Cliff Varnell

It was a done deal Friday night when LBJ ordered Cliff Carter to call the Texas authorities and order them to drop the conspiracy angle. Why would we expect Katzenbach to refuse to follow similar orders? He said he was under pressure from the State Department. The historical record shows Johnson under pressure from the State #3, Averell Harriman. Those who either demonize or lionize Katzenbach have not processed those facts.

Newman didn’t write this nonsense, you did. Someone at the CIA told LBJ, "'Hoo-boy, look at this LHO-Kostikov meeting, we better put the lid on this, or its WWIII."

You didn’t quote John Newman, did you?

Nonsense. The first people LBJ met with at the White House were Averell Harriman and William Fulbright. Harriman claimed to speak for all the US Gov’t Kremlinologists and informed him the Soviets were not involved. Harriman was the #3 man at the State Department. Katzenbach claimed he was under pressure from State. I don’t see why folks can’t believe him.

Hoover apparently changed his mind. "I urged strongly that we not reach conclusion Oswald was the only man." — Hoover on 12/12/63. He said Foggy Bottom leaned on him. The historical record shows the State Department behind the Lone Nut push.

“We may never know ifJFK’s death was the act of a lone shooter or a CIA coup d’état.” Why do folks celebrate this kind of False Mystery garbage?

I didn’t ask a question. I’ve presented the receipts for the State Department driving the Lone Nut scenario. Hoover wanted to push a commie conspiracy. From a 12/12/63 memo Hoover wrote: "I urged strongly that we not reach conclusion Oswald was the only man."

Who were following the dictates of higher ups at the State Department.

On the ground to paint Oswald as a killer commie, right?

The no-conspiracy “memo” from the White House didn’t go out until Friday night.

Someone Would Have Talked, Larry Hancock, pg 289. <quote on> On Friday night the White House placed telephone calls to Dallas DA Henry Wade, to Texas State Attorney General Carr and Police Chief Curry requesting that they avoid any official statements, charges, or discussion relating to conspiracy. Johnson’s aide Cliff Carter was making the calls and if the individual in question raised objections, President Johnson was used as the authority for the message. </q> Johnson met with Harriman and then instructed his aide Carter to call Dallas and cut short talk of conspiracy.

#3 man at Foggy Bottom, W. Averell Harriman, leveraged the entire US foreign policy apparatus to convince LBJ to back away from any commie conspiracy talk. But Harriman hadn’t consulted with anyone when he told Johnson top Kremlinologists concluded the Soviets were innocent. He was correct.

The Assassination Tapes, Max Holland, (pg 57): <quote on> At 6:55 p.m. Johnson has a ten minute meeting with Senator J. William Fulbright and diplomat W. Averell Harriman to discuss possible foreign involvement in the assassination, especially in light of the two-and-a-half-year sojourn of Lee Harvey [in Russia]...Harriman, a U.S. ambassador to Moscow during WWII, is an experienced interpreter of Soviet machinations and offers the president the unanimous view of the U.S. government's top Kremlinologists. None of them believe the Soviets have a hand in the assassination, despite the Oswald association. <quote off> This was the genesis of the Lone Nut Cover Story. Bundy called LBJ on AF1 and told him the lone assassin was in custody. As soon as Johnson got to the White House he found out that all of his government’s top Kremlinologists concluded the Soviets were innocent. But there was no such discussion among top Soviet experts on 11/22/63. By reputation the top 3 Soviet hands were Charles Bohlen, George Kennan, and Harriman himself. According to his biography, Bohlen was traveling by train in Europe. According to Kennan’s biography, he spent the day quietly with Robert Oppenheimer up in Princeton. By title, the US gov’t’s top Soviet guys were Llewelyn Thompson, Ambassador At Large for Soviet Affairs, and Dean Rusk, Secretary of State. From their Warren Commission testimonies: Mr. DULLES: Did you have any conversations at any time while you were Ambassador or after you returned to the United States with any Soviet official with regard to the Oswald case? Ambassador THOMPSON: I discussed with the Soviet Ambassador the desire of the [Warren] Commission to receive any documentation that they might have available, but I did not in any way discuss the case itself, nor did the Soviet official with whom I talked. Mr. DULLES: And do you know of any conversations of that nature that any other official of the Department had in connection with the Oswald case? Ambassador THOMPSON: I do not myself know of any. Mr. DULLES: You probably would, would you not, if that had taken place-of any importance? Ambassador THOMPSON: Off the record. (Discussion off the record.) Mr. DULLES: Your testimony is you have no knowledge of any other conversations other than that of the Secretary of State [Dean Rusk], in connection with communications to and from the Soviet Government on this case? Ambassador THOMPSON: That is correct. I know of no other cases where it was discussed with Soviet officials. </q> Thompson acknowledged discussions with Dean Rusk, but nothing about Harriman or other "top Kremlinologists". Rusk didn't return to Washington until after Harriman's meeting with Johnson. Here's what Rusk told the Warren Commission (Vol 5): <quote on>. Secretary RUSK: As the Commission may remember, I was with several colleagues in a plane on the way to Japan at the time the assassination occurred. When we got the news we immediately turned back. After my mind was able to grasp the fact that this event had in fact occurred, which was the first necessity, and not an easy one, I then, on the plane, began to go over the dozens and dozens of implications and ramifications of this event as it affects our foreign relations all over the world. I landed briefly in Hawaii on the way back to Washington, and gave some instructions to the Department about a number of these matters, and learned what the Department was already doing. But one of the great questions in my mind at that time was just that question, could some foreign government somehow be involved in such an episode. I realized that were this so this would raise the gravest issues of war and peace, but that nevertheless it was important to try to get at the truth-to the answer to that question-wherever that truth might lead; and so when I got back to Washington I put myself immediately in touch with the processes of inquiry on that point, and as Secretary of State had the deepest possible interest in what the truthful answer to those questions would be, because it would be hard to think of anything more pregnant for our foreign relations than the correct answer to that question. </q> Harriman and Bundy called the shots on the Lone Nut.

Didn’t the Dallas PD suspect Oswald’s involvement well before the FBI?

Hoover and LBJ made the decision to blame a lone gunman? Or was that decision made earlier? The President Has Been Shot, Charles Roberts (p. 141) A reporter for Newsweek, Roberts was on AFI and met McGeorge Bundy at Andrews. <quote on, emphasis added> I remember looking at (McGeorge) Bundy because I was wondering if he had any word of what had happened in the world while we were in transit, whether this assassination was part of a plot. And he told me later that what he reported to the president during that flight back was that the whole world was stunned, but there was no evidence of a conspiracy at all. <quote off>

Most Still Aren’t Buying JFK ‘Lone Gunman’ Conclusion https://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/lifestyle/general_lifestyle/october_2017/most_still_aren_t_buying_jfk_lone_gunman_conclusion Most Americans still aren’t convinced that President John F. Kennedy was the victim of a lone assassin in November 1963. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 43% of American Adults accept the government’s conclusion that Kennedy was assassinated by a lone gunman. But 33% continue to believe he was the victim of a conspiracy, while one-in-four (24%) are undecided. </q> 6 years later: https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/rasmussen-reports-jfk/2023/07/12/id/1126834/ Voters are still divided on whether Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy. A 1964 Warren Commission found that Kennedy was killed by Oswald, a U.S. citizen who had previously lived in the Soviet Union, and that Oswald acted alone. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 38% of likely U.S. voters accept the government's conclusion that Kennedy was assassinated by a lone gunman. But 38% continue to believe he was the victim of a conspiracy, while 24% are undecided. These numbers haven't changed much since 2017, when 43% of adults said a lone gunman killed JFK. </q> Thr purveyors of False Mystery are prevailing, even if they don’t want to.

James Ellroy is a great auther. https://www.npr.org/2023/09/13/1199058023/book-review-james-ellroy-the-enchanters-sees-return-of-freddy-otash

I engaged in pseudo-debate for 21 years on-line. For the first 8 years I didn’t realize I was participating in the cover-up of the JFKA. In 2005 I went to the Cracking The Case Conference in Bethesda, a proud member of the Critical Community. By the time I got back home I was a critic of that community. I didn’t feel part of a movement at all. I engaged in fake debate for my own kicks. I’m not the one who put Our Lady of JFKA Truth in the gutter; I was just flicking ashes on Her bruised and bleeding body. By the end 2018 I felt I’d learned enough and quit with the fake debate. I was then entitled to enroll in the Vincent Salandria School of Research into the Obvious. With a license to ridicule pseudo debate, I still get my kicks.

I wonder if it was well received by the COPA crowd. He basically said to their faces they didn’t want to solve the case. The subtext of pseudo-debate: there is a foundational mystery to solve. In JFK Revisited it’s debunking the Magic Bullet that solves the false mystery. False because JFK had a shallow wound in his back and 6.5 mm Full Metal Jacket rounds don’t leave shallow wounds, not in soft tissue. Indeed. The last time the clothing evidence was mentioned at a JFK Conference was Schotz in ‘98.

A literal interpretation of “go through the ceiling” is equally valid: “unprecedented heights.”

Pure hearsay: Henry Heiberger was the FBI agent who handled JFK’s clothing. Heiberger had four daughters. One of his daughters went to college with my sister. She told my sis that her Dad told her the Warren Report was a lie.

I don’t trust an FBI analysis of any of the evidence once the Magic Bullet was put into play — by the FBI. Once CE 399 was put into evidence, copper HAD to turn up.

An object lesson in the power of physical evidence in a cold case murder investigation. The WarrenCommission, The Truth, & Arlen Specter by Gaeton Fonzi https://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/GaetonFonzi/WCTandAS.pdf <quote, italic emphasis in the original, bold added> The Warren Commission Report says the entrance wound caused by the bullet which came out Kennedy’s throat was “approximately 5-1⁄2 inches” below the back of the right ear. Yet photographs of the President’s jacket and shirt, which were part of the FbI supplemental report of January 13th, make it difficult to believe that is the truth. These photographs were not part of the Warren Commission Report and were left out of the 26 volumes of supporting evidence. Although a description of Kennedy’s clothing was in the Report, the discrepancy between the location of the bullet holes in them and the reported location of the wounds was never discussed or explained. And there was a very obvious discrepancy: the hole in the back of the jacket was 5-3/8 inches below the top of the collar and 1-3⁄4 inches to the right of the center back seam of the coat. traces of copper were found in the margins of the hole and the cloth fibers were pushed inward. “Although the precise size of the bullet could not be determined from the hole, it was consistent with having been made by a 6.5-millimeter bullet,” said the Report. The shirt worn by the President also contained a hole in the back about 5 3⁄4 inches below the top of the collar and 1-1/8 inches to the right of the middle. It, too, had the characteristics of a bullet entrance hole. Both these holes are in locations that seem obviously inconsistent with the wound described in the Commission’s autopsy report — placed below the back of the right ear — and illustrated in exhibit 385, which dr. Humes had prepared. “Well,” said Specter, when asked about this in his City Hall office last month, “that difference is accounted for because the President was waving his arm.” He got up from his desk and attempted to have his explanation demonstrated. “Wave your arm a few times,” he said, “wave at the crowd. Well, see if the bullet goes in here, the jacket gets hunched up. If you take this point right here and then you strip the coat down, it comes out at a lower point. Well, not too much lower on your example, but the jacket rides up.” If the jacket were “hunched up,” wouldn’t there have been two holes as a result of the doubling over of the cloth? “No, not necessarily. It ... it wouldn’t be doubled over. When you sit in the car it could be doubled over at most any point, but the probabilities are that ... aaah ... that it gets ... that ... aaah ... this ... this is about the way a jacket rides up. You sit back ... sit back now ... all right now ... if ... usually, as your jacket lies there, the doubling up is right here, but if ... but if you have a bullet hit you right about here, which is where I had it, where your jacket sits ... it’s not ... it’s not ... it ordinarily doesn’t crease that far back.” What about the shirt? “Same thing.” There is no real inconsistency between the Commission’s location of the wound and the holes in the clothing? “No, not at all. That gave us a lot of concern. First time we lined up the shirt ... after all, we lined up the shirt ... and the hole in the shirt is right about, right about the knot of the tie, came right about here in a slit in the front ...” But where did it go in the back? “Well, the back hole, when the shirt is laid down, comes . . . aaah ... well, I forget exactly where it came, but it certainly wasn’t higher, enough higher to ... aaah ... understand the ... aah ... the angle of decline which ...” Was it lower? Was it lower than the slit in the front? “Well, I think that ... that if you took the shirt without allowing for it’s being pulled up, that it would either have been in line or somewhat lower.” Somewhat lower? “Perhaps. I ... I don’t want to say because I don’t really remember. I got to take a look at that shirt.” </q>

If anyone thinks I’d give up my naturally air-conditioned Haight Ashbury pad for hot-as-hell Henderson...well, there are a couple of bridges here in town I can arrange for you a real deal, since you’re in the market. I recommend the orange one.

E. Martin Schotz, from his 1998 COPA speech: https://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/FalseMystery/COPA1998EMS.html <quote on> The struggle for truth in the assassination of President Kennedy confronts us with the problem of the “waters of knowledge” versus “the waters of uncertainty.” Let me give you an example involving two important individuals who attempted to bring the truth before the American people. I am speaking of New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison and filmmaker Oliver Stone. Both Garrison and Stone knew that the President was the victim of a conspiracy by high level US military intelligence officials. Each in his own way tried to bring such knowledge to the attention of the American people. In the case of Oliver Stone, even before his film JFK had received its final cut there developed an unprecedented campaign of slander against Stone, that he was a madman, that he was a drunk. In the face of this attack Stone was advised to compromise and did so.[3] He backed off from telling the American people that his film was the truth, and instead claimed that his film, JFK, was “my myth.” In other words Stone said “I have my myth and you are entitled to yours. I’m not saying I know what happened here. There is uncertainty.” The instant Stone did that, the campaign of slander ended. He was again acceptable. He was invited to address Congress and was permitted to ask the government to release more information so as to help us clear up the supposed mystery. Jim Garrison’s story is different. In the face of his effort to reveal the true nature of the assassination there was a campaign to discredit him. It was claimed that he was a drug addict, that he had ties to the Mafia, that he was grandstanding and self seeking. But Garrison never backed down. And because of that, even today a noted biographer cannot get a major publisher to enter into a contract to do an honest biography of the man. He is still an outcast, a madman as far as the society is concerned. Stone agreed to drink the waters of uncertainty and society recognized him as having miraculously recovered his sanity. Garrison refused, insisting on continuing to drink the waters of knowledge, and for this he suffered accordingly. </q>