Who changed the motorcade route?

[James DiEugenio]

That is really good Vince.  

You really corrected a misconception about the case.

Dallas was not the rule at all.  It was an exception. And the fact that it was a hostile environment and they knew it beforehand, makes it all the worse.

[David Lifton]

8 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

That is really good Vince.  

You really corrected a misconception about the case.

Dallas was not the rule at all.  It was an exception. And the fact that it was a hostile environment and they knew it beforehand, makes it all the worse.

Jim:

Where have you been?

If you followed Palamara's blog. or read his book, you would know that he established these facts years ago.

There was no "misconception" about the case. 

All of this was laid out quite clearly years ago. (Maybe you were under a misconception?)

You should watch his video of what happened when Clint Hill was on C-Span, with Brian Lamb, and Lamb forced Hill to comment on Palamara's work.

DSL

[Vince Palamara]

45 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

That is really good Vince.  

You really corrected a misconception about the case.

Dallas was not the rule at all.  It was an exception. And the fact that it was a hostile environment and they knew it beforehand, makes it all the worse.

Thanks a lot, Jim!

[Vince Palamara]

31 minutes ago, David Lifton said:

Jim:

Where have you been?

If you followed Palamara's blog. or read his book, you would know that he established these facts years ago.

There was no "misconception" about the case. 

All of this was laid out quite clearly years ago. (Maybe you were under a misconception?)

You should watch his video of what happened when Clint Hill was on C-Span, with Brian Lamb, and Lamb forced Hill to comment on Palamara's work.

DSL

Thanks a lot, David! I am really looking forward to your new book.

 

Vince

[Vince Palamara]

On ‎5‎/‎27‎/‎2018 at 10:58 AM, Mark Knight said:

Ron, that sounds quite reasonable. You don't route the President of the United States through the "rougher" parts of a city if there is an alternative route, IMHO. Every city wants the President to see their best side, not their worst. Basic human vanity at play here more than anything sinister, IMHO.

YES, I fully understand that this point of view like the legs out from under the point of view that "the plotters" put Oswald "in place" at the TSBD specifically to kill Kennedy.  So be it. 

Hi, Mark! Kennedy motorcaded thru the streets of Harlem and the slums of Caracas, Venezuela. Wherever the president goes, so do the people. Industrial Blvd was infinitely better than both Harlem and the slums of Caracas. 

[Vince Palamara]

On ‎5‎/‎27‎/‎2018 at 2:38 PM, James DiEugenio said:

Now, what I find intriguing about it all are the roles of Sorrels and Lawson before and after the assassination.

As Doug Horne titles a section of  his book, IARRB, Volume five:

"The motorcycle escort for the Presidential Limousine in Dallas is Cut in Half, and Directed to Stay behind the Rear Wheels of the Limousine, by Winston Lawson, the Secret Service Agent for Dallas" (p. 1401)

Now, according to Horne's evidence, the original design of the cycle escort was four on each side of the limo. Grand total of eight.  On November 21st, Lawson cut the total to four, and advised that the last two be aligned with the rear fender. (ibid, p. 1402)  As Horne notes, this  juxtaposed dramatically with what had happened in Houston the day before. There, the cops had 18 cycles, nine on each side. Motorcycle cop B. J. Martin affirmed that he had been so instructed at the airport to align himself in what he considered a weird formation. (ibid, p. 1404) 

Now, Sorrels  assisted Lawson as the advance man, and along with him approved the motorcade route.  Well, as everyone knows, there is a big debate as to how Oswald got from the TSBD to his rooming house that day.  One of the most questionable aspects is whether he was on a bus.  Sylvia Meagher raised the most serious questions about this bus ride. Mary Bledsoe was the prime witness for that ride and recall she said Oswald looked like a maniac and his face was distorted.  

Bledsoe appeared with an attorney before the WC. Her name was Melody Douhit.  She had prepared a series of notes for Bledsoe to keep on the straight and narrow.. Those notes were prepared at the request of Sorrels. (https://kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-articles/deeper-into-dave-perry)

I won't go into the whole Roberts/Rybka call off, or Rowley and the Perry cover up etc.  The WC did an absolutely horrid job in their inquiry into the Secret Service.  And to allow them to serve as the second most used investigative arm for their investigation was ridiculous. Almost as ridiculous as letting the FBI serve as number one.

 

 

Jim, not to get off on a tangent, but DALLAS researcher Matt Douthit (a friend of mine on Facebook----and we actually communicate quite often haha) was stunned by this bit of news- when I alerted him to this, he posted "Whoa!!!!!Surely there has to be!!! I’ll look into it! Thanks!!" [Matt is coming out with a massive medical evidence/ pro-conspiracy book very soon; he is only 21 or so]:

Testimony Of Mary E. Bledsoe  

The testimony of Mary E. Bledsoe was taken at 9:30 a.m., on April 2, 1964, in the office of the U.S. attorney, 301 Post Office Building, Bryan and Ervay Streets, Dallas, Tex., by Messrs. Joseph A. Ball, David W. Belin, and Albert E. Jenner, Jr., assistant counsel of the President's Commission. Mrs. Mary E. Bledsoe was accompanied by her attorney, Miss Melody June Douthit.

 

Edited June 2, 2018 by Vince Palamara

[David Von Pein]

David Lifton said:

Do you think that Oswald and Kennedy "crossed paths" by accident? .... As the chronology plainly reveals, the motorcade route was deliberately designed to create this "crossed paths" situation. .... Moreover, it was a route that had been selected and agreed upon days before, starting around November 14th. .... What we have here is important evidence of premeditation in terms of the design of this crime, and recognize it for what it is.

No, what we really have here---with respect to the motorcade route---is a natural and logical and ordinary and non-sinister decision being made by the United States Secret Service (in conjunction with the Dallas Police Department) to take President Kennedy's motorcade down Elm Street in Dallas, Texas, in order to get the Chief Executive from Main Street to the Stemmons Freeway and then on to the Trade Mart.

It is the conspiracy theorists of the world who insist upon turning ordinary happenstance into a massive pre-planned conspiracy plot.

And to think, as many conspiracy theorists do, that the very ordinary and non-conspiratorial way in which Lee Harvey Oswald became an employee of the Texas School Book Depository in mid-October of 1963 (a full MONTH before the Dallas motorcade was even finalized) can somehow be turned into an act of "conspiratorial planning" is not reasonable thinking at all, in my opinion.

Plus, there's this very important "motorcade-related" article [below] that appeared in the Dallas Morning News exactly one week before the assassination, which paints a dim picture for there being any motorcade drive through downtown Dallas AT ALL on 11/22/63. Do some conspiracists (like David Lifton) think this 11/15/63 article is nothing but a lie or a ruse, just to throw people off? Or do some CTers really believe that a plot to murder the President on Elm Street in Dallas wasn't even conceived until AFTER this newspaper article was published on November 15th?....

"Dallas sponsors of a luncheon said they expect President Kennedy to travel between the site and Dallas Love Field by the most direct traffic artery. They see little chance that the President will change his plans to include a motorcade through Downtown Dallas." -- Dallas Morning News; November 15, 1963

 

Edited June 2, 2018 by David Von Pein

[Vince Palamara]

On ‎5‎/‎27‎/‎2018 at 4:27 PM, Joseph McBride said:

The Industrial Boulevard route supposedly was considered too grungy for a presidential

motorcade, but they would have seen more voters than by whizzing along the freeway

to the Trade Mart. Still, by the time they reached Dealey Plaza, they had

been seen by many thousands of people downtown and on the way from the airport. There was also a time consideration. As it was, the motorcade

was running five minutes late as it entered Dealey Plaza. But the excuses don't

explain the decision to violate Secret Service protocol, which required the limousine

to not to go below 25mph. It was going about 11mph after the dogleg turn onto Elm Street..

Hi, Joseph! Big fan of your book! As I stated elsewhere, JFK motorcaded thru the slums of Caracas and thru Harlem...so Industrial Blvd was a piece of cake in comparison.

[David Von Pein]

1 hour ago, Rich Pope said:

Sorry, you're completely wrong.  We have the newspaper clippings showing the parade route kept changing many different times...

Here ya go, David L. .... you can borrow this icon from me. It comes in handy every time somebody repeats these idiotic words --- "the parade route kept changing"....

 

 

Edited June 2, 2018 by David Von Pein

[David Lifton]

2 hours ago, Rich Pope said:

Sorry, you're completely wrong.  We have the newspaper clippings showing the parade route kept changing many different times in the Dallas Times Herald and the Dallas Morning News.

I'm not going to waste time re-typing what has already been published but Howard Roffman's excellent book Presumed Guilty spends plenty of time on the topic proving not only was the route often changing, but Oswald himself if he were acting as a lone-assassin, could not himself have even known the route.

Sorry, Rich Pope, but its you who is wrong.

You write: “We have the newspaper clippings showing the parade route kept changing many different times in the Dallas Times Herald and the Dallas Morning News.”

Really. . . you do?  (Or rather. . “we do”. . as you wrote). All very well, Rich, then lets see your clippings.  (Really, I do look forward to see a story perhaps bearing a headline: “The Parade Route Has Changed. . . once again!”)

And by the way, in San Antonio, there was such a kerfuffle. There was such a public relations mess—in that city—and whether the motorcade woud go this way or that way through the area called “Alamo Plaza” (sound familiar?); that the headline in one of the major San Antonio papers actually read:

     “The JFK Parade. .  a route, or a rout?”  (from memory)

But that was San Antonio; now back to Dallas where, as i recall, there was no such level of confusion.

As far as I know, and contrary to your asertion, the Dallas parade route did not “ [keep] changing” ; and your statement that it did (that it “kept changing many different times in the Dallas Times Herald and Dallas Morning News") is flat out incorrect.

SOME DEFINITIONS. . . 

Let’s start with the basics, your ue of the word “many.”  The dictionary defines many as “numerous, a great good deal of, a lot of, countless, innumerable, scores of, crowds of, droves of, an army of, multitude…” etc etc.

Rich, let’s set asid the word “many”.  Can you produce “any”??

Can you produce a single news dispatch from the Dallas Times-Herald or Dallas Morning News that supports your claim?

Back around 1969 —plus or minus—I spent months in front of a  Bell and Howell microfilm reader at the UCLA Research Library and created complete newspaper files from each of the two newspapers in each of the five cities JFK was schedule to visit,  so I know what the underlying record looks like.  Perhaps you can produce one story that says —for example—that the motorcade would (or “might”) proceed down Main Street en route to the Trade Mart.  Something vague or imprecise like that.  But the only authoritative stories were the ones produced starting on Tuesday, November 19, 1963, when—in Washington, D.C.—the White House press office (i.e., Pierre Salinger) released detailed information about the parade routes for all five cities that JFK was to visit on his upcoming two-day five-city Texas trip.  This information was released simultaneously for all five cities, and in each case, the routes were published in the relevant cities to be visited—i.e., San Antonio, Houston, Fort Worth, Dallas and Austin.

If you believe you’ve found evidence that contradicts what I’ve just said, I invite you to produce it right here, on this forum. Conceivably, I missed a particular news clipping, and should that be the case, I’d like to know it.

SOME RULES FOR DEBATING THIS ISSUE. . . . 

You know, Rich, legitimate debate about a historial issue is not some kind of poker game where you can make assertions about what you believe to be some truth, but then say, “This is what I believe, but I’m just not going to waste the time to show you the cards that I’m holding.”

Yet you write as if it was. Rather than provide evidence to support your assertions, you write:  “I'm not going to waste time re-typing what has already been published.”  Well, I have news for you: if you wish to be believed, then you’re going to have to take the time and show us your evidence.

ABOUT “PRESUMED GUILTY” 

One other matter. You cite Howard Roffman’s book 1976 book “Presumed Guilty.”  FYI: Roffman used to correspond with me when he was a high school student, was absolutely transfixed by the assassination, and went on to write “Presumed Guilty.”   All very well, but Roffman’s highly analytic book, as I recall, was largely devoted to establishing (his view that) LHO couldn’t have been at the sixth floor window and then downstairs at the coke machine, some 90 seconds (or less) later.  Now that’s a debatable proposition, but here’s my point; if you are so enamoured of his book, please do retrieve it from your book shelf, and either type into a post those passages in which you believe he argues that the parade route changed “many” times (and, presumably, presents evidence for that assertion);  or just use your iphone and take a picture of the page.  Frankly, I don’t recall Roffman arguing that point, but perhaps I’m incorrect.  So again, show us your evidence.

THE REAL FOCUS OF ROFFMAN’S BOOK

For those reading this post and interested in the subject: what Roffman does do is present evidence from the Warren Commission’s internal “office files” (which I examined in great detail at NARA around 1970), that within a month or two of the creation of the WC, the staff was working off a series of official “outlines” (just like a student who writes a term paper starts by creating an outline).  Roffman shows that their starting point, as established by these outlines, reeked with the presumption that the assassin was LHO, firing from the 6th floor SE corner window. 

From whence comes the title of his book. . .

The listing at Amazon for this book, has some half-dozen very interesting reviews. Most of them positive. 

Back in 1970, when I was in Washington studying these WC “office files,” It was sobering to see outlines written by David Belin dated January 1964, which outlined the work to be done, and which assumed that Oswald was “the assassin.”

So the title of the book was certainly justified, but that doesn’t mean that the parade route was changed multiple times prior to the official announcement(s) that were released in all five cities of the Texas tour on November 19, 1963, and I doubt very much that there are newspaper clippings that would prove that to be so.

DSL

6/2/2018 - 5 PM PDT

South Orange County, California

Edited June 3, 2018 by David Lifton

[David Von Pein]

8 minutes ago, David Lifton said:

Roffman’s highly analytic book, as I recall, was largely devoted to establishing (his view that) LHO couldn’t have been at the sixth floor window and then downstairs at the coke machine, some 90 seconds (or less) later.  Now that’s a debatable proposition...

Well, not really....

http://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/reconstructing-steps-of-assassin.html

[Ron Bulman]

Maybe all of us are missing the mark here, me included.  Some may have been led to believe the route went straight down Main to jump the curb to Elm or on to Industrial, but it was changed, for them on the 21st or 22nd.  I still can't say that some were not convinced of this at the time after reading this thread.

The mark we may miss is possibly why was the TSBD chosen as a site for the patsy, and in turn Dealy Plaza for the assassination itself.  If the assassination was a intelligence and/or military operation it was pre planned.  Possibly (likely?) months in advance at upper levels.  

The TSBD was empty in early 1963.  Owned by Harold Dry Hole Byrd, cousin of Richard E Byrd, South Pole explorer, descendent  of British Royalty.  Texas oil man, Dallas and Houston petroleum club member as well s suite 8F and founder of the civil air patrol whose members included Oswald and David Ferrie.  Major owner of Ling Temco Vought aircraft company who profited greatly from the assassination through it.

In came text book companies.  Some reputedly used as CIA fronts, in the course of influencing History learned by the public in schools, among other uses.

Byrd went to Africa on his first ever hunting trip there in late November 1963.  I've read, though I don't remember by who or how reliable it is, that when asked why he went on the African hunting trip he said he didn't want to be in Dallas when Kennedy was killed.  He reportedly had the window frame of the "snipers nest" removed from the TSBD after he got back and moved to his home as a trophy.

Was the TSBD chosen because it was made "available" because it was on the most likely route from Main to Stemmons Freeway if a parade down Main street to the Trade Mart if JFK could be convinced to do both the parade and speech?

 

[Vince Palamara]

On ‎5‎/‎26‎/‎2018 at 3:31 PM, James DiEugenio said:

Paz:

In my opinion, the best answer to this is in Vince Palamara's book. From my cheesy web site, this is part of my review of Survivor's Guilt which addresses the issue. 

 

 

Chapter 4 is devoted to the setting of the motorcade route. This is a key point. Because as anyone who has been to the Dealey Plaza, triple underpass site will know, the two turns made by the motorcade into the plaza, onto Houston and then Elm, created an almost ideal situation for what military assassins call an L shaped ambush. That is a slow moving target, vulnerable to snipers from concealed places at three points surrounding the target. In addition, the location allowed for easy exits since there were parking lots adjoining at least two sniper locations: the Depository and the grassy knoll. Palamara does some good and interesting work in regard to the mystery of how this bizarre, indefensible route was chosen. He states that considering the fact that agent Gerald Behn, White House assistant Ken O'Donnell and Kennedy advance man Jerry Bruno were all opposed to the Trade Mart as the dinner destination, its seems odd that it was ultimately chosen. (pgs. 98-101) As late as November 14th, there was no dogleg on the motorcade route. The route came straight down Main Street. (ibid, p. 102)

The author makes the case that the two men who added the dogleg onto Houston and Elm Streets were Secret Service agents Forrest Sorrels and Winston Lawson. There were other routes possible, and the motorcade route was not automatically determined by the selection of the Trade Mart. (ibid, p. 103) Palamara later adds that the final route was not actually decided upon until November 20th. He feels that this change, which included the dogleg, was kept secret after being authorized in Washington by agent Floyd Boring. In a suppressed Commission document the author found, the assistant police chief, Charles Batchelor, revealed that the secrecy about this change in the route made it hard for the local authorities to furnish any help to the Secret Service. (p. 105) Another witness, Sgt. Sam Bellah told the author that the police did not know about the route change until the evening of November 21st. Bellah said the original plan did not have the motorcade pass in front of the Texas School Book Depository. Bellah said that his commander, Captain Lawrence, came to his home late on the evening of the 21st. He took him to the triple underpass to show Bellah the new route for the motorcycle advance escort, of which Bellah was a part. (ibid) Bellah said that there was never any explanation as to why the route was changed at the last moment.

Another local policeman, Captain Orville Jones told author Larry Sneed the same thing. That the motorcade route was changed just prior to the 22nd. Jones told the author that many people he knew in the Secret Service did not approve of going through Dealey Plaza at all. There were other routes discussed which avoided the triple underpass. (ibid)

Another witness to this strange alteration was motorcycle officer Bobby Joe Dale. Dale said that there was more than one route discussed and reviewed by the police. In fact, three had been bandied about. Dale said it was not until Kennedy's arrival at Love Field that morning that he was alerted to what the actual route was going to be. (ibid, p. 106)

Winston Lawson told the Warren Commission that the dogleg was necessary, "Because it is my understanding there isn't any entrance to the freeway on Main Street." (ibid, p. 108) But as the HSCA correctly noted, " ... the Trade Mart was accessible from beyond the triple underpass in such a way that it was not necessary to enter the Elm Street ramp to the expressway. The motorcade could have proceeded westward through Dealey Plaza on Main Street, passed under the underpass and then proceeded on Industrial Boulevard to the Trade Mart." (ibid) In fact, this is the route that Jones thought Kennedy would take that day. As the HSCA attorney in charge of the motorcade route inquiry wrote, "Any map of Dallas in 1963 shows that it was easy to reach the Trade Mart on streets that join Main on the West side of the overpass."

Compounding this shockingly poor choice of a route was the fact that Secret Service protocol was then broken while it was being navigated. Two years before Kennedy's murder, Mike Torina, Chief Inspector, stated that whenever a motorcade must slow down for a turn, the entire intersection must be checked in advance.(p. 109) That did not occur here.

James Rowley wrote to the Commission that he had no knowledge of who actually released the motorcade route to the press. This seems another deception by Rowley. Palamara says it was Betty Forsling Harris a Dallas socialite on the local committee, who did so. She was working closely with representatives of John Connally, the Secret Service, and LBJ aide Bill Moyers. Palamara concludes that this false information was given out for purposes of plausible deniability. That is, the Secret Service could later say that the route was purposely advertised in more than one configuration to show that there was more than one option in hand. When, in reality, the Secret Service knew between November 18th and 20th what the actual route was, including the dogleg.

This is a quite disturbing issue. In and of itself it seems simply bizarre that Lawson and Sorrels would choose this incredibly dangerous route. But then to not protect the president as he was going through this dangerous path is even more bizarre.

Once this route was chosen, then the only way it could be made secure was by the Secret Service being supplemented by local law enforcement agents i.e. the police, the sheriff's office, military intelligence. Again, none of this happened. According to the author, Sheriff Decker told his men not to participate in any security operations. Palamara then writes that the local Dallas police force was called off the night before by the Secret Service. (p. 118) Captain Will Fritz was supposed to commander a detail riding behind the Vice-President with rapid-fire machine guns. According to two sources, this was changed the night before. Instead, this detail was sent to the Trade Mart to protect the speaker's stand.

Palamara now brings in witnesses like former Eisenhower press secretary Jim Haggerty, and former agent Darwin Horn who state that supplementing the Secret Service with local police was a common practice. He then quotes Winston Lawson as denying this before the Warren Commission under oath. His specific words were, "This was not usual procedure." (ibid)

Palamara now makes a penultimate point about the arrangement of the motorcade. Military aide Godfrey McHugh almost always rode in the president's car on these occasions. Yet, in Dallas, another anomaly took place. In Dallas, he was asked by the Secret Service "for the first time" to "ride in the back, instead, as normally I would do, between the driver and the Secret Service agent in charge of the trip." (p. 119) The reason given was this would allow the president fuller exposure to the crowd. As Air Force aide, one of McHugh's duties was to supervise Air Force One.

Finally, the author notes that Batchelor told the Commission that he did not think any local authorities were in place below Houston Street. He then quotes William Manchester as writing, "Possibly [Police Chief] Curry's department met its responsibilities by deciding to end supervision of Friday's crowd at Houston and Main, a block short of the ambush ... " Manchester then added, perhaps for ironic effect, "The weakest link in downtown Dallas was Dealey Plaza." (p. 120)

As Palamara points out with detailed accuracy, everything about this route, from its unnecessary choice, to the lack of supporting personnel, to the violation of protocol, to the secrecy about which route was actually to be used, to the almost incredible lack of protection at its most exposed point, cried out for a thorough investigation. To put it mildly, that did not happen.

 

 

 

Hi, Jim! Please see my latest post

Secret Service Agent Floyd Boring…is very interesting, indeed. 

[Vince Palamara]

On ‎5‎/‎27‎/‎2018 at 2:10 AM, Joseph McBride said:

I write about this crucial decision at length in INTO THE NIGHTMARE. The decision to choose the Trade Mart as the luncheon location was made in Eugene Locke's law office in Dallas on Nov. 14. Kenneth O'Donnell made the final decision, with the complicity of the Secret Service (Lawson and Sorrels) and Governor Connally and perhaps also Locke. Jack Puterbaugh was representing O'Donnell at that meeting in Dallas. Yes, they could have gone through Dealey Plaza to the Trade Mart while bypassing Elm Street and putting a wooden ramp from Main leading to the freeway entrance ramp, but the choice of the Trade Mart made the dogleg onto Elm Street appear all but inevitable. Eugene Locke isn't talked about much, but he was one of those "Mr. Everywhere" guys -- a crony of LBJ, an old friend of Henry Wade, and the chairman of the State Democratic Executive Committee in Texas. LBJ rewarded him with the Medal of Freedom, the ambassadorship to Pakistan, and the post of deputy ambassador to South Vietnam (at various times, Mary Ferrell worked in his law firm, as did, after Locke's death, George W. Bush's personal lawyer and failed Supreme Court nominee, Harriet Miers); Locke even served as Marie Tippit's attorney after the killing of her husband. 

One of the surprises of my research was finding that O'Donnell evidently was the inside man on the plot at the White House. He and the Secret Service also stole Kennedy's coffin from the hallway at Parkland Hospital at gunpoint to avoid having an autopsy done by Dr. Earl Rose in Dallas, as was legally required (I think the coffin may have been empty at that point, and from the plotters' point of view,  it would have been worth a gunfight to conceal that, which would have exposed the plot). O'Donnell lied to the Warren Commission about the direction of the shots; he later told Tip O'Neill that he heard two shots from behind the fence but "testified the way [the FBi] wanted me to. I just didn't want to stir up any more pain and trouble for the family . . . everybody wanted this thing behind them." What was O'Donnell's motive for his various acts of disloyalty? According to Seymour Hersh's DARK SIDE OF CAMELOT, O'Donnell had been disparaging the president and was going to be fired on Monday, Nov. 25, by JFK at the White House for corruption (skimming of campaign contributions by O'Donnelll and two others). This part of Hersh's book (which in some sections admittedly has serious problems) seems to be based on strong evidence from Kennedy presidential campaign and  Democratic National Committee operative Paul Corbin and journalist Charles Bartlett, a close friend of JFK's, who called O'Donnell "the bagman" for the corruption and said Corbin had signed statements he took to RFK and JFK. O'Donnell began a long slide into alcoholism after the assassination, and that led to his premature death in 1977. His daughter's book reports that he was always "haunted" by Dallas and blamed himself for choosing the motorcade route through Dealey Plaza: "His decision would haunt Kenny for the remainder of his life." O'Donnell would tell his wife, "I let him down. I failed. I let him down." As Mort Sahl put it, President Kennedy "had a strange group of friends. Remarkably absent when he fell."

Hi, Joseph! There is a very interesting tidbit about O'Donnell in my latest post

Secret Service Agent Floyd Boring…is very interesting, indeed. 

[Vince Palamara]

5 hours ago, David Lifton said:

Sorry, Rich Pope, but its you who is wrong.

You write: “We have the newspaper clippings showing the parade route kept changing many different times in the Dallas Times Herald and the Dallas Morning News.”

Really. . . you do?  (Or rather. . “we do”. . as you wrote). All very well, Rich, then lets see your clippings.  (Really, I do look forward to see a story perhaps bearing a headline: “The Parade Route Has Changed. . . once again!”)

And by the way, in San Antonio, there was such a kerfuffle. There was such a public relations mess—in that city—and whether the motorcade woud go this way or that way through the area called “Alamo Plaza” (sound familiar?); that the headline in one of the major San Antonio papers actually read:

     “The JFK Parade. .  a route, or a rout?”  (from memory)

But that was San Antonio; now back to Dallas where, as i recall, there was no such level of confusion.

As far as I know, and contrary to your asertion, the Dallas parade route did not “ [keep] changing” ; and your statement that it did (that it “kept changing many different times in the Dallas Times Herald and Dallas Morning News") is flat out incorrect.

SOME DEFINITIONS. . . 

Let’s start with the basics, your ue of the word “many.”  The dictionary defines many as “numerous, a great good deal of, a lot of, countless, innumerable, scores of, crowds of, droves of, an army of, multitude…” etc etc.

Rich, let’s set asid the word “many”.  Can you produce “any”??

Can you produce a single news dispatch from the Dallas Times-Herald or Dallas Morning News that supports your claim?

Back around 1969 —plus or minus—I spent months in front of a  Bell and Howell microfilm reader at the UCLA Research Library and created complete newspaper files from each of the two newspapers in each of the five cities JFK was schedule to visit,  so I know what the underlying record looks like.  Perhaps you can produce one story that says —for example—that the motorcade would (or “might”) proceed down Main Street en route to the Trade Mart.  Something vague or imprecise like that.  But the only authoritative stories were the ones produced starting on Tuesday, November 19, 1963, when—in Washington, D.C.—the White House press office (i.e., Pierre Salinger) released detailed information about the parade routes for all five cities that JFK was to visit on his upcoming two-day five-city Texas trip.  This information was released simultaneously for all five cities, and in each case, the routes were published in the relevant cities to be visited—i.e., San Antonio, Houston, Fort Worth, Dallas and Austin.

If you believe you’ve found evidence that contradicts what I’ve just said, I invite you to produce it right here, on this forum. Conceivably, I missed a particular news clipping, and should that be the case, I’d like to know it.

SOME RULES FOR DEBATING THIS ISSUE. . . . 

You know, Rich, legitimate debate about a historial issue is not some kind of poker game where you can make assertions about what you believe to be some truth, but then say, “This is what I believe, but I’m just not going to waste the time to show you the cards that I’m holding.”

Yet you write as if it was. Rather than provide evidence to support your assertions, you write:  “I'm not going to waste time re-typing what has already been published.”  Well, I have news for you: if you wish to be believed, then you’re going to have to take the time and show us your evidence.

ABOUT “PRESUMED GUILTY” 

One other matter. You cite Howard Roffman’s book 1976 book “Presumed Guilty.”  FYI: Roffman used to correspond with me when he was a high school student, was absolutely transfixed by the assassination, and went on to write “Presumed Guilty.”   All very well, but Roffman’s highly analytic book, as I recall, was largely devoted to establishing (his view that) LHO couldn’t have been at the sixth floor window and then downstairs at the coke machine, some 90 seconds (or less) later.  Now that’s a debatable proposition, but here’s my point; if you are so enamoured of his book, please do retrieve it from your book shelf, and either type into a post those passages in which you believe he argues that the parade route changed “many” times (and, presumably, presents evidence for that assertion);  or just use your iphone and take a picture of the page.  Frankly, I don’t recall Roffman arguing that point, but perhaps I’m incorrect.  So again, show us your evidence.

THE REAL FOCUS OF ROFFMAN’S BOOK

For those reading this post and interested in the subject: what Roffman does do is present evidence from the Warren Commission’s internal “office files” (which I examined in great detail at NARA around 1970), that within a month or two of the creation of the WC, the staff was working off a series of official “outlines” (just like a student who writes a term paper starts by creating an outline).  Roffman shows that their starting point, as established by these outlines, reeked with the presumption that the assassin was LHO, firing from the 6th floor SE corner window. 

From whence comes the title of his book. . .

The listing at Amazon for this book, has some half-dozen very interesting reviews. Most of them positive. 

Back in 1970, when I was in Washington studying these WC “office files,” It was sobering to see outlines written by David Belin dated January 1964, which outlined the work to be done, and which assumed that Oswald was “the assassin.”

So the title of the book was certainly justified, but that doesn’t mean that the parade route was changed multiple times prior to the official announcement(s) that were released in all five cities of the Texas tour on November 19, 1963, and I doubt very much that there are newspaper clippings that would prove that to be so.

DSL

6/2/2018 - 5 PM PDT

South Orange County, California

Hi, David!

Please see my latest post

Secret Service Agent Floyd Boring…is very interesting, indeed.