Moderated JFK conspiracy theories: it never ends III

[abaddon]

Mr. Belz. I am not going to play games with you. What I said is common knowledge to anyone who has studied this case for over a month.

Factually incorrect, as my own experience attests. You are wrong on this point.

And you only made that request, knowing that I would never spend several days itemizing every statement made about the final shots. And if I did, you wouldn't believe it anyway, would you

Not if you failed to make a case. If you made an actual case, the answer would be different. But you can't make a case, can you?

This was nothing more than a very shabby tactic.

Seemed like an observation of reality to me. If you disagree, make your case.

 

[abaddon]

Mr. Strong, I don't waste time reading posts which try to stereotype all of your adversaries.

You admit that you discard arguments you do not like out of hand?

And after having moderated two JFK forums, one in partnership with John McAdams, I can assure you that I am quite familiar with the tactics of the worst of the conspiracy advocates. After 20 years, I have to suspect that I've seen many more of them than you and Tomtom have

Did you save them to your HDD? It certainly seems so.

Lecturing me is nothing more than a diversion from what really matters, which are the facts and evidence. Why don't we stick with that?

Yet somehow, you refuse to produce those. Why is that?

 

[Belz...]

Mr. Belz. I am not going to play games with you.

Anymore ?

What I said is common knowledge to anyone who has studied this case for over a month.

Lame excuse.

And you only made that request, knowing that I would never spend several days itemizing every statement made about the final shots.

What do you mean ? You said you had an average. I assumed you had a table with the numbers in order to make the calculation, and that it would be trivial for you to post it here. However given your inability to support your claims I didn't expect you to do so.

That you pretend that it's a matter of time constraints is laughable.

 

[abaddon]

As I mentioned several days ago, I prefer to discuss the case with those who stick to the facts and evidence. That is especially so, since I have sworn off 10 hour days at the keyboard on this stuff

I will respond to posts from you, which make no mention or reference to me, and are solely related to the evidence.

Have a great day!

But your arguments appear to consist of no more than link spam and copy pasta. Why is that?

 

[swright777]

I have no idea what your argument is. They wouldn't have shot anyone unless they saw them with exposed weapons.



Of course not. The evidence is overwhelming and beyond dispute, that additional shots were fired. How do you explain why most witnesses only heard one of the early shots?

How do you explain the absence of visible startle reactions prior to 285?

Oswald's rifle was proven to generate sound levels of 130 decibels, at street level. That's 16 times louder than 90db, which is the level at which involuntary startle reactions will occur as well as permanent hearing loss with extended exposure.

There is no way Oswald could have fired those shots.

Nor could he have have fired both of the "closely bunched" shots at the end.

That constitutes indisputable evidence.

You keep claiming this even though it is in dispute. Why?

 

[BStrong]

Mr. Strong, I don't waste time reading posts which try to stereotype all of your adversaries.

And after having moderated two JFK forums, one in partnership with John McAdams, I can assure you that I am quite familiar with the tactics of the worst of the conspiracy advocates. After 20 years, I have to suspect that I've seen many more of them than you and Tomtom have

Lecturing me is nothing more than a diversion from what really matters, which are the facts and evidence. Why don't we stick with that?

Edited by Agatha: 

edited breach of rule 12

When I have more time tonight I'll respond to your collection of myths about LCN, starting with Marcello - teaser - Marcello was not the "mafiosi most likely" to go after the Kennedys. That title went to Sam Giancana based on the RFK made fun of his laugh during Giancana's committee hearing appearance. Marcello's immigration beef with the Gov. Org went back to 1952 and he had already lost at the SCOTUS level on his appeal and your characterization of this deportation as something RFK cooked up out of the blue is incorrect:

http://notabeneuh.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-amazing-but-true-deportation-story.html

Deportation proceedings began in 1952, when Marcello was arrested pursuant to an immigration warrant stemming from his 1938 marijuana conviction. After he was found deportable by INS officers and the Board of Immigration Appeals, Marcello appealed through a habeas corpus petition in the Eastern District of Louisiana. The court found his due process argument lacking, and noted that “no amount of due process would help him” anyway, but did allow Marcello’s release on bail. The Fifth Circuit affirmed the District Court’s decision, and Marcello’s case reached the Supreme Court in 1955.

In Marcello v. Bond, 349 U.S. 302, Marcello’s lawyer, Jack Wasserman, argued that the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act under which Marcello was to be deported, deviated from the Administrative Procedure Act in its hearing requirements. This deviation was especially significant especially when it came to the separation of functions within an agency and its officers, a key provision of the APA, which would have demanded more separation in the roles of officers in adjudicating Marcello’s deportation hearing. The Supreme Court delivered a 5-3 verdict, affirming the decisions of the lower courts, and finding that Congress, in passing the Immigration and Nationality Act, expressly exempted the Act from the APA’s hearing requirements. A strong dissent followed from Justice Black, who stated “a fair hearing necessarily includes an impartial tribunal.” Outrage from the ABA and other groups followed, and the case helped lead to the reforms Wasserman argued for in new INS regulations promulgated in 1955 and 1956.

Now, the time had come to deport Marcello. The INS only needed to find a country who would take him. Marcello designated France as his choice country, only to be rejected. Italy also rejected his request (possibly after a large bribe to an Italian Court Official). This left the United States with a problem, leading to more delay for Marcello’s deportation, along with Marcello’s continued court actions, further delaying his deportation.

Marcello's deportation did not come as a surprise to him in the way you represent.

 

[Tomtomkent]

So could somebody please consolidate the contradictory claims and stop Bob from arguing against himself.


Was there a lack of evidence for other shooters because they were following the methods of a sniper. Or is the abundance of evidence overwhelming.

I worded it poorly when I tried to point this out, and think the point was missed.

As it happens I don't think snipers work how it was claimed. And the only way to avoid any evidence is to not fire. Otherwise there would be (as others pointed out) ballistic evidence. Which there is not.

That the shot was apparently silenced (or more accurately, suppressed assuming we even attempt to think in real terms) there are a slew of other issues.

 

[turingtest]

So could somebody please consolidate the contradictory claims and stop Bob from arguing against himself.


Was there a lack of evidence for other shooters because they were following the methods of a sniper. Or is the abundance of evidence overwhelming.

I worded it poorly when I tried to point this out, and think the point was missed.

As it happens I don't think snipers work how it was claimed. And the only way to avoid any evidence is to not fire. Otherwise there would be (as others pointed out) ballistic evidence. Which there is not.

That the shot was apparently silenced (or more accurately, suppressed assuming we even attempt to think in real terms) there are a slew of other issues.

I wouldn't worry too much about Bob getting the point- he can't afford to. As for anyone else, it's obvious. Just do like I've decided to do, enjoy the comedy of yet another CTist making such hash of logic; in this case, one who claims to rely on verifiable, objective and empirical evidence for his conclusions essentially using the complete lack of such evidence to argue for his DalTex shooter conclusion.* Funny is as funny does; I'm sure Bob will continue to provide us countless hours of chuckles.

*There's another point to be made here in connection with the lack of ballistic, or other empirical, evidence for a DalTex shooter. According to Bob, they would have taken pains to not be seen; but only a truly magical conspiracy would plan on the assumption that their bullets would leave no traces. The problem with these reverse-engineered conspiracies is that the people who construct them never seem to consider how it would look to someone who had to forward-engineer them. "Wait, you want to do what? Make it look like the President was shot from only one place with one rifle by one guy, by having different guys shooting him from different places using different weapons, and assume nobody will see the other guys and that their weapons will leave no fragments???!?!?" The "Dr Evil" school of conspiracy...

 

[Robert Harris]

Yes. If you apply any number of irrelevant statistical methods, you can find any number of numbers perfect for other theories.

Let's cut to the chase. The witnesses corroborated my theory. They contradicted yours.

That's the bottom line.

Really? I was unaware I had posted a theory with any frame number for the second shot.

That's why I said "if" you accepted a second shot at 223. Are you saying you don't?

But then, I'm aware that the consensus was not established by trying to apply an average to the statements. I am aware that the number of shots, and the timings of shots differ in reports for reasons not limited to, but including, echoes and mistaken identification of sounds, making an average.

If "echoes" were an issue, why did most of the witnesses only hear one early shot?

Oh dear. The consensus and not the majority?

An easy mistake to make. Do you happen to understand the difference?

Better than you, apparently

American Heritage/Apple dictionary


Consensus
noun [ usu. in sing. ]
general agreement: a consensus of opinion among judges

I said exactly what I meant and used exactly, the correct noun.

Other than filmed footage that recently identified the traffic light gantry it hit? Other than the spent shell?

There is no valid evidence of that, and as Dale Myers and Gary Mack have stated, none of the witnesses heard a shot then. I have also suggested an early shot, but my explanation works much better, since it is perfectly consistent with shots being fired from a suppressed weapon.

Yes there is evidence.

Well, I'm all ears. Tell me about it.

You mean there is no definitive proof.

Yes, that sort of goes with no evidence

But as the two shots we know struck targets came from Oswald,

No we don't. CE399 was not the bullet that hit JFK and Connally. That is a proven fact.

http://jfkhistory.com/bell/bellarticle/BellArticle.html

Oswald might have fired the 313 shot, but to believe that, you must have a lot of faith in an FBI, to have delivered the original frags, that you will find hard to muster after you read the article.

and the wound is a plausible effect of these shots, you are wrong.

I have no idea what you are saying.

Of course the wounds are effects of the shots, but that doesn't mean they were all fired by Oswald.

Given we have no evidence for any other shooter, or any other shots being fired, the balance of probability leans towards Oswald.

Nonsense. I just explained why Oswald could not have fired the early shots and all of the final ones. If you wish to make this assertion, you need to resolve those issues. So far, you haven't even tried.

You still seem to misunderstand the word fact. At best the only fact here is the opinion these people shared in their testimony.

They are not "opinions". They made very specific, empirical statements which were mutually corroborative. The key word in the statements was "gurney" or stretcher.

Connally said the bullet fell from his stretcher/gurney to the floor and was recovered by a nurse.

Wade said the nurse was holding a bullet that she stated, came from Connally's gurney.

Nolan said she stated that she had a whole bullet that came from Connally's "gurney".

What makes this such a powerful corroboration, is that the term "gurney" was non-intuitive. The natural presumption would be that a nurse holding a bullet, had acquired it from the surgery. "Gurney" would have been an unexpected term and not something they would just mistakenly presumed.

And all three of them said the same thing.

The FBI tried to make it appear that Nolan actually received the tiny wrist fragments from Connally's wrist, that nursing supervisor Audrey Bell acquired. But she flatly denied their claim that she said that, stating that she gave that envelope to plain clothed agents, and NOT to Nolan or any other uniformed officer.

In addition to lying about what Bell said, they also lied when they claimed that Bell said it contained a single fragment. Her envelope actually contained four tiny frags and was clearly labelled as containing "fragments" from Connally's arm.

But they were trying to pass it off as Nolan's envelope, which really did contain a single item.

Putting aside the limitations of witness testimony (as has been discussed at length) for a moment, we have to ask how the DA or police officer guarding a room were able to offer such conclusive facts.

C'mon man. Are you saying they all just coincidentally suffered the same delusion about a bullet from a "gurney"?? This was the most important piece of evidence and by far, the biggest crime they had ever been associated with. How could they have forgotten those details?

Were they perchance able to observe the bullets in flight and track their trajectory and number at the time? Could they see everybody in the plaza with perfect clarity to distinguish between the reactions to individual bullets?

The DP witnesses were too many and too consistent to just blow them all off like that. And their testimonies and the limo passengers reactions were also corroborated by one of the most brilliant Physicists of the 20th century, who identified Zapruder's reaction at 290-291, to a startling noise.

The limo passengers began to react at 290-292. That's three totally independent forms of verifiable evidence, all leading to exactly the same conclusion.

 

[Tomtomkent]

Hmm. Bob, I really think you need to provide some numbers to show the consensus was a majority of the witness total as you imply.

Oh. And learn that a qualifier goes before an assumption. There is a difference between stating that if one ascribes to a theory they should belie e something, and suggesting somebody must believe a fact if they actually ascribe to a theory.

But only if you want people to take your claims and presentations seriously.

 

[Tomtomkent]

Oh, Bob, when asked about two witnesses you named, it is a cheap and worthless dodge to make assertions about multiple other witnesses. You said a DA and a man guarding a room proved as fact the effect of a mystery bullet.

As you were unable to explain how they could indeed verify your fact, I'm discounting it as meaningless bluster.

 

[Robert Harris]

So could somebody please consolidate the contradictory claims and stop Bob from arguing against himself.

I made no contradictory claims. If I had, you would have been able to cite them.

Was there a lack of evidence for other shooters because they were following the methods of a sniper.

Yes. I can't prove it, but my wild and crazy theory is that they probably didn't want to get caught.

Or is the abundance of evidence overwhelming.

What is overwhelming is the fact that most of the witnesses never heard one of the early shots and neither of them were loud enough to provoke visible startle reactions, even remotely similar to the ones at the end of the attack.

Oswald's rifle generated sound levels of 130db at street level. Think about it. Have you ever wondered why the Secret Service appeared to be so "sluggish". They were actually extremely quick, but they heard nothing prior to frame 285 that sounded like a real gunshot.

Clint Hill for example, didn't jump to the pavement until AFTER frame 285. In fact, we can see in the Altgens photo taken at the equivalent of Zframe 255, that he was standing very calmly, with no sign at all that he was about to jump.

I worded it poorly when I tried to point this out, and think the point was missed.

As it happens I don't think snipers work how it was claimed.

My claim was that they didn't want to get caught. Do you disagree?

And the only way to avoid any evidence is to not fire. Otherwise there would be (as others pointed out) ballistic evidence. Which there is not.

There was no usable ballistic evidence for any of the missed shots, either the one apparently at 150-160, or the one that caused Tague's minor wound.

There was evidence for the shot at 223, but that certainly wasn't ce399, which was substituted for the actual bullet. This article explains in detail.

http://jfkhistory.com/bell/bellarticle/BellArticle.html

That the shot was apparently silenced (or more accurately, suppressed assuming we even attempt to think in real terms) there are a slew of other issues.

Please be specific. What issues were there?

 

[Tomtomkent]

Now would be a good time to revisit the nature of human memory.

Too often the CT advocates assume witness testimony is preferable to physical objective evidence. But this is not always true. Your brain is not a film camera. You di not record your memories. When you try to remember something your brain throws together the key details that sunk in, and fudges everything else.

Take a look at the witnesses in the plaza. Timings, the number of shots, the direction of shots not only differ between witnesses, but can differ between testimony by the same witnesses. Ignoring for now some bizarre suggestions of what does and does not verify a member after the fact (and apparent psychic instincts when holding a bullet to know of it was or was not heard, or which of the impacts it was from, etc), we simply do not remember things accurately.

Mostly because we make those memories up when we try to remember. We change our memories as we talk about events, as we try to make sense of events, and we remember differently under stress.

These are well documented. We can get some important information from memories, but we expect noise and we expect discrepency. Collany might have thought he was hit by an extra bullet, but this is his best interpretation of events. It is not supported by physical evidence, and funnily enough, being in pain and reacting to gunshots does not make you the instant expert many CTs happen to believe.

Passengers on the Titanic could not agree if the ship split in two, or sunk whole. A man can be forgiven for misinterpreting the reactions of those around him when in pain. People can be forgiven for having different estimates of times between gunshots. Or leaping to conclusions when they found a bullet.

But we should be very wary of those who mistake best interpretations as fact. Or memories alone as proof.

 

[Tomtomkent]

I made no contradictory claims. If I had, you would have been able to cite them.

You claimed that the lack of evidence for a sniper in a building was because they covered their tracks.

I quoted this, asked if the lack of evidence was meant to convince us.

You then quoted me and stated the evidence s overwhelming.

Which of these is true?

Can you produce evidence placing a rifle, silenced or otherwise where you have claimed? Or were tracks covered?

 

[Tomtomkent]

I think my copy of the Z film is faulty. I can't hear any gunshots on it. All I can see are personal reaction of possible interpretation.

And yet these are stated as fact. Still.

I remember a debate on another board about what was or was not a reaction by somebody I the film. Somebody declared with absolute authority that one person was shot on a particular frame, because if he was shot when the WC deduced he would have dropped a hat. Yet the chap retains the hat throughout. After such interpretations it is hard to believe anybody who claims near psychic knowledge of who heard or felt something in a particular frame.

Especially as for two of the most likely points of impact, our view is obscured.

Declaring any interpretation of the film as fact, rather than in terms of probability is childish and a gross misunderstanding of what it means to be a fact.

 

[Belz...]

Let's cut to the chase. The witnesses corroborated my theory. They contradicted yours.

That's the bottom line.

No, that's the claim. We're still waiting on the evidence, but fortunately I'm not holding my breath.

 

[Belz...]

Too often the CT advocates assume witness testimony is preferable to physical objective evidence. But this is not always true.

In fact, it pretty much never is.

 

[Axxman300]

Of course the wounds are effects of the shots, but that doesn't mean they were all fired by Oswald.

Nonsense. I just explained why Oswald could not have fired the early shots and all of the final ones. If you wish to make this assertion, you need to resolve those issues. So far, you haven't even tried.

There were only three shots fired. Ballistics has proven they all came from the TSBD. The only way there was another shooter is if he was standing next to LHO. Ballistics is the only solid evidence in the case. Had the shots come from somewhere else it would have obvious.

Your sound evidence is non-existent. There are no recordings of the event clear enough to use as evidence, or even just to use as a frame of reference. Witness testimony is useless because because what a person heard depended on where they stood.

You seem to be unaware that specific sound waves develop over distance, and can be effected by the air quality. LHO's rifle likely sounded louder 300 feet away than it did to the people below the window where he fired from. The people under the path of the bullets reacted to the snap of each round, and your gifs all stop conveniently before they show people on the left side of Elm Street diving for cover.

Before you can rule in a second shooter you have to rule Oswald out, and you can't. All of the actual evidence points to him. You and people like you can argue over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin all you want, but you're wasting your time.

 

[RoboTimbo]

Robert, don't forget to post a video of a car braking and people's heads not reacting in unison. Then we can put that inference to bed.

 

[turingtest]

...

What is overwhelming is the fact that most of the witnesses never heard one of the early shots and neither of them were loud enough to provoke visible startle reactions, even remotely similar to the ones at the end of the attack.

Oswald's rifle generated sound levels of 130db at street level. Think about it. Have you ever wondered why the Secret Service appeared to be so "sluggish". They were actually extremely quick, but they heard nothing prior to frame 285 that sounded like a real gunshot.

Clint Hill for example, didn't jump to the pavement until AFTER frame 285. In fact, we can see in the Altgens photo taken at the equivalent of Zframe 255, that he was standing very calmly, with no sign at all that he was about to jump.

[qimg]http://jfkhistory.com/hillaltgens.jpg[/qimg]

...

Dear lord- there's those mad photo-interpretation skilz of Robert Harris again, only now applied to a still photograph, by which he can tell not only a man's state of mind ("standing very calmly"), but what he is about (or not about) to do. By that reasoning, it should be obvious that the motorcycle to the right in the picture is showing no sign that it's about to roll forward.

And this supposed lack of reaction is meant to show that Hill heard nothing that sounded like a real gunshot? Hm- what did Hill say?

Well, as we came out of the curve, and began to straighten up, I was viewing the area which looked to be a park. There were people scattered throughout the entire park. And I heard a noise from my right rear, which to me seemed to be a firecracker. I immediately looked to my right and, in so doing, my eyes had to cross the Presidential limousine and I saw President Kennedy grab at himself and lurch forward and to the left.

He says he heard what sounded like a firecracker- not very loud, but certainly more than you'd expect a silenced gunshot to sound. And he heard it, then saw JFK grabbing at himself- well before 285.

Then, of course, Bob has cleverly cropped the Altgens photo so you can't see the reactions of the agents riding the car's other running board. Here's the whole thing:

The two agents on the left of the picture are John Ready in front and Paul Landis in the rear. Ready:

At about 12:30 p.m. we began the approach to the Thornton Freeway traveling about 20-25 MPH in a slight incline. I was about 25-30 feet from President Kennedy who was located in the right rear seat. I heard what appeared to be fire crackers going off from my position. I immediately turned to my right rear trying to locate the source but was not able to determine the exact location.

Again, "firecrackers"- but loud enough to draw his attention, exactly as he describes in his report. Clever Mafia thugs, suppressing the sound, but not quite enough to avoid drawing the attention of SS personnel they must have known would be there.

And Landis?

As the President's car continued around the corner, I continued to survey the crowd along the right hand side of the road and noticed that it was fairly scattered, with hardly enough people to form a single line. I continued to look ahead to an overpass over the route we were traveling. At approximately this point, I would say, the President's car and the Follow-up car had just completed their turns and both were straightening out.

At this moment I heard what sounded like the report of a high-powered rifle from behind me, over my right shoulder. When I heard the sound there was no question in my mind what it was. My first glance was at the President, as I was practically looking in his direction anyway. I saw him moving in a manner which I thought was to look in the direction of the sound. I did not realize that President Kennedy had been shot at this point.

I immediately returned my gaze, over my right shoulder, toward the modernistic building I had observed before.

He heard a suppressed rifle that sounded just like an un-suppressed one! And reacted as corroborated by the photo.

Let's don't forget Rosemary Willis, and John Connally. This article, with the sort of accompanying and corroborating clips that Robert seems to adore, has both of them testifying to having heard, and reacted to, very audible shots well before 285. Willis:

I stopped when I heard the shot...In that first split second, I thought it was a firecracker. But within maybe one-tenth of a second, I knew it was a gun shot.

Corroborated by the film- what's good for Nellie should be good for Rosemary, eh?
And Connally:

We had just made the turn, well, when I heard what I thought was a shot. I heard this noise which I immediately took to be a rifle shot. I instinctively turned to my right because the sound appeared to come from over my right shoulder, so I turned to look back over my right shoulder, and I saw nothing unusual except just people in the crowd, but I did not catch the President in the corner of my eye, and I was interested, because once I heard the shot in my own mind I identified it as a rifle shot, and I immediately -- the only thought that crossed my mind was that this is an assassination attempt.

Again, corroborated by the film- and certainly what's good for Nellie should be good for her husband.
Seems an awful lot of people whose testimony can be corroborated by film heard a shot Robert says they shouldn't have. Yes, Robert, I know- "not remotely similar" to the "startle reflexes" you insist later on that prove 285. But you yourself have said that startle reactions can take many forms; to insist that these couldn't have been proper startle reactions to a shot is to just define in circles- that the loudness of the shot at 285 is what makes the startle reactions, and the startle reactions are what proves there was a shot at 285.