Cont: JFK Conspiracy Theories VIII

[HSienzant]

Skeptic has an interesting article by Gerald Posner about the JFK case.

https://www.skeptic.com/article/how-maga-is-reviving-jfk-conspiracies-for-political-theater/

“Representative Anna Paulina Luna, the chairwoman of the newly created Task Force on the Declassification of Federal Secrets, has said that the JFK assassination is only the first of several Oversight Committee investigations…. Why, however, spend the task force’s time and taxpayer money investigating the assassination? Representative Luna is not leading an honest probe into what happened. Her public statements show she has already made up her mind that the government is hiding a massive conspiracy from the public and she believes she will expose it.”

The first post in this long series of threads was oh, so prescient…

 

[Cosmic Yak]

I never believed they were right.

No: you said you weren't sure whether they were right or wrong:

Supposedly JFK said, "I will break the CIA into a thousand pieces," which encouraged them to assassinate him

Did he actually say that, or is it a conspiracy invention?

Now, do you believe he actually said that, or is it a conspiracy invention?

 

[Axxman300]

No: you said you weren't sure whether they were right or wrong:


Now, do you believe he actually said that, or is it a conspiracy invention?

Look, JFK was never on any official record as saying this. Ever. The statement came from an unnamed Kennedy aide in related to the post Bay of Pigs mess. It's referenced here on Page#2/colum 1 toward the bottom:

https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP84-00499R001000120002-1.pdf

Here's Gizmodo's deep dive into the subject (spoiler: he didn't say it):

The Real Story Behind That JFK Quote About Destroying the CIA

Thanks to Wikileaks, you may have seen a quote from President Kennedy recently about his desire to “splinter the C.I.A. in a thousand pieces and scatter

gizmodo.com

And since this is a skeptic's board, he's JFK's speech to Congress in May, 1961 (with option of listening to the speech):

https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-speeches/united-states-congress-special-message-19610525

With these formidable weapons, the adversaries of freedom plan to consolidate their territory--to exploit, to control, and finally to destroy the hopes of the world's newest nations; and they have ambition to do it before the end of this decade. It is a contest of will and purpose as well as force and violence--a battle for minds and souls as well as lives and territory. And in that contest, we cannot stand aside.

We stand, as we have always stood from our earliest beginnings, for the independence and equality of all nations. This nation was born of revolution and raised in freedom. And we do not intend to leave an open road for despotism.

There is no single simple policy which meets this challenge. Experience has taught us that no one nation has the power or the wisdom to solve all the problems of the world or manage its revolutionary tides--that extending our commitments does not always increase our security--that any initiative carries with it the risk of a temporary defeat--that nuclear weapons cannot prevent subversion--that no free people can be kept free without will and energy of their own--and that no two nations or situations are exactly alike.

Yet there is much we can do--and must do. The proposals I bring before you are numerous and varied. They arise from the host of special opportunities and dangers which have become increasingly clear in recent months. Taken together, I believe that they can mark another step forward in our effort as a people. I am here to ask the help of this Congress and the nation in approving these necessary measures.

 

[Axxman300]

Skeptic has an interesting article by Gerald Posner about the JFK case.

https://www.skeptic.com/article/how-maga-is-reviving-jfk-conspiracies-for-political-theater/

“Representative Anna Paulina Luna, the chairwoman of the newly created Task Force on the Declassification of Federal Secrets, has said that the JFK assassination is only the first of several Oversight Committee investigations…. Why, however, spend the task force’s time and taxpayer money investigating the assassination? Representative Luna is not leading an honest probe into what happened. Her public statements show she has already made up her mind that the government is hiding a massive conspiracy from the public and she believes she will expose it.”

The first post in this long series of threads was oh, so prescient…

Yup, probably find all those documents in the same warehouse they keep the Lost Ark of the Covenant, and captured UFOs.

 

[Cosmic Yak]

Look, JFK was never on any official record as saying this. Ever. The statement came from an unnamed Kennedy aide in related to the post Bay of Pigs mess. It's referenced here on Page#2/colum 1 toward the bottom:

https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP84-00499R001000120002-1.pdf

Here's Gizmodo's deep dive into the subject (spoiler: he didn't say it):

The Real Story Behind That JFK Quote About Destroying the CIA

Thanks to Wikileaks, you may have seen a quote from President Kennedy recently about his desire to “splinter the C.I.A. in a thousand pieces and scatter

gizmodo.com

And since this is a skeptic's board, he's JFK's speech to Congress in May, 1961 (with option of listening to the speech):

https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-speeches/united-states-congress-special-message-19610525

Not sure why you're addressing this to me. I'm not the one having trouble deciding if it's true or not.

 

[Axxman300]

I just hit the reply button. that's all.

 

[SpitfireIX]

Anna Paulina Luna(tic) claims that she's been told NBC has a secret video of the assassination that allegedly proves Oswald couldn't have been the shooter. From Politico:

In an interview with Fox News on Friday, Luna said that she had just been told that NBC has a “never been seen before” video of the shooting that she would be requesting access to. The video, according to Luna, “allegedly” shows presumed gunman Lee Harvey Oswald near Kennedy’s vehicle when the assassination happened. . . .

Luna has been elevated by House Republicans to lead the House Oversight Committee’s “Task Force on the Declassification of Federal Secrets,” and said she would be asking NBC to turn over this alleged video. . . .

Luna claimed that the Central Intelligence Agency “never bought” the one gunman theory. Luna added that Oliver Stone — who made the 1991 movie “JFK” that reignited interest in the assassination — purportedly saw a secondhand copy of the alleged video.

“I think the American people had an inclination as to what we were saying, but we never had the hard evidence until now,” Luna told Watters, adding recent declassification efforts are “going to be generational changing.” . . .

Luna’s task force is set to convene a hearing on the JFK files on April 1, and she has promised to travel to Dallas and interview “first-hand witnesses” from the six-decades-old assassination.​

Yeah, because, of course, a news organization that had "video" of the news event of the century would just keep it secret instead of broadcasting it (among numerous other problems with the story).

 

[Axxman300]

The "Secret" video is TV news footage that has been in the public domain since 1963, and the guy they claim ins Oswald is actually a man named Lovelady. This has been a BS CT claim since the 1970s, and has been debunked since the 1970s. The scope of this lady's stupidity is on a galactic scale.

 

[SpitfireIX]

It didn't occur to me that she might have heard this from someone who'd mangled the story of the Bill Lovelady photo (not video), which was taken by an AP photographer. If she did, that's bad, because I'll bet she'll never accept the truth; she'll undoubtedly keep insisting that the video exists, and NBC is hiding it, or else "they" destroyed it.

There were no TV cameras in Dealey Plaza^*; those were relatively scarce, bulky, and hard to move, and portable video recorders hadn't even been invented yet. The TV cameras were set up at the Trade Mart in anticipation of the President's arrival and connected to vans with their antennas pointed back toward the local stations. Any recordings of those broadcasts were made on non-portable equipment in the studios.
_______
^*And yet, in a classic example of the Mandela Effect, lots of people who were old enough could have sworn they remembered having watched the assassination live on TV, obviously conflating their memories of the day with having later watched the Zapruder film. That reminds me; I should ask my boss to tell me about that day. He was 12.5 years old and home from school watching TV, recovering from burns he'd gotten when some idiot threw gasoline on a fire he was standing near. He's mentioned that a couple of times, but never gone into any great detail about what he remembers.

 

[Axxman300]

It didn't occur to me that she might have heard this from someone who'd mangled the story of the Bill Lovelady photo (not video), which was taken by an AP photographer. If she did, that's bad, because I'll bet she'll never accept the truth; she'll undoubtedly keep insisting that the video exists, and NBC is hiding it, or else "they" destroyed it.

There were no TV cameras in Dealey Plaza^*; those were relatively scarce, bulky, and hard to move, and portable video recorders hadn't even been invented yet. The TV cameras were set up at the Trade Mart in anticipation of the President's arrival and connected to vans with their antennas pointed back toward the local stations. Any recordings of those broadcasts were made on non-portable equipment in the studios.
_______
^*And yet, in a classic example of the Mandela Effect, lots of people who were old enough could have sworn they remembered having watched the assassination live on TV, obviously conflating their memories of the day with having later watched the Zapruder film. That reminds me; I should ask my boss to tell me about that day. He was 12.5 years old and home from school watching TV, recovering from burns he'd gotten when some idiot threw gasoline on a fire he was standing near. He's mentioned that a couple of times, but never gone into any great detail about what he remembers.

In 1963, TV news used 35mm film cameras in the field, and the in-studio cameras were about the size of a vending machine. BUT there were plenty of cameras in Dealey Plaza in the hands of citizens like Zapruder, and other along with the TV press who were park of the motorcade. Those guys jumped out and went to work.

If you're bored you can look up:

The Bell Film
Pascall Film
Couch Film
Wiegman Film
Daniel Film
Martin Film

All shot on 8 or 16mm home movie cameras.

Of the news footage, the most significant is the Alyea Film, shot by a local news cameraman who followed the cops into the TSBD and filmed the search of the Sixth Floor, and recorded the discovery of the Carcano. He tossed the film can out an open window to a waiting reporter below who raced back to the studio to process the film to get it on the air. Yes kids there was a time when reporters where awesome enough that Superman wanted to be one.

There are better versions of the Alyea Film, but this one starts on the 6th Floor:


Of all the films, only three captured the assassination. The Bell Film captured the TSBD face with the sniper's window wide open, and someone moving just inside.

The thing is the public saw still images of the three films through the Warren Commission books, and others. No one saw the Zapruder Film until Geraldo Rivera aired it on TV in 1975. Outside of rare documentaries, the public didn't have direct access to the film until just after the Oliver Stone movie when the remastered Zapruder Film was released on VHS.

 

[Allen773]

Anyone else have a favorite JFK assassination theory that you don’t have proof of but just find interesting to speculate about?

Mine is that Oswald really hated Connally and wanted him dead similar to how he hated General Walker, whereas he killed Kennedy simply because he was the President—in other words, the pure symbolism and infamy that would come with assassinating ANY American President. And the motorcade offered him a golden opportunity for a twofer, killing both the Governor and the President.

He almost succeeded—Connally was badly wounded—but the Governor’s life was ultimately saved by the Parkland doctors, whereas the President was a dead man at the moment of impact from the third shot.

 

[Pope130]

Anyone else have a favorite JFK assassination theory that you don’t have proof of but just find interesting to speculate about?

Mine is that Oswald really hated Connally and wanted him dead similar to how he hated General Walker, whereas he killed Kennedy simply because he was the President—in other words, the pure symbolism and infamy that would come with assassinating ANY American President. And the motorcade offered him a golden opportunity for a twofer, killing both the Governor and the President.

He almost succeeded—Connally was badly wounded—but the Governor’s life was ultimately saved by the Parkland doctors, whereas the President was a dead man at the moment of impact from the third shot.

I read a variation on this years ago. The theory goes that Oswald was actually shooting at Connally and hit Kennedy by accident. The motive was that Connally, then Secretary of the Navy, was responsible for downgrading Oswald's General Discharge to a Dishonorable Discharge from the USMC after Oswald defected to Russia. At least that theory, unlike most, has an understandable motive attached.

 

[SpitfireIX]

Another variation: Connally, as governor, had blocked Oswald from joining the Texas National Guard.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

Lauren Boebert just confused Oliver Stone with Roger Stone in a hearing.

 

[SpitfireIX]

Well, they're both paranoid, they're both charlatans, and they both push CTs, so I guess it wouldn't be that hard of a mistake to make.

 

[Pacal]

Anyone else have a favorite JFK assassination theory that you don’t have proof of but just find interesting to speculate about?

Mine is that Oswald really hated Connally and wanted him dead similar to how he hated General Walker, whereas he killed Kennedy simply because he was the President—in other words, the pure symbolism and infamy that would come with assassinating ANY American President. And the motorcade offered him a golden opportunity for a twofer, killing both the Governor and the President.

He almost succeeded—Connally was badly wounded—but the Governor’s life was ultimately saved by the Parkland doctors, whereas the President was a dead man at the moment of impact from the third shot.

Wasn't there a book published 30+ years ago that actually suggested that Oswald's target was in fact Connally?

My favorite JFK conspiracy theory is that JFK hired Oswald to kill Jackie Kennedy so he could marry Marilyn Monroe. But sadly for JFK it went all wrong.

 

[Allen773]

Last week, the historian Alexis Coe testified at a hearing for the House Task Force on the JFK assassination. Some excerpts from her testimony, via her Substack:

The title [of today's hearing} uses charged words: obstruction, obfuscation, deception. But in the 132 days since the JFK assassination records were released, not even conspiracy theorists claim it upended the Warren Commission.

No hidden truths. No real disclosures. No shocking revelations. This wasn’t history disrupted—it was history remastered: a 60th anniversary re-release with better resolution and the same ending.

There is something unprecedented in the files: Unredacted Social Security numbers and private information of living Americans. I’ve never seen anything like it—but given that most quality control has been fired, like the State Department’s Historical Advisory Committee, I’m afraid it’ll become the new normal.

I hope we talk about public trust--and what appears to fit into a larger pattern. The Kennedy Center is no longer bipartisan, the Rose Garden stripped of its historic character, USAID was gutted. Taken altogether, it’s hard not to see this as an attempt to reduce a consequential leader to a grotesque spectacle—his legacy defined by how he died, not what he did.

Congress Is Broken From Afar—And Soul-Crushing Up Close

I came for a sad time, not a long time

alexiscoe.substack.com

 

[mikegriffith1]

Last week, the historian Alexis Coe testified at a hearing for the House Task Force on the JFK assassination. Some excerpts from her testimony, via her Substack:

Congress Is Broken From Afar—And Soul-Crushing Up Close

I came for a sad time, not a long time

alexiscoe.substack.com

Ms. Coe either hasn't been following the task force/Luna hearings or is peddling misinformation. I recommend Jeff Morley's substack to get factual information about the disclosures that have come from the hearings and from the documents released by the task force:

JFK Facts | Jefferson Morley | Substack

Authoritative journalism that seeks to clarify the causes of JFK's assassination and to abolish the official secrecy that still surrounds it. Click to read JFK Facts, a Substack publication.

jfkfacts.substack.com

Morley is a former investigative reporter for the Washington Post and the author of two books on the CIA and JFK.

Another informative source on the Luna hearings is the Kennedys and King website:

The Nothingburgers? Nope.

Did the MSM really read the newly declassified JFK files? Or are they just ignorant with how they connect to the established facts of the JFK case? In this limited review, we show how relevant they are. The Nothingburgers? Nope. The MSM is at it again. The New York Times, for example, is saying...

www.kennedysandking.com

 

[Allen773]

Ms. Coe either hasn't been following the task force/Luna hearings or is peddling misinformation. I recommend Jeff Morley's substack to get factual information about the disclosures that have come from the hearings and from the documents released by the task force:

JFK Facts | Jefferson Morley | Substack

Authoritative journalism that seeks to clarify the causes of JFK's assassination and to abolish the official secrecy that still surrounds it. Click to read JFK Facts, a Substack publication.

jfkfacts.substack.com

Morley is a former investigative reporter for the Washington Post and the author of two books on the CIA and JFK.

Another informative source on the Luna hearings is the Kennedys and King website:

The Nothingburgers? Nope.

Did the MSM really read the newly declassified JFK files? Or are they just ignorant with how they connect to the established facts of the JFK case? In this limited review, we show how relevant they are. The Nothingburgers? Nope. The MSM is at it again. The New York Times, for example, is saying...

www.kennedysandking.com

Morley is a conspiracy theorist pretending to be a "Just Asking Questions" guy. Not an honest source, much like this joke of a task force.

Oswald did it and he acted alone.

 

[Axxman300]

Ms. Coe either hasn't been following the task force/Luna hearings or is peddling misinformation. I recommend Jeff Morley's substack to get factual information about the disclosures that have come from the hearings and from the documents released by the task force:

JFK Facts | Jefferson Morley | Substack

Authoritative journalism that seeks to clarify the causes of JFK's assassination and to abolish the official secrecy that still surrounds it. Click to read JFK Facts, a Substack publication.

jfkfacts.substack.com

Morley is a former investigative reporter for the Washington Post and the author of two books on the CIA and JFK.

Another informative source on the Luna hearings is the Kennedys and King website:

The Nothingburgers? Nope.

Did the MSM really read the newly declassified JFK files? Or are they just ignorant with how they connect to the established facts of the JFK case? In this limited review, we show how relevant they are. The Nothingburgers? Nope. The MSM is at it again. The New York Times, for example, is saying...

www.kennedysandking.com

Morley is a crank. Luna-Tic is a grifter who sits in Congress.

Unlike you, I read most all of the relevant documents from the files. Here's documented evidence:

The CIA Mexico City Station recorded Oswald's visits to the Cuban and Soviet Embassies, and a phone call to a KGB agent named Kostikov about meeting him at a party the night before. Oswald was trying to get a visa ti Cuba, and hoping his one-time defector status would give him some pull with the Russians to push the Cubans into speeding up the process. The CIA Mexico City Station cabled Langley stating that Oswald, a one-time defector, had visited both embassies, and was talking to a KGB agent socially, and they advised this information be passed along to the FBI.

Langley never directly tells the FBI about Oswald's visit to Mexico City. *(FBI agent James Hosty DID learn of Oswald's visit from the Customs Agency, but he failed to notify the Secret Service about Oswald's presence in Dallas, and specifically his place of employment at the TSBD on the parade route, but that's another story).

After the assassination both the FBI and CIA work overtime to link Oswald to anybody (the Cubans, the Russians, the Mafia, Cuban Exiles). There are three separate memos from Hoover demanding field offices in Dallas, Los Angeles, New Orleans, and Miami shake down their criminal informants as hard as possible to squeeze out a link.

The only documented cover-up is to keep JAMWAVE and other CIA activities in Central and South America secret, and all of that is in writing.

No second gunman, no secret CIA/FBI/Hunt Oil/Chicago Mob/ *insert your evil-doer-here conspiracy. Just a loser with an overpowered rifle.