Those who wish, can believe the conspiracy theories - I am convinced that Oswald, with all kinds of adreneline rushing through his body, pulled off three shots - two connected, one was fatal.
Lando 
Posted on 11/25/2003 1:51:37 PM PST by veronica
I paid no attention to the many television programs broadcast this past week on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of President Kennedy’s assassination. The reason for my lack of interest was that the questions about the assassination that had obsessed me all my life—and not only the factual questions, but the deeper moral and emotional issues left by Kennedy’s killing—were resolved for me by Gerald Posner’s 1993 book Case Closed. Here is a letter I wrote to Posner about his book ten years ago, shortly after the 30th anniversary of the assassination: December 15, 1993
Dear Mr. Posner:
I would like to tell you how deeply grateful I am to you for your magnificent book, Case Closed.
Over the years, I had shared the general sense that we did not have the truth about the Kennedy assassination. While I never gave credence to the various wild conspiracy theories, I did feel that there was probably a second gunman, and perhaps Mafia involvement. But it seemed impossible ever to get closer to the truth. A year or two ago there were new television programs and articles about the assassination with some interesting information, but trying to follow the issues that were raised only led one into a morass of confusion.
One of the problems was that, while the conspiracy proponents seemed a contemptible bunch (especially Oliver Stone, who I think is truly evil), the defenders of the Warren Commission report, such as David Belin, also seemed fishy. They just went after the most obvious weaknesses in the conspiracy theories while blandly and self-righteously insisting on the “total correctness” of the obviously flawed Warren report. (It was that same sort of bland defense of the Warren report, the glossing over of its many troubling flaws and gaps, that had helped set off the conspiracy paranoia, along with the general suspicion of our government, back in the mid 1960s.) The Warren defenders never responded to the hard questions that continued to trouble me and everyone else who thought about the issue; and they never seemed to appreciate the fact—which you certainly bring out in your book—that there were many odd events surrounding the assassination that could reasonably give rise to suspicions of a conspiracy. It was all terribly, deeply frustrating. It seemed that this mystery would last forever, and that there was no point in even trying to figure it out.
Then one day this past September, at the National Airport in Washington, D.C., I picked up the U.S. News and World Report with the long excerpt from Case Closed. Reading the article on the shuttle flight back to New York, I experienced an epiphany. The clarity of your presentation, your story of Oswald, the fascinating new information about the timing of the shots and many other things all added up to an account that for the first time in all these years had the ring of truth. The magazine excerpt, of course, did not answer all my questions (I had to wait to read the book for that), but it did satisfy me that Oswald did it alone. Oswald emerged as a totally believable, real person, not this shadowy figure upon whom the conspiracy theorists could cast any fantasy they wanted.
There is another, perhaps unintended, benefit of Case Closed. Reading it made me realize that for years, all the bedeviling issues surrounding the assassination had blocked the assassination itself—the horror and tragedy and poignancy of it—from full consciousness. The conspiracy theories had become the main historical event, not Kennedy’s terrible death and what it did to the country. But your account, by clearing away those questions, has restored the assassination itself as an event in my experience and I think our collective experience as well. It was as though I began feeling the trauma and the meaning of Kennedy’s death afresh, undiminished after three decades.
Apart from the tragedy of the event itself, it was truly a fateful turning point in our country’s history—but, I believe, in a sense exactly opposite to what Oliver Stone imagines. Rather than marking the rise of Stone’s fictional militaristic right-wing to national power, it marked the rise to influence of a left-wing culture of alienation typified by people like Oliver Stone himself. These members of the adversary culture, unable to absorb Kennedy’s murder as the terrible event it was, chose to see it as a confirmation that America itself was evil, that America would always block the exaggerated hopes for unlimited individual fulfillment and social progress that Kennedy seemed to personify for many people. It was shortly after Kennedy’s death that the deadly notion became current that the “system” was blame for everything, thus turning Americans against their own country. Of course, the rise of black rage, the Vietnam war and so on were also important parts of this historic catastrophe, but the Kennedy assassination was crucial.
The unresolved assassination puzzle also fed the alienating notion that truth is indeterminable, that all we can know are self-serving narratives. This idea opens the gates to all kinds of viciousness. For example, the egregious Stone could present his paranoid fantasy as a revelation of “hidden truth” to a mass audience of millions of unformed, suggestible minds, and at the same time cover himself with the elites by saying that his movie was a mere “counter-myth,” not intended to be a factual presentation. Thus he got to convince millions of people that horrible lies were the truth, while denying that that he was doing anything of the kind. With Case Closed, you have not only uncovered the specific truth of the assassination; you’ve demonstrated that truth itself exists and can be known.
But for me, what is most remarkable about Case Closed is that this old festering sore of uncertainty and discouragement surrounding the assassination, which I never expected to be cured, has been cured. In bringing the truth to light out of all that confusion, you have performed not only a great public service, but a heroic act.
Sincerely yours,
Lawrence Auster
If one looks for who did have motive, Johnson stands out as the one individual who had the most to gain. His own lawyer says he was "guilty beyond a reasonable doubt" of having Kennedy murdered. His long time mistress, and mother of his son, is sure he had at least foreknowledge of it. A Texas grand jury would have brought formal indictment against him in another political assassination if he hadn't died already. Further, he had the opportunity to help set the time and route of the motorcade, control the initial investigation, preempt authorities from performing their normal functions, and appoint the Warren Commission as a body directly under him. Of course that commission was unable to discover that the unidentified fingerprint found in the "sniper's nest" belonged (34 points of match) to Johnson's buddy, convicted murderer Mac Wallace.
I'll ignore your attempt to lower the conversation to insult trading. But since you seem to be claiming (say so if you have merely overstated your case) that "every fact in the case" supports the view that Oswald acted as a lone assassin, and that no conspiracy to commit or cover-up the murders existed, please explain how the testimony of Earline Roberts to the fact of a police car stopping and honking while Oswald was briefly at the rooming house supports Oswald's acting alone.
Further, it is not I, but you, who has drug in the rank speculation about Oswald's possible motive. (The postulates of Posner) I have directly stated that LBJ did have a definite and obvious motive, becoming president. Do you deny the truth of that direct statement?
I've seen that and I don't buy it. Look at the Zapruder. Connelly is facing forward and is sitting fairly close to his door when Kennedy is hit through the back. Connelly is [b]still[/b] facing forward when JFK puts his hands to his throat. Then Connelly begins to turn around. All I can say is, the bullet that came out JFK's throat did not hit Connelly unless it bounced off of something or otherwise changed trajectory.
JWinNC
Finally, the fact that Connelly's wound was oblong proves the bullet hit SOMETHING else before striking him. What was that, do you suppose?
I don't recall pinging you to this thread. "Boys in the woodwork?"??? Do you see figures moving on your wall? :))
That's new to me. I thought there was supposed to be only 3 shots. The one shot that missed hit a curb away from the car. Reaction to debris from a missed shot? Hmmm... I'm not buying it. The hands to neck movement is clearly a reaction to being shot. He begins to slump forward. He has already been hit and Connelly does not fall back toward the left side of the car until after JFK gets hit. The positioning is still wrong. If the shot was later then the positioning is even worse.
The wounds on Kennedy indicate that the bullet exiting the neck was still traveling downward and leftward. Within the possible timeframe of that bullet Connelly was not in position to be shot in the manner he was hit.
"Finally, the fact that Connelly's wound was oblong proves the bullet hit SOMETHING else before striking him. What was that, do you suppose?"
I don't know, but I still see no way for that bullet to have been the one exiting JFK's neck. The positions are still wrong.
Peace,
jw
Those who wish, can believe the conspiracy theories - I am convinced that Oswald, with all kinds of adreneline rushing through his body, pulled off three shots - two connected, one was fatal.
Lando
;-)....Sorry I put the nickel in the machine again! If I hadn't been there today I too could have waited!! All the best!
Lando
Amen. You don't even have to analyze it. All you have to do is look at it. The back of Kennedy's head is clearly visible, and intact, before, during, and after the fatal shot.
Proving without doubt that Cyril Wecht is a buffoon when he says there was a "massive defect" there.
... and it came out like this
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.