Paul Brancato

I wouldnt lump Bernstein and Woodward together like that. Bernstein is a real journalist, Woodward a CIA asset. Simplistic I know, but what I generally believe about the two. I'm not disputing their cumulative effect in bringing down the renegade Nixon, just suggesting one of them may have been working for the national security state while the other thought he was just trying to bring down a corrupt president.

Steven Gaal posts interesting stuff, but his presentation is confusing at times, and he occasionally leans towards the anti-semitic, for lack of a better descriptor. But give him credit - he does source his material. In any case Crichton is very interesting. What I don't get is why no one here addresses the accusations of Fabian Escalante. Is he to be dismissed because he is Cuban? He does not supply backup to his claim that George H W Bush and Jack Crichton together provided off the shelf financing for Richard Nixon's Operation 40, amongst whose members, curiously, was Porter Goss. Nevertheless it rings true to me. Can anyone here either support or refute his claim?

Walker never mentioned Oswald until after Nov 22. Its useless, Paul T., to continue to misrepresent this fact. Your point about Walker wanting Oswald to be seen as a Communist is well taken, and goes to the heart of why I and others believe that Oswald did not shoot at Walker. Had Walker mentioned his suspicions before Nov 22 I would have a different take on this. When Walker found out that the man in DPD custody was a 'communist' he jumped on the chance to accuse Oswald of being his shooter as well, precisely because he wanted to spin the JFK assassination into a communist, Castro conspiracy, and what better way to bolster Oswald's bonafides than to link him to an assassination attempt on America's most prominent rightist? Without Walker's insinuation into the JFK hit I think it is very unlikely that Ruth Paine, Marina, Demohrenschildt would ever have provided so-called 'evidence' in support of that story. How convenient all this post Nov 22 character assassination of LHO was. Yes, Paul T. - you are right. None of it worked to influence US foreign policy. The lone 'communist' nut became the story.

Jon is technically correct, whatever the innuendos were. FPCC was not a communist organization. That is why there were covert efforts to smear them with a communist brush - hence Oswald's attempt to create a NO branch and then use his bonafides in MC. It seems too much of a coincidence that Oswald's NO games occurred at the exact time that CIA and FBI were running operations to smear FPCC. It seems highly likely to me that Phillips was involved in this effort. It was common practice to link progressive organizations to known communists in order to discredit them in the public's eye.

'truthiness' - what a great word. Thank you Stephen Colbert

Defense contractors. Recall General Smedley Butler, after a long career putting down South American rebellions, finally coming out and proclaiming that he had made these countries 'safe for American corporations'. Public officials have to worry about paper trails because they are subject to some degree to public scrutiny. Corporate heads are more protected. Its the private communications between these two groups that we rarely see - in my opinion. Ron - Gary Mack says the CTKA article is wrong. He claims the Winspear Opera House owns the recording.

Defense contractors. Recall General Smedley Butler, after a long career putting down South American rebellions, finally coming out and proclaiming that he had made these countries 'safe for American corporations'. Public officials have to worry about paper trails because they are subject to some degree to public scrutiny. Corporate heads are more protected. Its the private communications between these two groups that we rarely see - in my opinion.

I guess no one is interested in the Crichton connection?

Uh - Henry Cabot Lodge?

How exactly did the news media get the national security message to suppress all evidence contradicting the lone nut scenario?

Jack Allston Crichton - Steven - please repost just the link to the Spartacus page on Crichton. This guy has flown under the radar for so long. His name pops up once in a while of course, but Simkin puts it all in one place, and I think it is must reading, since he ties in so many things in Dallas.

Paul - an interesting post. Some clarification - were there two stories about Walker published in the nov 29 edition of the German paper? Did one or both mention RFK? Did either Walker or Frey ever clarify what Walker told Frey early morning on nov 23rd? I seem to remember some prevarication and lack of clarity on this. Its logical to assume that Walker told Frey that LHO had been his shooter. But did he confirm that he told Frey, or did Frey confirm that Walker told him that? It would be helpful if you could be very clear when you talk about this particular possibly very important set of details, since we have no record from before nov 22 that anyone knew or thought they knew who shot at Walker. And please clarify what exactly we can prove about RFK appearing in that article. Mae Brussell's theory about a fourth reich goes a lot deeper than your summary indicates. In the first place the evidence she pointed to was global in nature. Secondly, she also pointed out that certain factions of our business elites supported Hitler before the war, and maintained ties during the war. I agree that we had our own bad guys, and I think when we use labels like Nazi it makes it too easy to dismiss evidence of collusion. What does it matter what we call our Dulles brothers, and our Bushes?

Paul - I pointed out before that Oswald's faked pro-Castro credentials have not stood the test of time, as they were obviously paper thin. In my mind that lends support to the idea that operations involving LHO were never meant to stand up to close scrutiny, the kind of scrutiny you get when a president is murdered. More likely their sole purpose was to discredit FPCC by painting that organization with a communist brush, not to set Oswald up as a communist patsy. We know that US intelligence were mounting such operations against FPCC, both FBI and CIA, at the very time that LHO began his New Orleans sojourn. To me it makes logical sense that Oswald was part of those operations, as were Banister and his boys, and Ed Butler, and probably Bringuier. When was it decided, by whomever, that Dallas would be the place? After all, we do know that plans were afoot in Chicago and Miami that were thwarted, and that didn't involve LHO. Its even possible that Oswald was the reason for the failure of the Chicago plot, as we know that it was someone named 'Lee' that blew the cover. It appears that their were other patsies set up in both places. Very complicated plan for a bunch of Birchers. A far simpler explanation in my view is that the plotters had no specific aims in regards to Cuba, but simply wanted to get JFK out of their way. They didn't want WW 3. They wanted power. The guys who planned it also controlled the coverup.

Robert, and Greg, and Paul T, I would like to point out for the umpteenth time that whenever Mr. Trejo claims that Walker knew within days of the attempt on his life that it was LHO who was the shooter, or at least one of the shooters, he neglects to mention that Walker's claim dates from after the JFK assassination. Indeed Walker did claim after the assassination, though not to the WC, but often throughout the remainder of his life, that he knew within days that LHO shot at him, but he never stated that before NOV. 22 1963! Every single time that Trejo repeats this assertion he gives a false impression, knowingly, and it reflects on his intellectual honesty in my opinion.

Thanks Ron - that is a great link, one I hope everyone here reads.

Ron - thanks for clarifying that it was the mayor of Dallas who arranged the Rose interview and refused to allow recording or transcript to be released. What is your source? Jon - agree about John Jr. I think we know which major crime family benefitted the most from the destruction of the political power of the Kennedy clan.

Bob - you and Paul T disagree about Oswald shooting at Walker. Also, be aware that Trejo eliminates the Joint Chiefs, Alan Dulles, LBJ, CIA brass, and Hoover from any possible involvement in the 'kill team', even though this cast of characters I just mentioned would have had far less difficulty organizing local military intelligence units, the DPD, the Secret Service, local FBI, Dallas mayor Cabell, and controlling the motorcade route than Trejo's choices Edwin Walker, Guy Banister, Minutemen, JBS, etc. Note that there are close connections between his group and mine, the primary difference being that his group of right wingers are 'rogues', whereas mine were actually in power officially. His theory in a nutshell is that his group of rightists committed the crime and my group of righties covered up the crime to prevent civil unrest. I have no shame in saying that JFK's murder was itself an act of state, and not just a convenient murder. Trejo expects that in 2017 his theory to be vindicated by a document release and the end of the coverup. I expect no such thing.

Jon - feel free to engage with Trejo in detail, but please try to answer my simpler questions first, since I am trying to find out what you believe, rather than arguing my point of view. Trejo - we do know how JFK felt about Vietnam, and we do know that his policy was reversed the day before he was shot. We do know what his relationship with the Joint Chiefs was like, and we do know how he felt about Alan Dulles and his minions,and about LBJ. We also know that the right wing is in control here, now. The electorate rails against this of course, even going so far as to elect Obama twice. But the right has control of the courts, and of the Congressional districting, and of the 'free' press. I doubt that anyone here agrees with you that 2017 will see the release of documents by the U.S. government that will finally put this national nightmare to rest. We at least agree on one thing - JFK was killed by a right wing conspiracy.

Jon - are you aware of the fact that Robert F Kennedy Jr. went to Dallas in 2013 for an interview with Charlie Roae which has never been aired? The best coverage of that interview states that RFK Jr. claimed his father did not believe the WC and thought that rogue CIA officers were behind it. This was the first speaking visit since 1963 of any Kennedy family member to Dallas. RFK Jr. has also been recommending JFK and the Unspeakable to those who wish to read about the assassination of his uncle. Have you read this book? I think the best explanation for the Kennedy silence is fear. 50 years is a long time to wait, and when one courageous member of the family finally came forward the press essentially didn't cover it, and in fact changed the story, putting words in RFK Jr's mouth that actually came from Charlie Rose. I believe it was the Dallas morning news which covered the story first, and all subsequent coverage twisted one part of the story in order to spin the word 'Mafia' as coming from RFK Jr rather than Charlie Rose, thus twisting what was said by whom significantly. So as you said on another thread Jon, the coverup is alive and well.

Jon - I welcome your attempts to answer your very valid questions. Who set up Oswald, and why? Why is the coverup ongoing?

I am bumping this thread to see where it goes. I'm not sure what I think about the post I wrote, #204, on this thread. When I wrote it I was not aware of the connection between Operation Tilt and the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee and their man in the State Department Security office, Otto Otepka. Generally, following Carl Oglesby's definitions, I am much more suspicious of the Cowboys than the Yankees. But its too simplistic, as there are mutual interests that supercede eastern and western power centers. How would one characterize the Joint Chiefs for instance? Bayo Pawley does seem like an important clue.

Jon - you make the statement that no one here can be sure how and why JFK was killed. In general terms I disagree. Specifics are of course lacking in the absence of smoking gun confessions or tapes of the conspirators planning the operation. That we will never have. So we don't know exactly where shooters were standing or how many bullets they fired from what gun. But we do know for a certainty that Oswald did not fire a rifle from the tsbd. We should have stopped trying to prove this decades ago. And we generally know why he was killed too. So I don't think DVP and his ilk do us any favors by keeping our skills well honed. The idea that we are dealing with a mystery has only served to keep us fragmented and powerless.

Good final question Thomas. I am working through Scott's article for which you provided a link, Oswald and the search for Popov's mole. Is that the right title? Would you. Mind posting another link here on this thread? I'd do it if I knew how. Should be required reading for anyone pondering Oswald's possible intelligence ties.

Thanks for that Jon. You say you ran into many CIA officers in Vietnam and that they were relatively easy for you to spot. Did your knowledge of these individuals extend to actually seeing ID's? If not, do you think that any or all of them carried ID's identifying themselves as CIA employees?

Jon - do you know anyone personally who has interacted and intersected with intelligence agents from various branches for several years with barely a month or even week going by without some footprint or other? Is it usually so confusing to look at the military records of an individual? Should we expect to find so many confusing and conflicting bits of info normally in someones service record? I find the 'footprints of intelligence' descriptor very useful to describe Oswald's confusing and obfuscated record.