Dr. Gregg Wager

This book is about the murder of Anna Mae Pictou-Aquash, but also cross references to the topics of Leonard Peltier, Legal Hermeneutics, and Postmodern law.

For another perspective on Tom O'Neill's book and others, I write about this in the newest issue (016) of garrison: https://www.lulu.com/shop/midnuight-writer-news-publications/garrison-the-journal-of-history-deep-politics-issue-016/paperback/product-2mvrd2v.html?page=1&pageSize=4

Here's a follow-up: https://covertactionmagazine.com/2022/03/02/was-liberal-activist-allard-lowenstein-a-nyc-congressman-who-headed-dump-johnson-movement-in-1968-and-investigated-robert-kennedys-assassination-a-cia-asset/

I know it came down to a big battle in court whether Silverstein should be paid twice for two separate attacks, and Silverstein won. It would have been a brave insurance investigator indeed to challenge what had become a false flag operation blamed on Al-Qaeda terrorists. We hear a lot about Project for a New American Century (PNAC) being part of the plan (which included Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz), as well as William Kristol (whose father Irving was an editor for one of the CIA's front publications during the Cold War). Gore Vidal was an early skeptic and also mentioned a probable role for Zbigniew Brzezinski as someone who advocated a New Pearl Harbor (Vidal eventually recanted his suspicions).

I lived in Manhattan during 9/11 and remember a colorful newspaper (the New York Observer) which I wrote a few music reviews for in 2001. Every issue had a large color caricature of a prominent New Yorker on it. I remember the caricature of Larry Silverstein when he got the 99-year lease to the World Trade Center only a few months before 9/11. He was fast becoming one of the biggest land developers in Manhattan and a scheme to demolish the buildings on WTC to collect insurance (twice it turned out--considered two terror attacks because there were two airplanes) and then rebuild would make him a ruthless operator indeed (not to mention mass murderer). Many people also don't mention that 9/11 was an election day for Mayor, and I had gone out early to vote (that is, before the planes hit--the election was of course cancelled later in the day). Local news interrupted the Today Show with the first news of a plane hitting the north tower, but there was a complete blank in terms of news gathering after that until all four planes were down. No one could identify the flights or what airport they had departed from. Even a hijacking by itself would have been national news and would have interrupted any scheduled program not more than five minutes after it occurred. An air traffic controller in Connecticut heard a broadcast from Flight 11 and knew the plane had been hijacked 20 minutes before it hit the north tower. Not one word until more than an hour later.

David Ray Griffin writes a terrific article about the collapse of WTC 7 in the newest "garrison" magazine (I have an article in there as well). Shouldn't we wait until a plausible explanation for the Surfside building collapse is available? Watching the security camera footage, I see a similar "free fall" during the first part of the collapse and then another free fall during the final collapse, after the remaining building seems to be leaning a bit. Also, I see several small, bright explosions in this footage (very similar to WTC 1 and 2). We shouldn't rule out anything yet (including foul play in Florida).

I hope you get a chance to read my article in the new Garrison on Lowenstein. He is a key figure to unlocking a lot of intrigue of his day.

Garrison Issue 007 has a new article by me regarding Lowenstein's assassin and schizophrenia: https://www.lulu.com/spotlight/MidnightWriterNews

An interview about my career as a music journalist: https://musicjournalism.substack.com/p/gregg-wager-interview

I'm drawing from my personal experience with Halberstam, because I can't find the source of Abbie Hoffman calling "Best and the Brightest" his favorite book. Back in the 1980s when I was a classical music critic with the LA Times, I had a friend a few decades older than me who was a classical music buff and worked as a probation officer in Pasadena. He had an odd assortment of young men my age who were his close friends and had been at one time on probation. He was the one who not only told me that "Best and the Brightest" was Hoffman's favorite book, but that he thought Halberstam was the "greatest journalist of his generation." When I finally read Halberstam, I knew I had been had, since it was yet another book trying to put down JFK and doing it implausibly. I wondered if this probation officer was on some secret mission to get and keep us young radicals in line. I'm glad to know Vann was feeding Halberstam a very lopsided position on things, but I still think there was a concerted effort (probably led by the CIA) to destroy JFK's legacy; and Halberstam's book was used to help along this purpose.

Prouty's account of Chiang Kai Shek's picture omitted from the Teheran Conference has always been one of my favorite examples of how the narratives of history become revised and false. The encounter between Elliott Roosevelt and Stalin still remains by and large unknown and shocking. http://www.prouty.org/coment11.html

Yes, I would concur easily detecting something fishy about Halberstam's slant, although I remember reading his Fifties book without many suspicions. Didn't know much about Vann. I was in kindergarten when JFK was assassinated but remember clearly the high regard he was held under until gradually books like Halberstam's and Seymour Hersch's started to pick away at his legacy (no such picking away at Johnson or Reagan, who are much easier targets). I confess I had a sweet tooth for reading Sherman Skolnik when he was alive (and corresponding with him). He had no trouble accusing the Chicago Seven of being provocateurs. I also remember Abbie Hoffman appearing on the McGlaughlin Group in his later years and wondered how things got so topsy turvy. I have yet to figure out what Ken Burns is ultimately up to. His New York documentary was very compelling. As a musicologist, I found his Jazz documentary to be downright silly and sacrilegious (blame his reliance on Wynton Marsalis). Vietnam was noticeably watered down.

I always felt "the Best and Brightest" was a disingenuously slanted book. Abbie Hoffman said it was his favorite book, which makes me think he was just as disingenuous.

If you've ever driven a taxi cab or ambulance (or used a CB radio, for that matter), you know that there can be up to 10 open mikes at one time in a group of 50 or more drivers on the same frequency. It would not typically happen on a motorcycle, because it usually occurs when the driver drops the microphone in their lap and sits on it. Certainly, the HSCA made an embarrassing mess of many things (especially neutron activation, which has also now been thoroughly debunked). That doesn't stop me from wondering exactly what is on the Dictabelt. If it was actually made during the event, it should be treated like other evidence (e.g. films) and be thoroughly analyzed. My recollection is that the acoustic team used mathematical probability to conclude that the sonic impulses they found (which could not be heard, only indicated on their equipment) matched generally the sounds of gunshots fired within the time frame. I especially find it unbelievable that there was a carillon on the recording, but after more than fifty years, no one has ever stepped forward who knew where that carillon was in the city of Dallas. Bugliosi laughably uses several pages to ineptly examine the Doppler effect that occurs on the recording, obviously having no idea whatsoever what the Doppler effect is (not even a proofreader bothers to explain it to him--I learned about the Doppler effect in high school--it's not rocket science). Can't anything at all be done competently to analyze this Dictabelt recording?

I have the advantage of graduating from law school, although I'm not a practicing attorney. Still, I remember my criminal law professor claiming that most practicing prosecutors in America could indict a ham sandwich for just about anything. I also notice many researchers stumbling on the cold and ruthless legalism that dead people have no rights. In other words, once LHO was dead, he no longer had a right to due process of law (including valid chains of evidence, cross examination of witnesses, facing accusers, let alone proving guilt "beyond a reasonable doubt").