Paul Rigby

I wonder if Arnaud de Borchgrave will answer in person? It doesn't; and I didn't say it did. What it does tell us is, given the extent of the cover-up, that version 2 is a different version. The case for the first version also being a forgery is a separate issue.

Features in Zapruder public version 1 (Zpv1) absent from or different to Zapruder public version 2 (Zpv2): 1) Presidential limousine turning left from Houston onto Elm 2) No street sign interposed between camera and President at moment of impact of first bullet 3) Shooting took place further up Elm St towards Overpass, either opposite (or “abreast” of) Zapruder, or beginning at the steps leading up to the grassy knoll 4) Connolly’s white shirt visibly covered in blood following impact of shot 5) JFK’s head went forward in response to impact of head shot Elements of Zpv1 (1) to (5) described in following: 1) Presidential limousine filmed turning left from Houston onto Elm: • Abraham Zapruder on WFAA-TV, at 2:10pm CST, November 22, 1963: transcript: http://www.jfk-info.com/wfaa-tv.htm • Dan Rather, CBS radio & TV, 251163: http://www.i-accuse.com/Rudd_Hotelet.html • UPI (New York), “Film Showing Assassination Is Released,” The Valley Independent, (Monessen, Pennsylvania), Tuesday, November 26, 1963, Page 5 (description of film shown on WNEW-TV, NY, at 00:46hrs, November 26, 1963) • Arthur J. Snider (Chicago Daily News Service), “Movies Reconstruct Tragedy,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, (Evening edition), November 27, 1963, section 2, p.1 • Warren Report (U.S. Government Printing Office (1964), p.98 • Roy Kellerman, 090364 (2WCH91): http://jfkassassination.net/russ/testimony/kellerma.htm • Mark Lane. Rush to Judgment: A Critique of the Warren Commission’s Inquiry into the Murders of President John F. Kennedy, Officer J. D. Tippit and Lee Harvey Oswald (London: The Bodley Head Ltd., 1966), p.66, footnote 2 2) No street sign interposed between camera and President at moment of impact of first bullet: • Dallas Morning News, “Photographer Sells Pictures of Assassination for $25,000,” November 24, 1963 • Dan Rather, CBS radio & TV, 251163 (Richard Trask. Pictures of the Pain, p.87): http://www.i-accuse.com/Rudd_Hotelet.html • Associated Press (Dallas), "Movie Film Depicts Shooting of Kennedy,” Milwaukee Journal, November 26, 1963, part 1, p.3 • UPI (New York), “Film Showing Assassination Is Released,” The Valley Independent, (Monessen, Pennsylvania), Tuesday, November 26, 1963, Page 5 (description of film shown on WNEW-TV, NY, at 00:46hrs, November 26, 1963) • UPI (Dallas), “Movie Film Shows Murder of President,” Philadelphia Daily News, Tuesday, 26 November 1963, p.3 (4 star edition) • Express Staff Reporter (New York, Monday), “The Man Who Got the Historic Pictures,” Daily Express, Tuesday, 26 November 1963, p.10 • John Herbers, “Kennedy Struck by Two Bullets, Doctor Who Attended Him Says,” New York Times, November 27, 1963, p.20 • Arthur J. Snider (Chicago Daily News Service), “Movies Reconstruct Tragedy,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, (Evening edition), November 27, 1963, section 2, p.1 • “The Man Who Killed Kennedy,” Time, December 6, 1963, p.29 • Abraham Zapruder (7WCH571): http://www.jfk-info.com/wc-zapr.htm • William Manchester, Look magazine, 040467; Death of a President (London: Pan, paperback, 1968), p.234 3) Shooting took place further up Elm St towards Overpass, either opposite (or “abreast” of) Zapruder, or beginning at the steps leading up to the grassy knoll: • Associated Press (Dallas), "Movie Film Depicts Shooting of Kennedy,” Milwaukee Journal, November 26, 1963, part 1, p.3 • John Herbers, “Kennedy Struck by Two Bullets, Doctor Who Attended Him Says,” New York Times, November 27, 1963, p.20 • Abraham Zapruder, 7WCH571: http://www.jfk-info.com/wc-zapr.htm • Harold Feldman, “Fifty-one witnesses: The Grassy Knoll,” The Minority of One, March 1965, p.17 • John Herbers, “Kennedy Struck by Two Bullets, Doctor Who Attended Him Says,” New York Times, November 27, 1963, p.20 4) Connolly’s white shirt visibly covered in blood following impact of shot: • Dan Rather, CBS, Radio & TV, 251163: http://www.etcfilmunit.com/iaccuse.html 5) JFK’s head went forward in response to impact of head shot: • Dan Rather, CBS, Radio & TV, 251163 (Richard Trask, Pictures of the Pain (Danvers, Mass.: Yeoman Press, 1994, p.87): http://www.etcfilmunit.com/iaccuse.html • Associated Press (Dallas), "Movie Film Depicts Shooting of Kennedy,” Milwaukee Journal, November 26, 1963, part 1, p.3 • UPI (Dallas), “Movie Film Shows Murder of President,” Philadelphia Daily News, Tuesday, 26 November 1963, p.3 (4 star edition) • John Herbers, “Kennedy Struck by Two Bullets, Doctor Who Attended Him Says,” New York Times, November 27, 1963, p.20 • Cartha DeLoach, Hoover’s FBI: The Inside Story by Hoover’s Trusted Lieutenant (1995), p.139: http://www.kenrahn.com/jfk/the_critics/griffith/Alteration.html Most of the newspaper articles cited above can be found in the thread Eleven early print descriptions of the Zapruder film: http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=8953

He didn't. The first version - the one he described, at least twice, on both CBS radio and TV, on Monday, 25 November - was no more an accurate record of the assassination than the second. The original fake was withdrawn early to mid-morning on Tuesday, 26 November, largely, it would appear, due to concerns about the impact of the Parkland doctors' press conference, at which it was stated unequivocally that Kennedy was shot from the front. The original fake failed to show JFK turning round to account for an entrance wound to the throat. It was therefore suppressed, and a revised fake substituted, one which sought to finesse the issue by depicting the throat wound's impact as taking place behind the street sign. This attempt to defuse the issue of the throat wound's frontal entrance necessitated major changes: The bullet impacts were moved back down Elm Street, closer to the TSBD, with all the attendant problems that created in the first version's witness alignment etc, most notably on the south curb. Quite right - and nor do I. But we don't have to in this instance, for it is not the veracity of the film he saw which is here of primary importance, but the sequence and context. Remember, Rather offered his first descriptions in the expectation that the film would soon be broadcast. Why would he offer such extended hostages to fortune and credibility in that circumstance? Our problem is that we view everything through the prism of the much later versions of the films' histories; and not through the record as it unfolded. In short, we read everything backwards, and through the lenses the CIA created for us.

Bit obsessed with your opponents' bottoms, I can't help noticing. Here's Laney getting all righteous about Dan Rather and which version of the Z-fake is the bigger fake. Now there's a discussion for the philosophers, most likely of deception: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXi0usMq30E In the documentary The Garrison Tapes, there's a wonderful segment on Lane's attempt, in conjunction with Mort Sahl, to prepare Garrison to feign shock on the Carson show. A skill he himself put to some use in 1975.

Photographic fact trumps witness testimony every time - er, doesn't it? But there's your mission, Craigster, your chance to make a non-photographic research splash: Get Lane to go on record issuing a repudiation of what he wrote in 1963. Good luck with getting a reply. I believe the evidence of this forum isn't too auspicious!

I did a number of things, Bob, but, for the moment, I'll refrain from boring you with all of the tedious detail. Translated from Rigbyspeak Robert..... NO. And I thought you were only interested in "photographic fact"! I am shocked to see you straying into the realm of, well, research. You sure you're feeling ok? Lane was of little interest because he's i) a player* and ii) he's hardly likely to have videotaped WNEW-TV's showing of the Z-fake in November 1963. There were other, more interesting, priorities, not least trying to find a kinescope or a copy of the original UPI film. How thorough the CIA was in covering its tracks remains to be fully tested. * Lane has had numerous opportunities to speak out on the issue, not least in April 1975. To the surprise of no one familiar with his career, he didn't take them.

I did a number of things, Bob, but, for the moment, I'll refrain from boring you with all of the tedious detail. One avenue of inquiry provided powerful, if indirect, confirmation of my proposition. Without being too cryptic about it - for I made a promise to one respondent which I intend keeping - it's safe to say that sight of the first version of the Z-fake could be almost as injurious to health as witnessing the assassination itself. A second elicited a mildly amusing reply from an eminent collector in the kinescope field, who irately demanded to know why I didn't just google "Zapruder film" and watch it on-line. I had sent him this: I forgave him his impatience for the obvious reason.

“Lane’s Defense Brief for Oswald,” published by the National Guardian, 19 December 1963: http://karws.gso.uri.edu/jfk/The_critics/Lane/Natl-Guardian/Natl_Guardian.html How could Lane write, in an article published in the 19 December 1963 edition of the National Guardian, of having viewed the Zapruder film on television, when, according to the Department of Zapruderland Security and fellow-travellers, the film wasn’t shown on television until 1975? (1). Well, if the hypothesis advanced in the thread Was Muchmore’s film shown on WNEW-TV, New York, on 26 November 1963? – to wit, that the first version of the Z film debuted on that station at 12:46 a.m. on the morning of Tuesday, 26 November 1963 - is correct, we have an explanation. So where was Lane 25-26 November 1963? According to the forward to A Citizen’s Dissent: Mark Lane replies (NY: Fawcett Crest, April 1969), in New York. From the same source, we learn that he commenced work on his defence brief for Oswald on Tuesday, 26 November: Lane’s recollection of the showing of the Z film fulfils the classic criteria for preferment as an historical source: it was spontaneous; contemporaneous; and, seemingly, disinterested. It also had recent and related precedent. Just as in the case of Dan Rather and his rather more detailed descriptions of the radically different first version of the Z film, as offered on CBS (radio and TV) on 25 November, Lane could have had no inkling of the plotters’ plans for the film. There never was, it almost passes without remark, formal notice of the first version’s withdrawal for “editing,” merely the announcement that Time-Life had acquired film rights in addition to the still ones. In A Citizen’s Dissent, Lane noted that advance proof sheets of his original defense brief were “sent to the United Press International (UPI) by the Guardian. The UPI responded that they ‘wouldn’t touch it’” (3) No wonder. If the Milwaukee Journal report of 26 November 1963 was accurate, UPI had “obtained” (or, more likely, merely been allocated) the original film rights for the Z film’s first version (4). Lane’s reference to having viewed it on TV would inevitably have set alarm bells ringing within the senior ranks of the organisation: It was now involved in the dissemination of amnesia and confusion with regard to the film, not the film itself. It should be noted that: 1) Lane’s ignorance of the changes made to the first version of the Z-fake was still complete by the time of Rush To Judgment’s publication in 1966; and 2) the left turn was from Houston onto Elm is recorded as being present on the Z-fake (version 1) by the Warren Report itself, a fact blithely and enduringly overlooked by the sharp-eyed and principled defenders of the Z-fake’s veracity. Mark Lane. Rush to Judgment: A Critique of the Warren Commission’s Inquiry into the Murders of President John F. Kennedy, Officer J. D. Tippit and Lee Harvey Oswald (London: The Bodley Head Ltd., 1966), p.66, footnote 2: You’ll find these useful, too: The edited Zapruder film: The vanishing left turn from Houston onto Elm http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=8952&view=findpost&p=87147 Early print reports of the Zapruder film and its contents (most extensive, though there is an earlier version somewhere on this site): http://www.deeppoliticsforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=261

All the above is spot-on. Pity Truman came so late to the game. Kennedy was warned about Dulles almost immediately after his election. And this wasn't the wisdom of post-assassination hindsight:

Thanks, Mike, I had quite forgotten how utterly devastating Miller was on the grassy knoll gunman nonsense. So much for initial shots from distance. Useful ammunition for those who think diversionary shots came later.

I agree. In fact, it was shown on WNEW-TV on the morning of Tuesday, 26 November. Even worse, I have a moderately well-known assassination researcher who wrote so at the time (a Mr Mark Lane); a journalist who wrote that UPI Newsfilms had distributed it to subscribing stations (in this instance, in Milwaukee); and two other written recollections of the film being broadcast on television during that time frame. I wouldn't mind, but I got this far entirely unassisted by a generous Foundation grant. The question is, who to believe: David and the contemporary orthodoxy, which once held the film had never been near the CIA in the days following the assassination, or the contemporaneous witnesses? It's a tough one, I concede, but who said history was easy? Except in this case, of course.

Fair enough. We've established your criterion. Bearing that in mind - no prizes for anticipating what's coming - show me exactly the same from any one of your preferred (non-car) locations. Simple, straightforward challenge, no tricks. Same sort of question, again, no tricks, no "side." On what basis did you decide some frames are genuine, and others not?

Purely out of curiosity, Dean, if you don't buy the eyewitnesses, and you think the Z-fake's a fake, what exactly are you relying upon? Is there something that we've all missed? Or, if you are persuaded by some eyewitnesses, but not others, what are your criteria for so discriminating? Nothing too esoteric, mind, as it's getting late.

That's a fairly radical take on the necessity for specialization within the SS, Greg, one thoroughly repudiated, moreover, in the publicly available literature that I've come across; and common sense would suggest. Greer wouldn't always be driving when on duty with the SS; presidential limos occasionally stopped and were momentarily engulfed in well-wishers; and he didn't need to "multi-task" when delivering the fatal shot to his President's left-temple: He stopped the car against the south curb of Elm, turned round, and fired. Footnote from chapter 4, The Filmed Assassination, of Fred Newcomb & Perry Adams’ Murder From Within (Santa Barbara: Probe, 1974) Nowt to do with supposition. It's there in the statements and observations of some of the closest eyewitnesses:

Ah, yes, Plan B: If you can't convince them, emote. In fact, Bob, the average TV viewer in 1975 could simply pop down to the cinema and watch much worse than the Z-fake any day of the week. Not to mention television news. As I observed above, you're an anti-historian.

And if I listed the anti-alterationist absurdities you ignore I'd be here all night. Be that as it may, let's consider the question of "relative" to what. First, and most obviously, the Muchmore film could not conceivably have been considered "gruesome" even had it been shown in 1963, complete with added footage of the assassination untaken by Muchmore. The first version of the Z film could. Second, what was this age of innocence? One in which footage of a firing squad and its victims was shown (live?) by CBS TV; and the assassination-by-stabbing of a Japanese cabinet member broadcast. Very innocent. One of the many troubles with the anti-alterationist cause is that it is fundamentally anti-historical. It reads history backwards; and with CIA spectacles. Fortunately, Angleton had at least one thing right: The past, if we allow it, can telescope into the future.

At last, a point of substance. And the Muchmore film isn't a gorefest. http://karws.gso.uri.edu/jfk/The_critics/Lane/Natl-Guardian/Natl_Guardian.html Of course, what was shown on WNEW-TV in the first hour of Tuesday, 26 November had to be withdrawn and history rewritten. But, happily, we've caught back up with them and now know what they did. Enter stage right, the PNAC...

What do you reckon, Francois, Lucky Strike or Virginia Slim? Given the range, it would have to be the latter, surely?

No, it isn't. But it should have been. Hence the laughter. Perhaps you could help him out, Jim, by vetting his posts on the subject? That way he could get to say what you think he should, instead of mangling things hopelessly.

Good question. Shall we explore further? Let's. A promising start, it has to be said: a non-summary summary. But now our resident stand-up gets into full comedic stride. From circular logic... ...to, er, no logic: Brilliant. And now for the punchline: You've forgotten something here, Bob, and it's kind of important: The film described as "gruesome" is meant to be the Muchmore film, not the Zapruder, remember? So explaining why late November 1963 TV viewers were shocked by seeing the Zapruder film is, from your anti-alterationist perspective, just not very bright. Now that is funny. Yes; and right over your head it sailed, too. Never mind, keep trying!

The contrary is true: It was an elegant, if brutal, schema which boasted powerful advantages over any other alternative plan for a public assassination using guns. 1. Any plan predicated upon the SS not merely facilitating, but firing, the fatal shots, gave it a portability which no other alternative could match: The assassins would be with their target on all relevant occasions, ready to go at any opportune moment. 2. The selection of the driver as the assassin fixed the distance between target and shooter; and ensured that the shooter controlled the speed of his target: No alternative can match this plan for economy and efficiency. 3. The selection of the driver as assassin offered element of surprise (for both target and observers); a natural alibi (“I was merely returning fire, guvnor, honest”); and more control over external factors – an excited spectator, a wandering motorcycle outrider, a curious local policeman unwittingly interdicting or merely disturbing a sniper team – than any of the alternatives. 4. The selection of the driver as assassin utilised a man with an existing skill-set perfect for the task. 5. The selection of the driver as assassin guaranteed ready access to incriminating evidence, which could then be made to vanish etc.; and furnished the most powerful motive of all for participation in the subsequent, inevitable, cover-up. And so on and so forth.

With pleasure: Was Muchmore’s film shown on WNEW-TV, New York, on November 26, 1963? http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=12216 Muchmore’s FBI interview, 4 December 1963: “…she advised she did not obtain any photographs of the assassination scene.” http://www.history-matters.com/analysis/witness/witnessMap/documents/wcd_hsca/wcd_hsca_0080a.gif

No, it wasn't. The first version of the Z-fake was: Mary Muchmore shot no footage of the presidential limo on Elm: There is a spectacularly good thread on this very issue elsewhere on this site. I must find my own work.

Never said you did, Greg. I simply drew attention to a faulty distinction you'd drawn. What puzzles me, quite genuinely, is why those who embrace the abundant evidence of SS treason find it so unimaginable that that involvement should extend to the actual shooting. It's particularly perplexing in the case of those such as you who have seen through the Z-fake. Clear this CIA-constructed impediment out of the road, and we transform the case into a standard murder inquiry - one dependent upon witnesses, not a lot of junk celluloid.

The verb you chose - "refute" - reveals you have missed my point by some distance, quite possibly the length of Elm. No, I am not "refuting" the existence of non-Oswaldian assassins by such arguments, not least because the evidence is overwhelming that Oswald had nothing whatever to do with the shooting. So the facts oblige us to consider the alternatives. I merely pointed out that the particular objection advanced by Jim DisIngenuous is, contrary to the impression he sought to convey, every bit as applicable to all other alternatives to Greer. It thus tells us nothing about the case against Greer, or, indeed, the alternatives, but plenty about DisIngenuous. Here again, all is confusion. You seek to persuade us of a distinction between active and passive SS involvement which rests upon your belief that as Greer didn't shoot his President, the SS involvement was thus "passive." The distinction is bogus. "Active" complicity is stripping the layers of protection, slowing the limo to a halt etc. The question is then not whether the SS was actively or passively complicit, but whether one of its number pulled the trigger. And judgment on that issue rests with consideration of the eyewitness testimony, the Parkland doctors observations etc.