David Lifton- the start of this video will shock you

[Greg Doudna]

6 hours ago, S.T. Patrick said:

This sums up quite a number of personal conversations I've had about the case for the past two years. I know of at least two decent researchers who have all but quit doing anything with the case - a case they care about deeply and personally - because they have no interest in being the public target of the CIA Primacy crowd that rests atop of the hierarchy in the Kennedy assassination research community. It's an odd thing to observe when a community founded on the idea that "the establishment media needs to look into this with a much more open mind" is a community that has planted their flags into their own theories and refuses and refutes anything that doesn't support that flag. Anyone who disagrees is "a disinformationist," "untrusted," and the tiresome "discredited," while those who do agree with them are characterized as "careful researchers" who have done "valuable," "important," and "noteworthy" work. I continue to tell young (under 50 in this case... lol) researchers that anytime you read that someone has been "discredited," you've probably found a writer with a fragile ego who has to circle the wagons and destroy the outsiders to validate their own needed sense of importance. And yes, they'll use "limited hangout," as Pat pointed out," just as they'll use "discredited." Both phrases cause the same near-ripping of the optic nerve from the eye roll they deserve and usually describe the fragility of the descriptor better than its target. Well said, Pat. 

S.T., I completely agree. Well said to you as well as Pat. 

[Greg Doudna]

On 5/12/2022 at 5:42 PM, Vince Palamara said:

It seems like your goal is to nitpick and debunk everything. I thought you were in cahoots with Parnell LOL

Maybe you can work a little harder on your reading comprehension issues going forward LOL.

[Vince Palamara]

18 minutes ago, Greg Doudna said:

Maybe you can work a little harder on your reading comprehension issues going forward LOL.

LOL...not.

[Joseph McBride]

A distinguished scholar such as Vince Palamara, who has

written a number of important books on the case, does not

need advice on his reading comprehension, "joking"

or otherwise.

Edited May 14, 2022 by Joseph McBride

[S.T. Patrick]

Agree that Vince is a good guy, a good writer, and I believe his motivations are good ones. 

Just to be clear, I'm 100% in the conspiracy camp on the case. It's just that I don't have a flag to plant. If someone updated Michael Benson's "Who's Who in the JFK Assassination," I'm not sure you could fit all the names and events discussed in one 1,000-page volume. The more docs, the more complex the case becomes with all the tentacles. And sure, insert argument about how "they" want to keep it complex because that keeps everyone away from answers... insert that here.

But, the point is, I'm interested in people, the way they think, what they've found, and what they have in mind. At conference, when someone comes up to me and says, "Hey, Ive been thinking about something...", my tendency is not to do what has actually happened to me with someone in this group: to look around the room for someone more "important" to talk to. I may not always agree, I may agree very little, or I may disagree completely. But one thing I'm against is berating them as discredited disinformationists while lauding everyone who agrees with me as a valuable, trusted researcher.

Some of these same people claim some form of empathy with leftist/socialist/liberal ideology, yet when information and theory are the commodities, they are monopolistic capitalists. They want to control the value of the information, they want to control the suppliers, and they want to control what items are allowed to hit the shelves of the stores, so to speak. You could even say they are monarchical. Why should they control it? Because they've been in the family the longest. They knew the founding kings and queens. They'll never see the result of it all, and that's okay with them. The result is that the JFK assassination field dies with them.

It's the church whose attendance has dwindled from 300 to 25 because the elders refuse youthful change because it's not the way that it used to work and it's not how they've always done it. It's the formerly great basketball team you suddenly realize looks old. Yet, they do it their way and that's what they prefer, and that's the way it will be throughout the remainder of their lives. My problem with it is that it's also a guarantee the field is over when they're over. And, as much as the Lincoln assassination is one of my favorite topics, JFK will be Lincoln or Pearl Harbor one day. And that'll be a sad thing to see because it's one of the five most vital stories of our nation's history and it deserves our better angels.  

[John Butler]

2 hours ago, S.T. Patrick said:

JFK will be Lincoln or Pearl Harbor one day. And that'll be a sad thing to see because it's one of the five most vital stories of our nation's history and it deserves our better angels.  

Is it a sad truth that the historians will have their way and 50 years down the road Oswald will still be the lone killer of President Kennedy?  Look at the history books in the public schools today.  I haven't for 25 years, so I am going to assume they are still saying that Oswald murdered Kennedy and he was the lone shooter.  I think that tradition is still there.

Does that mean that all of the work done by many good and great researchers saying there was a conspiracy will account for nothing and go down a future drain?  

[Vince Palamara]

8 hours ago, Joseph McBride said:

A distinguished scholar such as Vince Palamara, who has

written a number of important books on the case, does not

need advice on his reading comprehension, "joking"

or otherwise.

Thanks!

[Pat Speer]

31 minutes ago, John Butler said:

Is it a sad truth that the historians will have their way and 50 years down the road Oswald will still be the lone killer of President Kennedy?  Look at the history books in the public schools today.  I haven't for 25 years, so I am going to assume they are still saying that Oswald murdered Kennedy and he was the lone shooter.  I think that tradition is still there.

Does that mean that all of the work done by many good and great researchers saying there was a conspiracy will account for nothing and go down a future drain?  

A lot of my early research was fueled by my love of used book stores and libraries. I read everything I could on the assassination: CT, LN, mainstream, adult, young adult, fiction. And I found that a large number of books took a middle approach and noted that while the Warren Commission determined Oswald acted alone, questions still remained. 

This was clearly unsatisfactory to many newspaper and book publishers, moreover, as they took control of the 50th anniversary by actively pushing for the case to be closed in the public mind, as Bugliosi et al had answered all the questions, or at least all the important questions. 

It bears repeating, moreover, that while the main stream news media has a heavy bias against conspiracy, the entertainment industry--where most people get their info and ideas--has a heavy bias towards conspiracy. I mean, if you see a reference to the assassination in a non-news show or a movie, 2 times out of 3 it will be someone on the show saying Oswald didn't act alone, or that they had a relative who knew what really happened and it wasn't Oswald, etc. It's everywhere. 

And this is what fuels the news media attempts to reverse course, IMO. It's not some big government conspiracy--Operation Mockingbird. It's Operation "I'm right and I wish they'd just shut up and stop telling people it was a conspiracy because it's bad for the country." The problem, of course, is that the truth is like an onion. When you look at the surface layer, it looks like a conspiracy. When you peel a little, and read the Warren Report, or Bugliosi, etc, it appears the problems have been explained. And that's where most mainstream news people--busy people all--stop. They got their "truth" and they're happy with it. 

The problem, of course, is that, if you peek below that layer, you realize that the WR and Bugliosi's bible are filled with deceptions and sometimes even l-i-e-s. 

Now, I've had conversations with a number of prominent LNs, and they all come from the same place, intellectually. They all say that by going to the next layer, you are digging through the weeds. You are nit-picking minutiae. Yes, I have been told by men like Willens, Bugliosi, and Michael Shermer that one can not discover truth by doing the deep dive, i.e. that the truth is easily recognized once one accepts the basic facts, and the interpretations of these facts by prominent men like Earl Warren, Arlen Specter, and Michael Baden. 

In short, they are all intellectually lazy. In his book Bugliosi admits he called up Baden again and again to explain the medical evidence. He never once picked up a text book to see if Baden made any sense. It was the same with Willens. He cut off all discussion once I showed him Specter had lied. He thought it was unfair to think his friend had lied simply because his friend had repeatedly told untruths about something he quite obviously knew the truth about. (In this case, the location of the back wound.) 

In any event, I think it's a good sign when someone like Litwin challenges what's in Stone and DiEgenio's film. One of the first books I read on the case was Case Closed. It momentarily swayed me, but only for a few days. The reason: I followed up Case Closed by reading responses to Case Closed on the internet, and by going to Rex Bradford's History Matters site and reading the report of the HSCA medical panel. This brought me to another layer of the onion, so to speak. I then followed up that by reading all the forensics journals and textbooks I could and documenting that the HSCA's medical experts were largely talking our of their rumps. 

 

 

[Kirk Gallaway]

20 hours ago, S.T. Patrick said:

This sums up quite a number of personal conversations I've had about the case for the past two years. I know of at least two decent researchers who have all but quit doing anything with the case - a case they care about deeply and personally - because they have no interest in being the public target of the CIA Primacy crowd that rests atop of the hierarchy in the Kennedy assassination research community. It's an odd thing to observe when a community founded on the idea that "the establishment media needs to look into this with a much more open mind" is a community that has planted their flags into their own theories and refuses and refutes anything that doesn't support that flag. Anyone who disagrees is "a disinformationist," "untrusted," and the tiresome "discredited," while those who do agree with them are characterized as "careful researchers" who have done "valuable," "important," and "noteworthy" work. I continue to tell young (under 50 in this case... lol) researchers that anytime you read that someone has been "discredited," you've probably found a writer with a fragile ego who has to circle the wagons and destroy the outsiders to validate their own needed sense of importance. And yes, they'll use "limited hangout," as Pat pointed out," just as they'll use "discredited." Both phrases cause the same near-ripping of the optic nerve from the eye roll they deserve and usually describe the fragility of the descriptor better than its target. Well said, Pat. 

I agree completely S.T. Even though the NSS and the CIA is to me the most likely in a plurality of possible choices. It's also become self serving to some authors who promulgate it to insist that an ongoing conspiracy  with full knowledge of the assassination has been oppressing us to  to this day. That there are people who know who killed JFK and are either 1)secret elites who have passed it on generation to generation. or 2)Deep State Government bureaucrats who have passed the secrets on to incoming bureaucrats or 3)Corporate interests who had a hand in the JFKA who have passed it down to their corporate heads. The story line is that they live in fear that the 60 year old plot be exposed as if the entire infrastructure of government will then radically change and there will no longer be an Intelligence or Security apparatus. When I've asked specifically  about how this is being done on any of the levels, by the elites, the Deep State government or on the Corporate level, no one can ever come up with any support for their ideas..  And yet to hold on to such beliefs with no factual support is often a comfort to those hold to that.

This is only to add another layer to why there is this "circle the wagons"  mentality you mention. There is a protection of an ongoing narrative  in this period that gives real influence and sells books.

It's become so stultified. For example ,with Greg's recent posts concerning the Paines, While I do realize it is an integral, though not critical element to one JFKA narrative. Whether you agree with Greg or not. The resistance to any new ideas or revision is a bit over the top!

I've used the analogy, though I admit not a very good one,  that the JFKAC community is forever piling up grains of sand on a sedimentary bedrock. In some  cases I ask,. Is the dogma so worth hanging on to? If you blow off the dogma would you believe there was a conspiracy to kill JFK 1-2-3% less? 

****

Joe, both Vince and Greg are gracious about it. It's understandable no one has time to read everything. And Vince misportrayed Greg as an "Oswald did it alone" theorist. Which he clearly isn't.

[Vince Palamara]

3 hours ago, Kirk Gallaway said:

I agree completely S.T. Even though the NSS and the CIA is to me the most likely in a plurality of possible choices. It's also become self serving to some authors who promulgate it to insist that an ongoing conspiracy  with full knowledge of the assassination has been oppressing us to  to this day. That there are people who know who killed JFK and are either 1)secret elites who have passed it on generation to generation. or 2)Deep State Government bureaucrats who have passed the secrets on to incoming bureaucrats or 3)Corporate interests who had a hand in the JFKA who have passed it down to their corporate heads. The story line is that they live in fear that the 60 year old plot be exposed as if the entire infrastructure of government will then radically change and there will no longer be an Intelligence or Security apparatus. When I've asked specifically  about how this is being done on any of the levels, by the elites, the Deep State government or on the Corporate level, no one can ever come up with any support for their ideas..  And yet to hold on to such beliefs with no factual support is often a comfort to those hold to that.

This is only to add another layer to why there is this "circle the wagons"  mentality you mention. There is a protection of an ongoing narrative  in this period that gives real influence and sells books.

It's become so stultified. For example ,with Greg's recent posts concerning the Paines, While I do realize it is an integral, though not critical element to one JFKA narrative. Whether you agree with Greg or not. The resistance to any new ideas or revision is a bit over the top!

I've used the analogy, though I admit not a very good one,  that the JFKAC community is forever piling up grains of sand on a sedimentary bedrock. In some  cases I ask,. Is the dogma so worth hanging on to? If you blow off the dogma would you believe there was a conspiracy to kill JFK 1-2-3% less? 

****

Joe, both Vince and Greg are gracious about it. It's understandable no one has time to read everything. And Vince misportrayed Greg as an "Oswald did it alone" theorist. Which he clearly isn't.

@Greg Doudna My apologies!  Let's all get along! Thanks, Kirk.

[Greg Doudna]

You got it, gentleman Vince! Thanks! 

[Vince Palamara]

2 hours ago, Greg Doudna said:

You got it, gentleman Vince! Thanks! 

[S.T. Patrick]

On 5/14/2022 at 1:48 PM, Kirk Gallaway said:

I agree completely S.T. Even though the NSS and the CIA is to me the most likely in a plurality of possible choices.

To be clear, it's not that I don't think the CIA-Military establishment had a vital, maybe leading role. They are at the top of my JFK pyramid of fault. Neither of my posts were about the "Who." My contention is that it's been an awful (long) trend by some to try to destroy the reputations of those who think otherwise solely to protect the work, ego, and, for some, careers of those who believe in CIA Primacy. And it's done as I described above (through essays or speeches tagging them with "disinformationist" or the dreaded "discredited" when they aren't discredited - they just don't agree with the writer of the essay). The thing about a group project is that you try to take the best ideas and work of everyone in the group and then the process combines it all. In a group project, you don't try to destroy everyone else in the group just so the teacher or supervisor sees that you're the vital entity, the all-star. I've said it until it's tired, the "bad guys" here are the textbook conglomerates and the mainstream media, not the people with whom you disagree inside the tent.  

[By the way, my comments on this thread were not aimed at the EduForum. They were commentaries on the community at-large.]

Edited May 17, 2022 by S.T. Patrick