Paul Rigby

So to the hypothetical. What factors might have prompted the highest echelon of the conspirators to intervene, however clumsily, to suppress the first public version of the Zapruder film (Zpv1)? Three reasons in particular suggest themselves. The existence of any one of the following, given widespread public familiarity with the material, would be sufficient. A combination would be devastating and cause Z(pv1) - unless suppressed, reworked, and buttressed by, for example, public amnesia and further filmic props - to be transformed from asset to liability: 1. Error(s) or oversight(s) in the original; 2. Film or photographs which contradicted Z(pv1); 3. Authoritative (expert) testimony that did likewise. We have evidence of all three: 1. Rather’s descriptions, as offered on both CBS television and radio on Nov 25, of Connally’s posture when shot in Z(pv1) aligns him with neither a shot from the rear, nor one from the knoll; 2. Altgens #4, the most widely distributed single image of the actual shooting sequence; 3. The Parkland doctors’ press conference, which was extensively televised.

Not really, Bill. I'd much prefer the evidence alleged to underpin his claim. His repeated failure to produce it strongly suggests it doesn't exist - much like your claim that Trask's Pictures of the Pain contains reference to Muchmore's film being shown on WNEW-TV on Nov 26. Paul

British democracy, Myra, is currently as vibrant as the Norwegian Blue in the Python sketch.

Happy to oblige, Bill. I did two things. First, I rang a former managing editor of the New York World-Telegram & Sun. I asked him if he thought it probable or likely that a film shown on a New York-based TV station - according to Mack, at, well, let us fix upon just one of the timings offered, just after midday on Nov 26 - was likely to have made it into his former paper, or the other two NY afternoon papers, that same day. He said he thought it highly unlikely, and that a far more likely proposition was the NYT of Nov 27. I then bought a stack of NY papers covering the period 25-28th Nov 1963, and went through them. The only report I could find was that by Doan in the NYHT of Nov 27 (see previous postings in this thread). I found nothing in the purchased editions of the Journal American, the Post, or the Telegram & Sun of Tuesday, Nov 26. Nor in the NYT of Nov 27. I cannot absolutely preclude the possibility for the simple reason that I couldn't afford, even assuming they were available for purchase, to buy every single edition of the three afternoon papers from the date in question. (I would urge any US readers with the time, access and inclination to investigate further.) But I'm very sceptical. If such a report does exist, why Mack's reluctance to produce it? After all, as Mark Knight has rightly pointed out, it's Mack who claims it exists; and on its existence, rests his case. Paul

A very grand way of describing robbery with extreme violence!

Further evidence of the Metropolitan Police's unremitting probity: Sean O’Neill, “Judges condemn police lies after 9/11 attacks that ruined pilot's life,” The Times, 15 Feb 2008 http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/busi...icle3368163.ece

Some mistakes are worth their weight in gold: In the above email of late Feb last year, in the course of dismissing my very different history of the Muchmore film, Gary Mack described a November 26, 1963, NY newspaper description of the...Zapruder film. Thank you. I knew we'd get there. Eventually. Paul

Mack email to me, Education Forum message: Mack email to me arising from exchange #42933 on JFK Lancer website, 19 January 2006: Bill Miller on behalf of Gary Mack, JFK Lancer, 15 January 2006: The Shifting TV debut day of Muchmore: Two years have passed, and still nothing from Mack in support of his repeated claims that there exists a clipping from a New York afternoon newspaper, dated November 26, 1963, that confirms the showing of the Muchmore film earlier that day. Could it be that no such clipping exists? Or does the first cited email above suggest it does exist, but contains information not entirely helpful to the anti-alterationist case? Paul

Some days can, in retrospect, seem a little too eventful for their own good. Never fear, a helping hand is always at the ready. First Stolley, then the historian: Perfect timing for a C.D. Jackson intervention on November 25, after the cinematic bird had, temporarily at least, flown the cage. Enter a man with a net: And by way of confirming the date of the first of the "fact finding" recreations/surveys:

Bernice, Any follow up to this to be found within the files? Paul

Paul, you're joking - right? Trask's book tells of the sale of the film - date - etc.. I then went to Gary Mack to find out that the details of the Muchmore film showed up in the press. That article told of the showing of the Muchmore film (I believe the night before). Maybe if you'd get all the facts before drawing your conclusions, then possibly you'd better understand my position. Here is Mack's email address ... feel free to learn as much as you can on the matter - GMack@JFK.Org Bill, You claimed Trask's Pictures of the Pain as the source for WNEW-TV showing Muchmore's film not long after midday on November 26 - it does no such thing. If you wish to persist in the untruth, that's, er, great! Paul

Needs more work, frankly, as attempted explanations go. Perhaps Tarantino could shoot the covert remake of the Muchmore film? The last two sentences were, indeed, and thus the report is all the more credible, as the unnamed reporter gives unmistakable indication that he - or she - rang WITI-TV and checked. Lot of very interesting and important questions thrown together here. In order: Yes; No; Was any member of the media going to listen to such a figure? How do you know they didn't?; The figures who spotted the need for changes were not in total control of the film and its distribution: CD Jackson intervened on their behalf, using Time-Life as cover; The stills in the first post-assassination of Life were few and of poor quality. Paul

The Chuckle Brothers have been conferring. Amnesia and obfuscation resulted: As Mack well knows - it's been on this forum before at least once - Tass stated flat out that Soviet viewers had been shown footage of the actual shooting, and contemporaneous Foreign Office files, inspected years later, confirmed it. Links to both: http://www.assassinationresearch.com/v1n2/worldreaction.html http://karws.gso.uri.edu/JFK/history/wc_pe...lmson%20TV.html I note with a smirk that one G. Mack, no less, assured Ian Griggs, the man responsible for the fine piece of research at the other end of the first link above, that "the Muchmore Film had been shown on a New York TV station, and probably others, on the 25th. He added that since the film was owned by UPI, it was likely to have been distributed to other news outlets and so it was quite possible that the film shown on Soviet TV was Marie Muchmore’s footage." Awesome. Paul

Thought as much, Jack: Bill Miller is a purveyor of porky pies. Trask either missed this claim, or else knew it to be false and steered clear of it, leaving the dirty work to the footsoldiers of falsehood. Take your pick. Paul

The history of the Muchmore film can be read in Trask's book "The Pictures of the Pain". If anyone doubts what film was flown to NY and shown on TV, then read Trask's book. The interesting part about Muchmore's film was that it wasn't known to the Feds until after it had been aired to the public. Sorry, Bill, but I've accidentally sent my only pair of reading specs to Jim Fetzer. Please remind me of the page reference and/or footnote in Trask's Pictures of the Pain wherein he explicitly states that Muchmor's film was shown on WNEW-TV on 26 November 1963 at, well, anytime? I would hate readers of this thread to be left with the impression that you've just made this up and that, in fact, there is no such claim made by Trask anywhere in the book. Paul PS Check your pants aren't aflame. I fear a conflagration.

Only if you guarantee to ensure Jim Fetzer makes good use of the spare pair of reading specs I've popped in the post to him tonight! Appreciated. Paul

Doesn't convince, Len. There was a film circulating which was genuinely gruesome and it wasn't the Muchmore: Sounds like the same film to me: Paul

Nat, Trask’s National Nightmare on six feet of film: Mr. Zapruder’s home movie and the murder of President Kennedy (Danvers, MA: Yeoman Press, 2005), pp.137-144, offers transcripts of Dan Rather’s two surprisingly detailed descriptions of the film, as offered on November 25, first to radio listeners, then to CBS television news watchers (Walter Cronkite presiding). I have assumed them accurate, whether wisely or not remains to be seen. Rather’s descriptions suggest a compelling reason for the recall of the first public version of the Z film. In both of them, Rather describes Connally as having turned to face the President, with his right arm extended towards the latter (radio) or merely reaching with an unspecified arm (tv) in response to Kennedy’s agonised response to the first bullet’s impact. Anatomically, then, Connally was in completely the wrong position to receive a bullet in the back from the rear. In fact, he was side-on to the TSBD, chest facing the grassy knoll, when, according to both Rather descriptions, the front of his exposed white shirt clearly manifested the exit wound. You see at once the problem for the manufacturers of the two official orthodoxies (TSBD and the grassy knoll – I think of them as a pair). Interestingly, Trask notes elsewhere that Rather was shown the Z film again on November 26 – in effect, one can’t help thinking, “re-educated” as to the film’s contents – at KRLD. According to Trask, it was one of the two copies sent to Washington, and recalled by the Dallas Secret Service (p.131). Call me cynical, but I rather suspect they were not the same film: By coincidence, November 25 was not only the day that Rather offered his two descriptions, but also the day on which Time-Life initiated a survey/reconstruction; and, late in the afternoon, that the same organisation felt belatedly compelled to buy the film rights to Z (or so the received version has it). Even more interestingly, it was the same night that Russian TV viewers were treated to a film of the actual shooting, a film that could not – because of the time differences involved – have been the Muchmore film. All in all, then, for the Zapruder film, a very event-filled day, November 25. Paul.

It is an article of faith among leading anti-alterationists that Mary Muchmore a) definitely did shoot film footage of President Kennedy’s execution (despite her explicit denial to the FBI); and that this brief film sequence was shown on WNEW-TV, New York, on Tuesday, 26 November 1963. When asked for both a specific timing and print sources for this certainly, however, said advocates have a marked tendency to become a little vague, or just plain conflicting. Responses for the showing time range from “morning,” to “just after midday,” or “afternoon” – of November 28, according to a recent bizarre contribution from Josiah Thompson – with appropriately imprecise citations of an unnamed New York newspaper report, of unspecified title on an unknown page, which appeared either on the afternoon of 26 November, or a day, possibly two, later. All of which is odd, because there are contemporaneous print sources for the showing of an assassination film by WNEW-TV on Nov. 26. The trouble is, as we shall see, that they don’t quite reinforce the simple-minded story the anti-alterationists would have us believe. I first came across a dating of and location for the Muchmore film’s debut in Barbie Zeliger’s Covering the Body: The Kennedy Assassination, the Media, and the Shaping of Collective Memory (University of Chicago Press, 1992), which directed the reader – see p.68 n7 (p.233) - to the December 2, 1963, edition of Broadcasting: The Businessweekly of Television and Radio (Vol 65, No 23), and a piece entitled “A World Listened and Watched.” On p.37, I found the following: So far, so good for the anti-alterationists. Better still, the same edition, on p.69, carried a full page advertisement from UPI. Curiously, however, the advert made no mention of the film-taker’s name. Here it is, in full: This reluctance to name the film-taker, as noted, struck me as curious: It was not without precedent, though, as we shall shortly see. Further reading unearthed an even earlier print source for the claim that the Muchmore film had debuted on WNEW-TV, New York, on Tuesday, Nov 26. The lengthy report, entitled Pictures of the Assassination Fall to Amateurs on Street, was authored by Rick Friedman, and appeared over three pages in the Editor and Publisher edition dated November 30, 1963. The germane passage ran as follows: This seemed such unequivocal confirmation of the anti-alterationists’ version of events – I didn’t flatter myself that all of them had missed the item - that I wondered what on earth stopped them from citing this source with cheerful regularity. Then I turned the page. Friedman’s article was spread over three pages. The passage on Muchmore and WNEW-TV appeared on p.17, the second of them. The third and final page was to be found distantly on p.67. As I read it, I realised at once why Friedman’s article could not be adduced by Thompson, Mack et al: Friedman had proceeded to commit heresy. The Muchmore film was not the only film of the assassination to have made it onto American television on November 26, 1963: This couldn’t have been the Muchmore film, which, even allowing for changing mores, could not conceivably have been considered “too gruesome,” even in 1963. Nor, to his limited credit, did Friedman seek to pretend it was. But what was this film, and who had taken it? Was there another assassination film in circulation in the US on November 26? Indeed there was, according to the Milwaukee Journal of November 26: The tale is not quite finished, though. There was, I discovered last year, an even earlier print source for a film shown on WNEW-TV on Tuesday, November 26. Again, note the absence of an attribution to a named film-taker: As with Friedman’s piece, so, too, with Doan’s report – it didn’t quite tell the tale the anti-alterationists peddle. And begged the question: Was it really the Muchmore film shown on WNEW-TV? Or was it the first public version of the Zapruder, the one seen and twice described by Dan Rather on November 25? Had the films been switched, with the Z film (public version one) hastily withdrawn, and the Muchmore – or merely frames from it - substituted? What there any evidence to support such a hypothesis? To my surprise, there was. On the front page of the Philadelphia Daily News, 4 star edition, on Tuesday, 26 November 1963, under the headline “Man Who Came to See JFK Makes Tragic Movie,” there is the following blurb above 4 stills, which take up the rest of the page: Below lay from 4 frames from…the Muchmore film. Something very interesting was going on with the assassination films on November 25-26, 1963. What it was, and why, offers the potential to shed important light on much more than just the history of the films.

Tribune, 21/28 August 1998, p.11 Letters: Noam, Sweet Noam Is Noam Chomsky a dissident? Donavan Pedelty insists so (Tribune, July 31) but the truth is otherwise. Chomsky’s bogusness is revealed by his repeated insistence upon the CIA’s unwavering fidelity to successive Presidents. Where the evidence is contrary, he ignores it. Nowhere is the suppression more systematic than in Rethinking Camelot: JFK, the Vietnam War, and US Political Culture (Verso, 1993). Consider, in particular, his survey of the Vietnam coverage of the New York Times from October 3 to December 4, 1963. One omission, among many, will suffice. On October 3, 1963, the NYT carried a column entitled “The Intra-Administration War In Vietnam.” It opened: “The Central Intelligence Agency is getting a very bad press in despatches from Vietnam…” Its author, Arthur Krock, proceeded to quote extensively from one such despatch, “Arrogant CIA Disobeys Orders in Vietnam”, by Richard Starnes of the Scripps-Howard group. The quotes below are from Starnes’s courageous and hauntingly prophetic original. According to Starnes’s senior diplomatic source, “Twice the CIA flatly refused to carry out instructions from Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge”, even though one set had been brought direct from Washington. Likening the CIA’s growth to a “malignancy”, which he was “not sure event the White House could control any longer”, the source predicted: “If the United States ever experiences a Seven Days in May it will come from the CIA” (Washington Daily News, October 2). PAUL RIGBY, BANKS, LANCASHIRE

...compelling rebuttals of James Chaney's testimony, as corroborated by etc. Funny, but I can't find one of them. Nor any from the head of the Sixth Form Museum. Odd, that.

Not, alas, in your reading age, Bill, but we can't have everything. Still, we do, after all, have your wit and charm to sustain us. Odd, this, as I tend to follow the eyewitnesses. You know, fringe figures like, er, James Chaney. Remember him? Sorry, Bill, but I appear to have missed your no doubt compelling explanation on this thread of where exactly Chaney vanished to in the the following fakes: Zapruder, Nix and Bell. Perhaps you'd deign to point me in the direction of your disquisition on the matter. As for the US mainstream media, it has as much connection with freedom of speech, truth and accuracy as Pravda in the time of Stalin. From the Fosbury to the Miller flop in a generation. The decline of America in a nutshell. Paul “If you toil so for Trask, what would you do for treasure?” John Clarke, Paroemiologia Anglo-Latina, 1639

Charles, I can't speak for "honourable alterationists" - good grief, what a Miltonian burden that imposes upon the poor souls* - but only for myself, a thoroughly dishonourable one. And, unsurprisingly, I couldn't disagree with you more. Would you have us cohere round a politico-literary fiction? Of course not. So why so around a series of mutually reinforcing celluloid ones? As for the alteration of the Z-film not being undertaken "to excise visual proof of conspiracy," I can only say "phooey." That was precisely why it was undertaken. In inverting that truth, you leave the field wide open to every limited hang-out the CIA and associated drones can dream up. The anti-alterationists have effectively held the field since at least 1975, and have taken us nowhere, precisely as intended. Some of us want to see a very outcome long before another three decades have elapsed. Paul *"Those who would be free must first be wise and good." Hell, that means eternal tyranny for the overwhelming majority of humanity!

For those interested in making the comparison for themselves between the Altgens photo in question*, and the Z frame – 255 - held to be the same instant in time only captured from the north pergola pedestal allegedly occupied by the dressmaker, there is no better place to turn than National Nightmare on six feet of film: Mr. Zapruder’s home movie and the murder of President Kennedy (Danvers, Ma: Yeoman Press, 2005), p.71. The Z frame is at the top of the page, Altgens’ immediately below. *Strictly speaking, Altgens’ most famous photo of the assassination was, at most generous, his fourth photo of the motorcade. For an outstanding exposition of the issues surrounding attribution of photos to Altgens, see John Costella's essay, “A Scientist’s Verdict: The Film is a Fabrication,” within James H. Fetzer (Ed.) The Great Zapruder Film Hoax: Deceit and Deception in the Death of JFK (Chicago: Catfeet Press, 2003), pp.199-206. As Costella notes, “Trask would have been a perfect addition to the staff of the Warren Commission!” (p.206).

He was in the process of passing the presidential limo in the Altgens photo. Chaney appears to have held his course and speed, as captured in the aforementioned: The presidential limo, by contrast, slowed and went left, towards the south curb of Elm, whereupon, according to eyewitnesses, it stopped; and a final shot was fired. Chaney, of course, drove straight on to the lead car. Removing Chaney was part of simplifying the falsification of the Z film. By removing from the shooting sequence the lower level of the first version – by first version I mean the one described by, for example, Dan Rather on CBS radio/TV on 25 November – the fabricators could concentrate on the middle and upper layers of it ie the presidential limo and the south curb, their occupants and dispositions in the course of the shooting. The decision to excise the lower level - in effect, the north curb and its occupants - from the film is strongly suggestive of the scale and complexity of the task, not to mention the time constraints, confronting the fabricators. Second, any trace of Chaney passing the limo lent credence to both his own description of events, and any observations attributed to him like, say, those by Marion Baker; and those of corroborating witnesses. Third, Chaney’s interposing himself between the north curb and presidential limo did little for the built-in fall-back position, the knoll. Paul