Jeff Carter

The issue of the authenticity of the BYP will always be subject to debate, a debate which will likely never be resolved. Yet this debate consumes the vast majority of attention and energy to this topic. Far more interesting, in my opinion, is the often overlooked fact that - as Steve Thomas refers - the investigating officials allowed a false legend regarding the provenance of the photos to remain in the record. (Dallas Police Department and also Secret Service, and likely FBI). Additionally, a cover story regarding the physical presence of the Imperial reflex camera - determined to have taken the photos - was also made part of the official record. The HSCA’s photo panel later perpetuated this problem by failing to account for the photos’ provenance and for the addition of a third pose (133-C), even as they directly interviewed the DPD official who would have known. HSCA photographic panel leader Cecil Kirk also utilized tightly framed lawyerly language to mislead and redirect understandings of Oswald’s cameras and extent of personal photo-making. The consistency of misdirection, omission, and false information from 1963 through the 1970s by the investigating officials points to a specific cover-up which is not based on the “authenticity” of the photos but rather their provenance. That is, the source or method by which they came into the possession of the DPD was too problematic for the developing lone-nut conclusion.

Some clarifications: The HSCA panel did not authoritatively authenticate the BYP - rather, their experts acknowledged that a face paste at the chin could not be ruled out, which is exactly the conclusion the FBI reached back in 1963. So this will always be subject to debate. That said, the panel did have access to the original prints and surviving negative, while the critics have largely worked with generational copies. The photos were “discovered” in the afternoon of Nov 23 in the Paine garage, in a seabag identified as an Oswald possession (not a photo album). However, a backyard photo was seen by both Michael Paine and a reporter the previous evening, and Fritz refers to a BYP in his notes before assigning the officers who soon after made the discovery. The photo said to have been destroyed by Marina and Marguerite Oswald may not have been a BYP but rather a photo of Oswald from the Soviet Union. Investigators unfortunately did not seek to clarify what MO was referring to, whereas witnesses such as Michael Paine specified “the photo published in Life”. Marina Oswald’s story of participating in the creation of the BYP changed numerous times and she was unable to accurately describe the unique operation of the camera. Interrogation notes establish that, immediately before describing her participation in BYP, Marina was informed by government agents of potential punishment including deportation in the absence of her “cooperation”.

Social media users have noticed particular activity which in past have been linked to “color revolution” operations. Example: “Many accounts all created April 2021 with 0 followers/following suddenly spring into action in coordinated fashion during the protest in Cuba” https://twitter.com/EmpireFiles/status/1414371287787479040 In last couple of weeks CIA chief Burns has visited and held high-level meetings in such places as Columbia and Brazil, as the rollback to the so-called “Pink Tide” has sputtered over last year. Visits were followed by assassination in Haiti, unrest in Caracas and Cuba, election dispute continuing in Peru, and ominous statements by President and military in Brazil. Expect much more of same in near future. The “problem” remains: the Left is democratically popular in the region.

There is no "smoking gun" and there never was. From Mate's piece: Kilimnik's account is corroborated by Gates, the ex-Manafort associate and Trump campaign official whose testimony was used by the Mueller team – deceptively, he says – to suggest a connection between the polling data and possible Trump-Russia collusion. The Special Counsel's office "relied heavily on Mr. Gates for evidence" about the polling data, the New York Times noted in February 2019. According to Gates, that reliance entailed significant creative license by Mueller's prosecutors, particularly Weissmann. Gates says he told the Special Counsel's Office that the polling data was not sensitive information, but rather publicly available figures taken from media outlets. "I explained to them, over the course of many interviews, what the polling data was about, and why it was being shared," Gates told RCI. "All that was exchanged was old, topline data from public polls and from some internal polls, but all dated, nothing in real time. So for example, Trump 48, Clinton 46. It was not massive binders full of demographics or deep research. No documents were ever shared or disclosed. And this is part of what Mueller left out of the report. They cherry-picked and built a narrative that really was not true, because they had pre-determined the conclusion."

Aaron Mate provides a more objective POV which supports my position. It was Mueller deputy Weissman who deliberately seeded the "polling data" conspiracy in January 2019. It was obvious at the time this was a ploy to encourage unsupported speculation. https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2021/05/19/accused_russiagate_spy_kilimnik_speaks_-_and_evidence_backs_his_no_collusion_account_777328.html

looks like the link shared by Mr Caddy is no longer functioning - but here is a similar piece written by a travel writer visiting Minsk and reflecting on Oswald's stay in the city https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/05/28/letters-from-minsk-lee-harvey-oswald-comes-in-for-the-cold-war/

Have you actually read the Treasury Department read-out on which this new cycle of “collusion” theorizing is based? I don’t think you have because nowhere outside the imaginations of lazy journalists is any new information developed: https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy0126 Even though it remains the official position of US Gov that Kilimnik was a “Russian intelligence Services agent”, his CV still reveals he worked for US intelligence cut-out NED (via International Republican Institute) for an entire decade, and when in Kiev he was a regular briefer for US State Dept and others connected to US Embassy. Funny how that major scandal and security breach is not discussed. Similarly downplayed is that Manafort Associates - as eventually deposed Ukrainian President Yanukovych’s political advisors - were never “pro-Russian” and in fact strongly advised acceptance of EU association which cut sharply across Russian interests. The Treasury Department document should raise eyebrows as it raises the expression of opinion on current events to a sanctionable and even indictable offence if it cuts across “US narratives”. One entity was sanctioned for expressing opinion that the 2000 US federal election suffered from improprieties - but is that not a commonly understood impression? Efforts to punish or criminalize the expression of opinion, or the formulation of analysis outside official dictat, should be resisted - at least one might think…

There has been a lot of controversy in Britain regarding a Wikipedia “editor” named Phillip Cross - sort of the UK’s version of “Gamaliel”. Former diplomat Craig Murray came upon “Phillip Cross” in 2016: https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2016/03/the-astonishing-case-of-the-doppelganger/ Murray followed up with more info two years later: “Philip Cross” has not had one single day off from editing Wikipedia in almost five years. “He” has edited every single day from 29 August 2013 to 14 May 2018. Including five Christmas Days. That’s 1,721 consecutive days of editing. 133,612 edits to Wikpedia have been made in the name of “Philip Cross” over 14 years. That’s over 30 edits per day, seven days a week.” https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2018/05/the-philip-cross-affair/ The above information has fuelled speculation that "Phillip Cross" represents a network of persons rather than a single individual, a network nonetheless uniform in style and content: "the purpose of the “Philip Cross” operation is systematically to attack and undermine the reputations of those who are prominent in challenging the dominant corporate and state media narrative, particularly in foreign affairs." The Wikispooks site has more info: https://wikispooks.com/wiki/Philip_Cross

Bob, the Cold War ended in 1991. Even if some apparatchiks in the State Dept and NATO hdq feel compelled to start it all up again, the rest of us don't have to go along. Chill out.

A form of “social credit” is already with us in the western countries, though in the main enforced by ostensibly private companies. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/07/amazons-twitch-says-it-will-now-punish-users-for-certain-harmful-offline-behavior.html These trends will probably accelerate as the protracted crisis faced by our countries inevitably expands. The planet’s current population could be sustainable if the form of capitalism known as neo-liberalism (aka laissez-fair/ free market) could be abolished, as it is by far the largest promoter of unsustainable activity. I once attended a lecture by a prominent British scientist who believed humanity could in fact double in population provided a strict switch to vegetarian diets. Elite fascination with population control - which goes back a hundred years or more - is as much about maintaining their privilege as it is anything else.

Diem was supposed to fly to Europe to attend a conference, after which a coup would occur in his absence and Diem would then be physically safe in a fait accompli exile. For unknown reasons Diem walked off the plane, returned to his presidential offices and was shortly thereafter captured and killed. The dismay in Washington was based on the fact of Diem walking away from the plane. The following Honolulu Conference, reviewing US policy in Vietnam, felt the influence of Diem’s violent passing, and the drafts of NSAM 273 reflected a new state of affairs post-coup. That is to say, the crisis resulting from Diem’s violent death (as opposed to a smoother transition in exile) may have been intended to upend Kennedy’s withdrawal policy as expressed in NSAM 263.

Good question. There has been thought that a warmer more humid climate reduces the contagious effect. Whatever the answer, it doesn't appear to be the result of actions taken but the accumulation of existing circumstances. India has just seen one of the largest protest events in history and there hasn't been any accompanying super-spreader disaster recorded as result.

A lockdown strategy is only meant to last 3-6 weeks, to break the Rate of Infection to what could then be manageable through an effective trap and trace effort (identifying infected persons, quarantining them, and testing all of their contacts). The trap and trace component of this strategy was, for probably a host of complicated reasons, never properly administered in North America or in Europe - and so the strategy as a whole was ineffective. Ongoing lockdowns and curfews in these regions have really been just a statement of failure, and the fact that numerous countries have long put the pandemic behind them confirms this. The experiences of those more successful countries also show that the development and administration of an effective vaccine was not a primary factor to their success as they had broken the pandemic before the vaccines arrived.

Fortunately, we do not (at least yet) have a “one-world government” and so are able to review differing circumstances and realities in other countries. It is fairly easy to observe that the covid pandemic is a real event and a public health crisis, capable of creating severe and longstanding havoc if simply ignored or downplayed. The “freedom” people are wrong and in denial on this fact, and notably are a vocal minority only in the western bloc of countries. Disparate places such as China, Vietnam, and New Zealand have been successful in applying a strict but short-lived lockdown strategy followed by a contact tracing regime which has essentially eliminated the health crisis and allowed a general return to “normality”. The Atlantic provinces in Canada have managed to achieve comparatively very low case numbers through sharp restrictions in travel to the region. The development of vaccines as a public health strategy is common across the globe, so it is hard to argue they represent solely a malign agenda - although certain products may be more or less effective or later reveal side effects. Cuba has apparently vaccinated its entire population with products its own medical system has developed. An inability to form a global front and combine best practices from all regions and countries is unfortunate, but that is where we are at as a species. Self-serving agendas are surely at play as well, but applying totalizing frameworks featuring either absolute malignant intent or absolute altruism do not help. Packing forty-thousand people into a baseball stadium while the pandemic continues to rage, as apparently is planned in Texas, is absolute folly which should be entirely obvious after this past year - but again that is where we are at. The Atlantic provinces are positioned to return to something like normal - like New Zealand - but can’t as long as the pandemic continues all around it (i.e. they will have to continue to restrict travel into the region). We will have to live with the consequences of what has been, effectively, a "herd immunity" strategy in our western capitalist countries.

The "Center for Countering Digital Health" is actually known as Center for Countering Digital Hate - and is a censorship advocacy group run out of the UK and which Board of Directors is largely pulled from advisors close to the Blair wing of the Labour Party. This group advocates de-platforming and de-monetizing individuals and groups, including "conspiracy theorists", out of concern that "fringe ideas are finding an audience and becoming normalised." The organization's purpose is to be alarmist, and so any statistics or analysis they provide should be viewed with this in mind. Labelling views they disagree with as "hate speech", for example, is simply making an emotionalist appeal rather than offering sound analysis. Does David Icke really need to be removed from the internet? Hasn't that campaign been ongoing for twenty years or more? - i.e. before Facebook etc. https://www.counterhate.com

The people running the big tech social media companies didn’t independently wake up one morning and decide heightened moderation and withdrawal of service was the best next step for their business models. This all came about as result of pressure from US Congressional committees bolstered by advocacy for this result from the influential legacy media such as the NY Times. As usual, Cliff asks all the wrong questions. The notion that the government should force social media outlets to carry controversial posts hasn’t been advocated by anyone. The issue is whether the government should use its powerful influence and ability to regulate business in an effort to limit speech. Which is what has happened. Pretending this is all just the expression of private property rights is not just short-sighted, it entirely misses the point. RFK Jr’s positions extend beyond vaccine issues, and generally follow a progressive and international outlook. Shutting down his Instagram page - with 700,000 followers - eliminates an entire forum for networking and information sharing for a large number of people. Edward Curtin discusses this as a form of informational warfare: https://off-guardian.org/2021/02/14/opening-the-cias-can-of-worms/

A podcast such as BOR is not the same thing as social media outlets such as Facebook or Twitter which solely host user-generated content rather than purposely publish content. You seem to be deliberately misrepresenting the issues by consistently comparing these entities to media which are not at all similar. Twitter or Facebook are not the same as and do not function like the NY Times or CNBC. As to your prior inquiry - the internet features pages known as “search engines”. Search engines can be useful tools in uncovering information. Simply typing queries - such as “antiwar political groups removal social media” - can provide a wealth of information based on the terms of the query. Recently, however, some search engines have changed their algorithms to highlight some information at the expense of other information. So some patience and diligence may be required. Good luck out there.

What is plain to see is the concept of “conspiracy theories” as a social negative is not what is really driving the efforts to impose censorship, fact-checking, and vetted approval of information. The powers-that-be are entirely willing and capable of disseminating conspiracy theories of their own should it assist policy directives, just as the legacy media is content to publish the same. Fox News and Brietbart certainly promote asinine factually-incompetent “news”, but on the other hand the past four years of, say, the Rachel Maddow Show has equally been a trip to looney-town. Those problems are widely dispersed. In practice, what the social media companies are doing, in concert with directive from powerful politicians and elite opinion, is seeking to reduce or eliminate oppositional voices in favour of officially approved information. So, along with crazy “conspiracy theories”, legitimate political groups, antiwar activists, and representatives of designated foreign adversaries, for example, are being removed from social media. Further, an atmosphere of self-censorship has been cultivated - which may be informing a hands-off approach to projects such as the new Stone documentary. The deliberate “manufacturing of consent” for this process has been led by people who should know better, as they have adopted reactionary positions while maintaining they remain enlightened.

The current mania directed against “conspiracy theories” has been led by establishment liberals, beginning in late 2016, and at its root the disdain fingers the JFK research community as somewhat responsible for the state of affairs. Here, from November 2016, is the well-known author Joyce Carol Oates in a Washington Post opinion piece reviewing Aexandra Zapruder’s book, who - after slagging Robert Groden, Jim Garrison, and Dick Gregory - writes: “If Kennedy’s assassination was a tragedy, the aftermath of competing and vociferous conspiracy theorists was a farce, with serious consequences: the undermining of trust in the U.S. government and in authority in general that continues to this day.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/twenty-six-seconds-of-the-jfk-assassination--and-a-lifetime-of-family-anguish/2016/11/16/2b9f1c86-9547-11e6-bc79-af1cd3d2984b_story.html A few weeks after Oates’ piece, Zapruder followed with her own column in the New York Times where, as she conflates the so-called “pizza-gate” controversies with the JFK assassination, she also picks up on trust and authority: “While early assassination researchers performed a valuable function by making important information public, later conspiracy theorists relied on association and innuendo and cherry-picked details to build increasingly wild narratives.If one outcome of Kennedy’s assassination was a loss of trust in government and the news media, we have now entered an era in which such suspicions have mushroomed into something far more dangerous — a rupture in the very idea of shared truth…Is there any way to reverse this trend? The mainstream news media can’t do a thing. If I learned one thing from trying to understand the Kennedy conspiracy theorists, it’s that it is impossible to dispel the amorphous cloud of suspicion. If you try, you are either a dupe or part of the cover-up — the cloud simply grows to include you.” https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/10/opinion/sunday/there-are-no-child-sex-slaves-at-my-local-pizza-parlor.html Direct calls for the censorship of social media followed a year later, led by members of the Senate particularly Mark Warner - demands initiated by the alleged Russian “attack” on America by “sowing chaos” with social media posts, which itself is an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory. The social media companies were put on notice that if they did not impose censorship then censorship would be imposed on them. This is easily verified by referring to pubic statements by members of Congress at the time. Calls to impose discipline and authority over information have continued apace ever since, amplified in the legacy media (i.e. NY Times etc) and frequently voiced by liberal Democrats. Here is Hollywood screen writer Aaron Sorkin in the Times late 2019: “I want speech protections to make sure no one gets imprisoned or killed for saying or writing something unpopular, not to ensure that lies have unfettered access to the American electorate…The law hasn’t been written yet — yet — that holds carriers of user-generated internet content responsible for the user-generated content they carry, just like movie studios, television networks and book, magazine and newspaper publishers.” https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/31/opinion/aaron-sorkin-mark-zuckerberg-facebook.html The law to which he refers is currently being considered in Congress, sponsored by Warner. Rarely, in the dissertations supporting control over speech and opinion, is it acknowledged that the most disastrous and consequential “fake news” of this young century was widely published and disseminated by the US legacy media and endorsed by the US Congress - Iraqi WMD.

The handwriting on the back of the deMohrenschildt BYP does not match Marina Oswald, at least by a comparison of the same phrase ("ha-ha!") as it appears on that item and in a handwritten autobiography she produced for the Warren Commission. The inscription on the BYP, however, is consistent with Marina's speech pattern. Ruth Paine could write Russian, knew Marina reasonably well, and was in direct contact with the LP records which later disclosed the inscribed BYP - so it is not unreasonable to surmise that she may know a little bit more about all this than has been revealed. An aside - information about communist circles in NYC and the mechanics of political assassinations appear in fascinating detail in a four part essay just published by the World Socialist Website: "Sylvia Ageloff and the Assassination of Leon Trotsky" https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2021/02/06/sylv-f06.html

The “50 Reasons” episode on the furious counter-reaction to Stone’s “JFK” is the only one to have been removed from YouTube. As we put it together, I came to realize the main contemporary defenders of the official story - i.e. Max Holland, Bugliosi, and the network documentaries (most notably ABC’s “Beyond Conspiracy”) - never referred to information developed after the ARRB was formed and seemed to be perpetually stuck, when it came to this case, in the year 1992.

What we know about this film project is it is based on the releases mandated by the creation of the ARRB. This material has been peer reviewed for over twenty-five years now, and informs work by DiEugenio, McKnight, Scott, Newman, Hancock, etc - and apparently Netflix and other outlets are claiming it does not pass their fact-checkers. This appears as outright BS and what they are actually saying is they do not feel comfortable presenting this material to the American public.

This is actually very disturbing news, and underlines a creeping descent into a Soviet style information regime in the USA, a process which is farther along than most people realize and which has been actively encouraged and supported most vociferously by America’s liberal intelligentsia. National Geographic not a surprise - they have featured numerous shoddy JFK documentaries over the years, so the only thing surprising is their reference to fact-checking, if that is even accurate (as their bad docs obviously did not require the same). That Netflix would turn it down should raise eyebrows as Netflix is not a news-gathering current events outfit, and had no problem running the “Untold History” series also by Stone. Certainly for members of this Forum, the basic source material and interview subjects of this new project are known and are neither controversial or prone to articulate information which cannot be verified or sourced. So who are the “fact-checkers”? Pondering that question for a few minutes in the context of this new documentary should clarify the general perniciousness of the current mania advocating the distribution of only “approved” information.

This footage is always astounding. Fritz should be directly in front of Oswald. That is basic to the security manoeuvre - with a police officer covering Oswald's front, back, and both sides. And then - Fritz is the only person not to flinch when the shot goes off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy0IRPOhI5g