Cliff Varnell

1 hour ago, Vince Palamara said:

We live in a sound bite world, now even more so thanks to social media and smart phones. People want succinct and quick answers.

And that’s exactly what Gaeton Fonzi and Vincent Salandria gave us — The Bullet Holes in the Clothes are Too Low.

It’s a collective failure.

1 hour ago, Sandy Larsen said:

The drop in conspiracy believers could be due to old people dying. People who experienced the assassination, and then the killing of Oswald.

 

Not according to the 2017 poll.  No significant variation according to age.

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-one-thing-in-politics-most-americans-believe-in-jfk-conspiracies/

2 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:

No way. I mean - yes, a lot of wasted space on the internet. But disputing the back wound? 

The key to promotion is simplicity and repetition.  “Our Side” has failed to match the simplicity of Oswald Acted Alone.

The bullet holes in the clothes are too low to associate with the throat wound.

When was that root fact discussed at a JFK conference?  1998?

In 1966 after Gaeton Fonzi gave Arlen Specter a nervous breakdown over the location of the bullet holes in JFK’s clothes, the template for proper promotion of the fact of conspiracy was set — the bullet holes in the clothes are too low for the SBT.

Then the November 25th ‘66 issue of LIFE Magazine had a cover story featuring John Connally analyzing the Zapruder film.

A Matter of Resonable Doubt

This is a monstrous Big Lie.  It is beyond reasonable doubt that the holes in the clothes are too low.

It was genius as propaganda.  Folks have been micro-analyzing the evidence for all the years since.

Play the JFKA Parlor Game — prove the fact of conspiracy for fun and prizes!!

I’ve taken an amazing amount of static over the last 26 years from ambitious “CTs” who flat out dispute the location of the back wound.

Why?

 Because the T3 back wound counterfeits the Parlor Game.

Belief in JFKA conspiracy peaked circa 2000 at 80%.  After 17 years it dropped to 61%.  I attribute the drop to Internet Parlor Game Players who’ve spent the last couple decades disputing the T3 back wound — the best evidence of conspiracy— in order to inflate the significance of their own research.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

CV-

Try for a civil, collegial tone in your presentations.

I have little patience for those who habitually misrepresent the evidence.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

The curious case of the JFK body and wounds, made worse by an opaque autopsy, do not compel objective observers to any particular theory. 

For example, the above pretends the evidence of a shallow T3 back wound and throat entrance simply doesn’t exist.  Ben, your willful dismissals do not compel respect.

1 hour ago, Pat Speer said:

Let's be clear. The bullet broke the skin and broke the fascia. It did not "enter" the underlying muscle. Entering implies the whole bullet entered the body and was surrounded by tissue.

You’re making the unsupported assumption the round was conventional.  Your dismissal of the Autopsists’ “general feeling” JFK was hit with a high tech weapon is wrongheaded.

1 hour ago, Pat Speer said:

 

Many "experts" have pushed that the bullet must have transited, because it "entered" and bullets don't just work their way out once in the body.

Again, the unsupported assumption of a conventional round.

1 hour ago, Pat Speer said:

 

Some even say that it is purported to have turned around within the body. What they miss, or refuse to see, is that Humes' testimony strongly suggests that the bullet never entered the body. 

Humes testimony strongly suggests the damage was done by a high tech round which dissolved.  That’s what they seriously considered with the body in front of them.

4 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Finck had been a peacetime Army autopsist in Germany, if memory serves, for a couple of years. 

And not a forensic pathologist. 

Finck said he took part in 200 autopsies, “many” involving gunshots.  Pet theorists always bash witnesses who don’t confirm their biases.

4 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

You would think for the murder of the US president...there could be better people to have do the autopsy. 

The description of the JFK autopsy is famous and unchallenged---harried, confusion, directions barked from nonprofessionals in the viewing area, film being destroyed, unorthodox procedures, but fundamental procedures undone, records destroyed afterwards, rank amateurs Hume and Boswell doing their Laurel and Hardy routines---and hardly inspires confidence regarding any conclusions.

Especially if you’re a pet theorist married to one scenario or another debunked by hard facts.

4 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Baden may even be worse.

Did a bullet transit JFK or not? Who knows?  

We know the bullet didn’t transit — the bullet holes in the clothes are too low to associate with the throat wound.

4 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

JFK's body was not sectioned. X-rays did not show any bullets in the body. 

The Landis tale, if true, may answer the question. The bullet struck JFK, went in an inch or two, but was popped out by subsequent shot(s) that sent shock waves through JFKs body. That is what Landis suspects. 

If the bullet was so drastically undercharged how did it hit the target?

Was the shooter aiming at the sun?

4 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

The JFK throat wound? Perhaps a glass shard from the limo windshield, which exhibited a hole from a shot. 

Glass shows up on X-rays.  JFK had a couple of inches of ripped trachea, burst blood vessels, a hairline fracture of the right T1 transverse process, and an air pocket overlaying the right T1/C7 transverse processes.  No glass on x-ray, no bullet.

4 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

The other answer is a bullet did transit JFK, as posited by the WC (but I do not think that bullet struck JBC). 

 

Thanks for the crypto Lone Nut garbage.

1 hour ago, Pat Speer said:

It's in Humes' testimony. He said it was a defect in the fascia that did not continue into the muscle. The fascia is the layer just below the skin. IOW, the "hole" they observed was just a few millimeters deep.

Humes description is not consistent with a bullet that “did not enter,” as you put it.

The wound was shallow, there was a defect in the fascia, but that doesn’t mean the skin wasn’t broken.

Didn’t Humes eventually claim the bullet transited?

1 hour ago, Pat Speer said:

The bullet never entered the back. That is what Humes observed. It left a divot at the surface. But did not enter. 

Citation please.

3 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

So...if Landis speaks the truth...your explanation of the slug he found is...what? Another shot that harmlessly landed in the limo? 

Okay.

3 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Seems to me you are hoist on your own petard on the "shallow" bullet wound. 

As a habitual naysayer you would say that.

3 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Such a shallow wound could not close up around an 1 and 1/4 inch long slug--the Western Cartridge slug. 

What gives you the idea such a thing is possible— other than the demands of a pet theory?

3 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

And only seconds passed before JFK is shuddered hard by a second shot, sending a shock wave through his body. 

So how could a one-inch deep or less wound swallow and hold a 1 and 1/4 inch long slug

Because bullets don’t behave that way.

3 hours ago, Benjamin Cole said:

 

..when a few seconds later JFK is rocked by another shot (at least one. Pat Speer posits there may have another)? 

You might have to re-think your analysis. 

Show us an instance where a high powered rifle slug protruded from an entrance wound.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Well, you have the last word.

The JFK autopsy was lacking in nearly every regard, extensively harried and cut short.

It ended when FBI SA Sibert called the FBI Lab to follow thru on the autopsists’ ltheory JFK was hit with a high-tech round.  That was when the Magic Bullet raised it’s ugly rounded head.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

My limited understanding is that even fundamentals were neglected. Records were destroyed. 

Wounds were not sectioned, which (generally) would have conclusively shown pathways, if any. 

The wound was professionally probed — your naysaying aside.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

PS...If the back wound was less than an inch...the Western Cartridge slug is one-inch-and-one-quarter long. 

So...how does a wound "close up" around a slug still protruding from the body?

What other million to one shots do you find plausible?

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

 

And then a shock wave passes through that body moments later? 

Gee, might that bullet pop out? 

That strikes me as plausible. 

If Landis' memory is correct...very plausible. 

 

 

Uh hunh.

https://www.cryptogon.com/?p=67681

<quote on> 

Former Secret Service agent, Paul Landis, found the Magic Bullet on the top of the back seat of the limo?

Undercharged round???

Mmm hmm.

Nealy 60 years after the JFK assassination, we now have Magic Bullet 2.0.

Can anyone explain to me how the possibly “undercharged” Magic Bullet 2.0 managed to hit the target at all if the person firing the rifle dialed in DOPE [Data Observed from Previous Engagements?] for a standard velocity round?

Not only did the “undercharged” Magic Bullet 2.0 have enough velocity to hit the target using DOPE for a standard round, but it then, “Dislodged from a shallow wound in the president’s back, falling back onto the limousine seat.” 

If you’re not familiar with shooting high powered rifles, run this scenario past someone who is has and note the response.

It will go something like, “No way.”

Personal experience: I’ve probably shot something like 15,000 centerfire rifle cartridges in my life, mostly 5.56, 7.62×51 and 7.62×39. Also, some larger stuff, .300 Winmag, .338, etc. How many of those do you think were “Undercharged”?

None. Zero. Zilch.

I had a few bad primers (under a handful) fail to fire in all of that time. I mostly fired old, cheap military surplus ammo and most of that was not made in the U.S. I don’t think I ever had a U.S. manufactured centerfire rifle round (Winchester, Federal, Remington, etc.) fail to fire.

How many “undercharged” centerfire rifle cartridges have you encountered in your decades of shooting?

Imagine the odds, on the big day almost 60 years ago… A defective cartridge? Tell me another one. 

Someone, somewhere might try to sell you on squib loads to explain this. I’m just here to tell you, in over forty years of shooting, it hasn’t happened to me, or any of my friends. (Somewhere on this site you can read about my wife’s cousin trying to kill a pig with a wet .22. That doesn’t count, because first, that’s rimfire, which is less reliable than centerfire and, second, it was wet.)

</q>

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Tell us the factual basis for an undercharged bullet never leaves a very shallow wound, even after a shock wave passes through a human body. 

Because wounds close around bullets.  Look it up.  For an undercharged round to strike the back the shooter had to have aimed over JFK’s head.

Both of these points have been discussed extensively on the EF.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

If Landis is telling the truth...then where did the slug he found come from? 

From a firearm.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

You are correct in one regard---neither you nor Landis is qualified to state whether such an event is possible, or have any solid clue about the topic. 

We have the reports on the autopsy and their certainty the back shot did not transit.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

"Bullets don’t pop out of wounds"-CV

Landis, who was or is experienced with firearms, says "he believes the bullet was undercharged and fell from a shallow wound in JFK's back onto the limo seat."

CV, are you an experienced gun enthusiast? Worked in any autopsies? Surgeries? Been a deer hunter, etc.? 

 

 

How many autopsies had Landis performed?  

Tell us the factual basis for the claim.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

"He (Finck) said he performed 200 autopsies."  

And how many, in peacetime Germany, involved death by gunshot? And of those, how many were unexplained or suspicious murders (not suicides)? 

Out of 200 autopsies Finck said “many” involved gunshot wounds.  

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

A murder by gunshot autopsy should be attended by an experienced forensic pathologist, preferably one with lots of gunshot experience, such as found in the morgues of a major US city. 

Had Finck ever probed the pathway of a bullet in a murder victim ever in his professional career?   

 

“Many” out of 200 autopsies involved gunshots.  Interesting that you have to smear any witness inconvenient to your pet theories.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

As it is, it may be the bullet that struck JFK in the back was undercharged, penetrated modestly, then popped out from the shock wave sent from the following head shot. Then Landis found it. That is one scenario, as plausible as others. 

Bullets don’t pop out of wounds

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Finck was a peacetime autopsist in Germany for a brief while.  

To your knowledge, did Finck perform a forensic pathological autopsy examination in his career? 

He said he performed 200 autopsies.  

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Was Finck constrained or limited in his examination at Bethesda, by superiors? 

He wasn’t constrained from probing the wound.  Jenkins and O’Conner described a wound path that didn’t penetrate the pleura.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Perhaps I am a hobbyist, but ad hominem arguments are not worth making. 

Your “arguments” are formulaic — you automatically dismiss the evidence of a shallow back wound.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

We do not know if Hume and Finck properly determined the bullet path, or lack of one, through the JFK body.

Sure we do.  The wound was probed repeatedly.  There was no exit.  

Ben, I know your formula — which you will never get off of no matter how many facts contradict you — posits a magical mystery tour with a bullet striking at the level of T3 at a downward angle, then making a drastic change of direction striking the right T1 transverse process, then another magical tour ripping a couple inches of trachea and exiting below the Adam’s apple.

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

We know they tried, but for how long and how expertly? Could have an experienced autopsist found the bullet path? 

Finck was an experienced autopsist, your smearing of the man aside.

The SBT was destroyed in 1966.

The Warren Commission, The Truth,
and Arlen Specter

https://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/GaetonFonzi/WCTandAS.pdf

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

Oh come on! You are a little bit interested. Get on the bandwagon. Show some collegiality. 

And do we know for certain the JFK back wound was only a half-inch? Those were amateurs in the JFK autopsy room. 

Finck wasn’t an amateur.

Sigh.  Another hobbyist attack on the root facts of the case.

1 hour ago, Karl Kinaski said:

 Since we know that the back wound was the depth of half a finger only and had no connection with the throat wound - a fact which by it's own debunks the myth of one shooter only - I don't see the point of a lengthy discussion about a claim by an SS agent finding a bullet in the limo 60 years after the fact. 

BTW

V. Palamara showed SS Agents were lying through the years and had ever changing memories. 

I don't give a damn what Landis claims. 

 

KK

Thank you, Karl!  I thought it was just me!

In what universe is a 60 year old memory better proof of conspiracy than the location of the bullet holes in JFK’s clothes?

6 hours ago, Bill Brown said:

 

The idea that the bullet which hit Kennedy in the back was "undercharged" and traveling at a significantly lower rate of speed even though it had yet to strike anything is laughable.

 

Agreed.  Conventional firearms don’t leave shallow wounds in soft tissue.

A discussion of the kind of firearm that does leave shallow wounds in soft tissue:

1 hour ago, Benjamin Cole said:

CV-

 

You are barking at a bonsai tree in a redwood forest of anti-democratic organizations.

I contend the Deep State deposed JFK to retain control over US military, foreign and trade policies.  Several presidents have been deposed since for the same reasons. 

Since the JFKA, the US has been in three or four unnecessary major wars, innumerable smaller conflicts, and multinationals have expanded 100-fold in size and influence. Were those wars fought to protect the American citizenry from invasion? Or to protect the interests of globalists? 

The expression "working class" has been re-defined by legacy media to mean "white working class" and "white nationalists," while the useful expression "Deep State," has been linked to the nut-job cranks. 

Ponder that.

Then ponder that the JFK-less US government confiscates nearly $5,000 from every man, woman and child in the US (and every year) to run the global warfare complex (DoD, VA, black budget, pro-rated interest on the national debt.)

Yes, $863 bil for defense, $320 bil for VA, $100 bil for black budget and $250 bil for interest payments. Call it $1.5 trillion. Divide by 330 million. You get $4,645 per US resident. Every year and rising. 

Almost $20,000 from an average family of four. Every year. 

The media never tells you this tax story that I have related, and which is irrefutable. 

Instead the media trains you to get into useless catfights over ID politics and culture wars, and  blue or red kool-aid pissing wars. 

Now,  the D-Party fully participates in the suppression of info that might reveal the truth about the JFKA. The JFK Records Act. What does that tell you? No Deep State? 

Biden does not answer to the Deep State and globalists? Really? 

The 'Phants are no better. 

 

 

 

You never read that number anywhere. 

 

Thanks for the history lecture Ben, but you didn’t address my point.  You claim the MSM is controlled “99%” by enemies of Donald Trump and yet the MSM spent the ENTIRE last 11 days of the 2016 presidential campaign bashing Hillary.  The Deep State installed Trump, which defies your analysis.

1 hour ago, Keyvan Shahrdar said:

I think what this shows a clear indication the military does not like him.  If there was an assassination it would come from the generals and the secret service.  They are the only group that can kill a president and get away with it.

Trump ain’t President.  He poses no existential threat to either the military or secret service.

Trump poses an existential threat to the Establishment Republican wing of the Deep State.

1 hour ago, Keyvan Shahrdar said:

Yes, Donald Trump's relationship with some of the military's top leaders was often characterized as tense during his tenure as President. Several instances highlighted these tensions:

James Mattis: Trump's first Secretary of Defense, General James Mattis, resigned in December 2018, citing differences in viewpoints with the President.

Trump insisted on personal loyalty from everyone who worked for him.  Within days he called James Comey of the FBI — the man most responsible for Hillary’s defeat — to dinner and asked for his personal loyalty.  This is contrary to American government tradition — people swear allegiance to the Constitution, not one man.  That’s a fascist dictatorship.

1 hour ago, Keyvan Shahrdar said:

 

Mattis's resignation letter emphasized the importance of allies and suggested that Trump did not value these alliances as much.

Trump wanted to pull out of NATO and be the apple of Putin’s eye.  Yes, that alienated the military brass and they kept him bottled up.   But neo-con war hawks loved his Middle East policies.

1 hour ago, Keyvan Shahrdar said:

John Kelly: General John Kelly, who served as Trump's Chief of Staff, reportedly had disagreements with Trump on various issues. After leaving the White House, Kelly made statements that were critical of Trump's policies and actions.

90% of the people who worked for Trump are critical.

1 hour ago, Keyvan Shahrdar said:

H.R. McMaster: Trump's second National Security Advisor, Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster, also reportedly had a strained relationship with Trump, particularly over policy in Afghanistan and Russia.

And they’re going to whack the 4 times indicted, civilly convicted rapist for that?

1 hour ago, Keyvan Shahrdar said:

Syria Withdrawal: Trump's decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria in 2019 was met with resistance from military leaders and led to Mattis's resignation.

They ignored his orders.  As a motive for assassination it’s weak sauce.