Cliff Varnell

I care about Marilyn. I just don't care who she slept with. Because the overthrow of Diem led to the death of millions, including my brother who finally succumbed to the leukemia he contracted from Agent Orange exposure in 'Nam. Junior probably has pushed Trump to the right on public health issues -- Don Fuhrer vows to abolish the pandemic-response team at the White House in spite of the looming threat from bird flu. Dumbing down to dictatorship...

How? You ask how? 1) The subject holds not a scintilla of significance -- a quarter scintilla at best. 2) I didn't want to distract you from the Prime Objective -- canvassing the neighborhood for permission to put up RFKjr lawn signs. 3) Payback for your snub of Faye Dunaway as Mrs. Evelyn Mulwray in your list of great Hollywood actress roles. Understand? Or is it too tough for you?

Hollywood’s blackmailer-in-chief: the dirty cop behind Confidential, the tabloid the stars feared https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/0/hollywoods-blackmailer-in-chief-dirty-cop-behind-confidential/

That had more to do with the magic mushroom chocolate bar I pounded earlier that evening. I neglected to mention that. You thought the grin on my face was because I was glad to see you, and I didn't want to indicate otherwise.

Forget it, Cory. It's the Ed Forum.

In James Ellroy's hard-boiled masterpiece The Cold Six Thousand, Ellroy fingers Fred Otash as the notorious "Raoul," James Earl Ray's alleged handler. I have no idea how he made that ID -- but it's a fictional tale, so who knows. Otash appears in three other Ellroy novels I haven't read yet. Screenwriter Robert Towne used Otash as his inspiration for Jake Gittes, the Jack Nicholson character in Chinatown. That is the limit of my interest in, or knowledge of, Fred Otash.

Taking my victory laps...

Called it! US drug control agency will move to reclassify marijuana in a historic shift, AP sources say https://apnews.com/article/marijuana-biden-dea-criminal-justice-pot-f833a8dae6ceb31a8658a5d65832a3b8 On the Jesse Ventura as VP-USA? The JFK Records Act? thread on March 16 I wrote: "A prediction: on April 20, 2024, the DEA will reschedule cannabis from Schedule I to 3 and the Prez race will be in the bag for Biden." This thread is the appropriate place for this, yo... "

Yes, the removal of Jupiter missiles was a major strategic victory. A major objective, yes. Another objective was to gain advantage in the struggle over Cuban influence with Red China, https://www.nytimes.com/1963/01/03/archives/cuba-hints-trend-to-china-in-split-but-castro-keeps-to-course.html WASHINGTON, Jan. 2--Premier Fidel Castro indicated in his speech today that Cuba would steer a middle course "within the socialist camp" between the Soviet Union and Communist China but was leaning toward Peking. What about it? What about it? So? That doesn't mean the Soviets would initiate a nuclear war they couldn't win. The notion is preposterous! Castro was closer to Red China. The Bay of Pigs and the constant attempts on Castro's life should of disabused Khrushchev of such naivete. You seriously think Khrushchev expected Kennedy not to respond to the placement of nukes 90 miles off our shore? https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/01402399708437689#:~:text=It is on this legal,NATO Defense Forces in Turkey'.

In this scenario Castro would have been accused of starting it by whacking Kennedy. The Soviets got what they wanted out of Cuba when the US withdrew missiles from Turkey. Their response would have been diplomatic, railing against American imperialism at the UN. The US could have countered by citing the alleged Oswald meeting with Kostikov in Mexico City. No, the same principle would have been an attack on the USSR from the soil of an American ally. The US bombed the hell out of North Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia and there was never talk of nuclear confrontation over it. Why would Kennedy's advisers think the US didn't enjoy nuclear superiority in 1963? And surely Khrushchev wasn't crazy enough to initiate a nuclear exchange over a country that wasn't vital to USSR security.

RO: But do not obscure the fact that the amorphous group that wanted to get rid of Kennedy had several factions. Only some of them thought it was a good idea to use the murder as a pretext to go after Castro, which would have led to a war with the Soviets, who were pledged to respond such an attack, not to mention Kennedy that had given them a no invasion pledge barely one year earlier. </q> Khrushchev would start a war he couldn't win over Cuba? Nonsense. According to Gareth Porter's The Perils of Dominance the USSR didn't reach nuclear parity until 1965. Sandy, it wasn't Harriman who contacted AF1 to inform LBJ the lone gunmen was in custody -- it was McGeorge Bundy.

The CIA didn't conduct any successful covert operations under Allen Dulles? I guess Joe Kennedy and Robert Lovett got worked up over nothing, eh?

Richard Bissell, Deputy Director for Plans, Yale '31 (turned down Skull & Bones) Tracy Barnes, Assistant Deputy Director for Plans, Yale '33 (Scroll & Key) McGeorge Bundy, National Security Advisor, Yale '40 (Skull & Bones) Either the Yale crew royally screwed the pooch with the Bay of Pigs -- or the long knives were out for Princeton Allen D. Either way, Dulles never saw it coming.