Derek Thibeault

Could there be any thoughts that Oswald was trying to save the president? Besides his note to Hosty and his potentially calling in the crime. Could he have been trying to protect him? It's probably more plausible that he was placed there to keep an eye out and then take the fall. I like the theory of the Parallax View where Oswald was kind of the good guy here. Even if a right-winger it doesn't mean he wanted him dead, some people in the CIA/FBI take their jobs seriously no matter what their political leanings are. Or is my view romanticized?

21 hours ago, Ron Bulman said:

This is very intense.  I've only watched 3-4 of the Black Ops Fifty Reasons Fifty Years videos from links on here.  I thought I remembered hour long interviews with Len.  This is not an interview but a very concise presentation, direct, to the point.  675 pages of the book cannot be condensed into eight minutes and are not.  But, all here should take the time to watch the video whether you have the book or not.  It gets to the heart of the matter.

the 50 videos are great and very well done.

10 hours ago, Joseph McBride said:

My FIFTY REASONS . . . FIFTY YEARS segment on J. D. Tippit (note

the correct spelling). Len Osanic produced the series, and Jeff

Carter did the videography. This is based on my research for

my book INTO THE NIGHT, about two-thirds of which is on Tippit. 

 

Thanks - yeah I messed up the spelling - very hard to find your book at a normal price - still looking though. I read your book on Orson Welles. It was very good. Thanks for this video clip, I watched all 50 a few years back - I will check this one out again. Thank you!

On 6/9/2022 at 12:42 PM, James DiEugenio said:

My first reaction after watching it was:  Why did it take 59 years to do something like this?

I will be doing a two part review, part one should be up this weekend at K and K.

I finally got to see it today - it's excellent for the budget that was used. Max really went after a great topic. I believe we need to break this assassination into segments, and the Paine's are a major one. I have thought of them for years and wanted a deep dive. Kudos to Max - I read Jim's review also well-done. We need a doc on the JD Tippett murder. I'm glad Max showed Jack Ruby's comments about "the truth" - to me, that is one of the most damning public statements of all. It's amazing that Ruth has told the same story, and neither her or Michael broke nor died young. Seeing Posner in this - total fraud man. Thank you, Max, it was well worth the purchase.

18 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Amazing, isn't it Joe?

Almost 60 year later, and the case will not go away.

I should add, the documentary made out of Tink Thompson's latest book is doing well on You Tube, over half  a million views, and is now on Hulu.

Just makes you wonder, what will happen at the sixtieth?

I caught Thompson's doc, very different from Stone's but pretty good. Glad to see new docs still coming out. I read your take on Boot's column. Not sure how he can lie about Lummumba and not be discredited. It used to be, if you were called out for lies, you were disgraced.

Why can't Jim also go on another time? They both have different ways of discussing. Rogan has all kinds of guests, famous and not so famous. The more the better.

50 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

Rogan has been postponed. 

Oliver sent him the four parter.  He wants time to watch the whole thing.

Which is fine with me. 

We will let Glenn carry us for now.

Looking forward to Rogan - huge audience.

On 12/13/2021 at 8:23 PM, Ron Bulman said:

I had trouble finding it the day it came out but my wife finally did.  I was glad to see it featured in prime time on the anniversary and it's gotten some good media exposure in the U S.  As you allude to it is entirely fact based, all documented and persuasive to those who do watch it.  Yes it is frustrating it's ignored or dismissed by most of the msm.  

However, being on Showtime is itself a great accomplishment given the dismissal of the subject by that msm.  Further, it's public acceptance thus far from Cannes to Australia, Showtime and more may become the biggest step in exposure of the Truth ever.  Stone told the story of Garrison in New Orleans and part of the bigger picture in JFK.  Now, with the help of many others he tells the Truth.  As another poster mentioned and I agree it will change the future historical perception of the assassination, giving a greater understanding to many how our government really works.  FWIW, jmo.

That is good - can't wait for the 4-hour version. We need an 8 hr version like the Beatles film.

On 12/3/2021 at 12:04 AM, James DiEugenio said:

It does not get much better than this.  His name is Donald Turner and this is on FB.

Having now watched, and re-watched, what may be Oliver Stone's nearly parting gift to the world, "JFK Revisited: through the looking glass", despite already having been familiar with the majority of the content, I remain again, in a literal state of shock.

Profound.

In all seriousness, this is highly recommended viewing, considering, discussing

Less about speculation, theorizing, conjecture, more about bringing facts, from the record, to light.

The official "Warren Commission" report was exposed officially, as largely fraudulent, but most will never know that. Stone's gift is to try once again, to bring facts from the record, to light.

This was achieved, even by the corrupt and bungling, congressional efforts, the HSCA and ARRB but again, most, will never know these facts of record.

Offical "news sources" (all major media of the time - NYT, WaPo, TV Networks, etc) IGNORED this new information, instead, parroting lies, purposefully misdirecting the public, over and over again, aggressively mocking anyone, that challenged the official story. What can only be described as complicit.

Why is this so critical? Why am I still posting about this wake up call of a film?

An ugly event almost 60 years old?

I can only be left with a clear understanding that the US experienced a real coup d'état on November 22, 1963, and everything changed from that time forward. EVERYTHING.

Sure Powell memos, Kock brothers funding of Clinton DLC and the neoliberalization of the DNC, voodoo economics, 911, WMD nonsense, Trump, etc., all important milestones along this path, but clearly, that path continues to this day, to be owned and wholly operated by rogue intelligence agencies, outside government control, outside the people's control. Extra-legal.

The Raegan, Bush, Clinton, Bush II, Obama, Trump's come and go, but plainly, rogue agencies outside their scope reach, have and will, dominate all important policy, until this ends.

THIS is why myself, and so many others, constantly say, our elected politicians are merely figureheads, puppets, not actually in charge of anything meaningful. US politics, and it's bogus representative government, is today, a carefully constructed charade.

Stone's film is and has been mocked, predictably, and largely suppressed, currently only available on Showtime. Well worth a trial membership to watch.

When a new film comes out on streaming platforms, the new film is almost always first. When I looked for JFK: Revisited on Showtime the day it was released, it was not first. I actually scrolled through films, and documentaries and couldn't find it, I had to do a search. A casual person that doesn't know about it won't find it. That was concerning, it's not us that need to see it, we know about it and look for it, but it needs to hit more eyes. This doc provides facts, not crazy theories, fictionalized characters, or forced exposition. How anyone with a logical brain can't see what these facts are telling us. The reason we are still read and follow and discuss is cause 60 years or not, the country changed that day and has never come back. You can't say, JFK, RFK, MLK, Malcolm X, Lumumba, Dag, were all just a coincidence, no decade has that amount of crazy assassinations. Do we not have lone nuts today? Something does not add up. It's frustrating.

I know I have thought different ways about this for 40 years. My wish is that LHO had nothing to do with it, or he was told he was there to protect the president and was actually set up. His face when he is told he is being charged with JFK's murder is an amazing piece of film. You can almost see in his eyes and expression that he at that moment knows he was set up. Unfortunately, we are never going to know everything. There are a lot of inconsistencies, especially in Oswald's life, that can't be reconciled. I don't trust Marina and I don't trust Paine. Not even sure if I trust Frazier, everyone has an angle on this now.

Reading through this. So I don't believe in the two Oswalds, I do believe in the impersonation of Oswald at various times. But I just can't trust Marina, she has changed her stories before. I can't see for the life of me why Oswald takes a shot at both Walker and JFK, who are polar opposites. This incident is so important, like that of the Tippit murder, it presents a narrative. Why shoot once at Walker, why not get closer? I don't think the shooter wanted him dead. Like many aspects of this case, the Walker story fascinates me. If he is a crazy nut, then Oswald does come home and tells Marina what he did. If he is an operative on a mission, he tells her nothing. Or he had nothing to do with it.

I watched it twice and caught things in the second viewing I missed in the first. I knew a lot of this from reading, but still learned new things. I have been reading since the 80s, when I picked up Reasonable Doubt for a book report. Can we get a good Doc on just the Tippit murder? Would love to break that down. Some use that murder to prove the Kennedy murder, which is furthest from the truth.

On 11/20/2021 at 9:09 AM, Steve Roe said:

Let's face facts here, the film is a flop here in North America. To his credit, Oliver Stone recognizes the reality of the situation when he states there was little attention in the film. 

Now it's down to Social Media platforms to try to breathe some life in the film. Well, good luck with that!

The film has glaring errors, omissions, and "creative editing" to put forth this conspiracy. One researcher pointed out how Stone's Editor snipped and edited Bill Newman's historical eye-witness account to fit the story. I don't care what you say, but intentionally playing around with historical film clips like that, is highly unethical. 

 All JFK enthusiasts have to wake up to the cold hard fact that this is not 1991, and the JFK Assassination interest has waned dramatically over the years in the public. The subject is so saturated with books, films, forums that do nothing but confuse those new to the case. 

Also, in my opinion, a large population of Americans are sick and tired of Conspiracy Theories, from 9/11 to QAnon to RFK and of course JFK.  

I admire Oliver Stone for being candid and honest about the film's lack of interest, something you will seldom read here in this forum. 

 

I will agree with one thing, newer people to the case are confused because "everyone" killed JFK, too many theories. I though agree there was a conspiracy, but with everyone throwing things at the wall, the real points get lost. This doc is real good and talks evidence rather than craziness.

On 11/19/2021 at 4:37 PM, Jeff Carter said:

Obviously Mr Litwin is this go-round’s designated Posner / Bugliosi. It’s amusing that the effort stumbled out of the gate producing/sponsoring books on the assumption the new Stone film would be focussed largely on Garrison/Shaw/New Orleans… whoops.

Just to note, his claim the backyard photos were “conclusively” proven legitimate is completely incorrect. The HSCA, like the FBI before it, acknowledged that the technical possibility of a facial replacement at the chin line could not be proved or disproved.

I was arguing with Twitwin on FB about the backyard photos, look at the ring, the shadows, Oswald's words, it's all there.

On 11/17/2021 at 2:28 PM, James DiEugenio said:

As per Litwin, the guy is today exposed as a neocon clown.

In my review of his book, I exposed what he did with Andrews and Weisberg, a stunt that would get him thrown out of any advanced academic program.

I also exposed how he actually rewrote a CIA memo to alter its meaning.  Which also would have gotten him expelled.

Fred Litwin lives in his own solipsistic world. Does not matter to Parnell.

You know Tracy, if you just don't give two hoots about what happened to President Kennedy, why don't you just say that?

Is your life really that empty that you need to indulge in this kind of nonsense?

Litwin has been killing this film on Facebook, he sounds like someone who defends Trump, he is just nuts.

On 10/20/2021 at 4:18 AM, Joseph McBride said:

Jim Leavelle, the lead detective in the Tippit case, 

indicated to me that Captain Fritz wanted him to work up

a case on Oswald for the Tippit murder since they didn't have

a sufficient case on Oswald for killing Kennedy. I asked Leavelle

why he thought they had a better case for the Tippit murder, and

he said they had witnesses (ignoring the chaotic state of the

witness reports). It's a little-known fact that Oswald was arraigned

only for the Tippit murder and not for the presidential assassination.

Henry Wade and J. Edgar Hoover also expressed doubts about

whether there was a sufficient case against Oswald in the assassination.

I need to read your book on the Tippet killing, it's been tough to find for a reasonable price. I did read your book on the last days of Orson Welles, and it was very good. Is Leavelle a sympathetic person, can his words be trusted?

I wish there was more- and I know there will be in February. But what about a docuseries that has seasons, there is so much info that people who are not educated on the subject that are in books that they don't read. The Oswald docuseries on the History channel was pretty bad. Maybe even a YouTube series. I understand there is a lot of work involved, but Stone did do his book The Untold History on Showtime.

Anyone ever see Executive Action, I assume most have? Early 70s version of the assassination with Burt Lancaster and Robert Ryan. It's not bad but obviously not factually correct and slow compared to Stone's flair. Definitely an interesting early look. Shocked that it got made.

For the film "JFK" the deleted scenes are also pretty good and useful. Also watching the film with Stone's commentary is enlightening because he can explain what were composite characters and also what he used for cinematic effect. The deleted scenes are on youtube.  

8 hours ago, Joseph McBride said:

Detective James Leavelle confirmed to me that Oswald was telling the

truth when he said during his midnight press conference that he had not been told by the police that he had been charged

with murdering the president. From my book INTO THE NIGHTMARE:

 

. . .  So we can see that the “proof” Oswald shot Tippit was indeed crucial to the federal and local authorities in shoring up their dubious case that he shot Kennedy.

And the uncertainty over whether they could pin the assassination on Oswald would help explain his otherwise baffling behavior at his midnight press showing when he was asked if he had killed the president. As has previously been mentioned, Oswald made this key statement in response: “No. I have not been charged with that. In fact, nobody has said that to me yet. The first thing I heard about it was when the newspaper reporters in the hall [voice quavering], uh, axed [sic] me that question.” Some have argued that Oswald did not make a full stop after “No,” when asked if he had killed the president, but instead said, “No, I have not been charged with that.” The evidence on the television tape is ambiguous. If he made a full stop (as the transcript in the Warren Report, for what it’s worth, has him doing), he was denying killing Kennedy from this very prominent public podium, which was consistent with his other statements to reporters as he was being hustled through the hall (which had also been heard on television, including his assertions “I didn’t shoot anyone!” and “I’m just a patsy!”) and his reported statements behind closed doors to the police. If Oswald was only denying being “charged with that,” he might have been expressing genuine bafflement about why not.

Another possibility is that this could have been very real shock on his part about hearing about that charge first from reporters at the midnight press conference -- even though that contradicts everything we have been told by the Dallas police about his interrogation sessions.

I asked Detective Leavelle what Oswald had been told, by the time of that midnight press conference, about the charges that were to be filed against him in the murder of the president. Leavelle replied,

"He’d been told it, but see, he hadn’t been charged with it, so he answered it truthfully. He knew he was a suspect, but he hadn’t been charged with it. Now, that was the difference in the Tippit deal. Because we went ahead that evening and we had [Deputy District Attorney] Bill Alexander there, who accepted the case for the district attorney’s office. And once the district attorney’s office accept the charges, then he’s officially charged, see? So he was answering the question truthfully -- he hadn’t been charged with it [the presidential assassination]. We had charged him with the Tippit thing."

But since Oswald’s interrogation sessions were not recorded, we have only the word of the DPD to go on for what was said by Oswald in them, which means that their reports are dubious at best. Oswald’s statement at the press conference about having just heard the charge -- a sentence uttered with what seems like authentic shock -- may reveal something more about why the Tippit killing was being treated as such a key charge to pin on Oswald, and why Belin considered it “the Rosetta Stone.” Wade told me the midnight event was not intended to be a press conference but only a showing to demonstrate that Oswald, despite having a cut on his face from the arrest and shouting at the theater about “police brutality,” was not being mistreated by the police. Wade said Police Chief Jesse E. Curry asked his advice, and “I said let ‘em look at him, but there wasn’t any questioning of him.” In fact, the press naturally asked some questions, and the anxiety of the police to get Oswald out of there when he started giving answers that did not seem to fit the emerging official story is telling.

If the authorities were uncertain about whether they could pin the Kennedy killing on Oswald, as well they should have been given the paucity of actual evidence, were they trying to do an end-run by nailing him first as a cop-killer and then expanding the case from that unproven supposition, as Bugliosi, a respected prosecutor, would be found doing many years later in his book, long after Oswald was supposedly convicted by the Warren Commission in the court of history as the lone-nut killer of Kennedy? If Bugliosi, like many others, was grasping at the Tippit killing to help buttress the widely disbelieved and discredited case against Oswald as Kennedy’s killer, that would be another key indicator of how flimsy the “so-called evidence” against Oswald actually seems to the beleaguered and blinkered, if not actively dishonest, defenders of the official line.

 

Good stuff, I need to read your book, just need to find it at a good price. Thanks for your work on the Tippet case sounds like the definitive info.

8 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Here it is, if you have not read it.  The magnificent Edwin Black essay on the plot to kill JFK in Chicago.

In my view, it might be the best essay on the JFK case published in the seventies.  It is certainly one of the most important of that decade.

http://thechicagoplot.com/The Chicago Plot.pdf

The other side hates this article.  And its easy to see why. Some apparatus was hunting JFK in the fall of 1963.  And it appears that Oswald may have been the informant on it.

Great article, I mean these other plots, would seem to credit the Dallas conspiracy. It's probably the greatest evidence for a conspiracy in Dallas.

51 minutes ago, John Kozlowski said:

Do you believe Oswald told Hosty of a plot and Hosty ignored it or didnt take him serious enough to do something?

I personally always thought that. Also wasn't Oswald potentially an informant for the Miami or Chicago plots? Either Hosty didn't take him seriously or was told to ignore Oswald.

A while ago I was able to send something and Bill Kelley emailed me for a short bio. Which I emailed him back. Not sure how it's working currently.

22 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

Denny:

I am not so sure about calling those texts like Crossfire and AAF outdated.

IMO, a lot of the most recent stuff on the JFK case is pretty crappy.  I am actually thinking of writing an essay on that specific topic since I think its really debilitating to the case.

But one definition of the term classic, is that the work has stood the test of time.  In my view, the Meagher book is a classic.  And it would be made to order for this audience.  I still use Meagher in my current critiques.  One reason I think  her book has stood up is this: she really did read the entire 26 volumes.  A lot of people say they did, but she really did.

Crossfire, the first edition-- as I said a long time ago--is a really nice desk compendium which covers almost all aspects of the case. You could print out a few pages on each topic to kick start a discussion.

 

An essay on that would be helpful. I love Crossfire but I assume recent finds may have made a thing here or there inaccurate. Prayer Man for example.

Although not sure I agree with the rule that you can't criticize the forum at other sites, I don't understand why if you like being part of the site and the debates you would want to go trash the site elsewhere. I am part of the FP for JFK FB page and do not love everything that gets posted over there but I don't rip that page here. I don't see a point in it. If I don't like something then I should debate it. Seems like a lot of wasted time and stress to go and bash a site you like. IMO