" from certain facts surrounding
the JFK case. I like to refer to these types of VB inferences as "Why
Didn't I Think Of That?" moments. And Vince does this many times
throughout the book, too (some examples provided below in my chapter-
by-chapter analysis).
I'm a bit disappointed by the overall minimal number of photographs
that appear in this massive book (there are two "slick" sections of
pictures in the book, totalling 32 pages; and Vince has also included
6 extra pages of charts and diagrams as well, placed on unnumbered
pages).
The JFK assassination was the most-photographed murder in history, and
many hundreds of pictures were taken which would succeed, all by
themselves, in telling a rich photographic tale. And I would have
liked to have seen Vince augment his text here with more of the wealth
of pictures that exist surrounding those four dramatic days in
November 1963. Especially considering the author's boast about
"Reclaiming History" being the "book for the ages" on the JFK case.
Although, to be fair to the author, I'm guessing that Vince probably
didn't want to add still more girth to this heavy 6-pound volume; and
filling up the book with pictures would obviously have tacked on many
additional pages.
Another factor that might have kept the number of photos to a minimum
is the very thin paper that has been used for these pages (the thin
paper obviously also helping to minimize the volume's size).
I'm not an expert on such matters, but I'm guessing that printing
photographs on extremely-thin paper stock is not a very good idea. And
there are no assassination photos printed on any of the regular
(numbered) pages within this stout publication. That's a shame, in my
opinion. But it is understandable I guess, given all factors combined.
I do agree with Vincent, though, about this being a "book for the
ages" on the assassination. But some more photographs within this tome
would have, indeed, been nice, too. Although, the 32 pages of pictures
and illustrations that are supplied offer up a few rarely-seen
snapshots.
=====================================================
UP NEXT.......
"RECLAIMING HISTORY" CHAPTER-BY-CHAPTER HIGHLIGHTS AND VERBATIM
VINCENT BUGLIOSI QUOTES AND EXCERPTS (with some of my comments
inserted as well, denoted by a "DVP" reference; some related weblinks
have been included in various spots too).
I'd like to think of these excerpts as a kind of "The Best Of The
Best" when it comes to Vince Bugliosi's impressive literary
achievement known as "Reclaiming History":
FROM THE 36-PAGE "INTRODUCTION":
"I can assure the conspiracy theorists who have very effectively
savaged {Gerald} Posner in their books that they're going to have a
much, much more difficult time with me. As a trial lawyer in front of
a jury and an author of true-crime books, credibility has always meant
everything to me. My only master and my only mistress are the facts
and objectivity. I have no others." -- VB
-------------------
"The conspiracy community regularly seizes on one slip of the tongue,
misunderstanding, or slight discrepancy to defeat twenty pieces of
solid evidence; accepts one witness of theirs, even if he or she is a
provable nut, as being far more credible than ten normal witnesses on
the other side; treats rumors, even questions, as the equivalent of
proof; leaps from the most minuscule of discoveries to the grandest of
conclusions; and insists that the failure to explain everything
perfectly negates all that is explained." -- VB
-------------------
"Waiting for the conspiracy theorists to tell the truth is a little
like leaving the front-porch light on for Jimmy Hoffa." -- VB
DVP: Vincent's brand of humor has always been a favorite of mine (in
every Bugliosi book I've ever read). And I'm very glad to see that
that humor is alive and well in "Reclaiming History" too, with the
above jab at "CTers" being the first of many such witty remarks
interjected by the author during his non-stop assault on the
conspiracy theorists. That Hoffa one was a real goodie too. ;)
-------------------
"When one removes the Dictabelt "fourth shot" from the HSCA findings,
all that is really left is the HSCA's conclusion that Oswald killed
Kennedy, and the fact that the committee found no evidence of any
person or group having conspired with Oswald, the identical findings
of the Warren Commission." -- VB
-------------------
"The Warren Commission critics and conspiracy theorists have succeeded
in transforming a case very simple and obvious at its core--Oswald
killed Kennedy and acted alone--into its present form of the most
complex murder case, BY FAR, in world history.
"Refusing to accept the plain truth, and dedicating their existence
for over forty years to convincing the American public of the truth of
their own charges, the critics have journeyed to the outer margins of
their imaginations. Along the way, they have split hairs and then
proceeded to split the split hairs, drawn far-fetched and wholly
unreasonable inferences from known facts, and literally invented bogus
facts from the grist of rumor and speculation.
"With over 18,000 pages of small print in the 27 Warren Commission
volumes alone, and many millions of pages of FBI and CIA documents,
any researcher worth his salt can find a sentence here or there to
support any ludicrous conspiracy theory he might have. And that, of
course, is precisely what the conspiracy community has done." -- VB
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/27fe9802262b8672
-------------------
"And, of course, we know that humans, for whatever reason, love
mysteries (which, to most, the JFK assassination has become), whether
fictional or real, more than they do open-and-shut cases. For example,
who killed JR?" -- VB
DVP: Oops. It seems that perhaps Vince isn't an avid fan of the TV
series "Dallas". He thinks J.R. Ewing was "killed" by Kristin's
bullets in March 1980. (J.R. was only wounded, of course; he wasn't
shot dead.)
Vince should have said "Who shot JR?" above (instead of saying
"killed"). That's one of only a handful of minor mistakes I found in
"Reclaiming History", so I'm quite satisfied with the book's overall
accuracy. (Conspiracy theorists will no doubt disagree with me on that
point, however. No surprise there, though, huh?)
-------------------
"I am unaware of any other major event in world history which has been
shrouded in so much intentional misinformation as has the
assassination of JFK. Nor am I aware of any event that has given rise
to such an extraordinarily large number of far-fetched and conflicting
theories." -- VB
-------------------
"In my opinion, the Warren Commission's investigation has to be
considered the most comprehensive investigation of a crime in history.
Even leading Warren Commission critic Harold Weisberg acknowledges
that the Commission "checked into almost every breath [Oswald] drew"."
-- VB
DVP: Mr. Bugliosi also points out in this extensive "Introduction" to
the book that the 888-page Warren Report volume contains a "131-page
chapter (by far the longest chapter in the report) dealing exclusively
with the issue of conspiracy".
In addition, I was also glad to see Vince mention "the thirty-one-page
appendix XII to the report", in which "the Commission responds to 126
speculations and rumors, some dealing expressly with the allegation of
conspiracy, most dealing in one way or the other with the allegation".
To be perfectly technical, Vince has even slightly understated the
matter (but by just a couple of pages). The lengthy chapter of the
Warren Report entitled "Investigation Of Possible Conspiracy" actually
takes up 132 total pages (inclusively). While the "Rumors" appendix
Vince mentioned is actually 32 total pages in length.
This means, by pure percentages, that almost ONE-FIFTH of the entire
Warren Commission Report (18.5%) is devoted SOLELY to the topic of
possible conspiracy in the JFK case (164 of 888 pages). Most
conspiracy promoters either don't have any knowledge of this
impressive statistic, or they simply ignore it altogether.
-------------------
"Not the smallest speck of evidence has ever surfaced that any of the
conspiracy community's favorite groups (CIA, mob, etc.) was involved,
in any way, in the assassination. Not only the Warren Commission, but
the HSCA came to the same conclusion.
"But conspiracy theorists, as suspicious as a cat in a new home, find
occurrences and events everywhere that feed their suspicions and their
already strong predilection to believe that the official version is
wrong." -- VB
==============================
CHAPTER 1 (317 PAGES) -- "FOUR DAYS IN NOVEMBER":
DVP: This first chapter in the book is a spectacular one. It runs for
more than 300 riveting pages and includes a comprehensive narrative of
events, written in the present tense (for the most part). This
extensive and ultra-detailed chapter has a palpable "as it's
happening" feel to it.
The narrative proceeds chronologically, beginning at 6:30 AM (CST) on
the fateful morning of Friday, November 22, 1963, and continues
through those shocking "four days", culminating with JFK's funeral on
11/25/63.
Per the source notes on the CD-ROM, Mr. Bugliosi garnered much of the
detailed information for this chapter from Jim Bishop's excellent 1968
book "The Day Kennedy Was Shot", which contains practically a minute-
by-minute account of the last day of John Kennedy's life. William
Manchester's "The Death Of A President" (1967) was also a heavily-
relied-on source for this chapter's richly-textured material.
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/d5bfef3e64392e4d
The following section of this "Four Days" chapter is one I was
particularly intrigued by, as Vince tells the story of the chaotic and
confused scene at the assassination site, with NBC newsman Robert
MacNeil desperately searching for a ride to Parkland Hospital:
"Outside again, MacNeil rushes over to a policeman listening to the
radio on a motorcycle. [MacNeil:] "Was he hit?" [Policeman:] "Yeah.
Hit in the head. They're taking him to Parkland Hospital." ....
"MacNeil dashes out into the street, dodging the police cars whose
wailing sirens are pulling up from all directions, bouncing over
curbs, flowerbeds, and lawn. Not a taxi in sight. Traffic is beginning
to jam. He sprints across Dealey Plaza to Main Street and leaps out in
front of the first car that comes along. ....
"[MacNeil:] "This is a terrible emergency," he tells the driver. "The
president's been shot. I'll give you five dollars to take me to
Parkland Hospital." ....
"The driver, about thirty, not too swift, smiles and says, "Okay." The
car is filled with packages that look like cake boxes. "Yeah, I heard
something about that on the radio a couple of minutes ago," he
says. ....
"[MacNeil:] "Where's the radio?" [Driver:] "I put it in the
backseat." ....
"MacNeil grabs the little transistor and holds it out the window to
clear the antenna. They are already bogging down in the rapidly
jamming traffic. He begs the driver to speed, take risks, run red
lights, anything--MacNeil will pay the fines. All the police cars are
headed in the opposite direction, back toward the Texas School Book
Depository." -- VB; Page 49
------------------
"Officially, the president is logged into the hospital register at
12:38 p.m. as "No.24740, Kennedy, John F."" -- VB; Page 55
-------------------
"The oft-stated belief is that since the bubble top was plastic and
not bulletproof, it wouldn't have made any difference if it had been
used in Dealey Plaza. But that presupposes that Oswald would have shot
Kennedy if the bubble top was on the car, and we don't know that. The
limousine being a presidential one, he may have assumed the top was
bulletproof and therefore concluded that he could not shoot and kill
Kennedy." -- VB; Page 22 of Endnotes
DVP: This topic of the limo's bubbletop roof comes up in the following
discussion I had with a conspiracy theorist in late April 2007, where
I hint at the same thing VB hints at above:
"HAPPENSTANCE" OR "CONSPIRACY"?:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/5a5c5eddcc8290c7
-------------------
"Other than {conspiracy author Sylvia Meagher} and her colleagues'
insatiable passion for pointing out normal (not to them)
inconsistencies in the recollections of witnesses, nowhere does
Meagher tell her readers what the relevance of these inconsistencies
was.
"Was it her point that {Bonnie Ray} Williams was lying, that the
chicken eater was the assassin in the sniper's nest (who wasn't,
Meagher would assure us, Oswald), or Williams was not lying, but the
assassin in the sniper's nest was also eating chicken while he waited
to kill the president?
"I wish the theorists would tell us the relevance of the many
inconsistencies they cite in the Kennedy case instead of feeling that
the inconsistencies are an end in themselves and nothing else has to
be shown or argued." -- VB; Page 23 of Endnotes
-------------------
"Critics have questioned whether Howard Brennan was really the source
of {Dallas Police Inspector J. Herbert} Sawyer's detailed description
{of the TSBD assassin} and the dispatcher's subsequent broadcast. ....
The affidavit that Brennan gave at the sheriff's office within an hour
of the shooting includes {a} description of the gunman...nearly
identical in language to Sawyer's {12:44 P.M.} broadcast. .... There
can be little doubt Brennan was, in fact, the source." -- VB; Pages
35-36 of Endnotes
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/a83751f6ce319004
-------------------
"Hugh Aynesworth...covered the assassination story from ground zero
{and} said that he went out to {Lee Oswald's} rooming house right
after the police had searched Oswald's room on the afternoon of the
assassination and interviewed {housekeeper Earlene} Roberts in depth.
"She never said a word about any police car honking its horn outside
the rooming house around the time Oswald was there earlier in the
day."
"In fact, Aynesworth said he interviewed Roberts at least two more
times thereafter and she never said a word about the alleged incident.
{Jim} Ewell, he said, had also interviewed Roberts separately and she
never mentioned the incident to him either." -- VB; Page 40 of
Endnotes
DVP: It's also worth mentioning here, with respect to Earlene Roberts,
that Roberts told the Warren Commission that it wasn't all that
uncommon for a police car to stop in front of the Beckley Avenue
roominghouse and toot its horn. Roberts claimed that such an event had
occurred on other occasions prior to November 22, 1963.
So, the very fact that police cars had a pre-11/22/63 HABIT of
stopping in front of 1026 North Beckley and honking the car horn
should tell a reasonable person that even if a similar occurrence DID
take place on the day of the assassination, it probably wasn't any
kind of a CONSPIRATORIAL event. Instead, it can be considered a NORMAL
thing to have occurred at that location (assuming Roberts was being
truthful about the pre-November 22 horn-honking incidents).
-------------------
"{Jack} Tatum sees a man in a light tan-gray jacket start off in
Tatum's direction, hesitate at the rear of the police car, then step
back into the street and fire one more shot, right into the head of
the officer {J.D. Tippit} on the ground. .... [Mr. Bugliosi's
Footnote:] I asked Tatum at the {1986} London trial {"On Trial: Lee
Harvey Oswald"} if he got "a good look" at the man who shot Tippit and
whom he identified at the trial. "Very good look," Tatum responded. I
asked if there was "any question in your mind" that the man was
Oswald. "None whatsoever," he answered. (Transcript of "On Trial",
July 23, 1986, p.200)" -- VB; Page 79
DVP: The above book passage turned out to be a surprising revelation
for this writer, because I had no idea (until reading page 79 of this
book) that Jack Tatum had testified at the TV Docu-Trial in 1986. And
that's because my video copy of the 5.5-hour trial does not include
Tatum's testimony at all.
But, considering the fact that nearly 75% of that 21-hour mock trial
was not seen by the general public on television, it's not too
surprising to learn of some portions of the trial that I had
previously been unaware of.
-------------------
"The doors to the theater are slammed open as a wedge of officers
bursts into the sunlight {with suspected police killer Lee Harvey
Oswald in handcuffs}. .... The suspect complains that the handcuffs
are too tight. Detective Paul Bentley isn't too sympathetic, thinking
to himself that Oswald was in much better shape than Tippit was. He
reaches back and tightens the cuffs even more." -- VB; Pages 106-107
-------------------
"{Dallas medical examiner Earl} Rose sees the casket bearing the
president's body being pushed out of Trauma Room One, Mrs. Kennedy at
its side. .... A crush of forty sweating men are clustered around the
wide doorway as curses fly back and forth. One of them looks like he
might belt the medical examiner at any moment. .... "In a homicide
case, it's my duty to order an autopsy," {Theron} Ward says. .... Ken
O'Donnell pleads with him, "Can't you make an exception for President
Kennedy?" Incredibly, Ward tells him, "It's just another homicide case
as far as I'm concerned." O'Donnell's response is instantaneous. "Go
fuck yourself," he yells. "We're leaving!"" -- VB; Page 110
-------------------
"[Quoting LBJ:] "We'll get as many people in here as possible. If
anybody wants to join in the swearing-in ceremony, I would be happy
and proud to have you." .... UPI reporter Merriman Smith wedges
himself inside the door, and for some reason begins counting. There
are twenty-seven people in the room." -- VB; Page 117
------------------
"The unmarked squad car pulls up in front of the rooming house on
North Beckley in Oak Cliff and four men, armed with a search warrant,
climb out. .... Over the next hour and a quarter, they nearly strip
the room {that Lee Harvey Oswald rented under the alias "O.H. Lee"},
using the pillow cases and one of Oswald's own duffle bags to carry
everything to the waiting patrol cars. Only a banana peel and some
uneaten fruit are left behind when they leave just after 6:00 p.m." --
VB; Pages 135-136
------------------
"The doorbell rings {at Ruth Paine's home in Irving at 9:40 PM on
11/22/63} and two men from LIFE magazine appear unannounced. ....
Marguerite {Oswald} is fuming...because she's beginning to realize
that LIFE magazine is going to do a "life story" segment and she wants
to be paid. In her paranoid mind, Marguerite is beginning to suspect
that Ruth Paine invited LIFE magazine to come over and that she and
Marina, while speaking in Russian, have conspired to sell Lee's life
story without her." -- VB; Page 168
DVP: The above passage had me laughing aloud. I think Vince has
probably hit the nail on the head here too. Marguerite Oswald was a
strange and rare bird, to say the least.
The above speculation by VB re. the LIFE magazine thing puts me in
mind of another classic "Marguerite Moment" -- her spectacularly-
ludicrous (although tearful) "cemetery declaration" about her recently-
murdered son, Lee Harvey. Mrs. Oswald actually said this to the
rolling cameras and reporters at the cemetery:
"Lee Harvey Oswald, my son, even after his death, has done more for
his country than any other living human being." -- Marguerite Oswald
(I'll understand if any readers need to take a five-minute laugh break
after having read the above verbatim quote from the lips of
Marguerite.)
By the way, the remainder of page 168, and also page 169, of this book
are also quite intriguing, as they reveal additional details I had
never heard before regarding the visit of the LIFE magazine reporters
to Ruth Paine's home on the evening of November 22, 1963. Marguerite
evidently put on quite a show that night at the Paine residence. Go to
pages 168 and 169 to read the rest.
------------------
"He {Jack Ruby} called his sister Eileen, in Chicago {on Friday
afternoon, 11/22/63}, and was crying. .... "Maybe I will fly up to be
with you tonight," he suggested, but she reminded him that Eva
{another sister of Jack's}, who had just returned home from the
hospital from abdominal surgery, needed him now more than she did.
"You better stay there," she told her brother." -- VB; Page 172
DVP: Now, the above conversation between Lee Harvey Oswald's eventual
murderer, Jack Ruby, and Ruby's sister is quite illuminating (in a
"non-conspiratorial" sort of way). Because if Jack Ruby had been a
"hit man" for the Mob (or whoever) and had been assigned to "rub out"
Oswald (as many people firmly believe was the case), then why is he
offering to fly to Chicago on the night of the assassination to be
with his sister? It doesn't add up.
And, per page 172 of VB's book, Ruby might very well have gone to
Chicago too, if his sister, over the phone, had not persuaded him not
to make the trip.
------------------
DVP: Vincent Bugliosi's incredible attention to the smallest of
seemingly-unknowable details concerning the events of November 22-25,
1963, borders on the supernatural.* Such microscopic details are
utterly fascinating to me. Here's one such example, among literally
hundreds sprinkled throughout this publication:
"On an impulse he {Jack Ruby, at around 10:15 PM on November 22} stops
at Phil's Delicatessen on Oak Lawn Avenue and tells the counterman,
John Frickstad, to cut him ten corned beef sandwiches with mustard.
And ten soft drinks--eight black cherries and two celery tonics. He
chats a bit with the owner, Phil Miller. .... The sandwich bill only
comes to $9.50 plus tax--Frickstad made only eight sandwiches instead
of the ten Jack ordered." -- VB; Pages 174-175
* = Upon doing a little additional research of my own regarding Ruby's
purchase of the sandwiches and drinks on the night of November 22, I
discovered (by way of Mr. Bugliosi's ultra-complete source notes on
the CD-ROM that comes with this book) that Vince obtained the detailed
information about the type of sandwiches and exact flavors of the cold
drinks from Warren Commission Exhibit #2252, which is linked below.
CE2252 also gives additional information re. Ruby's late-night deli
order that VB doesn't have in the book. Quoting from CE2252: "He
{Ruby} also ordered three cups of butter, one-half loaf of bread, and
some extra pickles. Potato salad and pickles were provided with each
sandwich".
That is just one of many examples of the thoroughness of the Warren
Commission's investigation (and, of course, exemplifies the
comprehensive nature of Mr. Bugliosi's research for this book as
well). ....
http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh25/html/WC_Vol25_0103b.htm
------------------
"Conspiracy theorists, eager to find an extra fourth bullet...and
hence a conspiracy, got very excited when they learned that the
receipt for the two fragments turned over to FBI agents Sibert and
O'Neill on November 22, 1963, and signed by the two agents, refers to
a "receipt of a missle [sic]."
"But the HSCA concluded that "the receipt was in error." Chester H.
Boyers, the navy corpsman who typed the receipt, gave HSCA
investigators an affidavit under penalty of perjury that contained his
handwritten notes at the time of the autopsy, in which he jotted down
during the autopsy that "there were bullet missile FRAGMENTS
recovered."
"Both Agents Sibert and O'Neill confirmed to the HSCA that they
received two bullet fragments, not a missile." -- VB; Pages 76-77 of
Endnotes
------------------
"The Dallas police have done an incredible, some would even say a near-
impossible job over just the last eleven and a half hours. In that
short span since the president's murder, they have apprehended the man
they believe is responsible, and amassed evidence against him that is
destined to withstand years of intense scrutiny.
"Despite the thousands of government man-hours yet to come, the basis
of the case against Oswald is collected and assembled by the Dallas
police in these first crucial hours. It is a feat the world would soon
forget." -- VB; Page 182
------------------
"11:05 a.m. {Sunday, November 24}...Altogether, there are around 70
members of the Dallas Police Department in the basement {of the Dallas
City Jail} to make sure there are no problems." -- VB; Page 265
------------------
"11:10 a.m. {Sunday, November 24}...Fritz realizes that Oswald is only
clad in a T-shirt. "Do you want something to put over your T-shirt?"
he asks. "Yes," Oswald says." -- VB; Page 267
DVP: An interesting quote by DPD Captain Will Fritz there. I had
always thought it was Oswald who had asked for the additional
clothing, thus delaying his jail transfer just a little longer. But,
evidently, per Mr. Bugliosi's chronology of quotes above, it was
actually Captain Fritz who initiated the slight "clothing delay".*
Well, perhaps that will be something else for conspiracy theorists to
sink their teeth into....as they can now claim (if they haven't
already) that Captain Fritz deliberately delayed Oswald's transfer
until "hit man" Ruby got into position in the basement.
But to think that 30-year police veteran J. Will Fritz was a part of
some kind of conspiracy to "silence" his prisoner is to believe in a
silly fairy tale that would have had Fritz intentionally subjecting
his very own police department to public ridicule for years to come,
due to a Presidential assassin being killed right inside the Captain's
own police station while surrounded by dozens of armed officers.
That's a theory that doesn't sound very realistic to this writer.
* = On page 1073, Vince tells the flip-side to this clothing tale,
with Oswald being the one who requests the wardrobe adjustment,
instead of Fritz. In an endnote, however, Bugliosi acknowledges the
ambiguity of the situation with the following remarks:
"The recollections of those present are in conflict as to whether
Oswald was asked if he wanted to put something on over his T-shirt or
whether Oswald himself made the request." -- VB; Page 104 of Endnotes
------------------
"11:21 a.m. {Sunday, November 24}..."BANG! The shot {from Jack Ruby's
Colt revolver into Lee Harvey Oswald's abdomen} reverberates through
the basement garage. .... The Ike Pappas tape recording is available
at the National Archives and reveals that the shot was fired 1 minute
and 58 seconds after Oswald left the third-floor Homicide and Robbery
office." -- VB; Page 273
------------------
"Are we just left with conjecture to reach a conclusion on the issue
of how Ruby entered the police basement? No, there is evidence, common
sense, and Ruby's knowledge of events that prove he entered through
the Main Street ramp. ....
"The virtual proof that Ruby came down the Main Street ramp is that
within a half hour of his arrest, and right after he was taken from
the basement to the jail on the fifth floor (which was long BEFORE
{DPD officers} Pierce, Putnam, Vaughn, and Maxey had been interviewed
and given their statements), Ruby told Dallas police detective Barnard
Clardy and other detectives that he had entered through the Main
Street ramp and had seen Pierce driving out of the ramp.
"How could Ruby possibly have known this if he hadn't, in fact, been
at the entrance to the Main Street ramp? I mean, Pierce himself didn't
even receive instructions to drive out of the Main Street ramp until
around 11:15 a.m., just six minutes before Ruby shot Oswald." -- VB;
Pages 108-109 of Endnotes
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/77edb3f67ec3350a
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/e0230f9473550a56
------------------
"Approaching midnight {on Monday night, November 25th}, Bobby Kennedy,
alone with Jacqueline on the second floor of the White House, says
quietly, "Should we go visit our friend?" .... They arrive at the
cemetery at 11:53 p.m. in their black Mercury. .... The attorney
general and former First Lady drop to their knees and pray
silently. .... Together, they turn and walk down into darkness and
into lives that would never be the same." -- VB; Pages 313-314
------------------
DVP: Before I move on to Chapter 2, I'd like to add a semi-related
footnote to this top-notch "Four Days" chapter of VB's book by putting
in a plug for another production titled "Four Days In November", that
production being the 1964 motion picture which features the exact same
title as this first chapter of Mr. Bugliosi's book.
In fact, I was somewhat expecting Vince to use portions of that
exquisite "Four Days" documentary film (which is an excellent
chronicle of the events surrounding JFK's death) as reference material
throughout his book, but the film isn't mentioned at all in VB's book.
That Academy Award-nominated movie, which is generally based on the
Warren Report (which, of course, is one of the biggest reasons it's so
darn good), could have been used by Vincent to cite various quotes
from witnesses, including unique references to Johnny Brewer, Wesley
Frazier, Linnie Mae Randle, Earlene Roberts, and William Whaley. Each
of those witnesses provided information and direct quotes during the
movie's intriguing "re-created" scenes.
None of the above witnesses said anything in the movie that could be
considered a 'bombshell' or something strikingly different from their
WC testimony, but their individual statements made on film could have
been cited by Vince as an extra source of information to back up
certain lone-assassin-leaning assertions.
One good example: The scene where cab driver Whaley says in the film
that he positively dropped Oswald off at "Neely and North
Beckley" (instead of "Neches") on the day of the assassination. In
earlier statements, Whaley was confused about the street names, as he
mixed up the two similar-sounding streets, Neely and Neches.
In any event, even though the 1964 documentary feature film "Four Days
In November" isn't referred to in "Reclaiming History", I'd still
recommend it very highly to people who want to take a two-hour visual
tour of the sad events of November 1963. Much more information
concerning that film can be accessed by clicking the link below:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.video/msg/5093634b419405d5
==============================
CHAPTER 2 (62 PAGES) -- "THE INVESTIGATIONS":
"The {Warren} Commission {quoting Arlen Specter}..."chose men of
outstanding reputation, like Joe Ball of California, a leader of the
California bar for many years...Similar selections were made...from
New York and Chicago and Des Moines and New Orleans and Philadelphia
and Washington, so that every conceivable pain was taken to select
people who were totally independent, WHICH IS HARDLY THE WAY YOU SET
OUT TO ORGANIZE A TRUTH-CONCEALING COMMISSION"." [Bugliosi's
emphasis.] -- VB; Page 342
DVP: I couldn't agree more, Vince. And another thing that goes to this
issue of Commission credibility is the fact that the WC decided, at
great cost*, to publish the WC's 26 volumes of supporting testimony
and exhibits for the public to scrutinize.
And if Earl Warren's Commission had been engaged in a "cover-up"
mission of some sort from Day 1, why on Earth would they have endorsed
the release of those 26 volumes? Did the Commission WANT to be called
liars and conspirators by the public in future generations?
The notion that the Warren Commission participated in one big "lie"
with respect to its work in 1963 and 1964, but then just went ahead
and published 26 volumes of material that they certainly didn't have
to publish, is just simply ridiculous.
* = Per VB's book (page 356): "The cost of printing the {Warren}
report and the first 1,500 copies of its 26 volumes eventually came to
$608,000."
-------------------
"The conspiracy theorists have converted Katzenbach's and Warren's
desire to squelch RUMORS that had no basis in fact into Katzenbach's
and Warren's desire to suppress the FACTS of the assassination.
"But how could Katzenbach and Warren have known way back then that
they had to spell out that ONLY false rumors, rumors without a stitch
of evidence to support them, had to be squelched for the benefit of
the American public?
"How could they have known back then that there would actually be
people like Mark Lane who would accuse men like Warren, Gerald Ford,
John Cooper, and so on...of getting in a room and all deciding to
deliberately suppress, or not even look for, evidence of a conspiracy
to murder the president...or that there would be intelligent,
rational, and sensible people of the considerable stature of Michael
Beschloss and Evan Thomas who would decide to give their good minds a
rest and actually buy into this nonsense?" -- VB; Pages 367-368
-------------------
"Did {Earl} Warren subsequently order the sealing of great numbers of
Warren Commission documents? Not only didn't he do so, but instead he
and his Commission encouraged the release of all the records to the
American people. ....
"No special handling of Warren Commission documents was invoked to
keep the truth about the assassination from the public. The records
were sealed {for a mandatory 75 years} under a general {National
Archives} policy that applied to all federal investigations by the
executive branch of government. ....
"The belief that any alleged conspirators who plotted Kennedy's
assassination would commit to paper anything that expressly,
obliquely, or in any other way referred to the murderous plot is
ridiculous on its face. ....
"If that were the case, these people would simply destroy these
documents, not leave them in any file. If they were immoral enough to
murder Kennedy, or do whatever they could to cover up for those who
did, surely they would eliminate an incriminating document. ....
"Three things are very clear: First, after an unprecedented and
historic four-year scavenger hunt by the ARRB for all documents
"reasonably related" to the assassination, no smoking gun or even a
smoldering ember of conspiracy was found. The reason is that no such
smoking gun or ember ever existed.
"Second, if it did exist, it would never have been left in any file
for discovery. And finally, assassination researchers and conspiracy
theorists will never be satisfied, not even when the cows come home."
-- VB; Pages 134-137, 140, and 149 of Endnotes
-------------------
"Apart from all the elegant and esoteric mathematical computations
that {HSCA acoustic expert James} Barger and his associates used,
simple common sense tells us that the open mike was not, as the HSCA
concluded, in Dealey Plaza at the time of the assassination. ....
"Clearly, {Police Officer H.B.} McLain could not have been the one
with an open microphone on his motorcycle, nor could anyone else in
the motorcade, since both amateur films {Hughes' and Dorman's} prove
that there were no other motorcycles at the location and time that the
acoustic evidence demanded. ....
"In the final analysis, the validity of the HSCA's acoustic evidence
collapses under the weight of its own requirements." -- VB; Pages 203
and 216-217 of Endnotes
==============================
CHAPTER 3 (68 PAGES) -- "PRESIDENT KENNEDY'S AUTOPSY AND THE GUNSHOT
WOUNDS TO KENNEDY AND GOVERNOR CONNALLY":
DVP: This chapter brings about a "closure" (of sorts) for me with
respect to the single biggest "question mark" that I personally have
had regarding the entire JFK case -- that being: How could so many
different witnesses claim to see a large hole in the BACK of President
Kennedy's head on 11/22/63 (at Parkland and at Bethesda)?
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/886319d63cf23021
I've scratched my head more than a few times when thinking about those
back-of-the-head wound witnesses. But at the same time, I have also
always realized that there is a bunch of evidence that totally
contradicts those witnesses (regardless of how many of them there
might be).
That contradictory evidence includes: The official autopsy report
(signed by three doctors), the autopsy photographs and X-rays, the
Zapruder Film, and the never-wavering testimony of all three autopsy
doctors (with each doctor agreeing that President Kennedy was hit by
only two bullets, with both of those bullets coming from "above and
behind" John F. Kennedy). And all of this evidence is also pointed out
numerous times by Vince Bugliosi in this chapter as well.
Vincent doesn't pull some magical rabbit out of a hat when he
discusses this often-heated controversy about the head wounds of the
late President. Instead, he relies on basic sound judgment and common
sense (like always) to try and figure out a reasonable answer for why
the many Parkland witnesses thought they saw what they said they saw.
And Vincent's primary explanation re. this matter is actually an
explanation offered up by someone else, HSCA Forensic Pathology Panel
member Michael Baden:
"Dr. Michael Baden has what I believe to be the answer, one whose
logic is solid. [Quoting Baden] "The head exit wound was not in the
parietal-occipital area, as the Parkland doctors said. They were
wrong," {Baden} told me. "Since the thick growth of hair on Kennedy's
head hadn't been shaved at Parkland, there's no way for the doctors to
have seen the margins of the wound in the skin of the scalp. All they
saw was blood and brain tissue adhering to the hair. And that may have
been mostly in the occipital area because he was lying on his back and
gravity would push his hair, blood, and brain tissue backward, so many
of them probably assumed the exit wound was in the back of the
head" [End Baden quote]." -- VB; Pages 407-408
DVP: The above explanation is one that I, too, have postulated as the
probable answer to this enduring "head wound" mystery over the years:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/06a93e60c9987e2b
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/aae44871116dc9e9
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/03e53e998792e202
One other point that I think is worthy of mentioning here is the fact
that (as far as I'm aware) there wasn't a single witness at Parkland
or Bethesda who claimed to have seen TWO large wounds of exit in JFK's
head on 11/22/63.
This fact would certainly suggest that there was, indeed, only ONE
large wound in Kennedy's head, and that wound was located, per the
autopsy and the authenticated autopsy photographs, "chiefly
parietal" (i.e., the side and top of the head). .....
http://www.jfklancer.com/photos/autopsy_slideshow/images/AUT10_HI.jpg
http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/skull3.gif
-------------------
DVP: On page #410, VB provides some additional strength to the "No
Exit Wound In The Back Of JFK's Head" rope, when he says:
"Lest anyone still has any doubt as to the location of the large exit
wound in the head...the Zapruder film itself couldn't possibly provide
better demonstrative evidence. The film proves conclusively, and
beyond all doubt, where the exit wound was.
"Zapruder frame 313 and frame 328 clearly show that the large, gaping
exit wound was to the RIGHT FRONT of the president's head. THE BACK OF
HIS HEAD SHOWS NO SUCH LARGE WOUND AND CLEARLY IS COMPLETELY
INTACT." [Bugliosi's emphasis.] -- VB; Page 410
-------------------
"A popular theory in the conspiracy community is that the reason why a
particular autopsy photo of the back of the president's head shows no
large defect is that one of the autopsy doctors, before the photo was
taken, took the flap of scalp that had come loose on the right side of
the president's head and pulled it all the way backward to cover and
hide the large defect, thereby making the back of his head look
normal.
"I will not devote one word to responding to this insanity. But I WILL
ask the zany conspiracists, Who was present in the presidential
limousine after the president was shot to pull the flap back and make
the back of the president's head look undamaged in the Zapruder film?"
-- VB; Page 249 of Endnotes
DVP: I, too, would like to know the answer to that question that Vince
asked. Naturally, the conspiracists cannot answer it (without making
fools of themselves at any rate), because the back side of JFK's head
is intact, per Mr. Zapruder's motion picture just after the head shot,
and the large, gaping exit wound is located just where the autopsy
report and the autopsists said it was (i.e., to the right-front of the
head, above the right ear)....as is fully demonstrated by way of this
Z-Film still frame:
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/z335.jpg
-------------------
DVP: In the endnotes located on the CD-ROM included at the back of the
book, Bugliosi goes into additional detail with respect to the precise
location of the exit wound in JFK's head:
"On the issue of the locus of the head exit wound, perhaps the most
overlooked piece of medical and scientific evidence in books on the
assassination that proves the exit wound was in the right front of the
president's head is the fact that of the three fragments of the skull
found inside the presidential limousine, the HSCA forensic pathology
panel said that autopsy X-rays show that the largest one, triangular
in shape, contained "a portion of the right coronal
suture." {i.e.:}...The juncture between the parietal (side and top)
and frontal bone.
"Although the bullet fragmented upon striking bone in the president's
head, the HSCA concluded that the main part of the bullet literally
exited along the coronal suture line to the right front of the
president's head.
"Dr. Michael Baden {of the HSCA's pathology panel} told me, "The
autopsy photographs clearly show that the semicircular defect was half
of a bullet wound with an exit beveling, and this caused most of the
damage to Kennedy's parietal and frontal bones" (Telephone interview
of Dr. Michael Baden by {Vincent Bugliosi} on January 8, 2000)." ....
"The fact that the largest fragment found of the president's skull was
along the coronal suture, that this triangular fragment was one of
three that, in the aggregate, lined up, on reconstruction, with the
large defect to the right front of the president's skull, and that
this large fragment of bone was beveled on its outer surface, rather
than its inner surface, provide conclusive evidence of an exiting
bullet to the right front of the president's head." -- VB; Pages
235-236 of Endnotes
-------------------
"The "Harper fragment," was discovered around 5:30 p.m. on November
23, 1963, by Billy A. Harper. .... Dr. {J. Lawrence} Angel...declared
the Harper fragment to be "clearly parietal bone" that had come from
"roughly the middle of the right parietal" area (i.e., above the right
ear)." -- VB; Pages 236-237 of Endnotes
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/harper.htm
-------------------
DVP: On the subject of the entrance wound in President Kennedy's head,
we find this convincing passage:
"What this means is that...SEVENTEEN PATHOLOGISTS, even Dr. {Cyril}
Wecht, ALL agreed that the wound to the back of the president's head
was an entrance wound." -- VB; Pages 394-395
-------------------
DVP: With respect to the controversial bullet hole in the front of
JFK's throat (a wound that so many conspiracists seem to think was
positively an entry wound), Vince B. offers up this logical and
perfectly-sensible observation:
"Common sense tells us that seeing only the wound to the front of the
president's neck {and not seeing the corresponding entry wound in
Kennedy's back at any time}, the Parkland doctors would instinctively
have been more inclined to think of it as an entrance wound. Almost
anyone would be so predisposed." -- VB; Page 414
-------------------
"Though conspiracy theorists are almost unanimous in believing that
the president was shot from the front and his throat wound was an
entrance wound, they are strangely silent as to what happened to this
bullet after it entered the president's throat. .... It would be
virtually impossible for a bullet entering the soft tissue of the neck
at a speed of 2,000 feet per second to stop inside the neck and not
exit the body." -- VB; Page 416
DVP: Gee, that excellent argument sounds very familiar.....
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/6951e9702addec2c
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/bed05a055b2f4133
-------------------
"Perhaps the clearest visual evidence of the fact that the entrance
wound in the {President's} back was definitely above the exit wound in
the throat appears in one of {the} autopsy photos taken of the left
side of the president's head as he is lying on his back, his head on a
metal headrest.
[Here's the photo Mr. Bugliosi is referring to, turned sideways for
better orientation:]
http://www.jfklancer.com/photos/autopsy_slideshow/images/jfk_zeroang.jpg
"Only the wound to the throat is visible, not the wound to his upper
right back. However, it couldn't be clearer from this photo that the
wound to the back was definitely ABOVE the exit wound in the throat."
-- VB; Page 424
DVP: Another "deja vu moment":
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/d1d7ea222703d800
Note -- To be perfectly fair and honest here, I feel I must point out
an apparent inconsistency in this book with respect to the locations
of President Kennedy's back and neck wounds. Just one page prior to
the quote I cited above, Mr. Bugliosi seems to be arguing in favor of
the HSCA's conclusion (which I vehemently disagree with), which is a
conclusion that has JFK's throat wound being higher (anatomically)
than the upper-back wound.
However, in Bugliosi's FINAL analysis re. this subject (on page 424),
he positively endorses a scenario in which the back wound is
"definitely ABOVE the exit wound in the throat" (VB's emphasis).
-------------------
DVP: To add further confusion to the matter concerning the "downward
vs. upward" flight path of the bullet through JFK's back and neck,
Vince offers this in an endnote:
"It would seem to be that by straightening Kennedy's body out into an
anatomic position, not only does the bullet track (which is always
downward) go upward anatomically, but since the entrance wound is a
part of that track, it too is now abraded upward.
"If that's not the answer, then the language in 7 HSCA 87 is simply
incorrect, which certainly would not be the first time for the HSCA.
Indeed, when I spoke to two members of the HSCA forensic pathology
panel about the language in 7 HSCA 87, their attempted explanations
were so incomprehensible and incoherent that they don't lend
themselves to repeating." -- VB; Page 255 of Endnotes
DVP: But I'll repeat my thoughts on this subject again -- I cannot
disagree more strongly with the HSCA's determination that JFK's throat
wound was "anatomically" higher than his back wound. And the reason I
disagree so strongly is because the HSCA was so obviously wrong
concerning this matter. And the previously-linked autopsy photo proves
beyond all doubt that JFK's back wound was higher than the throat
wound (even when Kennedy is placed in a ramrod-straight posture).
-------------------
"A point that conspiracy theorists have raised over and over in their
books is that the entrance holes in the president's coat and shirt
were more than 2 inches lower in the back than the actual entrance
wound in his body. But even if there wasn't an explanation for this,
so what?
"Like virtually all criticisms by...conspiracy theorists, it doesn't
"go anywhere." The typical critic just points out the discrepancy and
then moves on. But the discrepancy would only mean something if one
were able to thereby conclude that the president was shot twice in the
back, once where we know the entrance wound in the back was, and once
below that where the holes in the coat and shirt were.
"But one can't conclude this because there is no evidence of a second
entrance wound to the president's back, and no evidence of any holes
to the back of the president's coat and shirt other than one to the
coat and one to the shirt." -- VB; Page 241 of Endnotes
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/3b0c2cd76e4bcfcb
-------------------
DVP: Among the many laughable theories that Vince systematically
destroys in this tome is Doug Horne's "Two Brains" hunk of idiocy. A
sampling:
"My God. RFK somehow finds out that Humes and Boswell, as part of an
apparent conspiracy to cover up the assassination of his brother, used
a brain other than his brother's to conduct their examination. So he
{RFK} goes out and finds, seizes, and then gets rid of his brother's
substitute brain {instead of taking the proper action to prosecute
these criminal autopsists to the fullest extent of the law}. Is there
any end to this silliness?" -- VB; Page 443
DVP: An obligatory "LOL" is required here. BTW, the "second brain"
that Horne thinks was examined by Humes and Co. was, per Horne, a
brain that was way too big to have been JFK's damaged brain.
So, just like all other crazy plots, evidently this "Double Brain"
charade was being carried out by total morons who couldn't even
simulate the size of Kennedy's real brain correctly. But, who's gonna
notice that, right? (Only Mr. Horne evidently.)
The goofball plotters who messed with JFK's brain must have been the
same ones who orchestrated the Jim Garrison/Oliver Stone-endorsed
theory that has several gunmen firing at President Kennedy in Dealey
Plaza within the PRE-ARRANGED context of a "Let's Frame Lee Oswald As
Our Lone Patsy" assassination scheme.
Speaking of brains...it appears perhaps that the "second brain" that
Horne thinks was substituted for JFK's probably belonged to one of
those conspirators that CTers seem to think existed in 1963. Because
I'm nearly positive somebody on that Conspiracy Team has lost theirs.
-------------------
"How would this "fake 6.5 mm {X-ray} object," as {Dr. David} Mantik
calls it, implicate Oswald? .... What possible advantage would the
conspirators have gained by forging the object onto the X-ray film?
The thought that they would risk getting caught doing this to
implicate Oswald in a case in which he and his rifle were ALREADY
OVERWHELMINGLY CONNECTED TO THE ASSASSINATION is irrational on its
face.
"One should add that if, indeed, Dr. Mantik's conspirators were
willing to do something so extremely risky and completely unnecessary
to frame Oswald, wouldn't they have found some way to bring it to the
attention of the FBI or Warren Commission in 1964?
"Instead, if Dr. Mantik is correct, we have to learn about the
sinister implications of the "cardboard artifact" for the first time
35 years later when he published his findings in the book
"Assassination Science"? Isn't this silly, again, on its face?" -- VB;
Page 222 of Endnotes
-------------------
"The single most important discovery, and one that establishes with
ABSOLUTE AND IRREFUTABLE CERTAINTY that the autopsy photographs have
not been altered, is the fact that many of the photographs, when
combined in pairs, produce stereoscopic images. ....
"The only way a forger can successfully alter a detailed stereoscopic
image...without detection is to alter both images IDENTICALLY, which
is, {photographic expert and HSCA panel member Frank} Scott said,
"essentially impossible." ....
"The entire photographic panel of the HSCA concluded that "the autopsy
photographs and X-rays were taken of President Kennedy at the time of
his autopsy and that they had not been altered in any manner." This
fact alone demolishes the conspiracy theorists' allegations that
photographic fakery was used to conceal the plot to kill the
president.
"It also destroys another prime conspiracy belief--that the eyewitness
descriptions of the president's wounds that were offered by the
Parkland Hospital doctors (and later by some eyewitnesses to the
autopsy) are proof that the autopsy photographs had been altered.
"Obviously, if the autopsy photographs are genuine and unaltered
(which all the experts agree), then eyewitness descriptions of the
president's wounds that contradict those photographs are not proof of
alteration, as some critics claim, but nothing more than examples of
understandable, mistaken recollections, or if not that, then
deliberate and outright falsehoods." -- VB; Pages 223-224 of Endnotes
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0a74025900f77968
-------------------
"For years conspiracy theorists have charged that the "missing"
autopsy photographs are, in their minds, one more indication of a
conspiracy in the assassination. .... But...with literally hundreds of
people from various official investigative agencies...examining and
working with the photos throughout the years, I not only don't find it
suspicious, I find it completely predictable that one or more
photographs ended up missing, misplaced, or expropriated by people
through whose hands they passed." -- VB; Page 275 of Endnotes
-------------------
"In addition to the allegedly missing or doctored photographs,
conspiracy theorists often refer to the missing "draft notes" that Dr.
Humes burned in his fireplace in the early morning hours of November
24 after he handwrote a draft of the autopsy report. Critics see this
act as highly suspicious, and consequently conspiracy books cite the
burning of the draft notes as evidence of some cover-up. ....
"It apparently has not entered the minds of the conspiracy
theorists...that since we're dealing with the same person, Humes, if
one believes that Humes was willing to lie on his autopsy report (his
draft notes reflecting the true and different situation), why wouldn't
he likewise have been willing to lie on his notes, thereby obviating
the need to destroy them?
"Did those behind the assassination come to Humes AFTER he wrote the
first draft and convince him, FOR THE FIRST TIME, to join the
conspiracy, he agreed, and then they told him what they wanted his
autopsy report to say? But what about Drs. Boswell and Finck? Did they
join the conspiracy too? Because if they didn't, how is it that their
conclusions just happened to coincide with Humes's new, conspiratorial
conclusion?" -- VB; Pages 276-277 of Endnotes
DVP: The above is yet another very good common-sense inference brought
forth by Mr. Bugliosi (among dozens of other such inferences sprinkled
throughout this book and CD-ROM).
Along similar lines, I can offer up another non-conspiratorial
inference with respect to the "Humes Burned His Notes" sub-topic,
detailed in the links below (along with some other comments about the
case and Dr. Humes).
Vince Bugliosi, by the way, also mentions the very same thing I talk
about below. I thought for a little while that VB wasn't going to make
that logical inference re. Humes' note-burning episode, but, yielding
to his implacable CS&L (Common Sense & Logic), I was pleased to see
Vince bring it up at the very end of the Humes-related endnote on page
280 of the CD. .....
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/470db330973c7717
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0bc05459437ae426
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/7d4034ff53074470
-------------------
DVP: Many conspiracy promoters love to cite the (false) notion that
the majority, or at least a large portion, of President Kennedy's
brain was "missing" at the time of the President's autopsy. But VB
dispels such nonsense in an endnote attached to Chapter 3 of the book:
"The answer is that the president's brain did NOT lose much brain
matter. .... As {Dr. Michael} Baden said in his {HSCA} testimony, the
{Ida Dox} diagram "represents extensive damage and injury to the right
top of the brain." Note the words "damage and injury" as opposed to
saying a large part of the brain was "missing." And, indeed, the
autopsy report says nothing about any significant part of the brain
being missing. ....
"{Baden said:} "Basically, the president's whole brain was still
there. The right hemisphere was severely damaged and torn, but less
than an ounce or two of his brain was actually missing from the
cranial cavity"." -- VB; Pages 283-284 of Endnotes
-------------------
DVP: VB's ability to process and logically present witness testimony
in a fair and balanced way (and in the proper order and CONTEXT) comes
to the forefront in the CD's endnotes when Vince totally demolishes
Dr. David Mantik's claim that Dr. Humes made an "astonishing
confession" during Humes' 1996 ARRB testimony.
Go to page 285 of the endnotes and watch Mr. Bugliosi systematically
wipe out Dr. Mantik's silly assertion with respect to Dr. Humes. It's
brilliant.
-------------------
DVP: If you want a rip-roaring laugh to lift your spirits, just go to
page 271 of this book's endnotes on the Compact Disc and check out the
hilarious set of fairy tales told by one Joe O'Donnell. That guy just
might rival Aesop in the "fable" department.
After reading the part where O'Donnell supposedly, himself, altered
the Zapruder Film at the REQUEST OF JACKIE KENNEDY, I thought I'd
never be able to stop the laughter. My sides still hurt from reading
about this O'Donnell kook.
==============================
CHAPTER 4 (63 PAGES) -- "THE MOST FAMOUS HOME MOVIE EVER, THE 'MAGIC
BULLET', AND THE SINGLE-BULLET THEORY":
DVP: Vincent Bugliosi's Single-Bullet Theory timeline has me puzzled a
little bit. I, myself, believe beyond all reasonable doubt that the
specific "SBT" point-of-impact Zapruder Film frame can be
established....and that frame is almost certainly Z224 (and not
"somewhere between Z frames 210 and 222", as Mr. Bugliosi says in his
book on page 463).
Although, VB says in an endnote on the CD-ROM (on page 25 of the
notes) that the SBT shot occurs "at Z223-Z224"; so I'm not quite sure
which exact Z-Film frame Vince totally endorses, if any.
Plus, on pages 325 to 327 of the CD's endnotes, Bugliosi acknowledges
the very real possibility (via Dr. John Lattimer's 1994 "lapel bulge"
tests) that a single bullet could have passed through both Kennedy and
Connally at Z224.
Vince actually mentions a three-frame range of Zapruder frames in this
"lapel" regard, which seems a little strange to me....but at least VB
admits the possibility of the bullet striking at the correct frame
(IMO) of Z224, when he says this on endnote page #325: "A bulging of
the right lapel of the governor's suit coat may pinpoint the moment
Governor Connally is hit to be at Z222-224".
Another oddity is that even though Vince supports a "Z223-Z224" and/or
a "Z222-Z224" SBT hit at various stages in the book's endnotes, in
other portions of the main text he also seems to be endorsing the
notion that Governor Connally was reacting to already having been hit
by a gunshot as early as Z222, which I totally disagree with.
I can't detect any such Connally "reaction" at Z222 at all. The first
firm "reaction" on Connally's behalf comes later, at Z225, just after
having been struck at Z224....again, that's in my own personal opinion
on the matter.
However, there's another indication in the book that VB advocates the
exact same frame for the SBT that I, too, endorse (Z224). That occurs
on page 40, when Vince says the second shot (the SBT shot) occurs "3.5
seconds" after the first shot which missed the limousine, a first shot
which, elsewhere in the book, VB says comes at Z-Film frame #160.*
And the only frame that is precisely "3.5" seconds after Z160 is Z224
(given the "round-off" mathematics that VB is utilizing on pages 40
and 41 and Mr. Zapruder's camera speed of 18.3 frames-per-second).
* = A "First-Shot Footnote" -- I completely agree with VB's "Z160
first shot" timing. However, I disagree with him on the exact scenario
of how bystander James Tague was wounded by this first bullet fired by
Lee Oswald on November 22.
Vince thinks the probability is high that the Z160 missed shot hit the
concrete on Elm Street and then the bullet (or a portion thereof) went
on to strike yet another hunk of street pavement over on Main Street,
which resulted in a bullet fragment or concrete fragment slightly
injuring Tague's cheek. (See page 471.)
I just cannot quite believe such a scenario myself. I think it's much
more likely that Oswald's first shot struck a portion of the nearby
oak tree, with the bullet then probably fragmenting (at least
partially), sending the majority of the lead portion of the bullet out
to Main Street, resulting in Tague's wounding, while the metal jacket
of the missile possibly struck the pavement on Elm near JFK's car,
resulting in the "sparks" that a few witnesses reported observing.
But, of course, realistically, the only thing that can be done with
respect to any "missed" shot is to simply guess about what happened,
since no physical bullet was recovered with regard to the shot that
missed the limousine's victims.
Another possibility concerning Tague's injury is that he was struck by
a fragment of the bullet that hit JFK in the head (shot #3 from
Oswald's rifle). I, however, don't like that theory much either, since
that bullet would have probably been pretty much spent and out of gas
by the time it travelled the many additional yards from the
President's car to Main Street to meet Tague.
Back to the subject of the SBT:
Many things begin to happen to Governor Connally beginning at Zapruder
frame #224 -- TOO many things, in my opinion, to believe that the SBT
bullet passed through both Connally and JFK at any other time.
Obviously, Vince is simply placing on the table ALL potential "SBT"
possibilities throughout his immense publication. I, however, would
have preferred more consistency in this book with regard to the timing
of the SBT bullet strike.
But Bugliosi evidently feels that the precise "impact" frame cannot be
definitively established on the Zapruder Film for the SBT shot. But I
believe it can be established on the film, via John Connally's sudden
"right shoulder drop" at exactly Z224. .....
http://216.122.129.112/dc/user_files/4594.gif
But even with a bit of ambiguity in his SBT timeline, at least Mr.
Bugliosi knows (as do I) that a "Single-Bullet Theory" Z-Film frame
DOES exist somewhere within Mr. Zapruder's 26-second home movie.
And I'm pleased to see that Vince doesn't endorse the notion that all
three bullets fired by Oswald hit a limo victim on 11/22/63, which is
an unusual lone-assassin theory that was postulated by author and
former LAPD detective Mark Fuhrman in his 2006 book "A Simple Act Of
Murder". .....
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/4c7616a35ac60e22
Fuhrman claims that the bullet that went through JFK's back and neck
somehow missed John Connally and then bounced out of the car. IMO,
that theory is silly. And VB thinks so too (see endnote on pages 298
and 299 of the CD).
To be fair to Mr. Fuhrman, however, the FBI's initial report on the
assassination (dated December 9, 1963) also came to the conclusion
that each of Oswald's bullets hit a victim. But when the shooting was
examined in more depth in the following months by the Warren
Commission, it became obvious that the FBI report was incorrect.
The FBI, though, certainly wasn't perfect when it came to some other
conclusions it reached in the early stages of its JFK murder
investigation either. Some further examples are provided below:
The exact moment when the controversial "SBT" shot struck John Kennedy
and John Connally has been debated for many, many years, of course.
Even the two major U.S. Government inquiries into the assassination
had differing views on this important matter, with the 1964 Warren
Commission offering up a 15-frame range of Zapruder Film frames when
they said the single bullet struck JFK and Connally (Z210 to Z225).
But the House Select Committee in 1977-1978 placed the SBT strike at
approximately Z190, which, by the way, is the timing that was
seemingly endorsed by Bugliosi at the TV Docu-Trial in which he served
as prosecutor in 1986; although I strongly suspect that the reason for
such a VB endorsement in '86 was due to the fact that Bugliosi's main
"SBT" witness/expert at the London mock trial (Cecil Kirk) was a
member of the HSCA panel, which itself endorsed the absurdly-early
Z190 SBT timeline.
So, as we can see from the pages of "Reclaiming History", Vincent T.
Bugliosi, in the intervening years, has gotten closer to the Z224 SBT
hit.
It turns out that I disagree (for the most part) with Vince with
respect to the exact timing of the Single-Bullet Theory, but certainly
not by very much; so I'm not inclined to call a "2-frame" difference
of opinion a major or all-important disagreement.
And, as I mentioned, there are references in this book that seem to
indicate VB's possible belief in a "Z223-Z224-Z225" SBT hit too (which
will no doubt have conspiracists attacking Bugliosi's credibility and
lack of consistency throughout the book on this "SBT timing" point,
which, indeed, appears to be warranted criticism when you read the
whole tome, plus the endnotes).
However, in my opinion, as stated previously, the most important point
is the fact that Vince Bugliosi supports the SBT, regardless of
exactly when on the Z-Film the SBT is occurring. And this SBT support
is due in large part to plain ol' common sense....because the sum
total of all the evidence in this case makes the Single-Bullet Theory
a virtual certainty.
Or, to use Vincent's own words (from page 482 of this book) -- "The
overwhelming evidence is that whenever Kennedy and Connally were hit,
or first reacted to being hit, they were both struck by the same
bullet." -- V. Bugliosi
(See the links below for more SBT talk.)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/bb22792c022c5a2e
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0b30398a449c05b7
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/fb001573e51658aa
-------------------
"The very fact that the Warren Commission, by its noncategorical
language ("very persuasive evidence"), did not unequivocally rule out
the possibility that Kennedy and Connally were struck by separate
bullets (in effect, not ruling out the possibility of a conspiracy) is
itself extremely powerful evidence that not only didn't the
Commission, or any portion thereof, set out to suppress the truth from
the American people, but that its conclusion of no evidence of a
conspiracy was not, as conspiracy theorists believe, a predetermined
conclusion." -- VB; Page 457
-------------------
"We can have all the confidence in the world, by an examination of the
physical evidence and the utilization of common sense, that {a single
bullet wounded both JFK and Governor Connally}. When you can establish
the single-bullet theory by reference to evidence other than the
{Zapruder} film, you necessarily know that the film itself cannot, by
definition, show something else. .... Since we KNOW Kennedy and
Connally were not hit by separate bullets, we know, before we even
look at the film, that it CANNOT show otherwise." -- VB; Pages 457-458
DVP: The above VB quote is brimming over with still more common sense
(with such common-sense observations flowing like water over Niagara
Falls from every page of this book).
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/7360799fec7f549d
A quote from my forum post linked above:
"Regardless of what exact Z-Film frame the SBT equates to, the point
is: There IS a Z-Frame (somewhere on that film) that DOES equate
perfectly to the "SBT". There is no way there's NOT such a Z-Frame
given the totality of the evidence with respect to the initial
wounding of both victims." -- DVP; May 23, 2005
-------------------
"In the final analysis, even if one were forced to rely only on the
Zapruder film, we have seen that from the film alone, there is strong
evidence of three, and ONLY three shots, fired during the
assassination. This is completely consistent with all the physical
evidence in the case, and flies in the face of over four decades of
allegations made by conspiracy theorists that the film contains
conclusive "proof" of two or more assassins." -- VB; Page 489
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/32668ce6dd515ced
-------------------
"With respect to the second shot fired in Dealey Plaza, the "single-
bullet THEORY" is an obvious misnomer. Though in its incipient stages
it was but a theory, the indisputable evidence is that it is now a
proven FACT, a wholly supported conclusion. .... And no sensible mind
that is also informed can plausibly make the case that the bullet that
struck President Kennedy in the upper right part of his back did not
go on to hit Governor Connally." -- VB; Pages 489-490
DVP: I couldn't agree more strongly with Mr. Bugliosi here. And I've
said so...many times:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/a7cf61c59d09bc05
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/d16a5df97cccb32c
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0b30398a449c05b7
-------------------
DVP: On the goofball issue of "Zapruder Film Alteration", Vince B. had
me actually physically applauding him after I read these common-sense
words:
"The conspiracy alterationists are so incredibly zany that they have
now gone beyond their allegation that key frames of the Zapruder film
were altered by the conspirators to support their false story of what
took place, to claiming that the conspirators altered all manner of
people and objects in Dealey Plaza that couldn't possibly have any
bearing on the president's murder. ....
"The alterationists have even claimed that at some point after the
assassination, all the curbside lampposts in Dealey Plaza were moved
to different locations and/or replaced with poles of different
height. .... I know that conspiracy theorists have a sweet tooth for
silliness, but is there absolutely nothing that is too silly for their
palate?" -- VB; Pages 506-507
For a few additional laughs re. the "Z-Film Hoax" nonsense, check out
the following weblinks:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/f6c0a6dec30e8ce1
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/e5f75aab67fa7b9e
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/102b3923010e8c71
-------------------
"The reality is that even today, it is highly doubtful that any of the
most modern technological advances available in film and photography
could do what the buffs said was done {to the Zapruder Film} over four
decades ago. It unquestionably could not have been done back
then. ....
"But all of this is irrelevant, since the NPIC {National Photographic
Interpretation Center in Washington, D.C.} was not equipped...to
duplicate any kind of color motion picture film, which the Zapruder 8-
millimeter home movie was. Over the course of well over 40 years, no
evidence has ever emerged to dispute this fact." -- VB; Pages 352 and
355 of Endnotes
DVP: And I'm still waiting for a kooky "Z-Film alterationist" to tell
me (with a straight face) why on this Earth a band of sophisticated
film-fakers decided to alter the Zapruder movie and yet NOT ALTER the
very thing that spells out "conspiracy" to most people viewing the
movie -- i.e., THE REAR HEAD SNAP?
Were the film-alterers simply too pre-occupied with the color of Mary
Moorman's shoes and socks to worry about such trivialities like that
head snap to the rear (which, more than any other single thing, was
probably the prime catalyst that sparked the creation of the HSCA in
the late 1970s)?
Or: Were the film-fakers just freaking idiots?!
Funny, the CTers who favor an "altered" Z-Film never seem to say.
~shrug~
-------------------
DVP: Re. Warren Commission member Richard Russell (who went on record
as having been opposed to the WC's pro-SBT conclusion):
"What Russell essentially said {in a 1970 interview} is that there
were too many things he had questions about, and because of these
unanswered questions, instead of concluding he didn't know what
happened, he tended to believe there was a conspiracy.
"Maybe if Russell had acted like a responsible public official, he
would have learned the answers to his questions. But he did not. ....
His attendance at the hearings where 94 witnesses testified before the
Commission was nothing short of disgraceful, Russell only attending
the testimony of 6 witnesses. And if Russell had a little more common
sense, that would have also helped.
"Russell is the same person who on October 22, 1962, right in the
middle of the Cuban missile crisis...actually urged war rather than a
peaceful resolution to the crisis. ....
"Can you imagine that? To Russell, possession of nuclear weapons
wasn't a deterrent to war but a golden opportunity to blow up the
planet. I must confess: when a mental giant like Russell says he
believes there may have been a conspiracy in the Kennedy
assassination, I listen." -- VB; Pages 297 298 of Endnotes
DVP: LOL! I've also had many of the same types of thoughts when it
comes to Senator Richard B. Russell of Georgia. Every time I ever
heard him speak, the word "goofball" would immediately enter my mind.
(I'm just glad there were six other more responsible people on that
1964 Presidential Commission.) .....
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/b9af777b0e813fd7
-------------------
DVP: In the Chapter-Four endnotes, VB offers up some interesting
observations regarding the genesis of the SBT and the architect(s) of
the Warren Commission's single-bullet conclusion:
"From the first moment that I heard that {Arlen} Specter had come up
with the single-bullet theory, it made very little sense to me since
the theory was so obvious that a child could author it.
"Since {the members of the WC staff} all knew that the bullet, fired
from Kennedy's right rear, had passed through soft tissue in Kennedy's
body on a straight line, and that Connally was seated to the
president's left front, the bullet, after emerging from Kennedy's
body, would have had to go on and hit Connally for the simple reason
it had nowhere else to go. How could it be that among many bright
lawyers earnestly focusing their minds on this issue, only Specter saw
it? ....
"When I asked {Norman Redlich on September 6, 2005} if, indeed, Arlen
Specter, was the sole author of the single-bullet theory, his exact
words were, "No, we all came to this conclusion simultaneously." When
I asked him whom he meant by "we," he said, "Arlen, myself, Howard
Willens, David Belin, and Mel Eisenberg." ....
"I don't know about you folks, but I'm inclined to take what Redlich
told me to the bank. My sense is that Redlich, who by almost all
accounts worked harder on the case than anyone else, was a team player
only interested in doing his job well. ....
"If I have done a disservice to Specter in what I have written above,
I apologize to him. But I did give him an opportunity to respond to
this issue {via a letter sent to Specter on June 24, 2005}, and he
declined." -- VB; Pages 302-304 of Endnotes
-------------------
"The big problem for the conspiracists is that if the head shot was
fired, as they claim, from the grassy knoll, since their grassy knoll
gunman was approaching being perpendicular to the president, using
their law of physics theory the president's head should have been
pushed much more to the LEFT than to the REAR. Yet we know the precise
opposite happened, which argues strongly for the HSCA's neuromuscular-
reaction theory, and against the shot-from-the-grassy-knoll theory."
-- VB; Page 332 of Endnotes
-------------------
DVP: I was pleased to see that assassination researcher Dale Myers is
given some "air time" in Mr. Bugliosi's book, including a very nice
overview of Mr. Myers' excellent computer animation project within the
CD's endnotes:
"As technology has continued to evolve, computers have been brought to
bear on the concepts of the single-bullet theory. .... Neither the
{1988} Nova nor the {1992} FAA computer studies attempted to create an
animated computer model that matched the entire filmed record as
captured by Abraham Zapruder's camera.
"Emmy Award-winning computer animator Dale Myers took on that
challenge with the belief that the resulting computer re-creation of
the Zapruder film would, for the first time, allow historians to
examine the entire motorcade through Dealey Plaza in three
dimensions. ....
"To ensure a high degree of accuracy, Myers based his three-
dimensional computer models on the historic record. Blueprints of the
{TSBD}...were used for the first time to create a finely detailed
computer model of the infamous building. .... A survey map of Dealey
Plaza, and calibration photographs taken by Myers, were used to build
a model of Dealey Plaza, Elm Street, and its surrounding structures.
The original blueprint of the modified 1961 Lincoln convertible in
which the president was riding...served as a guide in modeling the
presidential limousine. ....
"The result of Myers's efforts is a remarkably compelling view of the
assassination of President Kennedy that is consistent with the Warren
Commission's and HSCA's conclusion that Kennedy and Connally were,
indeed, struck by the same bullet, Myers concluding at frame Z223." --
VB; Pages 346-347 of Endnotes
DVP: More information about Dale K. Myers' exacting and detailed work
on the JFK case can be found below. The second link shows a still
frame from Myers' 3D computer animation at the approximate time of the
"SBT" shot, as seen from the point-of-view of Oswald's sniper's perch.
As can be seen, a bullet going through JFK's back and neck had nowhere
else to go except into John Connally's back. (And keep in mind that
the photo depicted in that link is an image that Mr. Myers has based
almost exclusively on the Zapruder Film itself, with the Z-Film being
"Key Framed" into Dale's three-dimensional computer animation.).....
http://jfkfiles.com/index.html
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/images/SOH_1061.jpg
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/ed8d8ab92a74c7ee
-------------------
"{Richard} Trask's magnificent 1994 book, "Pictures of the Pain",
which I've quoted from often in this book, was the result of ten years
of meticulous research on the photographic history of the
assassination. Presented in a coolly objective way, the book's 638
pages are chock-full of much information and detail Trask unearthed
that had never been previously published. The book is an absolutely
invaluable reference that has been widely relied upon by the
assassination research community." -- VB; Page 358 of Endnotes
DVP: Hear, hear! I totally concur with Vince's assessment of Mr.
Trask's fabulous book ("POTP"). In addition, Trask's follow-up volume
to "Pictures" (1998's "That Day In Dallas") is also a very worthwhile
addition to anyone's JFK library.
Plus: Trask's 2005 book all about the Zapruder Film ("National
Nightmare On Six Feet Of Film"), which is also referenced several
times in "Reclaiming History", is by far the best book I've ever seen
on Abraham Zapruder's famous home movie.
And I defy any "alterationist" out there to read "National
Nightmare's" 392 pages and still somehow work into the chronology a
way for the Z-Film to have been spirited away from Dallas in order for
massive fakery to be performed on the film. Such talk is just flat-out
nutty.
More "Trask Talk" (Book Reviews).....
=====================================================
"PART 2" OF THIS BOOK REVIEW CAN BE ACCESSED AT THE LINK BELOW:
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/89d1fa8be2a6ee64
=====================================================
cdddraftsman
______________________________________________
=====================================================
AUTHOR: VINCENT BUGLIOSI
=====================================================
Book Website:
http://www.reclaiminghistory.com
=====================================================
http://www.simonsays.com/content/book.cfm?tab=1&pid=526698
http://www.audible.com/adbl/entry/offers/productPromo2.jsp?BV_UseBVCo...
http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117966398.html?categoryId=14&cs=1
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/b3a8181c73cfa095
=====================================================
UP NEXT.......
FROM THE 36-PAGE "INTRODUCTION":
-------------------
-------------------
-------------------
-------------------
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/27fe9802262b8672
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/d5bfef3e64392e4d
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/a83751f6ce319004
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http://www.amazon.com/gp/discussionboard/discussion.html/ref=cm_rdp_s...
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http://history-matters.com/archive/jfk/wc/wcvols/wh25/html/WC_Vol25_0...
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/77edb3f67ec3350a
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/e0230f947355...
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.video/msg/5093634b419405d5
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/886319d63cf23021
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/06a93e60c998...
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/aae44871116d...
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/03e53e998792...
http://www.jfklancer.com/photos/autopsy_slideshow/images/AUT10_HI.jpg
http://faculty.washington.edu/chudler/skull3.gif
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http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/z335.jpg
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http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/harper.htm
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/6951e9702add...
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/bed05a055b2f4133
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http://www.jfklancer.com/photos/autopsy_slideshow/images/jfk_zeroang.jpg
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/d1d7ea222703d800
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/3b0c2cd76e4b...
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0a74025900f77968
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/470db330973c7717
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0bc05459437ae426
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/7d4034ff5307...
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http://216.122.129.112/dc/user_files/4594.gif
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/4c7616a35ac60e22
http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/discussions/start-thread.ht...
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/bb22792c022c5a2e
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0b30398a449c05b7
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/fb001573e51658aa
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/7360799fec7f...
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/32668ce6dd515ced
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/a7cf61c59d09bc05
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/d16a5df97cccb32c
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0b30398a449c05b7
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/f6c0a6dec30e8ce1
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/msg/e5f75aab67fa...
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/102b3923010e8c71
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~shrug~
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http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/b9af777b0e813fd7
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http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/discussions/start-thread.ht...
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http://jfkfiles.com/index.html
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/images/SOH_1061.jpg
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/ed8d8ab92a74c7ee
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http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/discussions/start-thread.ht...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/discussions/start-thread.ht...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/discussions/start-thread.ht...
David Von Pein
=====================================
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.assassination.jfk/browse_thread/thread/fbd56181ee3c6af1/?hl=en#
Fabulous stuff, John. Thanks for sharing that excellent e-mail.
Go Rosemary! I love her already! (From just one single message.) ;)
Now seems like a good time to re-post these items I have recently
written re. Mr. Bugliosi's exquisite book, "Reclaiming History". .....
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/e020f809d5a0b5fe
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/152c32e6339d8670
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/70cb3f7da25853ab
David Von Pein
>>> "Some might think it was CE 399 {that went into JFK but never exited}." <<<
Not even remotely possible, of course (and Tony knows this full
well...he just wants to argue the obvious), because Kennedy's
stretcher was never even close to that corridor where CE399 was found
by Tomlinson. Why this major fact is totally ignored by many CTers can
only elicit a shoulder shrug from yours truly.
>>> "How about Posner's bullet which hits a tree branch which strips off the jacket entirely allowing the lead core to go on to hit the curb near Tague?" <<<
That's what I certainly believe happened--although, admittedly, it's
just a guess...but I think it's by far the best guess, and it's a
guess that solves two problems.
One, if the bullet hit the tree and separated the jacket from the lead
core....the lead can go on out to hit Main St. and then Tague; hence,
no copper tracing on the curb. Perfectly reasonable, IMO.
Two, with the bullet now split into two parts, the copper jacket can
strike Elm St., resulting in the "sparks" that some witnesses said
they saw near JFK's limo. While the other portion of the bullet can
separately go on out to meet Mr. Tague without having to perform any
hopping, skipping, or jumping from one curbstone to yet another.
I completely disagree with Vince Bugliosi's explanation re. the first-
shot miss and the Tague wounding...which, btw, Vince only briefly
mentions in his book. He gives the whole matter two short paragraphs
on pages 471 and 472.
Vince thinks that the first Oswald (missed) shot hit the Elm pavement
on the fly, and then the same bullet somehow finds its way (at grass
level all the way?) over to Main Street to hit the Main curb and cause
Tague's cheek injury.
I, myself, find that scenario hard to swallow, although I cannot
disprove it, of course; nor can anyone else. Since we're talking about
a shot that missed the limo occupants completely and was never
recovered, all we can do is guess. But I find Posner's "guess" to be
the best guess....in that it can explain multiple questions
surrounding the shooting -- e.g., the sparks on the Elm pavement and
the non-copper tracings on the Main curb and Tague's wounding.
I respect Vince Bugliosi's opinion re. the first shot at Z160...I just
don't agree with his complete scenario of the path that bullet
followed on November 22. (At least we agree about one thing about the
first shot though -- when it was fired by Oswald -- Z160. I agree with
VB on that 100%.)
As a footnote to the above discussion re. the Tague wounding --- I
must also point out that Mr. Bugliosi does mention in "Reclaiming
History" (in an endnote on the CD-ROM disc that comes with the book)
that Gerald Posner's tree-branch deflection theory "is possible" (VB;
footnote on page 315 of endnotes).
================================================
"RECLAIMING HISTORY" -- A PERSONAL REVIEW (AMAZON.COM VERSION):
================================================
David Von Pein
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0d64b930629674d7
Footnote -- Mr. Bugliosi had apparently agreed to appear today (July
9, 2007) on a radio show called "Air America", hosted by Thom
Hartmann, but Vince had to cancel his appearance.
So Hartmann and Lamar Waldron used a few minutes at the end of the
July 9th broadcast (linked below) talking about their book ("Ultimate
Sacrifice") and quoting a few passages from Bugliosi's book (passages,
btw, that had absolutely nothing to do with Waldron's book; the quotes
used were general type things re. Oswald and the lack of evidence for
any conspiracy in JFK's murder).
I wish Mr. Bugliosi had made the time to go on the air live with
Messrs. Hartmann and Waldron, because I have a feeling that VB would
have won that debate easily.
Waldron's abbreviated summary of his book to the "Air America"
audience was filled with nothing but guesswork about Bobby Kennedy,
the CIA, the Cubans, the supposed-impending invasion of Cuba on Dec.
1, 1963, and about how Carlos Marcello and Santo Trafficante had the
"motive, means, and opportunity to kill Kennedy".
So, I guess, that must mean those guys got together and DID kill JFK
in Dallas...right? It's nonsense and pure conjecture, just like Mr.
Bugliosi aptly writes in his book, "Reclaiming History", in an
extensive endnote re. the Waldron book. Allow me to offer a sample:
"From the {Top Secret U.S.} CONTINGENCY invasion {of Cuba} plan,
conspiracy author Lamar Waldron (with coauthor Thom Hartmann) has
produced one of the most empty, vacuous books ever written about the
assassination {2005's "Ultimate Sacrifice: John And Robert Kennedy,
The Plan For A Coup In Cuba, And The Murder Of JFK"}.
"Although it is well written, it makes incredible assumptions, the
authors untroubled by the lack of support for these assumptions in the
record. ....
"If the reader hasn't figured it out by now, all of this is much to-do
about nothing, which would be a much more apt title for Waldron's
book. Even assuming everything Waldron says is true, SO WHAT? It is
common knowledge that the CIA had multiple plans to overthrow or
assassinate Castro. If C-Day was one we hadn't heard of before Waldron
told us, so what? What's the relevance?
"Listening to Waldron, one might believe that all the other well known
attempts on Castro's life or to overthrow him were subsumed by his C-
Day. But even if this absurdity were true, again, so what?
"Waldron knows he has to show the SO WHAT, and that's what he tries to
do in the other half of his book. In this other half...Waldron makes
one ludicrous assumption after another, never bothering to present a
lick of evidence to support any of the assumptions. .... Waldron's
theory could hardly be more ludicrous.
"One gets the definite sense from Waldron's book that the U.S.
government, RFK, and the CIA were much more interested in protecting
the secrecy of the attempt on Castro's life on December 1 {1963} than
they were in bringing JFK's killers (the mob, per Waldron) to
justice. ....
"Without bothering to present one tiny speck of evidence to support
his allegation, Waldron says in several places in his book that {Mafia
mobsters} "Marcello, Trafficante and Roselli planned the
assassination" of JFK. ....
"The source for all this? You guessed it: Lamar Waldron. You see, he
was present during all these meetings {involving Mafia kingpins as
they planned JFK's demise}...and was nice enough to pass on what he
saw and heard. And apparently no editor of Waldron's book was about to
tell Waldron that his book was supposed to be nonfiction, not fiction,
so he would have to have a source for all of this other than his own
silly mind. ....
"One thing he {Waldron} knows. Oswald was innocent and just a patsy,
Waldron totally ignoring the mountain of evidence against Oswald. ....
"Waldron started his book with nothing to say, added a whole lot of
nothing to it, and ended up with nothing. So why have I wasted my time
and space in this endnote talking about nothing? Because of a few
things. Waldron's book is one of the longest (904 pages) {960 pages in
its re-released 2006 paperback "Updated Edition", which promises
"Dramatic new revelations"} ever written on the assassination
and...gives the outward appearance of being a scholarly work. ....
"So to expose, as I believe I have, the ridiculous nature of a book
like this demonstrates...the absolutely utter and total bankruptcy of
the conspiracy movement in this country." -- VB; Pages 759 and 762-766
of Endnotes
======================
Here's the link to the July 9th "Air America" broadcast. The portion
re. Bugliosi and the JFK case comes near the very end, about 2.5 hours
into the 3-hour dry-as-dust program (just IMO re. the "dust"
thing). ;) ......
http://www.whiterosesociety.org/content/hartmann/HartmannShow-(9-7-2007)b.mp3
David Von Pein
http://www.amazon.com/gp/discussionboard/discussion.html/ref=cm_cd_md_plReviewDetail/?ie=UTF8&cdForum=&ASIN=0393045250&cdPage=1&cdItems=10&asin=&store=yourstore&cdSort=ByDateCreated&cdThread=Tx3KPJUUXHM5SZY&reviewID=R2KL7A1WM1SLBY&displayType=ReviewDetail&cdSortDir=Ascending#Mx3EDN31ZHOMMMP
>>> "I recently listened to a radio debate between Vincent and Dr. Cyril Wecht, the world famous pathologist, on the subject of the JFK assasination and Bugliosi was torn to pieces by Dr. Wecht." <<<
That's total nonsense. Wecht didn't tear anybody to pieces. The very
interesting radio debate in question (from June 14, 2007) can be
accessed at the weblinks below:
www.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/260403d21ac1e084
Re. that debate -- If anything, Bugliosi tore Cyril to pieces (via
both the evidence in the case and through ordinary common sense),
especially with respect to Dr. Wecht's own "magic bullet", which is a
bullet that was heading downward, but (per Cyril) came out of JFK's
neck but didn't hit Connally and also didn't hit anyone else or the
limo's interior.
Wecht's anti-SBT bullet simply vanishes, just like all crazy "CTer"
bullets in this case; and then when all the dust had settled, what
remained were--miraculously--only Oswald's bullets and fragments, even
though, per nearly all CTers, the victims were pelted with bullets
from at least two weapons (and if you want to believe Jim Garrison,
you'll have to increase that total to 4 or 5 guns!).
And yet EVERY single non-Oswald bullet or fragment managed to
disappear. Remarkable, huh? (Silly, is more like it.)
The Single-Bullet Theory is a fact:
www.google.com/group/alt.conspiracy.jfk/msg/0b30398a449c05b7
>>> "It's amazing that he {VB} still believes there was a magic bullet after it has been discredited numerous times, and even just recently by the manufacturers of the rifle who could not...fire off three bullets, let alone with such accuracy and on a moving target, in 19 seconds." <<<
Yeah, I got a huge kick out of the recent Terni, Italy, "tests" on a
Carcano rifle. Good grief, what a crock. My great-great-grandmother
could get off 3 shots in 19 seconds! But not these Terni firearms
"experts". It's absolutely insane. (Maybe all the "experts" had
massive arthritis?) ~Belly Laugh~
>>> "...Yet Bugliosi said he {Oswald} couldn't shoot." <<<
It really burns me up when people don't pay attention (or just flat-
out distort what they do hear). Mr. Bugliosi never, EVER said that
Oswald "couldn't shoot". He has always maintained that Oswald was a
"good shot, but not an expert shot" (which, of course, is 100% true).
Oswald was a "Sharpshooter" in the U.S. Marines, for Pete sake. If
"Sharpshooter" somehow equates to a lousy rifleman, then it's a topsy-
turvy world we reside in.
Lee Oswald had more than enough shooting ability to hit his target
(JFK's head) one time out of three gunshots in 8.4 seconds from less
than 100 yards.
>>> "Oswald shot no one and was nothing more than a Patsy." <<<
The above statement earns you a front-row seat in the "Conspiracy Kook
Club". Congratulations.
To believe that Oswald had an assistant somewhere behind the scenes is
one thing (despite the lack of verifiable proof for even that lower-
level "conspiracy"); but to completely ignore the mountain of evidence
that says Lee Oswald fired the shots that struck down BOTH John
Kennedy and J.D. Tippit is just beyond pathetic...it's obscene (IMHO).
>>> "It's quite clear to anyone that Kennedy was shot from the front; hence, his head goes back." <<<
Why not actually READ THE BOOK (or do some other research yourself)
and then you'll know the facts. And the fact is: Kennedy's head rocks
FORWARD first, then backward. This indicates a shot from the rear, not
the front.
This clip (below) is by far the best example of that initial forward
head movement I've ever encountered (it's just too bad this toggling
digital clip couldn't have somehow been placed in Mr. Bugliosi's
outstanding book; it would make an ideal visual aid to the text within
"Reclaiming History"):
http://www.jfkmurdersolved.com/images/Headshot-large.gif
>>> "I don't care how many so-called facts Bugliosi thinks he has; he simply ignores the major ones or those that have been discredited numerous times in defense of the lone-gunman theory." <<<
Pot...meet Mr. Kettle.
You've just described precisely what conspiracy theorists have done
for years on end -- i.e., ignore the tons of "It Was Only Oswald"
facts and cling to pure guesswork (and the perceived "motives" for any
number of would-be assassins, without a shred of evidence to show that
any of these non-Oswald groups or persons fired any shots at the
President).
It's called: Guilt By Association. And, per many CTers, just about all
of planet Earth was somehow "associated" with a desire to want John
Fitzgerald Kennedy dead in late 1963.
But, after all these years, only one man has ever been linked (in so
many ways) to the murder of the 35th President....and that man was Lee
Harvey Oswald.
www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/discussions/start-thread.html?reviewID=R2R0RQ0Q9AZY0M
David Von Pein
aeffects
> "Reclaiming History Versus The Conspiracy Theorists"......
>
> http://www.ambackforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=50341
for the 100th time...... and the beat goes on, it ain't selling, David
David Von Pein
Please take note of the large pct. of reasonable and logical lone-
assassin believers at the forum linked below. It's refreshing indeed
to see the rational people outnumbering the irrational on an Internet
forum thread devoted to the assassination of JFK.....
tomnln
I bought one.
"aeffects" <aeff...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1184594628....@o11g2000prd.googlegroups.com...