W. Niederhut

Yes, it's truly a shame that guys like Arledge are still cranking out this kind of disinformation about Garrison's investigation of Clay Shaw, in 2019. There's no excuse for such willful ignorance (or dishonesty.) Someone should tell Arledge to get a clue and study Destiny Betrayed.

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Didn't J. Edgar Hoover have a sex tape of Gerald Ford cavorting with the East German spy Ellen Rometsch? Can't recall where I read that salacious story, but I was under the impression that Hoover had Gerald Ford by the short hairs during the Warren Commission "investigation."

I think it was Michael Wolff who first said, in Fire and Fury, that Trump had been effectively bribed by Sheldon Adelson, Paul Singer, et.al., to become an Israeli/Neocon mule. It was another 180 degree flip-flop by Trump on a 2016 Trump campaign policy "position," because Trump had been highly critical of Hillary and the Obama administration's involvement in the Neocon wars in the Middle East, including the CIA's Operation Timber Sycamore, to overthrow the Assad regime with proxy Sunni militias, including "Al Qaeda." It was the only policy position in 2016 where I agreed with Trump rather than Hillary. And Trump did, in fact, pull the funding plug on Timber Sycamore in July of 2017. Then, in a surprising reversal, in the spring of 2018, Trump had appointed the Neocon war monger John Bolton as his National Security advisor! Jimmy Carter presciently called Bolton's 2018 NSC appointment, "a disaster for this country." I'm not privy to the longstanding political disputes here between various forum members, but I do believe that DiEugenio's latest Kamala Harris history is timely and important. I interpret it in light of the role of the MSM in influencing our choices about viable alternatives to Trump, whose presidency has been, in my view, an unmitigated disaster for this country and the planet.

Not all politicians are similarly Machiavellian and psychopathic-- least of all Bobby Kennedy and his older brother, Jack. Bobby, certainly, believed that it was less than expedient to demand that Martin Luther King, Jr. be released from a Georgia prison, but he did so because he knew that it was morally right. Personally, I won't vote for a Machiavellian shark nominated by either party. I want a POTUS who has the moral sensibility and courage to break the CIA into a thousand pieces, or stare down Joint Chiefs clamoring for a nuclear war because he knows they're nuts.

Good point, but, in some cases, accusing a politician of showboating is more akin to accusing a shark of swimming. For example, Donald Trump invited women who had accused Bill Clinton of sexual misconduct to one of his debates with Hillary-- around the same time that Donald arranged for Michael Cohen to pay $130 K to Stormy Daniels. Trump is a shark. Is Kamala Harris a shark, or a fish?

Interesting to read Willie Brown's specious comments in Politico, in light of Jim DiEugenio's "Showboating" essay. It sounds like Brown is fully onboard with Kamala Harris's Showboat production. Perhaps people in the mainstream media should ask Willie Brown and Kamala Harris if they can name any white politicians who got elected 40 years ago for publicly advocating forced busing to desegregate schools. It must be a very short list. P.S. I was (and am) an advocate of desegregation, and lived through the first, tumultuous busing years it in the Denver Public Schools-- but it was not very popular in white communities.

I'm not on the Biden bus, myself, but I am concerned about the way our mainstream media is spinning the debate coverage of the alternatives to the Current Occupant. The last thing this country needs in 2020 is a Democratic nominee who can't compete with the Orange Baboon in the White House. When Fox Business News is suddenly promoting Kamala Harris, I smell a rat. But, getting back to the general forum subject of JFK, the candidate on the stage Thursday who reminds me most of JFK is young Pete Buttigieg. Buttigieg, to me, seems to have the same kind of keen intellect, humanistic wisdom, and self-confidence that JFK had. And, to their credit, both men had actually served their country in time of war.

Well said, Joe. I agree with your take on the debate format. The simplistic debate sound-bytes were then simply amplified by the superficial media spin afterward. "Biden is in trouble," etc. One key point in the DiEugenio essay is that Harris (and the MSM) have avoided any discussion of the historical context for political discussions about busing and desegregation 40 years ago. It reminds me of people who denounce Abraham Lincoln for not being a more ardent Abolitionist in 1860, at a time when he was trying desperately to keep the border states from seceding. I think it was Daniel Patrick Moynihan who said that people need to be judged on the basis of their historical contexts and culture. As for Kamala Harris, if she is a true champion of justice, why did she put the kibosh on re-opening the botched RFK assassination "investigation?"

Excellent, timely commentary about Kamala Harris by James DiEugenio at the Kennedys and King site, folks. America desperately needs this kind of informed historical analysis, in lieu of the usual MSM soundbytes. After watching the debate Thursday night, I have had a sinking feeling about the mainstream corporate media's celebration of Kamala Harris's alleged "win" over Joe Biden on the busing/desegregation issue. To paraphrase Paul Krugman in 2016, it looks like Biden is already getting "Gored" by the mainstream media. Kamala Harris: A Study in Showboating https://kennedysandking.com/articles/kamala-harris-a-study-in-showboating

Well, that is helpful. Piper's theories about Mossad involvement in the JFK assassination seemed mostly speculative to me-- an extrapolation from the JFK/Ben Gurion conflict to some operational link between Jack Ruby, Micky Cohen, and the Mossad. Factual, operational details are largely absent from Piper's theoretical Mossad narrative. The same could be said about Laurent Guyenot's related theory that the Mossad had in some way hijacked the CIA/Mafia false flag op in Dallas in order to turn an assassination attempt on the POTUS into an assassination.

As I recall, (from Alison Weir's account) Truman felt politically pressured to sign off on Israel's declaration of independence-- a decision which was opposed by a number of high level U.S. officials, including James Forrestal, who believed that the establishment of an Israeli state in Palestine would be a long-term disaster for U.S.-Arab relations. (Forrestal went on to, diplomatically, jump out of a 16 story hospital window.) In contrast, James Angleton tended to view a U.S.-aligned Israeli state as something that would be strategically useful for the U.S. In his book, Final Judgment, Michael Collins Piper repeatedly mentioned alleged connections between the JFK/Ben Gurion/Dimona conflict and Mafia figure Meyer Lansky, (and Jack Ruby.) Collins claimed that Meyer Lansky was the real "boss" of the Mafia in the U.S., and that there was some sort of operational linkage between the Mossad -- Itzhak Shamir and Menachem Begin-- and mob figures in the U.S.-- Lansky, Micky Cohen, Ruby, etc. Anything to it?

Barr is a stooge, but he's a remarkably shrewd stooge. He was originally brought into the DOJ, from the CIA, by GHWB to arrange for the pardons of the Iran-Contra cabal. He executed that Iran-Contra hat trick flawlessly. Barr seems to have a knack for using the power of the DOJ to protect people in the Executive branch who have broken the law.

I saw this story last year. * (Can't vouch for the source) A newly declassified document revealed that the CIA had, in fact, funded the opposition South Vietnamese military officials who murdered Diem. So, it's a bit confusing. Did the CIA and Joint Chiefs really oppose the coup d'etat that Harriman and Lodge wanted? One thing that seems certain is that JFK was shocked and appalled when he learned that Diem had been murdered. He abruptly left the room after hearing the news. As I recall, From Prouty's writings, General Ed Lansdale (USAF/CIA) had wanted JFK to appoint him Ambassador to Saigon. Instead, Lodge was appointed and Lansdale was recalled to Washington (and, eventually, assigned to oversee Operation Mongoose.) * https://intelnews.org/2018/04/30/01-2314/ Report reveals deeper CIA role in 1963 Vietnam coup and Diem’s assassination April 30, 2018 A newly declassified report by the Inspector General of the United States Central Intelligence Agency reveals that the South Vietnamese generals who overthrew President Ngo Dinh Diem in 1963 used CIA money “to reward opposition military who joined the coup”. Acknowledging that “the passing of these funds is obviously a very sensitive matter”, the CIA Inspector General’s report contradicts the sworn testimony of Lucien E. Conein, the CIA liaison with the South Vietnamese generals. In 1975, Conein told a United States Senate committee that the agency funds, approximately $70,000 or 3 million piasters, were used for food, medical supplies, and “death benefits” for the families of South Vietnamese soldiers killed in the coup. The report (.pdf), one of the 19,000 JFK assassination documents released by the US National Archives on Thursday, also contains new details about the South Vietnamese generals’ decision to assassinate Diem that contradict a conclusion of the coup’s history written by the CIA station in Saigon. The majority of the generals, said the CIA at the time, “desired President Diem to have honorable retirement from the political scene in South Vietnam and exile”. According to a newly declassified portion of the 49-page document written by the CIA’s Inspector General, an unidentified field-grade South Vietnamese officer who provided the CIA station with pictures of the bloodied bodies of Diem and his brother and advisor, Ngo Dinh Nhu, said that “most of the generals” favored their immediate execution: “The ultimate decision was to kill them. A Captain Nhung was designated as executioner”. A redacted version of the Inspector General’s report, dated May 31, 1967, was released by the National Archives in November 2017. In that version of the report, the paragraphs related to the use of CIA funds and the generals’ decision to murder Diem were excised. * William J. Rust is the author of four books about US relations with Southeast Asia countries during the cold war, including Kennedy in Vietnam. He is currently completing a book about US relations with Indonesia.

Jim, Is there a reference link about Dubya's 11/22/63 alibi? I've never read any thing about Dubya's account of his whereabouts on 11/22/63-- or comments from his Andover classmates.

Yes, it's truly frightening to see how readily our mainstream U.S. media has been playing along with the latest Gulf of Tonkin stunt in the Persian Gulf. It's the same epic failure of American journalism that we saw in August of 1964 and March of 2003. And, unfortunately, those who cannot remember the past are destined to make all of us repeat it. Good article on the subject at The Intercept a few days ago. https://theintercept.com/2019/05/17/us-media-journalists-iran-coverage/

Strange but true. My wife and I were married by the same minister who conducted Lee Harvey Oswald's funeral. The Reverend Louis Saunders was a very close, personal friend of my father-in-law. (My father-in-law had worked as the Director of Public Relations at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth for many years back in the day.) I did not really know Rev. Saunders, (my wife knew the family well) but he seemed like a very kind, good man. He was a "liberal" Protestant, affiliated with the Disciples of Christ, and with the World Council of Churches-- an organization that was often anathematized during the Cold War. Saunders had, apparently, offered to conduct Lee Harvey Oswald's funeral after other ministers in the Dallas-Fort Worth area had refused. Unfortunately, when Louis Saunders was still alive, I never asked him any questions about Oswald's funeral. In those days, I was clueless. I had not studied any of the JFK assassination literature, and simply assumed that JFK was murdered by the "Lone Nut" in the "library" with the "rifle."

Just donated. I would be very disappointed to see this scholarly forum fold.

Point well taken. I included Phillip Graham in the list because he was, certainly, a "titan" of the mainstream U.S. media-- as majority owner of the Washington Post-- who was also closely involved with the CIA's "Mockingbird" operation. Has anything been written about possible connections between Phillip Graham's August 1963 "suicide" and the JFK assassination? I noticed that he used a standard CIA suicide methodology-- one of their preferred alternatives to jumping out of 16th floor windows. According to Wikipedia, (FWIW) Phillip Graham was, apparently, a friend of both Lyndon Johnson and John F. Kennedy, and had been involved in convincing JFK to put LBJ on the 1960 Democratic ticket.

William S. Paley, Frank Stanton, C.D. Jackson, Phillip Graham, et.al... The close relationships between these mainstream U.S. media titans of the early 60s and Allen Dulles, the WWII OSS and CIA never cease to amaze. And those guys were masters at controlling the narrative from Day One -- e.g., buying and sequestering the Zapruder film, telling Dan Rather to lie about the Zapruder film, and altering the Zapruder photo still sequence published in Life magazine, etc. I wonder if the ongoing CBS cover up -- and promotion of the WC-- was controlled all along from the top down by Dulles, Paley and Stanton.

Reading Family of Secrets was a real eye-opener for me, as well. And, as Joseph McBride discovered, GHWB was a Company man -- and hardly the squeaky clean, out-of-the-loop, bumbling ninny he presented in his public persona. His father was close to Allen Dulles, and was a leader of the extreme right-wing opposition to Eisenhower and the New Deal in the 1950s-- the ultimate plutocrat. And some believe that Prescott was even involved with other Wall Street bankers in the 1934 Wall Street coup attempt against FDR. If true, it seems fairly obvious that Prescott and his son had no compunction about participating in coup d'etat attempts against the POTUS -- in 1934, 1963, and 1980-- in addition to manipulating Presidential vote counts in 2000 and 2004.

George W. Bush (?) Was he in Dallas on 11/22/63-- on break from Phillips Andover Academy?

Well, so much for Fred Littwin's thesis that Garrison was out to impugn the reputation of New Orleans' gay community.

As I recall, from The Devil's Chessboard, Allen Dulles continued to meet regularly with his "Secret Team" members after he had been fired as CIA Director. And, as I recall, he was at "the Farm" at Langley on November 22, 1963.