JFK Conspiracy Theories IV: The One With The Whales

[MicahJava]

BStrong, earlier I think you were saying that the last two shots sounded close together because the last noise was just an echo or some kind or reverberation. How does this not mean that only two shots were fired in the assassination?

Edited by Agatha: 

Do not alter usernames without express permission, particularly if done to insult.

By the way, I did not intend to misspell BStrong's name. I read the name and It showed up to me as "BSstrong".

 

[MicahJava]

Let me save you some time:

Oswald did it alone.

Look, I get it, you WANT THIS TO BE A CONSPIRACY. Maybe it reinforces your world view, maybe you actually believe it, but you're lying to yourself.

I was a JFK CTer (aka: Moron) for 25 years. I read every book written between 1964 and 1996 on the assassination and I bit hard on the conspiracy. I sat through Oliver Stone's movie 6 times in the theater, and hundreds more on VHS. I even bought the cleaned up Zapruder Film.

I have forgotten more Assassination CT lore than I can recall.

Looking back there was a huge problem that I ignored (because ignoring the obvious is a primary trait of morons), over the years my prime suspects behind the assassination changed with each new book. First it was Johnson, then the Mafia, then the CIA, then the CIA with the Mafia, then anti-Castro Cubans, then anti-Castro Cubans with the Mob, then anti-Castro Cubans with the mob, CIA, and the FBI.
The motivations also changed; the military industrial complex wanted to go big into Vietnam, the Mafia wanted revenge, the CIA wanted revenge, the anti-Castro Cubans wanted revenge, Hunt oil had some kind of problem, etc...

A real crime has a narrow list of suspects.

All of the suspects I just listed were angry with JFK and his brother, but killing a President of the United States was not part of their playbook.

More importantly, there was no guarantee JFK would be re-elected in 1964. Historically speaking, Kennedy accomplished nothing while he was in the White House. Not a single bill he co-sponsored made it through the house. With the exception of the Cuban Missile Crisis he is mostly a forgettable President if one looks at his record alone, and not the hype.

There was no need by any of the suspects to kill him.

I never thought of any of these things...until I went to Dallas.

In less than 10 minutes I went from a CT-moron to normal person. Oswald had an easy shot from the 6th floor. I mean EASY. You can argue ear-witness testimony, and matrix in your interpretation of the Zapruder film frames all you want, none of these things outweigh the physical evidence, or the ballistic evidence which all points to Lee Harvey Oswald.

Like I said before, guns don't lie.

I don't know what you've been reading, but from what I understand, most people tend to think that the CIA was involved from the beginning. It wound seem like some elements of the conspiracy were pretty sloppy, though. Especially since a few years ago, photographic evidence confirmed that Lee Harvey Oswald had three wallets (one left on Marina's dresser, one found on the scene of the Tippit shooting, and one found in his pocket when he was arrested).

Also, from what I understand, the physical and ballistics evidence has endless literature explaining why it supports conspiracy. For example, why each shell casing shows some sign of being cycled through the rifle more than once and/or dry fired.

 

[MicahJava]

It's been my experience with people who have an opinion on JFK, if they actually know how to shoot a rifle and have seen the layout of Dealey Plaza, they generally don't have a problem with the fact that Oswald could have shot JFK. The exceptions would be those who are selling something; people like Craig Roberts.

I think most people theorize about multiple shooters because they don't think the trajectories or medical evidence match the sniper's nest.

 

[kookbreaker]

I don't know what you've been reading, but from what I understand, most people tend to think that the CIA was involved from the beginning.

Maybe now, but look at the history of the JFk conspiracies and has run a complete gauntlet of suspects. Early on the main suspects were communists, either the KGB or Castro. Later the mafia was considered a prime suspect. Some even tried to say it was a conspiracy but a small one: Jim Garrison thought it was a thrill kill among homosexuals. Oliver Stone had to weld on politics to his story.

When the late 60's rolled around the CIA was added into the mix, but rarely acting on its own - either hiring the Mob or goading Cuba into doing the deed. Even later corporate interests were tossed in, them getting CIA to do their dirty work. It has been a long, long list of suspects over the years and just because a few buffs these days have settled on the CIA doesn't mean they can pretend their past insinuations didn't happen.

Also, from what I understand, the physical and ballistics evidence has endless literature explaining why it supports conspiracy.

Most of the ballistic evidence points to a single shooter using the Carcano found on scene. Neutron analysis, for example. Meanwhile, there is absolutely zero evidence of any other weapon being fired on scene.

For example, why each shell casing shows some sign of being cycled through the rifle more than once and/or dry fired.

1) Cycling cartridges is a way to unload a rifle. There are plenty of reasons that Oswald may have put rounds through the action previously.

2) Are you saying Oswald somehow 'dry fired' a live round? Do you now know how firearms work?

 

[MicahJava]

I believe what people are trying to suggest is that earwitness testimony is even more unreliable than eyewitness testimony. There were a few witnesses who believed that the second and third shots were closer together the the first and second. There were some witnesses who believed the opposite. There were some who believed that the three shots were evenly spaced. Is there any particular reason that you believe the first set of witnesses over the second two sets, other than that's what you've read from conspiracy theorists and don't know any better?

cmikes, the vast majority of witnesses indicated that the last two shots were close together, and I have reason to believe that many of the "only two shot" witnesses may have interpreted the last two shots as one shot.

As far as the number of shots fired by Oswald at JFK, the majority of witnesses heard three shots, with more witnesses hearing two shots than four or more. But more importantly to the claims of conspiracy, even of the people who heard four or more shots, most witnesses in Dealy Plaza only heard shots from one direction. Now, again, ear and eyewitness testimony is the least reliable form of evidence you can get, but in this case, it matches up with the forensic evidence discovered.

There were three loud reports. The last two were most likely close together.

I don't think it's a good idea to rule out the possibility of volly fire and/or silenced weapons. There is evidence that Connolly was hit by a second bullet that came shortly after the first loud one. Also, the incredibly likely fact that LHO could not have done all of the damage to President Kennedy, especially considering that the small circular wound near the EOP couldn't possibly exit from the top-right of the head.

It's important to remember that both the damaged bullet recovered as well as the large fragment of a bullet recovered from the limousine were fired from Lee Oswald's rifle to the exclusion of every other rifle in the world.

It's important to remember that the evidence against LHO is some of the most discredited evidence in the world. You can't trust anything in this case, not even necessarily photographs (even though official photos do implicate conspiracy).

So no matter how many shots were fired, they all came from LHO's rifle unless you're claiming other bullets that hit no one and nothing and then vanished into thin air leaving no trace of their existence.

First of all, you are the one postulating that a bullet missed and was never found. I have already suggested that the early reports of a bullet found in the grass have physical evidence in the form of a deep indention on the side of the stone surrounding the manhole cover. There is also evidence for a broad bullet that came out of JFK's back.

Like many other posters, when I first became interested in this subject at least entertained the idea that there may have been a conspiracy and read several conspiracy books with an open mind. Most of the books were full of cherry picked quotes, obfuscations, and outright lies. My advice is to check everything, preferably against sources like the Warren Commission Report, the HSCA report and the ARRB reports, which are all available online. It's obvious that you've been reading various conspiracy theorists websites and books, so I would like to recommend a counter balance, along with the official reports. John McAdams' site at http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/home.htm is a great resource with a lot of links to primary sources.

John McAdams is not only a horrible human being, he is probably the worst source of information on JFK on the internet.

As a matter of fact, if you're interested in the earwitness testimony, here's a link that clarifies some of your confusion.

http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/shots.htm

I'm not interested in it. I know there's a House Select Committee earshot witness experiment which had results that overall said that while there were a lot of echoes in Dealey Plaza, you are most likely to correctly determine the origin of a loud gunshot.

 

[MicahJava]

Most of the ballistic evidence points to a single shooter using the Carcano found on scene. Neutron analysis, for example. Meanwhile, there is absolutely zero evidence of any other weapon being fired on scene.

You had me at "neutron analysis".

You are absolutely wrong. There is evidence for a shorter, broader bulllet from his back and evidence for a bullet found near a manhole cover.

1) Cycling cartridges is a way to unload a rifle. There are plenty of reasons that Oswald may have put rounds through the action previously.

2) Are you saying Oswald somehow 'dry fired' a live round? Do you now know how firearms work?

It's called framing someone. At least one of the shells show signs of being cycled through the rifle without a bullet. There's also the problem of the dented lip. And how the chain of custody is butchered. And how the original story was that two spent hulls and one live round were found on the floor.

 

[JayUtah]

It's called framing someone. At least one of the shells show signs of being cycled through the rifle without a bullet. There's also the problem of the dented lip. And how the chain of custody is butchered. And how the original story was that two spent hulls and one live round were found on the floor.

And how all these claims have been covered so many times already in this thread and its predecessors that I've lost count.

 

[traxy]

It's important to remember that the evidence against LHO is some of the most discredited evidence in the world. You can't trust anything in this case, not even necessarily photographs (even though official photos do implicate conspiracy).

This is simply not true. Every attempt to discredit evidence in the case only winds up confirming it.

Take the evidence that Oswald owned the Carcano used in the shooting. Conspiracy advocates will take their examination of each individual piece to absolutely absurd lengths until they find something to focus on.

The rifle was ordered from Kleins Sporting Goods in Chicago. Each individual piece of correspondence had handwriting matching Lee Harvey Oswald. The rifle was ordered using an alias that Oswald had an ID for when he was arrested. The rifle was sent to a post office box being rented by Lee Harvey Oswald. There are several photographs of Oswald posing with the same rifle as the one found in the depository. The negative for one of those photographs has been matched to the Oswalds Imperial Reflex camera to the exclusion of all other cameras. Every first generation print of those photographs has been examined in depth by an entire panel of photography experts and found to be 100% original and unaltered. There is a copy of one of the photographs with Oswald's handwriting on the back. Multiple sets of Oswald's prints were lifted off of the rifle after its recovery. One set, the palm print on the underside of the barrel, was matched to Oswald on the day of the assassination. The set of prints on the trigger guard was matched to Oswald in 1992 by fingerprint expert Vincent Scalice using newly found high contrast photographs of the print from the DPD. Oswald's wife testified to him owning a rifle, that she photographed him with it, testified to him taking it to shooting ranges, and that he would sit on the porch and dry cycle it for hours. Other acquaintances of the Oswalds also testified to Oswald owning a rifle.

In any other criminal case, that mountain of evidence would be enough for any thinking person to conclude that yes, Oswald owned the Carcano that fired the shots. In this case however, conspiracy advocates resort to picking gnat **** out of pepper in order to try and get around it.

They'll argue that the money order filled out by Oswald and cashed by Kleins doesn't have a bank stamp, so the entire paper trail must be fraudulent.

They'll argue that there is no proof Alex Hiddell was listed as an alternate recipient on Oswald's PO box due to a missing form, so there is no way he could have received mail there (conveniently ignoring that Oswald had a PO box in New Orleans and had listed Alex Hiddell as an alternate recipient there).

They'll argue that the rifle was picked up during the day when Oswald was at work, so he couldn't possibly have been the one to pick it up (conveniently ignoring that Oswald the model employee was fired from every job he ever had).

They'll argue that because the FBI didn't find the print the night of the shooting after it had already been lifted, that the DPD must have planted it.

 

[BStrong]

By the way, I did not intend to misspell BStrong's name. I read the name and It showed up to me as "BSstrong".

No harm, no foul.

It's been used before and my ego is intact.

 

[BStrong]

I think most people theorize about multiple shooters because they don't think the trajectories or medical evidence match the sniper's nest.

Based on what?

I know and understand firearms the way westerners understand the knife, fork and spoon, and marksmanship is as familiar to me as eating is to anyone else.

I can't say this enough: The various conspiracy theories with regard to the rifle, the mechanics of LHO's marksmanship and the terminal effects of the projectile are all flat-out ********.

 

[Regnad Kcin]

I don't know what you've been reading, but from what I understand, most people tend to think that the CIA was involved from the beginning.

What, "the CIA" (who, specifically, please) couldn't have spiked his drug cocktail or pushed him down a flight of stairs so instead went the easy route of concocting a scheme of multiple shooters in broad daylight surrounded by hundreds of people with the high possibility of leaving behind incriminating physical evidence?

Think, man!

 

[Regnad Kcin]

cmikes, the vast majority of witnesses indicated that the last two shots were close together, and I have reason to believe that many of the "only two shot" witnesses may have interpreted the last two shots as one shot.

There were three loud reports. The last two were most likely close together.

I don't think it's a good idea to rule out the possibility of volly fire and/or silenced weapons. There is evidence that Connolly was hit by a second bullet that came shortly after the first loud one. Also, the incredibly likely fact that LHO could not have done all of the damage to President Kennedy, especially considering that the small circular wound near the EOP couldn't possibly exit from the top-right of the head.

It's important to remember that the evidence against LHO is some of the most discredited evidence in the world. You can't trust anything in this case, not even necessarily photographs (even though official photos do implicate conspiracy).

First of all, you are the one postulating that a bullet missed and was never found. I have already suggested that the early reports of a bullet found in the grass have physical evidence in the form of a deep indention on the side of the stone surrounding the manhole cover. There is also evidence for a broad bullet that came out of JFK's back.

John McAdams is not only a horrible human being, he is probably the worst source of information on JFK on the internet.

I'm not interested in it. I know there's a House Select Committee earshot witness experiment which had results that overall said that while there were a lot of echoes in Dealey Plaza, you are most likely to correctly determine the origin of a loud gunshot.

Bolding mine.

And that's why I, for one, will not wade into the above-quoted rat's nest surrounding a pile of strands of tangled Christmas tree lights. I recognize someone who wants to believe a fantasy more than wants the truth.

 

[JayUtah]

That always reminded me of the Apollo 1 stories. Apparently one or more of the crew was going to spill the beans on Apollo being a hoax (or whatever) so the CIA and NASA decided to do away with them all -- by murdering them on government property, in a multi-million-dollar rocket, in a spectacular way that engendered congressional hearings questioning the future of the project.

So many of these conspiracy books -- on whatever historical event you want to name -- read like very bad spy novels.

 

[Ranb]

I think most people theorize about multiple shooters because they don't think the trajectories or medical evidence match the sniper's nest.

I think you're being evasive. Can a person hit a target in a slowly moving vehicle in Dealey Plaza from the 6th floor of the TSBD or not?

Also, from what I understand, the physical and ballistics evidence has endless literature explaining why it supports conspiracy. For example, why each shell casing shows some sign of being cycled through the rifle more than once and/or dry fired.

Nearly anyone else familiar with firearms understands that a cartridge can be cycled through a bolt action rifle for reasons other than furthering a conspiracy. Why don't you?

What evidence is there that those cartridge casings found after the shooting were used for dry fire? Why would evidence for dry firing be an issue?

 

[Tomtomkent]

That always reminded me of the Apollo 1 stories. Apparently one or more of the crew was going to spill the beans on Apollo being a hoax (or whatever) so the CIA and NASA decided to do away with them all -- by murdering them on government property, in a multi-million-dollar rocket, in a spectacular way that engendered congressional hearings questioning the future of the project.

So many of these conspiracy books -- on whatever historical event you want to name -- read like very bad spy novels.

No. My novels read much worse. And... Hey! Us bad writers do not appreciate the association.

 

[traxy]

What, "the CIA" (who, specifically, please) couldn't have spiked his drug cocktail or pushed him down a flight of stairs so instead went the easy route of concocting a scheme of multiple shooters in broad daylight surrounded by hundreds of people with the high possibility of leaving behind incriminating physical evidence?

Think, man!

A scheme entirely predicated on the weather in Dallas being unseasonably warm enough that JFK would make the choice to take the bubble top off of the limo.

If the weather had remained rainy that afternoon, there goes years of planning setting up poor Oswald as the patsy.

 

[Tomtomkent]

A scheme entirely predicated on the weather in Dallas being unseasonably warm enough that JFK would make the choice to take the bubble top off of the limo.

If the weather had remained rainy that afternoon, there goes years of planning setting up poor Oswald as the patsy.

You don't know the technology they had man...

 

[pgwenthold]

Based on what?
.

Cyril Wecht, and his idiotic attempt at trying to recreate the magic bullet?

(using dummies that were placed in completely wrong places and completely in the wrong positions in their seats)

 

[BStrong]

snipped....

I don't think it's a good idea to rule out the possibility of volly fire and/or silenced weapons.

...snipped...


.

Trying to crowbar fantasy into reality can sometimes be entertaining, so please enlighten us as to why a conspiracy to commit murder is made better by having more rather than less conspirators, and using mismatched weapons in differing calibers or designs is an advantage in hiding said conspiracy.

Kind of reminds me of the old Bill Cosby (pre-rapist) stand up bit about street football play calling:

 

[BStrong]

You had me at "neutron analysis".

You are absolutely wrong. There is evidence for a shorter, broader bulllet from his back and evidence for a bullet found near a manhole cover.



It's called framing someone. At least one of the shells show signs of being cycled through the rifle without a bullet. There's also the problem of the dented lip. And how the chain of custody is butchered. And how the original story was that two spent hulls and one live round were found on the floor.

Free advice:

Steer clear of anything to do with the rifle and the marksmanship involved.

You're lack of knowledge of the subject matter is not a virtue, and only serves to weaken your argument.