To Tom Gram, the "unbiased" researcher who disputes Dale Myers

[Bob Ness]

2 hours ago, Lawrence Schnapf said:

NBC and several foreign countries

Doesn't NBC have the Darnell film also? Or is that out in it's entirety?

[Pat Speer]

On 12/4/2022 at 7:22 AM, Steve Roe said:

1. Documents that have been released, sitting at NARA? You have to be more specific than that. Give me a link to look at. 

2. Of course, most of the conspiracy crowd here are going to favor DiEugenio, especially the Harvey & Lee contingency. Let me give you some insight why this debate happened. DiEugenio got upset over Noam Chomsky's talk about Kennedy being a "Cold Warrior". DiEugenio spells this out clearly in his opening argument. Buzzanco, a credentialed History Professor in Houston, is in agreement with Chomsky about Kennedy having actually studied all of this for years. Chomsky, a well-known and respected personality on the left, upset DiEugenio because of course, Stone/DiEugenio want lefties to support their narrative. So Buzzanco agreed to debate DiEugenio on Aaron Good's Podcast. Good is in the Skyhorse stable of book authors like DiEugenio. They have a connection. But Good conducted a fair moderation of the debate. 

The debate questions mainly centered around Kennedy's Foreign Policy and Vietnam. Stone/DiEugenio for whatever reason, believe Kennedy was murdered because he was a man of peace, was going to pull out of Vietnam and the "cough" Deep State killed him so they could have their war. Buzzanco is not into the minutiae of the Assassination, he mentions this many times. He was there to debate Kennedy's Foreign Policy and Vietnam and just how preposterous Stone/DiEugenio push this nutty narrative. Believe me there were many other historians before Buzzanco writing about this. 

Bottom line it was not a debate centered around whether Oswald was innocent or guilty. 

The debate format was not favorable to get into more detail on the remarks and rebuttals. 2-3 minutes to state your case, hardly enough time to get everything in, on both sides. But what is extremely clear is DiEugenio pushing a false narrative that Kennedy was pulling out of Vietnam. It's Poppycock and Pop Culture-Quasi History. 

One of the major points in the debate is the undeniable fact that Kennedy was in the Coup Planning of Diem. Yep, you can go to the Kennedy Library online and listen to the tape recorded. If you are pulling out of Vietnam, then why are you overthrowing the leadership and plunge it into chaos with American Military Advisors in country? 100% common sense. DiEugenio will never tell you this. 

Another mind-blowing claim by DiEugenio was Kennedy had no idea that there were assassination plots against Castro. Wow! 

 

A quick comment. It sounds like Buzzanco is of the mindset "No right-winger would kill Kennedy because JFK was a cold warrior and his Vietnam policy was the same as LBJ's." We used to hear this a lot. But it's just not true.

Some of the earliest conspiracy theorists were right-wingers who thought it unlikely a wanna-be commie like Oswald would kill Kennedy, since they considered Kennedy a commie himself. 

IOW, it doesn't matter what some "historian" using 20/20 hindsight says today, the right-wingers of 1963 considered JFK a major obstacle to be overcome. 

[James DiEugenio]

I agree with that, the one exception being Shoup.

Lemnitzer and LeMay just despised JFK.  And we daw in the film how Taylor tried to double cross him on VIetnam. 

[Steve Roe]

On 12/7/2022 at 5:13 PM, Pat Speer said:

A quick comment. It sounds like Buzzanco is of the mindset "No right-winger would kill Kennedy because JFK was a cold warrior and his Vietnam policy was the same as LBJ's." We used to hear this a lot. But it's just not true.

Some of the earliest conspiracy theorists were right-wingers who thought it unlikely a wanna-be commie like Oswald would kill Kennedy, since they considered Kennedy a commie himself. 

IOW, it doesn't matter what some "historian" using 20/20 hindsight says today, the right-wingers of 1963 considered JFK a major obstacle to be overcome. 

Pat before I answer this, do you believe:

1. Kennedy was pulling out of Vietnam at the time of his death?

2. The military industrial complex/CIA/Military were involved in a plot to murder the President because he was pulling out of Vietnam?

These are well known claims by Oliver Stone and DiEugenio. 

[Pat Speer]

8 minutes ago, Steve Roe said:

Pat before I answer this, do you believe:

1. Kennedy was pulling out of Vietnam at the time of his death?

2. The military industrial complex/CIA/Military were involved in a plot to murder the President because he was pulling out of Vietnam?

These are well known claims by Oliver Stone and DiEugenio. 

1. Pulling out? Probably. Pulling back? Definitely. My understanding of politics and Kennedy's politics in particular lead me to believe he would have distanced himself and the country from S. Vietnam while maintaining some financial and material support. It's clear I believe that he would absolutely positively have not sent hundreds of thousands of American boys to fight in SE Asia, and absolutely positively have not bombed civilians in the name of diplomacy. 

2. I'm skeptical the military was the driving force behind the assassination, but remain open-minded, and supportive of John Newman's journey into that mindfield. 

[Steve Roe]

2 hours ago, Pat Speer said:

1. Pulling out? Probably. Pulling back? Definitely. My understanding of politics and Kennedy's politics in particular lead me to believe he would have distanced himself and the country from S. Vietnam while maintaining some financial and material support. It's clear I believe that he would absolutely positively have not sent hundreds of thousands of American boys to fight in SE Asia, and absolutely positively have not bombed civilians in the name of diplomacy. 

2. I'm skeptical the military was the driving force behind the assassination, but remain open-minded, and supportive of John Newman's journey into that mindfield. 

Newman's claims are for another discussion.

Well, it's good you have an open mind about the Vietnam situation in the Kennedy years. There's been this constant mantra among conspiracy believers that Kennedy was this man of peace, going to pull out of Vietnam, etc. It's the old Camelot stuff. 

Running short of time, but if you want to see Dr. Buzzanco's arguments against the nutty Oliver Stone film, here's his three-part series. John F. Kennedy Goes Hollywood: Oliver Stone’s Fantastic History | Afflict The Comfortable (The Mind of Bob Buzzanco)

DiEugenio wrote a dumb K&K article about Buzzanco calling him "Chomsky's Useful Idiot". Bob Buzzanco: Chomsky’s “Useful Idiot” (kennedysandking.com)

Dr. Buzzanco is a credited historian who studied the Vietnam War years before, not a pop culture pseudo one like DiEugenio. 

But guess who is Putin's Regime Useful Idiot now? Just who does James DiEugenio work for? (onthetrailofdelusion.com)

 

[James DiEugenio]

When someone posts Roe, I have to look at this guy's stuff:🤮

 

Kennedy was pulling out of VIetnam at the time of his death, that is a claim made by Stone and DiEugenio.

Notice how he phrases this.  Oliver and myself, in order to isolate us and make us seem eccentric.  

Thus leaving out the following people who also believe this:

 

Gordon Goldstein

James Blight

David Welch

Janet Lang

David Kaiser

JIm Douglass

Howard Jones

John Newman

Jamie Galbraith

Robert McNamara

McGeorge Bundy

Lyndon Johnson

 

In light of the above, to say its just Oliver and me, that is pure propaganda. 

In light of the new evidence its almost impossible to deny that is what JFK was doing at the time of his death.  In the film we have two pieces of evidence that were not around back in 1991:  the Sec Def meeting of May 1963, and the McNamara debriefs, that are more of less the icing on the cake.  Plus in Newman's revised book there is the incident where the dissenters tried to pull the withdrawal plan out of the Taylor/McNamara report and JFK insisted it be placed back in. 

Newman then describes how Kennedy steamrolled the opposition, and then sent McNamara outside to talk to the press.  But as he did, he opened the door and said "And tell them that means the helicopters also."

 

 

Edited December 9, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Tom Gram]

2 hours ago, Steve Roe said:

Newman's claims are for another discussion.

Well, it's good you have an open mind about the Vietnam situation in the Kennedy years. There's been this constant mantra among conspiracy believers that Kennedy was this man of peace, going to pull out of Vietnam, etc. It's the old Camelot stuff. 

Running short of time, but if you want to see Dr. Buzzanco's arguments against the nutty Oliver Stone film, here's his three-part series. John F. Kennedy Goes Hollywood: Oliver Stone’s Fantastic History | Afflict The Comfortable (The Mind of Bob Buzzanco)

DiEugenio wrote a dumb K&K article about Buzzanco calling him "Chomsky's Useful Idiot". Bob Buzzanco: Chomsky’s “Useful Idiot” (kennedysandking.com)

Dr. Buzzanco is a credited historian who studied the Vietnam War years before, not a pop culture pseudo one like DiEugenio. 

But guess who is Putin's Regime Useful Idiot now? Just who does James DiEugenio work for? (onthetrailofdelusion.com)

 

This is kind of the issue I have with a lot of lone-assassin inclined thinking Steve. Many lone assassin theorists seem so determined to “debunk” anything and anyone they don’t agree with that they fail to look at ambiguous evidence objectively and consider the possibility that they might be wrong about something. The sources you are citing on Vietnam like Buzzanco are doing the same sort of thing by spinning evidence that JFK was getting out of Vietnam into a subjective interpretation of JFK’s intentions and claiming that interpretation is indisputable fact.

The real fact is that Jim has a lot of credible evidentiary support on this, and no matter how much you want to deny it there is not enough evidence to state unambiguously that JFK was not pulling out of Vietnam. It’s pretty much indisputable that JFK was not going to send in combat troops and that he wanted to wind down American involvement, so the only real matter of debate here is whether or not there would have been an unconditional withdrawal if JFK had lived. Mike G. did a good job arguing against Jim on this in their recent debate thread, but nothing he presented was even remotely conclusive and Jim had very effective counterarguments throughout. 

I’m hardly an expert on Vietnam, and am always open to looking at different perspectives and reviewing evidence I’m not familiar with. That said, I’ve read several of the common arguments against unconditional withdrawal, and all those arguments do at best is highlight some ambiguity in the question. Like it or not but JFK was possibly, if not probably, planning on getting out of Vietnam, and despite immense efforts to do so not one person has been able to prove otherwise. I think the only viable alternate scenario is JFK continuing to provide limited non-combat support, kind of like Pat said - and that’s bad enough considering what happened. 

[James DiEugenio]

Buzzanco's essay is really out there man.  When someone posted this, I said, Buzzanco is a sore loser.  This was written about 3-4 weeks after our debate.

I have always said that its what a person leaves out that tells you something about their scholarship and objectivity.

In the first part of the essay, he does not mention Galbraith.  Let me explain why.

In the fall of 1961, Galbraith came into DC to arrange talks with Nehru, of India and JFK.  One of the things he wanted to talk about was a plan to neutralize Vietnam.  This shows that Buzzanco is not just censoring Galbraith, but also the idea that, unlike what he writes, JFK was open to this kind of solution to the problem.  In fact he ended up approving it, but it was undermined by Harriman according to Gareth Porter. 

When Galbraith was there he heard about the Rostow/Taylor report and its recommendation of combat troops into Saigon.  He went over to Rostow's office and got a copy of the report.  He brought it back to his hotel room and read it in horror. He calls up Kennedy and asks "You are not really going to do this are you?" JFK said, write me up a. memo to counter it.  So JFK delayed the showdown meeting.  He then brought in Bobby to go over the memo with him.  At the meeting whenever someone would suggest inserting combat troops, RFK would step forward and say, "There will not be combat troops in VIetnam."  So the decision was to aid Saigon with more advisors and equipment, but to draw a line at combat troops.  As Jamie Galbraith says in the film: that line would not be crossed as long as JFK was alive. And as he also says, McNamara did a nice job holding that line until Kennedy's death. And he also did a nice job in enacting the withdrawal program.

Please show me where any of this is in Buzzanco's essay.  

Edited December 9, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

There is a good reason Buzzanco leaves out Galbraith.  Because after the November debates were over, JFK sent Galbraith to Saigon to write a report that would contrast with the Rostow/Taylor report.  And as Jamie told us, Kennedy knew that JKG would deliver. Which he did.

So when Galbraith was in town in April of 1962, Kennedy told him to give his report to McNamara.  Why McNamara?  Because after the November debates, Kennedy was very disturbed that he had to fight so hard to get his views across. He called a meeting on 11/27 and he said, look when policy is decided, people on the spot perform it or they get out.  He then asked: Who is going to implement my Vietnam policy? McNamara said that he would.  That is why Kennedy sent Galbraith to talk to McNamara.  The two did talk and, before he left, Galbraith told JFK that his Sec/Def got the message. This was the beginning of Kennedy's withdrawal plan.  In fact, McNamara's assistant, Roswell Gilpatric, said in an oral history that Kennedy had issued instructions to McNamara to wind down this whole Vietnam effort.

And consequently, one month later, McNamara met with the department leaders in VIetnam for a Sec/Def meeting.  After the meeting he asked Harkins, the Pentagon commander, to stay after, which he did.  McNamara told him that he wanted him to instruct the whole mission to begin to prepare schedules in order for a US withdrawal to take place.  One of Harkins' assistants was there and later said that Harkins' jaw about hit the floor when McNamara said this.  Which defeats another point that Buzzanco states, namely that the military did not really want to fight in VIetnam.  Those withdrawal schedules were submitted at the May 1963 SecDef meeting. McNamara looked at them and said they were too slow.

The records of that meeting were not declassified until 1997.  They were so definitive that even the Ny TImes headlined their story saying that Kennedy had a plan to exit Vietnam in 1963.

Now, again, where is any of this plentiful evidence that Kennedy was getting out mentioned by Buzzanco?  

Edited December 10, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

The worst thing about Buzzanco is his grouping of JFK with the MIC and the Power Elite.

This is just  bad history.  It dismisses the latest scholarship in the field, by people like Robart Rakove and Phil Muehlenbeck, both of whom are in our documentary.  The work these two men have done on Kennedy's policies in places like Africa and the Middle East is really a huge leap forward in the field. In 8 years Ike met with 8 African heads of state.  In three years, JFK met with three times that many. That tells us a lot about both nationalism and racism.

I mean when your models for study are Chomsky and Cockburn? Neither of which are or were historians.

To show you what I mean.  When Chomsky and ZInn were finalizing the editing to the Gravel version of the Pentagon Papers, Peter Scott wished to offer his seminal study of how the PP showed Kennedy was likely withdrawing from Vietnam.  Its nothing like what we have today, but it was important as a step along the road.

Zinn and Chomsky did not want to include it. Because as ZInn said, it will make people think that the president matters.  Can anyone imagine an intelligent historian saying that?  What, FDR did not matter? Lincoln did not matter?

To his credit, Chomsky said they would include it on freedom of speech grounds.  In other words, the content was not consequential to Noam.

Buzzanco allowed Chomsky on his show to say that there was no difference between Reagan and Trump and JFK.  I mean this is bonkers.  I said that Kennedy was on the verge of passing Medicare, he was promoting Universal Health care, he stood up for civil rights--did Reagan and Trump do that in the sixties? Heck no. Trump was getting sued for discrimination and  Reagan  was going after the Black Panthers through Ed Meese..

 

[Denis Morissette]

On 12/3/2022 at 3:23 PM, David G. Healy said:

Get you lies straight...as for .John, hopefully, I will see that asshole, soon...

Why did the admins ignored these comments?

[Denis Morissette]

On 12/7/2022 at 3:08 AM, Bob Ness said:

Doesn't NBC have the Darnell film also? Or is that out in it's entirety?

CBS, not NBC. Three answers have been suggested: CBS H.Q., KLRD and the 6FM. 

The 6FM say they don't have it and don't know who has it.