Robert Harper

Since this thread seems to cover predictions and opinions about the Dem and 2020, a few thoughts, always imho:

"Beto" couldn't beat Ted Cruz in their home State. JFK beat a Lodge in Massachusetts and RFK beat incumbent Keating in NY.  Don't see it.

"AOC" is charming in her own way; but way, way under-prepared for the national stage; Warren would be mocked as a Cherokee like Dukakis was mocked with a helmet in a tank .

"Mayor Pete" is a narcissist of the first rank, totally under-prepared for a national stage, and will play up to the 'progressives" while shilling for the oligarchs. Like with Dershowitz, you think after awhile that his middle name is "Harvard." He  also shouldn't be considered a "hero" to the gay community (even if he has the imprimatur of "Ellen")because when he first ran for mayor, he stayed in the closet. Since  Dem incumbents are routinely re-elected, he then "came out" and "won" by getting 11% of the eligible voters since so many stayed home.

"Booker" has been ambitious since his days at Stanford but what is his goal other than the top spot? He literally licked the boots of the AIPAC crowd, and how a man of color who might be talking reparations for slavery can ignore the issue of Palestinian suffering eludes me. NY's Gillibrand should have spoken up for women issues when the Clinton's made a mockery of them, but they were in the catbird seat then so she kept her mouth shut.

I think Tulsi Gabbard is the most articulate, principled and intelligent person among the Dems, and is matched by Sanders - who although I think has had his day - could head a good ticket to articulate issues of concern to working class (who the Dems used to represent) with the idea he'd serve a term and then pass the baton to the Major who made it on her own--not like Kamala Harris hooking up with Willie Brown to give her a leg up, like that other "feminist" Hillary who wouldn't have been able to win an election on her own - no Bill in other words - anywhere in the country.

fwiw as they say

Same here and just commented elsewhere. Great publication  made easy to get.

6 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

 But you can get a pdf of it.

I bought the pdf over the weekend. Very good launch of material and writing. Your article on JFK/ME was very encompassing and very well written. It might be said that the peace process took a dive when Rabin was killed in the same way the deaths of JFK and RFK and MLK were used. The build-up in settlements mirrors the build up in Vietnam.

I don't know why you made it a point to "not" consult Piper, but in my own case, I ignored Piper for years because I was informed - in numerous places  that he was "anti-semitic" and during a period of time I used to pay attention to such "descriptions" and stay away from them. 

 Once I found that the anti-word  was so bent out of shape, it lost all meaning, it no longer held any sway. Finklestein is called it; Goldstone was called it. Anyone who breathes a whiff of criticism of the gangster state is called it. The misuse and smear tactics lubricated by that term has been harmful to rational dialogue. It's now one of those words - like "terrorist" - that belongs in the witch hunt file. Like Vidal writes--you can't wage war against an abstract noun.

Also very much liked the way Hougan can encapsulate any Watergate related theme.

Reading those two articles in the pdf and Vidal's book that Assange was carrying when arrested, took up my weekend reading time. 

Like many on this site, I have read, enjoyed and learned much from Mr. McBride on the events of Nov 22 '63. I hope to read the Capra books and his memoir in the near future. I think his biography of John Ford is informative, detailed, rich in anecdotes and surely the definitive one.

That he also managed to be a college teacher in this mix has always impressed me. For those who might encounter his Ford book , I'd recommend a book John Wayne's America by Garry Wills.  Reading one of these books lead me to the other and mutually enriching. I have read and own about 20 of Wills' books. He covers a wide range of topics and this is his only film book (I think). The only book of his varied oeuvre that disappointed me was his book on Jack Ruby which he co-authored in the late 60's.

15 hours ago, Tony Krome said:

it is wild how many presidents (including future ones, of course) were in Dallas that day.

Years after the event, the wife of a future Prime minister of Israel, wrote about being in Dallas in that 24 hour period. The information evoked memories of Barbara Bush's "Dear family" letter which had the same sort of CYA feel that her husband had perfected. I believe it was Yitzak Rabin but can't locate my encounter with that info.

1 hour ago, Robert Wheeler said:

earned the right to consider him "nefarious."

For years I read books about the JFK case and never thought of Bush. I read Joseph McBride's article in the Nation magazine about the  Hoover memo to "George Bush of the CIA" but there wasn't enough to convince the public that there was anything there. I recall during that election, thinking of visiting Monticello and Jefferson's grave. His headstone  didn't list any government office held (governor, VP and Pres) but memorialized his writing of the Virginia Declaration of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, and the founding of the University of Virginia. George Bush on the other hand was all government in my mind--usually appointed: UN delegate/envoy to China/ CIA director/Chair of Republican Party. Think he was a one term Congressman and lost two races for the Senate. I kept thinking then, who the heck is this guy? I hadn't heard of Prescott Bush either. 

My awakening came reading Russ Baker's "Family of Secrets." I was in LA at the time and the LA Times dismissed it as I recall, as another one of 'those" books, but I read it and my eyes opened. The Iran-Contra nexus was through him; he pardoned those involved; he obviously lied about his CIA involvement,he made that weird call to the FBI hours after the killing that begs to be read as a CYA memo. His actions with the drugs cartel in South America and Panama has been pretty well established and his relationship with Barry Seal and Clinton in Mena also is. The letter the elder Bush - Prescott - wrote to the widow of  Allen Dulles on his death in 1969 makes me recoil with disgust every time I encounter it. It's one thing to spell "brought" as "brot" but quite another to mourn the death of  a 76 year old man by saying in a note of a few sentences - that he "never forgave" the Kennedy brothers--each shot in the head in mid life, one only a year before - for poor Allen's failure at the Bay of Pigs.(fwiw,  I think if all 3 generations of the Bush politicians were placed in a room and given  4 hours, they couldn't between them write a coherent couple of pages free of the echoes of others). Authors since Baker like  Wayne Madsen, Webster Tarpley, and Bruce Campbell Adamson have all added considerable knowledge to Bush 41 and his ties to Jack Crighton and George DeMohrenschildt are numerous and overlap in Dallas.Nefarious might be a kind way to describe that clan.

It took a long time, when in my 20's, to read his book on Moses, and the lasting impression was of having someone like J. Edgar Hoover in charge of "making New York City work." Likely Caro combined ( I don't recall)  an interweaving of esthetics and city planning within a structure of ingrained power. Moses isn't the only reason New York City developed in the wrong direction; once the British assumed authority in the early 18th century, they "planned a city" like one plans a backyard chalkboard. The founders and developers of Manhattan, devised a weaving of interlocking streets, triangles, crossed roadways and paid attention to the quality of an individual life. When the Dutch departed, that notion departed with them. As one who was born, schooled and later lived and worked in Manhattan, I have had the experience  - living in the Netherlands for a decade - of realizing the results of each approach, the Dutch and the English. The Dutch way secures the quality of life as a priority; it creates settings that are communal with individuality for each locale; there are preserved and beautiful green spaces in the midst of major cities. Giving one person like Moses so much power to control what the city would look like, and having him stay there so long, New York never found a way to mix the two legacies given to them.

54 minutes ago, Jim Hargrove said:

through Monday morning because I was so obsessed with this case

Wow. What a thread. Everyone's contribution seems packed with connecting links, summaries, suggestions. Armstrong's book - now read twice - has been extremely illuminating and provocative to me, though it made my head spin when I first encountered it. Robert Oswald and the Mom we saw with Marina continue to puzzle - even elude me - but if Messrs. Jolliffe, Hargrove , Thomas etc can make the case with a bullet sequence like that on Walker, it would help those of us, swimming amidst the deep and dark waters. 

On 7/26/2018 at 5:29 PM, Robert Harper said:

The media will pick up the cliche and ignore the underlying "unspeakable" - the failure to address the truth  of uncomfortable or hidden issues.

The umbrella under which certain topics are “unspeakable” has been getting wider. Some topics like AIPAC remain red hot to the touch; others like regime change and incursions into countries which haven’t attacked America, remain behind a cloud – or fog – of disinformation, hidden agendas and geopolitical strategies.

JFK’s encounter with the Israeli interest in securing nuclear power capability was not discussed until after his death. Who should acquire – and who need not obtain such material – has never had an encompassing guideline understood and accepted by all Americans. The same holds true of the substance of the “rendition” allowed during the Bush and Obama administrations, as well as the response to the legitimate yearnings of the Palestinians under Trump. The USA’s refusal to accept the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice (it’s okay for countries other than the USA and Israel) allows both countries to ignore International Law which makes the cries about what “other countries” do, hypocritical to say the least.

Among the most visible personalities on main stream media, is the ubiquitous Alan Dershowitz who seems to be the only lawyer - among the country’s 800,000 lawyers - who can be consulted by the MSM over the Middle East, the College admission scandal, the Mueller Report, or the status of Jerusalem. When he is introduced, it’s his “concern for civil rights” and his status as a “Emeritus Professor at Harvard” that are emphasized. What remains unspoken is Dershowitz’s vile attacks on those who question his “authority” or his integrity” as well as his racist undertones in proclaiming his association with Zionist principles.

Fortunately, the country has scholars like Noam Chomsky, Norman Finklestein and Francis Boyle who can offer alternatives to the gasbag Dershowitz. Unfortunately, they are rarely consulted by the CNN, FOX, CBS, and MSNBCs of the world.

Unfortunately, in April of last year, The College of Law at the University of Illinois invited the ever-talkative Dershowitz to speak on campus. Fortunately, Francis Boyle decided to also show up and speak.

Mr. Boyle has given me permission to post the statement he made at that event:

Denouncing Dershowitz at the University of Illinois*

            My name is Francis Boyle. I am the Senior Professor of Law here at the University of Illinois College of Law. That means that I have taught here longer than anyone else. I am now in my Fortieth Year of teaching law here.

I am here to condemn not only Dershowitz but the entire College of Law for inviting him in here and sponsoring him. They know full well Dershowitz is a war criminal and they could not care less. They could not care less! They invited him in here, this war criminal, knowing full well that Dershowitz is a member of a Mossad Committee that approves the murder and assassination of Palestinians, which is a war crime.

Indeed the Consort of our former Dean Hurricane Heidi Hurd, Mikey Moore admitted that he works for the Mossad and the C.I.A. I kid you not! Dershowitz believes he’s part of the übermensch and the same is true for Hurricane Heidi Hurd and her Consort Mikey Moore. They have been stinking up this Campus and the Law School and this Community and the Legal Profession by advocating torture in and out and all the time just like Dershowitz who is speaking in there tonight. Torture in war time is also a war crime!

We have a war criminal in there under the sponsorship of the Nazi College of Law. Carl Schmitt would be proud of them all – the foremost Nazi “jurist” of his time who justified every hideous atrocity Hitler and the Nazis inflicted on everyone including the Jews. That is exactly what Dershowitz has done to People of Color all over the world and especially Muslims of Color.

            Now in addition, Dershowitz has also advocated the serial destruction of Palestinian villages. Repeatedly he has done that, including in an editorial he wrote for the Jerusalem Post on March 11, 2002. This is a war crime in violation of the Nuremberg Charter and Judgment that convicted and condemned to death Nazi war criminals. Here let me quote from the relevant section of Article 6 of the 1945 Nuremberg Charter that the United States drafted and signed:

            Article 6

   The following acts, or any of them, are crimes coming within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal for which there shall be individual responsibility:

(b) WAR CRIMES: namely, violations of the laws or customs of war. Such violations shall include, but not be limited to…wanton destruction of cities, towns or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity;…

       That is exactly what Dershowitz has advocated to be done to the Palestinians. A Nuremberg War Crime right there in the Nuremberg Charter just like the Nazis did throughout Europe during World War II. In addition, Dershowitz published it on purpose over in Israel in order to incite the Israeli government to destroy Palestinian villages. The direct incitement of Nuremberg Crimes is a war crime in its own right. And the College of Law knowing this full well nevertheless brings Dershowitz in here to advocate torture, war crimes, and crimes against humanity against Palestinians and Muslims of Color in this country and all over the world.

Also, Dershowitz deliberately went onto Fox News to encourage Trump, their biggest fan, to bomb Syria. He incited Trump to bomb Syria and that is a Nuremberg Crime Against Peace, an act of aggression, a war crime as defined by international law. It also violated the United Nations Charter, the War Powers Clause of the U.S. Constitution and the U.S. Congress’s own War Powers Resolution of 1973.

            Dershowitz also attacked Professor Israel Shahak, one of the leaders of the Peace Movement in Israel, and a Holocaust Survivor himself – unfortunately, no longer with us, but a great man. I have dealt with Shahak and have great respect for him. Indeed, he was going to have a lecture tour here in the United States in the Fall of 1990 and was coming to speak in Champaign. The organizers of his lecture tour asked me if I would put him up in my home as my guest in order to conserve on expenses, and I agreed. I was greatly looking forward again to meeting Professor Shahak. But with the Gulf crisis, Professor Shahak decided to cancel his lecture tour and stay at home with his own people, which was certainly understandable. Dershowitz couldn’t care less! Whatever kind of outright character assassination he has to apply to anyone, even a Holocaust Survivor like Professor Shahak, it doesn’t bother Dershowitz. That’s how shameless Dershowitz is, publicly attacking a Holocaust Survivor!

He attacked and inflicted character assassination on Norman Finkelstein’s Mother, another Holocaust Survivor. Finally, he destroyed Norman Finkelstein’s academic career because Norman exposed him as a great and gross plagiarist in his book Beyond Chutzpah. Norman Finkelstein published a book with the University of California Press, a most distinguished press, criticizing Dershowitz and definitively proving that Dershowitz is a plagiarist. What did Dershowitz do? He set out to persecute Norman Finkelstein, a Fellow Jew, and then he got Finkelstein denied tenure at DePaul University – that says it’s “Catholic” – and destroyed Norman’s entire academic career. Norman can no longer get into a tenure track slot anywhere in this country or even abroad.

Now that’s free speech for Alan Dershowitz! If you criticize him, he will destroy you as he did Norman Finkelstein. Don’t ever forget it! So this guy even does dirty work against Fellow Jews. I know that our Friends from Jewish Voices for Peace are here today as a matter of principle in opposing Dershowitz’s presence.

            Finally, for the last year now Dershowitz has been running all over the country defending Trump. Think about that! Defending Trump all up and down in any way and in any capacity he can, defending Trump.  Indeed, just read the Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette yesterday. Dershowitz had dinner with Trump, giving legal advice to Trump. This is now the second Trump Legal Henchman that the College of Law has brought onto this campus. The last one was a high-level Trump legal apparatchik in the Trump/Sessions Department of Injustice that is arguing all of Trump’s cases for him in the U.S. Supreme Court.

The entire College of Law Faculty know exactly where I stand on these issues. Indeed they hired me to teach criminal law, international law, and international human rights law. I know a war criminal when I see him and it’s Dershowitz! Please join me:

Hey! Hey!

Dershowitz say!

How many kids!

Did you kill today!

Thank you.

Francis A. Boyle

On 2/24/2019 at 9:10 PM, Paul Brancato said:

Cliff - thanks for the Salandria interview. His words are so prescient, and so timely. 

What a great interview. I had read him, but had never seen him talk. Surprised to find that he is alive and kicking, God bless him. He thinks in paragraphs and speaks in complete sentences, which alone is worth noting when text- style writing seems rampant and headlines rule. He is so on the button, and doesn't mince words; loved him. He makes very clear the idea that one "knows" through reason and not through "authority." He is eloquent on Garrison and does justice to Meagher and Fonzi; I only wish he threw a bone to the centrality of Mark Lane. Granted he wasn't an investigator or researcher as Salandria uses the terms, but he was a present, breathing, voice of the government deception and showed a great deal of courage amidst attacks and intrusions by government agencies. His expression of the desire to catch and punish the perpetrators of this crime reminded me of similar emotions evoked when I read a book called Killers of the King a few years back by Charles Spencer (Diana's brother). It's a well written and engaging look at how Charles II pursued - to literally the ends of the earth - the killers of his father Charles I. We were deprived of that vision here in America -with JFK Jr as Senator from NY leading the way - when his helicopter...ugh...crashed.

1 hour ago, Steve Thomas said:

f Oswald wasn't arraigned, and he wasn't checked out of jail, what the hell was going on at 1:35 in the morning of the 23rd?

 

No matter how much I read of this case, I still get amazed when I encounter information I don't recall encountering. But the one thing that doesn't change is the internal anger produced by thinking about the complicity of the "press" and the "government."  The complicity between the "military" and the "government" always existed to some extent, but post 1941 became almost a branch of government itself.

 The facts and connections and deceptions and - even evidence - had to be tracked down by amateurs, not career investigators or law enforcers of integrity or an independent press.

2 hours ago, Paul Brancato said:

Thanks for posting all of this Ernie.

I just spent couple of hours reading much of this recent input, and downloading the Pdfs available. Your dedication to history and scholarship is impressive and I joined others with a   modest contribution to your GoFund Me drive to help costs involved in this generous  effort.

While reading a thread of Rick McTeague's photos of Dealey Plaza, Joe Bauer offered 3 reasons that it would be unlikely that he could make a trip to be there. Two of them - time constraints and health concerns - are beyond our capabilities to alter at will. So, we'll leave those aside. The 3rd concern - money - is needed needed to get there. 80% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck. Anytime something "out of the ordinary" is proposed, the one element one can sometimes alter is the economic one. Not necessarily "at will" but, a better chance than time and health offers.

Mr Bauer has offered candor and respect and honest  responses to a wide range of issues posted here. Those of us intertwined with JFK who have had the chance to be there, have had their attachment deepened.  I am not able to single handedly provide the sums needed, I could contribute $100. to the trip. My guess is that he and spouse could get there and back for about $1500. 

If anyone is interested and knows anything about how GoFundMe works, please start one for this purpose. We can even call it hirong Joe to report on his experience.

Other suggestions welcomed.

18 hours ago, Joe Bauer said:

the level of vitriol expressed by Mrs. Harvey 

In one of the books I read about Kim Philby (who ran circles around the great "spymaster" James Angleton) one of his cohorts (Burgess or MacClean)  had gotten into a fight with Harvey because he drew a picture of Mrs Harvey in all her flatulent splendor, sitting legs spread, in an armchair. I imagine the Cambridge 5 felt about her as you do, and rightfully so. Her toxic comments are in bed with those of Prescott Bush who managed to disparage the "Kennedys" when writing a note to Dulles's widow. He found it appropriate to take a swipe at two young guys in their 40's who were shot in the head shortly before his words of consolation with the widow of a man who died in bed at age 75. 

9 hours ago, Ron Bulman said:

She was adamant in the face of confrontation.

As was Sandy Serrano before that lying thug Hernandez beat the poor girl into the ground with faux "concern" about "Mrs. Kennedy" and her "Catholic" responsibility. This crowd was really something else. It's not over either. Recall that the 9/11 Report NEVER MENTIONED a 47 story building collapsing on itself, nor the reports of dozens of firefighters who spoke of "explosions" in the buildings. There has been a swamp in DC since 1963; unfortunately it's not being drained as promised.

 A boom to my head as well; reminded me of a few similar booms. First, when I found that Fred Korth involved with Baker and LBJ and the corrupt Boeing deal, was the divorce attorney for Marguerite Oswald. Another boom sounded when I found out that Mary Jo Kopechne had been, along with Carole Taylor, on the staff of Sen Smathers, who they discussed, would be the running mate of JFK in '64. Taylor- a GF of Baker - dies mysteriously in a helicopter near his hotel and Mary Jo, of course, dies mysteriously at Chappaquiddick. Grant Stockdale, also a colleague of these two, and also involved with Baker and Black on the Serve-U kickback scandal, ends up flying out a window 10 days after the assassination. The booms keep coming at odd times.

On 2/11/2019 at 3:16 PM, Gene Kelly said:

Manuel Pena has connections to both the JFK and RFK murders. It was Pena who traced Oswald's telescopic sight to a California gun shop.  After the assassination, Senator Dodd helped a Senate Internal Security Subcommittee publish a story that Oswald bad been trained at a KGB assassination school in Minsk. Two mail-order houses were the center points from which Oswald ordered his Smith and Wesson .38 revolver (Seaport Traders of Los Angeles) and his Mannlicher-Carcano rifle (Klein's of Chicago). Oswald ordered his pistol two days before Senator Christopher Dodd's subcommittee began hearings in January 1963. The subcommittee’s statistics later showed a purchase in Texas made from Seaport Traders. One of the groups being investigated for firearm purchases was one that Oswald had in his address book ... the American Nazi Party.  An investigator looking into interstate firearms sales at this time was Manuel Pena, the LAPD lieutenant who was later one of the officers investigating Robert Kennedy's assassination.

Pena had an interesting background; he served in the Navy during WWII and in the Army during the Korean War, and was a Counterintelligence officer in France.  He spoke French and Spanish, and had connections with various intelligence agencies in several countries. In 1967, Pena "retired" from the LAPD, leaving to join AID, a cover for political operations in foreign countries.  Roger LeJeunesse, an FBI agent who had been involved in the RFK investigation, told author William Turner that Pena had performed special assignments for the CIA for more than ten years.  After his retirement from the LAPD (and a public farewell dinner) in November of 1967, Pena inexplicably returned to the LAPD in April 1968 ...  just in time to head the LAPD group called Special Unit Senator that controlled the RFK investigation two months later. Pena was the trusted courier of key evidence being supplied to the FBI ... and he was affiliated with the same mercenaries and cut-outs used by JMWave operatives in various operations -- Saigon, El Salvador, Uruguay, Phoenix -- who were employed by cover with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

Thanks Gene for a succinct gathering of the info on Pena. Hernandez always gave me the creeps and, I think I mentioned once before, that the recording of him pestering - torturing - Sandy Serrano to change her testimony bugged me so much I couldn't finish listening to it. That the CIA  had tentacles into the Dallas and Los Angeles Police is disturbing  on its face; that they were used to cover both killings is yet another reason to , as JFK said, "break the CIA into a thousand pieces." 

On 1/27/2019 at 5:51 AM, Paul Brancato said:

Having now read the book in its entirety I'd like to give my impression. First I recommend that everyone read it. 

On the basis of Paul's response, I secured a copy.

Twenty pages into the book, I started aching for an editor. With cuts to and fro from this year to that year, it was hard to follow who had what, when. Well into the book, I still couldn’t be sure who was “talking” : Robert or Christopher. I think too much attention was spent on “visualizing” the narrative - the way a filmmaker would — and that the book would have gained by having a chronological, narrative. Because it is a “memoir” and not a work of history or non-fiction, there is wide latitude. Of course, that means that you might have to spray sentimental repellent around passages involving the author’s detailed first love encounter and subsequent proposal, his feeding an abandoned dog or visiting a museum in Washington DC or a church in Moscow.

It isn’t until page 73 that you find out that one guy sold it(Cartier watch) to the other guy. I mean all that flip flopping in time and details of events and it took that long to piece together who was talking about what. A third of the way through, there is a chapter with quotes of what someone else had said about the author, but he wasn’t there to hear it. It’s this sorta thing throughout the book.

At the same time, a memoir is expected to combine ambiguous recollection with accurately recorded details. The goal is usually about the search for truth (St Augustine, Whittaker Chambers, Thomas Merton) not disinformation or branding (like Mimi Alford, Gerald Blaine or OJ Simpson). One senses and feels throughout The Inheritance’s jagged presentation, the integrity of the search even if goals or particularities are cloudy.  The author doesn’t write well enough to have the memoir embraced for its skillful evocations of his life; rather it is a memoir engaged in another’s life that gives the book its propulsion.

Sometimes it read to me like part imaginings, part correct information, part justified speculation (Manchester dispute) part ‘stuff I never heard about or can’t recall having heard’ (control of the dress, radiation testing, another St. Christopher medal). In that sense it freely presents itself as the hodgepodge it has to be, 55 years after the event. My mind wandered freely when reading JFK books like Oswald Talked, Oswald’s Tale, Double Cross, Contract on America, and many others. I’d take the info in, wonder about it, move on, see if it recurs elsewhere, return to it or not. I wish a good crime reporter could have presented this story rather than a participant. The old Dragnet way: just give ‘em the facts. The letters of Evelyn Lincoln, the process with the individual wills, the reaction of the Kennedy family, are all interesting in themselves. As awful as LBJ splatting himself on the bed on AF 1, there is the crude removal of Ms. Lincoln’s White House belongings. Surely, she knew that LBJ would be replaced, surely, she knew of the Investigations into Baker and Johnson and we already knew that she suspected LBJ.

Pages on the NY auction are written with cliché upon cliché and characters are “quoted” in a manner of a comic book. Such is in keeping with the “post-modern filmic effect” of this “memoir” There is a scene with JFK Jr and the author that yearns to be a version from Vidal’s Burr, but without brevity or wit it comes across more as a dream in which the characters always speak in complete sentences with historical accuracy. The manner grates, but the information pulls. I’m stopping midway to write this up and take a break from his style.

The death of JFK has been transformed into a myth and myths have tentacles  placed diversely  and set deeply into the unconscious. Perhaps they are only truly explainable by works of art. So much information and elaborations and interpretations exist in myth that they are able to equally shoulder conflicting scholarly appraisals. A good example would be fairly recent studies of Julius Caesar in books by Garry Wills and by Michael Parenti. In one he is the epitome of the status quo and conservative in outlook; in the other, he is a progressive leader aligned with the working class. Plutarch first captured facts on paper that centuries later Shakespeare would bring to life. The recent biography of John Wilkes Booth – American Caesar – draws more on the stage understanding of Brutus than Plutarch’s version. Hopefully works like Stone’s film, DeLillo’s novel and Reddin’s play will continue to inspire other artists to confront the JFK killing and produce a truth. 

10 minutes ago, Joe Bauer said:

The greater eloquence in speaking is simply telling the honest truth.

Absolutely agree with that sentiment. The great playwrights also understood that eloquence or a position of power could cloud, rather than clear the air, and that the working class could unclear the cloud. The Fool in King Lear is one example;  the gravedigger in Hamlet, the jailer in Macbeth and Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof or Charley in Death of a Salesman are other examples. Using eloquence for nefarious purposes is  exhibited in Julius Caesar - Brutus and Mark Anthony are each skilled in rhetoric; each presents a different take on the murder of Caesar. It is not that eloquence obscures the truth, it is that it can do so. One has to be alert to who is speaking and why. Buckley had an agenda the same way Vidal did or Lowenstein did. It might not be the same agenda that one would prefer, but it is not based on unsubstantiated material, but rather focuses on the angle at which one can view material. The best way to untangle any "gate" in politics is to get the best representative from each side to  articulate their point of view. Whatever one thinks of the polemical Buckley,  he usually did just that.He never had Garrison on and he wasn't particularly interested in any of the political killings of the 1960's. Such disregard was one of his faults as a commentator. Whether that makes him  a "racist" or a lousy writer are separate issues. 

14 hours ago, Gene Kelly said:

t is, as you say, a cogent explanation of a very complex story. 

Yours is also a great synopsis of things to consider. Zapruder's connection with Dresser Industries and that business's relationship with DeMohrenschildt's wife. Why did he keep the film when others were taken? How did he "at the last moment" get up on that pedestal? It took me 30 years to grasp - even encounter - the Bush connection and near 50 years to think of Abe as other than a Dad with a camera out for the event. Who told him to be there, at that spot and to keep filming no matter what?Why did he lie about the money he received?How come the police didn't take the film? Was the LIFE magazine stuff set up ahead of time?  Was it a case of "Look, Abe, be there at that moment, at that spot. Do not stop filming no matter what. Take the camera home with you. Someone will call and it will be worth your while."

15 hours ago, Douglas Caddy said:

o bad that my close friend, William F. Buckley, Jr., with whom I founded the Conservative Movement in the 1950s and 60s, did not live long enough to see credible persons and entities embrace the idea of the possibility of UFOs and the Alien Presence. I feel certain that Buckley would have enjoyed talking with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senator Daniel Inouye of Hawaii about their arranging for the Pentagon to open up a research project into the subject

Mr. Caddy:

I think that the Buckley legacy can easily withstand any dribble of rain sprayed by Mr DiEugenio.

For starters, he was one of the premiere debaters on the American stage easily moving from political to cultural to philosophical and religious thought. He would never – for instance – refer to a book as a “tome of disinfo” without detailing reasons for referencing such; he would never not complete his role as spokesman for the affirmative in a debate about his usage of a term; and, although an author of scores of books and thousands of columns, he wouldn’t answer a debate query by saying “doesn’t anyone read my books?”

He was responsible for finding and publishing two of the finer intellects of the past 50 years—Garry Wills and Renata Adler and two of its best writers in Tom Wolfe and Joan Didion. His range of guests, invited to debate with him, is unapparelled in American history. How many people can you name who could discuss issues – with informed grace for an hour - with Norman Mailer, Kurt Vonnegut, Allen Ginsburg, Jack Kerouac, Harold MacMillan, Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, George McGovern, Timothy Leary John Kenneth Galbraith, Allard Lowenstein, Rosalyn Tureck, Rebecca West and Muhammad Ali, to name just a few? One could have a good grasp of the major issues of the 20th century by watching - or reading the transcripts of - his Firing Line show. 

He burst on the stage of authors with a book about his undergraduate years at Yale. He ran for Mayor of NYC and wrote a great book about the experience; his running spurred Norman Mailer to do the same and they – at opposite ends of the political spectrum in many ways – always had respectful and mutually engaging conversations. Although a prolific writer of spy novels which became best sellers, his writing on sailing and ocean crossing and his writings on religion are sublime products of a crystal-clear intelligence with a superb writing style.
I doubt he used words like “racist” or “sexist” or “anti-Semitic” to brand someone because of their beliefs. He was much more comfortable asking questions and providing context than in summing up a person – or an idea – with pejorative dismissals. He always provided a Constitutional answer to a question about the Constitution; he accepted another’s views for what they were—good faith articulations of an affiliation. His positions on issues weren’t those of what was termed “liberal,” but his thinking was libertarian in principle, and inclusive of dialectic thought.

On a personal level, I “liked” Gore Vidal more, and approved of his take on many issues.  I generally voted opposite to the way Buckley suggested. On the early evening of the Simpson murders on Rockingham Avenue, in Los Angeles, I was hosting an ACLU event a few houses down the street—certainly not WFB’s favorite group. But like Coleridge, Buckley felt that the best way to advance an idea was to face the best that the other side had to offer and that by doing so, one could come to an informed conclusion.

Mr Caddy, my guess is that he was a superb friend. I hope readers of this “education” forum are not put off by any suggestion that he was a “racist” or that he didn’t write well. Either of those propositions are, imho, unsupportable if one is acquainted with him or his works.

1 hour ago, Ron Ecker said:

I think that a bullet through the windshield was as good a signal as any for Greer to start slowing down.

Love this line, Ron.

Like the NORAD command on 9/11, Greer wasn't fired or even reprimanded for  performing his duty in a grossly negligent way. When DeGaulle was ambushed and surrounded by machine guns firing, he had a driver that knew to evade, speed up and swirl. JFK had a lazy, incompetent and likely a bit drunk one--if not an evil one. I think there was alteration; I also always thought the slow down at the time of the shooting was obvious. Such a slow down could have been perceived as a stop and maybe the altered frames came at the turn unto Elm.

On 1/15/2019 at 9:37 PM, Rick McTague said:

From this timeline, it is evident that the extant Zapruder film available today is not the same film as the camera original.

These thread reports reminded me that earlier last year I secured a copy of a play, called FRAME 312 by Keith Reddin, which premiered in the UK in 2002 and in Chicago and Syracuse in the USA. It is a learned, witty and poetic encounter with JFK's murder. It references Zapruder's film in the title  and uses the film for a plot point. The drama depicts the same characters with flashbacks to the 1960's and the 1990's. I have not seen a production but I believe it could be haunting, as well as entertaining. On a larger scale, it examiners the injurious impact of this watershed moment on the concept of the nuclear American family itself. Characters ruminate on the blurring of personal lives and the State and their place in the system. In the 1990's portion of the play, the trauma of 1963 has morphed into a chilly indifference. It's inexpensive and in paperback and enough productions of it - along with showings of Stone's film - might get people to think about how they know what they know. Reddin never hits the audience over the head; he skillfully and indirectly evokes parallel emotions. A plot point revolves around a version of Zapruder's film, but to have lasting impact, a work has to be adaptable to perceptions of a current audience, and the play doesn't demand intricate knowledge of facts.

Earlier in the thread a figure of $25,000 was mentioned in relation to Abe's take home pay.The actual figure agreed upon with LIFE was $150,000. He did give $25,000 (@$203,000. in 2017) to the Widow and Orphans Fund for police, and he told that on TV and under oath at the Warren Commission. He neglected to mention that he pocketed 5 times that - $125,000 (@$1.1 million 2017) for himself.  I wonder what he declared to the IRS?( for those interested in more on Zapruder, I made extended comments in two different threads of the past year.

On 12/27/2018 at 4:56 PM, David Josephs said:

o Robert... is it Lemay who orders Galloway despite the Air Force v Navy problem?

I haven't a clue..I assume they were all in on it. I remain bothered that Dr. Burkley seemed to attach more loyalty to military service than to truth. His cryptic note during the Church committee and his failure to expand during his oral testimony ("I would not like to be quoted on that") puts him in my do-not-trust dept. In Manchester's book, Burkley "knelt" next to Jackie on the plane and suggested that since JFK was a Navy man, perhaps Bethesda was preferable to Walter Reed. The only doctor who was at Parkland and Bethesda could have opened the proverbial can of worms if he had had the inner strength to do so; he didn't.

On 12/30/2018 at 5:30 AM, Ron Bulman said:

Larry, I have SWHT and Nexus but not Surprise Attack

Same with me  and I appreciate that Mr Hancock didn't blow anyone off by asking whether or not they read his book; he gives an explanation that can be followed more in depth by reading his book which I intend to do. My first readings of the USS Liberty, mentioned earlier, hit me like a ton of bricks and remains seared on my memory.