Embarrassing questions

[Bernie Laverick]

Francois:

What were the two questions Bernie would not answer?

JIM D

Jim this clown has a website whose sole purpose is to rubbish ALL conspiracy theories. I asked a simple question, and this goes to all LNs.

Has there ever been a conspiracy in the history of the USA involving any section of its government? If so, which?

His reply went like this... "Not that I know of" followed up in the next sentence with "There are several famous ones".

How do you converse with such a professional idiot like this?

Laverick, you're beginning to get on my nerves.

It's easy to insult people through a computer. Weak people do that !

I'd like to see you talk in front of me !

You are so stupid you don't even realize you are contradicting yourself.

I said I don't know of any conspiracy by the American government.

I then gave two examples of known conspiracies, one in Germany, one in Rome. Well, guess what, neither Germany nor Rome are the American government. But you are too stupid to tell.

Poor man !

/F.C./

I'd like to see you talk in front of me !

I demand that the moderators censure this man. I will not accept threats like this!!!!!

[Bernie Laverick]

Francois:

What were the two questions Bernie would not answer?

JIM D

What about this one ?

I copy/paste :

David Lifton claims that there was a conspiracy involving the highest echelons of the US government, and most likely the Secret Service (his sentence : "I don't know who altered the body but I know who had the body" ...) to kill President Kennedy and thus remove him from power. The scenario involved killing him from the front, then take the body unnoticed, then alter the wounds so that autopsy doctors would conclude he had been shot from behind. I repeat (it's so incredible !) : kill him from the front and change the wounds to make it appear he had been shot from behind. (And I can think of the conspirators having a meeting beforehand and preparing THAT plan !!! Wasn't there anybody to differ?)

My question : do you know of any occasion, in history, at any time, anywhere in the world, in any country, when such a conspiracy, such a plot, such an assassination existed ?

Give me one example in history where conspirators decided to shoot a public figure from the front, then change the wounds, then pretend he had been shot from behind ?

/F.C./

[note : I had made a mistake in my original message. I had written "Wasn't there anybody to defer ?" instead of "Wasn't there anybody to differ ?")

Give me one example in history where conspirators decided to shoot a public figure from the front, then change the wounds, then pretend he had been shot from behind ?

WHY???

[Dean Hagerman]

I'd like to see you talk in front of me !

What are you going to do Francis?

Hide behind the Maginot Line?

[Greg Burnham]

...I said I don't know of any conspiracy by the American government...

We the People are the government. And since we are a democratic republic, we elect officials to represent us and protect our interests. Therefore, any crime involving the cooperation of 2 or more elected government officials (or their staff) is a CONSPIRACY by the American government's elected officials against "We the People".

Ever hear of Watergate? There are perhaps hundreds of other examples. The Teapot Dome Scandal, etc., etc., etc.

[edited error]

Edited August 18, 2010 by Greg Burnham

[Terry Mauro]

If the question actually was, as Bernie said, was there ever an example of the US Government involved in a conspiracy? Well heck yes.

You can go way back to Polk and his provocation of the Mexican War which was, by the way, called out by a little known congressional figure at the time named Abe Lincoln.

How about the conspiracy hatched by Teddy Roosevelt and your French countryman Philippe Bunau Varilla to steal Panama from Columbia when Columbia did not want to sell us the Canal Zone. That was a real dandy.

I mean American history is full of these things. You can go all the way back to Aaron Burr and his incredible scheme of a southwest empire, or all the way forward to Iran/Contra, which is so big it can never really be fully explained.

So, the answer to that question is yes, and only someone who, as Allen Dulles, said "Does not read" would not be aware of that fact.

Conspiracy is as American as Mom, apple pie, and baseball.

And everyone here knows that. Except you and DVP.

Aaron Burr, now there's a turd. I think there is a historical link with Burr and the Dulles family by way of marriage into the notorious Mallet-Prevost family.

[Pat Speer]

Pat Speer wrote :

Your critical thinking argument is worse than critical; it's dead on arrival. Did you forget that Fetzer taught critical thinking for decades? If reading books on critical thinking helps one learn how to interpret evidence, and build reasonable theories based on that evidence, then you should recognize that he is your better, and defer to his judgment. Your failing to do so will only reveal what we already know--you are a typical single assassin theorist, kneeling before the "experts"...until they tell you something you don't want to hear.

I was expecting it, but this has to be the most stupid thing I have heard in years.

You see, mister Speer, I have read books about critical thinking for years. Books by the best in the world.

Then, in 1996, I went to Dallas (I had registered to both the JFK-Lancer and the COPA conferences). I had a lengthy talk with Jim Fetzer and (sorry for the vocabulary I am using) it didn't take me five minutes to realize that guy is a nut.

Then I came back to France and read an issue of the Assassination Chronicles (I was then a subscriber), and there was an article by Fetzer on critical thinking. I read it. It was appalling. It was bad. It was awful. I remember thinking : "that guy doesn't know what he is talking about"

Fetzer knows critical thinking as well as I know cooking ! To paraphrase a line by Wanda (in the movie "A fish called Wanda"), I've know sheep that could outwit Fetzer !!!

Come on, Mister Speer, you can do better, can't you ?

I can tell you something : I have read hundreds of articles and books by people such as Martin Gardner, James Randi, Paul Kurz, Kendrick Frazier, Ray Hyman, Philip Klass, Carl Sagan Joe Nickell, etc. I can tell you for a fact that Fetzer is nowhere near them.

Come on, Mister Speer, Jim Fetzer's "skills" (what a joke !) lead him to such beliefs as : the Zapruder film was altered, there was no plane into the Pentagon, Man did not go to the moon, etc.

On all these topics, he is alone. No other critical-thinking specialist agrees with him. Doesn't that tell you something ?

I mean, check for yourself, on all these subjects, what I think and say and write is exactly what Martin Gardner, James Randi, Paul Kurz, Kendrick Frazier, Ray Hyman, Philip Klass, Carl Sagan, Joe Nickell think, say and write.

So, on one side you have François Carlier, Martin Gardner, James Randi, Paul Kurz, Kendrick Frazier, Ray Hyman, Philip Klass, Carl Sagan, Joe Nickell, etc.

And on the other side, you have Jim Fetzer, on his own.

Now, you can choose whichever side you want to join. It doesn't matter to me.

/F.C./

You missed the point, Francois. You were naming books on critical thinking, and suggesting that READING these books would inevitably make one a better critical thinker. And here we have Fetzer, a professor of critical thinking, who, all by himself, proves your suggestion a foolish one (at least to you).

As far as the others, while I have not studied critical thinking per se, I have tussled with a few of Randi's devotees over the years and have, almost without exception, proved them to be unjustifiably proud of their modest skills and knowledge, in other words...bags of hot air.

Which reminds me...you still haven't answered my questions re McAdams and Myers... What? Is it a violation of the LN code to ever discuss the intellectual dishonesty rampant in your own "community"?

Why is that, do you think? Please use your critical thinking skills and get back to me.

[Dean Hagerman]

Aaron Burr, now there's a turd.

Burr is not a man, he turned around early and killed Hamilton before he even had a chance to draw down on Burr

What a loser

[Pat Speer]

Pat Speer:

Which reminds me...you still haven't answered my questions re McAdams and Myers... What? Is it a violation of the LN code to ever discuss the intellectual dishonesty rampant in your own "community"?

Why is that, do you think? Please use your critical thinking skills and get back to me.

Actually I think it is a code of theirs, like honesty among thieves.

I mean DVP, in his first review of Bugliosi's massive volume could not find one serious error in the whole text! Even though VB endorsed the Myers simulation fraud and printed the altered version of the back of the head photo that was exposed as such by Gary Aguilar and Randy Robertson in 2003 at the Duquesne Conference. Which is incredible in two senses.

We are to beleive that VB never saw the DVD of that conference in the four years before his book came out.

And we are to believe that DVP never saw it for any of his reviews and comments on the book--which are abundant and abundantly uncritical.

As per Francois and Myers and McAdams, forget it. McAdams sketch of the SBT via Artwohl is a howler. Seen only from the side and centering only on the path through JFK, it ignores the John Nichols point about the no impact on the spine issue. Which was repeated by Mantik.

BTW Pat, have you ever noted that the FIsher panel added particles in the neck that were not noted in 1963? Mili Cranor told me that.

She also said that when John Nichols read that he called up Lattimer and said words to the effect: What are you guys pulling now? You are now saying that a FMJ military bullet is losing fragments when it has passed through soft tissue upon entry? Bullxxxx, and you know it.

Nichols was a sharp cookie. Did you ever read his testimony at the Shaw trial?

Yes, I've read Nichols' testimony, along with a few of his magazine articles. My familiarity with Nichols and his studies helped me in a recent spat with McAdams.

From patspeer.com, chapter 19:

When, returning to the original topic, I pointed out that Ben Holmes and I were not alone in our conclusion the single-bullet theory bullet trajectory heads through the spine, and that Dr. Nichols in the 70's and Dr. Mantik in the 90's had come to the same conclusion, McAdams once again showed his closed-mindedness and responded: "I simply don't believe people like Mantik and Nichols. Mantik is a certified crackpot." When I pointed out that the HSCA panel failed to portray the internal passage of the bullet to show this wasn't true, McAdams took another flight of fancy. He wrote: "They didn't think any such was needed since they had no idea that crackpots like Mantik would raise the issue. Simple fact about the HSCA: they refuted conspiracy notions that were on the table in the late 70's. They could not know what people like Mantik would claim."

This simply wasn't true. Nichols was a well-respected forensic pathologist, and had published a paper claiming the bullet trajectory would have to have passed through the spine in the October 1977 Maryland State Medical Journal, within a month of the panel's first meetings. When I then tried to explain the key to Nichols and Mantik's findings, by pointing out that the spinal column and its transverse processes were not adjacent to the back wound entrance but mid-way between the entrance and the supposed exit on the middle of the throat, McAdams once again revealed his ignorance of basic anatomy. He claimed "That's absurd. There is a reason the spine is called the 'backbone.'" He then got nasty: "This is like your 'faked bag' business. You simply make no attempt to model these things with precision."

As far as the fragments in the neck, Lattimer also claimed he saw some, but the HSCA radiologists decided these were largely artifacts. One of them, if I recall, is a few inches above the supposed bullet trajectory, and would lend support to my theory a bullet or fragment came down the neck should it be authenticated.

Edited August 19, 2010 by Pat Speer

[Steve Duffy]

Still Waiting....

[Pat Speer]

Pat Speer:

Which reminds me...you still haven't answered my questions re McAdams and Myers... What? Is it a violation of the LN code to ever discuss the intellectual dishonesty rampant in your own "community"?

Why is that, do you think? Please use your critical thinking skills and get back to me.

Actually I think it is a code of theirs, like honesty among thieves.

I mean DVP, in his first review of Bugliosi's massive volume could not find one serious error in the whole text! Even though VB endorsed the Myers simulation fraud and printed the altered version of the back of the head photo that was exposed as such by Gary Aguilar and Randy Robertson in 2003 at the Duquesne Conference. Which is incredible in two senses.

We are to beleive that VB never saw the DVD of that conference in the four years before his book came out.

And we are to believe that DVP never saw it for any of his reviews and comments on the book--which are abundant and abundantly uncritical.

As per Francois and Myers and McAdams, forget it. McAdams sketch of the SBT via Artwohl is a howler. Seen only from the side and centering only on the path through JFK, it ignores the John Nichols point about the no impact on the spine issue. Which was repeated by Mantik.

BTW Pat, have you ever noted that the FIsher panel added particles in the neck that were not noted in 1963? Mili Cranor told me that.

She also said that when John Nichols read that he called up Lattimer and said words to the effect: What are you guys pulling now? You are now saying that a FMJ military bullet is losing fragments when it has passed through soft tissue upon entry? Bullxxxx, and you know it.

Nichols was a sharp cookie. Did you ever read his testimony at the Shaw trial?

Yes, I've read Nichols' testimony, along with a few of his magazine articles. My familiarity with Nichols and his studies helped me in a recent spat with McAdams.

From patspeer.com, chapter 19:

When, returning to the original topic, I pointed out that Ben Holmes and I were not alone in our conclusion the single-bullet theory bullet trajectory heads through the spine, and that Dr. Nichols in the 70's and Dr. Mantik in the 90's had come to the same conclusion, McAdams once again showed his closed-mindedness and responded: "I simply don't believe people like Mantik and Nichols. Mantik is a certified crackpot." When I pointed out that the HSCA panel failed to portray the internal passage of the bullet to show this wasn't true, McAdams took another flight of fancy. He wrote: "They didn't think any such was needed since they had no idea that crackpots like Mantik would raise the issue. Simple fact about the HSCA: they refuted conspiracy notions that were on the table in the late 70's. They could not know what people like Mantik would claim."

This simply wasn't true. Nichols was a well-respected forensic pathologist, and had published a paper claiming the bullet trajectory would have to have passed through the spine in the October 1977 Maryland State Medical Journal, within a month of the panel's first meetings. When I then tried to explain the key to Nichols and Mantik's findings, by pointing out that the spinal column and its transverse processes were not adjacent to the back wound entrance but mid-way between the entrance and the supposed exit on the middle of the throat, McAdams once again revealed his ignorance of basic anatomy. He claimed "That's absurd. There is a reason the spine is called the 'backbone.'" He then got nasty: "This is like your 'faked bag' business. You simply make no attempt to model these things with precision."

As far as the fragments in the neck, Lattimer also claimed he saw some, but the HSCA radiologists decided these were largely artifacts. One of them, if I recall, is a few inches above the supposed bullet trajectory, and would lend support to my theory a bullet or fragment came down the neck should it be authenticated.

Jim and Pat,

Funnily enough I was just reading Dr. Nichol's Shaw trial testimony the other day and read that at that time he hadn't had a chance to view the autopsy materials. Do either of you know if he got to see them and then wrote any papers on what he concluded?

Also, he mentioned tests he performed with a MC rifle and 6.5 mm ammo, shooting through wrists and ribs, did he publish any photos of these?

Sorry for the ignorance but I've heard his name many times and haven't come across any of his work.

As I recall it, Garrison brought suit to get Nichols access before the Shaw trial. The Feds fought it, claiming its agreement with the Kennedy family forbade it. Then, just as the Shaw case went to trial, Wecht testified to the fact that a study of the autopsy materials needed to be conducted by a non-government-employed forensic pathologist before the evidence could be accepted by the scientific community. The judge ruled in their favor. Then, BINGO, Attorney General Clark played his trump card. Unbeknownst to Garrison and Wecht, he'd already had such a study in his back pocket--the Clark Panel study performed the year before.

Thus, the Clark Panel report was released at the beginning of the Shaw trial, and only days before Attorney General Clark would be helpless to use it against Garrison and Wecht. Also telling, the report was written by Russell Fisher, a close colleague of Wecht's who had never told him of his involvement. As a result, the report was released and largely accepted by Garrison and Wecht, etc, as a legitimate study of the evidence. When Wecht finally did study the evidence, in 1972, in fact, he mostly deferred to the Clark Panel's findings.

I'm fairly certain that Nichols, who, as Wecht, continued to argue against the SBT, never did make it to the archives. Ironically, he was one of the few researchers able to acquire the identical kind of ammunition as that purportedly fired from the M/C rifle on 11/22/63, and was the source, as I remember it, of the bullets tested by Guinn for the HSCA.

Some of this is kind of fuzzy. It is described in detail in Weisberg's Post Mortem, if you want it crystal clear.

[Guest James H. Fetzer]

Egad! If I overlooked your questions, it was inadvertent. Citing an authority is not the same thing as presenting evidence, as I have done in post #57 and dozens of other places, such as THE GREAT ZAPRUDER FILM HOAX (2003), "New Proof of JFK Film Fakery", "Moorman in the Street Revisited", "Zapruder JFK Film impeached by Moorman JFK Polaroid", and "US Government Official: JFK Cover-Up, Film Fabrication", not to mention John P. Costella's "The JFK Assassination Film Hoax: An Introduciton", which is conveniently archived at http://www.assassinationscience.com/johncostella/jfk/intro/ . Groden is a collector, where he has gone out of his way to gather JFK memorabilia, the most important of which concern the Zapruder film. If the film is a fake--and there can be no doubt about it for those who study the evidence seriously--then the value of his collection, not to mention research of his based upon the assumption that the film is authentic, takes an enormous hit. It is for a combination of psychological conflicts and scientific incompetence that he has been unable to bring himself to acknowledge the obvious. If you want to deny the film is a fake, then you should confront the arguments for fakery and defeat them. Start anywhere. I have outlined them many places, so it should not be difficult for you to locate them. Explain the arguments and defeat them.

François Carlier's mind set appears to be indistinguishable from that of Chip Berlet. My arguments about him apply to François.

Supporting links may be found at the original place of publication: http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_6047.shtml

A deluxe version (with graphics) may be found here: http://jamesfetzer.blogspot.com/2010/06/conspiracies-and-conspiracism.html

Conspiracies and conspiracism

By Jim Fetzer

Online Journal Contributing Writer

Jun 28, 2010, 00:28

MADISON, Wisc. -- A new study from Political Research Associates. entitled Toxic To Democracy: Conspiracy Theories, Demonization, & Scapegoating, by Chip Berlet now proclaims that conspiracy theories are “toxic to democracy” because they share some portion of moral responsibility for irresponsible acts, such as the shooting of the abortion provider, Dr. George Tiller, which some have associated with Rush Limbaugh and other pro-life zealots. By adopting a sweeping stance that does not discriminate between different cases on the basis of logic and evidence, Berlet discredits himself. Since conspiracies only require collaboration between two or more individuals in illegal acts, they are as American as apple pie.

Perhaps Berlet didn’t get the memo, but according to the government, the US was attacked on 9/11 by 19 Islamic fundamentalists who used box cutters to hijack four airplanes, outfox the most sophisticated air defense system in the world, and commit multiple atrocities under the control of a guy in a cave in Afghanistan. When I published a critique of the “official account,” which suggests the facts contradict it, I used the title, THE 9/11 CONSPIRACY, in the knowledge that either way a conspiracy was involved -- either one told by the government using THE 9/11 COMMISSION REPORT, or something far more sinister, which involved key members of the Bush administration with a little help from their friends. (See, e.g., “9/11 and the Neo-Con Agenda” and the PowerPoint presentation, “Was 9/11 an ‘inside job’?,” which is archived at 911scholars.org.)

According to Berlet, belief in a conspiracy turns out to be the manifestation of a “belief system” that violates the principles of logic. Having taught logic, critical thinking, and scientific reasoning for 35 years, however, the violations of logic seem to be committed by the author. Berlet commits many fallacies in the course of his study, including some stunning, easily disprovable generalizations about reasoning:

“Conspiracism is neither a healthy expression of skepticism nor a valid form of criticism; rather it is a belief system that refuses to obey the rules of logic. These theories operate from a pre-existing premise of a conspiracy based upon careless collection of facts and flawed assumptions. What constitutes ‘proof’ for a conspiracist is often more accurately described as circumstance, rumor, and hearsay; and the allegations often use the tools of fear -- dualism, demonization, scapegoating, and aggressively apocalyptic stories -- which all too often are commandeered by demagogues.” (Toxic to Democracy)

No one would deny that a certain proportion of the American public may be vulnerable to “conspiracism” in this sense, which represents the modus operandi of Rush Limbaugh and other right-wing zealots, who find conspiracies to be a ubiquitous part of public life, from left-wing efforts to spend the country into oblivion to encouraging illegal immigrants to flow into the country unabated to questioning whether Barack Obama has the qualification for office of being “native born.” These are the kinds of “conspiracy theories” that are dime a dozen, which find gullible followers across the country by the bushel basket.

But so what? If conspiracy theories like these are supposed to be “toxic to democracy,” then democracy needs to be made of sterner stuff. Circumstance, rumor, and hearsay, after all, tend to be the starting point for more serious studies of specific events. The BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is a case in point. Who has not heard swirling rumors about Halliburton having cut corners, the BP practice of putting profits before safety, and the further catastrophes that await those who reside along the coast of the states that are most directly affected? Puzzlement over phenomena that do not readily fit into our background knowledge and preliminary understanding is the point of departure for scientific investigations that may better reveal the truth.

Suppose we were prohibited from speculation and rumor in relation to the events that have made the most difference to American history in recent time? The most important aspect of reasoning is comparisons between different theories to measure which best explains the data. Indeed, Jesse Ventura’s AMERICAN CONSPIRACES advances no less that 14 illustrations of the collaboration between two or more individuals to bring about illegal ends, from the assassination of Abraham Lincoln (where four co-conspirators were hanged from the same gallows at the very same time), to the big-money conspiracy to overthrow the government in 1934 on to Watergate, the Jonestown Massacre, the Iran-scam that gave the presidency to Ronald Reagan, drug-dealing by the CIA, and many more -- a list that can be readily expanded by the assassinations of JFK, RFK, MLK, and Malcolm X (see, for example, "JFK and RFK: The Plots that Killed Them, The Patsies that Didn’t").

Berlet claims (what he calls) conspiracism “must be confronted as a flawed analytical model, rather than a legitimate mode of criticism of inequitable systems, structures, and institutions of power.” He claims it suffers from four debilitating features as “metaframes” of the model:

* dualism, according to which the world is -- presumably simplistically -- divided into the forces of good and the forces of evil;

* scapegoating, according to which an individual or group of people is wrongly stereotyped with negative characteristics;

* demonization, according to which an individual or a group is taken to be the personification of evil; and,

* apocalyptic aggression, which occurs when scapegoats are targeted as enemies of the “common good” and may be subjected to violence.

What is fascinating about these categories is how well they fit many of the government’s own campaigns to convince the American people to support an unpopular course of action. After 9/11, for example, the world was divided into the forces of good (the Americans) and those of evil (the Mulsims). Members of the Muslim community were said to be fanatical and violent, contrary to the principles of the Koran. Nineteen alleged hijackers and al Qaeda were scapegoated as responsible for those atrocities. And wars of aggression would be launched against Iraq and Afghanistan, which continue to this day.

Berlet tells us that what “conspiracy theorists lack is the desire or ability to follow the basic rules of logic and investigative research.” We can all remember being told Saddam Hussein was responsible for 9/11, but eventually even George W. Bush acknowledged that Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11. We were told that Iraq was in cahoots with al Qaeda, but investigations by the Senate and the Pentagon showed that that was not the case. And when Ed Haas of “The Muckraker Report” questioned Tex Tomb of the FBI about why 9/11 received no mention on a “wanted poster” for Osama bid Laden, he was told the reason was the FBI had “no hard evidence” connecting Osama bin Laden to the events of 9/11. But if Saddam was not responsible and if Osama was not responsible, then who was responsible for 9/11?

Indeed, according to THE 9/11 COMMISSION, 15 of the 19 alleged hijackers were from Saudi Arabia. The number from Iraq was zero. So why did we attack Iraq instead of Saudi Arabia? That looks like a stunning illustration of the failure to follow basic rules of logic or investigative research. As Ron Suskind, THE PRICE OF LOYALTY, reported, George W. Bush’s first secretary of the Treasury, Paul O’Neil, was astonished that war with Iraq was discussed at the first meeting of the cabinet, nearly nine months before the events of 9/11. Which means 9/11 was used as a fabricated rationale to support a predetermined conclusion, which appears to have been a policy that was adopted by Bush and Cheney before their formal inauguration.

While Berlet insists that “conspiracism” fails to follow the basic rules of logic and investigative journalism, he should have explained that rumor and conjecture represent the second stage of scientific modes of reasoning, where it is crucial to elaborate all possible alternative explanations to insure that the true hypothesis is not excluded from scratch. Thus, the first stages of puzzlement and of speculation are followed by those of adaptation (of hypothesis to evidence, using likelihood measures of evidential support) and of explanation (when the evidence has “settled down” and the best supported hypothesis is entitled to acceptance in the tentative and fallible fashion distinctive of science (see “Thinking about ‘Conspiracy Theories: 9/11 and JFK”).

The essence of Berlet’s book, however, is that he believes conspiracy theories come out of psychological needs of prejudiced people, which makes them INTERNAL FANTASIES. He is thereby throwing the crime baby out with the conspiracy bath water. Conspiracies really do happen in the EXTERNAL WORLD. They are not merely internal figments of the imagination. It is true that some people embrace conspiracy theories and reveal themselves by the inability to improve or adjust their views in light of new evidence or new hypotheses. If they are scapegoating, then the internal origin of their conspiracy need is manifest. However, conspiracy crimes are commonplace and external to us. When they are the subjects of objective investigations, those who study them are governed by logic and evidence, which are basic to rationality.

Ultimately, Berlet has defined a belief system called “conspiracism” that has only tenuous connections with conspiracies. While some gullible persons may satisfy its constraints, there are vastly more conspiracies than there are examples of conspiracism. Ask what Shakespeare would have had to write about if not for plots against the kings and queens of England. How many victims of conspiracies have died in the 20th century alone? In his brilliant study, “The Silence of the Historians,” for example, David W. Mantik, M.D., Ph.D., lists the names of more than two dozen prominent political figures -- from Franz Ferdinand and Czar Nicholas II to Salvadore Allende and Fidel Castro -- who were targeted for assassination by multiple conspirators on a single page of MURDER IN DEALEY PLAZA (page 402).

The ultimate failure of Berlet’s study is that it succumbs to the kind of simplistic thinking that he condemns. The world is divided into forces of good (the rational thinkers) and evil (the conspiracy theorists). The evil conspiracy theorists are stereotyped as trading in circumstance, rumor, and hearsay, while the rational thinkers follow the rules of logic and investigative journalism. Their careless collections of facts and flawed assumptions are often commandeered by demagogues. And of course they can be used to incite unjustified violence against innocent parties. But this presumes knowledge of which claims are true and which assumptions are flawed. Simplistic thinking of Berlet’s kind does not advance understanding. As Michael Moore said, when asked if he was into conspiracy theories, ”Only those that are true.” Each case must be evaluated on its merits using logic and evidence.

Thanks to Mike Sparks for inviting my attention to Berlet’s study and more.

James H. Fetzer is the editor of assassinationscience.com and co-editor of assassinationresearch.com. He has a blog at jamesfetzer.blogspot.com. His academic web site is found at www.d.umn.edu/~jfetzer

There is a major problem with conspiracy theorists, which is very well illustrated by this little story :

A psychiatrist was consulted by a patient with a very peculiar delusion. He was convinced that he was dead, and nothing could be done to dissuade him of this. The psychiatrist tried to reason with him. "Tell me", he said, "do dead men bleed ? " "No, of course not ! " cried the patient. "That is a stupid question ! " The psychiatrist pricked the man’s finger with a needle, and a drop of blood appeared. "And what do you conclude from that ? " asked the psychiatrist. The patient paused for a few seconds to examine the wound. "Obviously I was wrong", he murmured quietly. "Dead men do bleed…"

Just like the patient in this story, conspiracy theorists are so enclosed in their world of make-believe, that there is absolutely nothing a reasonable person can say to help them see things differently.

That's very sad.

But even sadder is the fact that conspiracy theorists would stop at nothing to claim their beliefs. They dare DENY anything. They deny reality, and that doesn't bother them.

Jack White denies that Americans went to the moon in 1969.

Jim Fetzer denies that an American Airlines plane crashed into the Pentagon in 2001.

And yesterday, Jim DiEugenio tried to deny that Lee Harvey Oswald ever owned a rifle !!!

It's so easy : denying the obvious facts will allow you to display any belief. Indeed if you deny reality, then you have an open field, and you are free to tell whatever story pleases your own beliefs.

That's bad !

And my experience in this forum showed me that conspiracy theorists NEVER answer the simplest questions.

When I asked if anybody had read the critical-thinking books I listed, NOBODY answered, because NOBODY had read them, but they were ashamed to admit it.

Nonetheless, that is a very serious matter. How can they hope to sort things out if they do not have the tools for that ?

I can think of an analogy.

Conspiracy theorists have bricks. Some one them have lots and lots of bricks. But they don't have the mortar to build a wall, so they end up standing in front of a huge pile of bricks, but they are still outside in the cold.

A reasonable person has as many bricks, but like a mason or bricklayer, he has the mortar, so he can build a wall, so he'll be able to build a house and spend the winter in the warmth of his home.

That's a good image.

Here, bricks are books, and mortar is critical thinking.

Without critical-thinking skills, conspiracy theorists are unable to sort things out, they do not know what to do with the evidence. They fly to hundreds of directions. It's a mess.

Some of them say the body was altered, when others say no, some of them say the Zapruder film was altered, when others say no, some of them say the Cubans did it, when others say no, some of them say Johnson did it, when others say no, etc., etc., etc., etc.

Anybody can say anything. Everybody is right.

Boy, John Kennedy must have been assassinated a hundred times !! It must have been very painful to him !

But as I said more than ten years ago, conspiracy theorists are in the business of ASKING questions, not ANSWERING them. I can understand : it is way easier….

(They are also in the business of ACCUSING people. When Jim Fetzer accuses some members the New York Fire Department of having something to do with 09/11, or when others accuse President Johnson, I want to vomit.)

For instance, these are very embarrassing questions for them (among many others) :

Why is it that Robert Groden, a very well-known conspiracy theorist doesn't believe that the Zapruder film was altered ? Is he dumb ? Does he work for the CIA ? Has he been paid to tell a false story ? Or is the Zapruder film authentic after all ? In that case, is Jim Fetzer wrong ? But if he is wrong, how come he has published anthologies that he claims "prove beyond any doubt" that the Zapruder film was altered ? Is Fetzer stupid ? Is Mantik wrong too ? Then is he wrong in his claims about the medical evidence ? How come Fetzer and his friends have managed to "prove" something that never existed in the first place (an alteration of the film) ? Can it be that some people can write conspiracy books that lead nowhere ?

Who is right ?

And why can't James DiEugenio give us a clear-cut answer as to whether the Zapruder film was altered ? Hasn't he read Fetzer's books ? Or has he read them but was unable to understand the evidence shown before his eyes ? Or he is paid by the CIA ?

Well, as long as conspiracy theorists will believe in as many theories as there are members of that community, refusing to debate reasonable people, afraid of being shown they had been wrong all along, they'll continue to spread their lies.

That's very sad !

/F.C./

Mister Fetzer,

Good evening.

I see you have read my post and copied/pasted an article of yours.

That's fine by me.

But why didn't you try to ANSWER my questions instead ?

Is it because, as the title of this thread says, they are "embarrassing" to conspiracy theorists ?

Once again, I am asking you :

Why is it that Robert Groden, a very well-known conspiracy theorist doesn't believe that the Zapruder film was altered ? Is he dumb ? Does he work for the CIA ? Has he been paid to tell a false story ? Or is the Zapruder film authentic after all ? In that case, is Jim Fetzer wrong ? But if he is wrong, how come he has published anthologies that he claims "prove beyond any doubt" that the Zapruder film was altered ? Is Fetzer stupid ? Is Mantik wrong too ? Then is he wrong in his claims about the medical evidence ? How come Fetzer and his friends have managed to "prove" something that never existed in the first place (an alteration of the film) ? Can it be that some people can write conspiracy books that lead nowhere ?

Who is right ?

Surely you will acknowledge that there is nothing wrong with my asking those interesting questions.

I assure you I would love to know your answers.

/F.C./

Edited August 19, 2010 by James H. Fetzer

[Dean Hagerman]

Groden is a collector, where he has gone out of his way to gather JFK memorabilia, the most important of which concern the Zapruder film. If the film is a fake--and there can be no doubt about it for those who study the evidence seriously--then the value of his collection, not to mention research of his based upon the assumption that the film is authentic, takes an enormous hit.

Very well said Jim

I agree with that 100%