Walk me through this, curtain rod fans

[Steve M. Galbraith]

At this point, after 60 years of investigations by several generations of Americans in the government and out, the conspiracists are reduced to pulling out their conspiracy "trading cards." The "What about this, huh?" and "What about that, huh?" cards. The only conspiracist answers now are so absurd and convoluted that the more reasoned conspiracists (there are some) know they can't promote them, they are unbelievable. So they are reduced to the "whatabout?" trading cards. Asking questions is fine; but how many more times do we need to answer them?

This is the JFK assassination forum not the "Oswald Didn't Do It Forum" or the "What About This? Forum." If at this point someone isn't offering a theory as to what happened it's only because they are embarrassed to do so.

[Lance Payette]

Hello??? You quote me but your responses then sound as though you're talking to someone else.

I have to agree with Michael here, and it seems that John does as well. It would never even have occurred to me that Randle was describing the package in any way other than one end being in Oswald's right hand and the other extending toward the ground

Why even mention it and why would I even care about that? I think your completely wrong. For an attorney to not see it, I think is odd. The WC investigators were attorneys.

I have NO IDEA what you're talking about here. The WC attorneys, of course, saw Randle as she testified - saw what she was doing when she said "carried it this way." I assume what she was doing was holding down her right hand and arm at her side and swinging her arm as one does when one walks.

Unless I've completely misinterpreted something, you've been feuding with Michael on the basis of your belief that Oswald somehow had the rifle in both hands when Randle said "carried this way" with one end "almost touching the ground." If that isn't your belief, feel free to correct me but Michael certainly seems to have thought this was your belief in a discussion that spanned numerous posts on another thread.

This is the same old argument being repeated over and over with no resolve. I have no problem seeing the problem with Linnie May’s ever-changing story. She was protecting her brother who she knew had no involvement.  Neither did Capasse and Iocaletti have a problem seeing it. What do you think is the reason for their bizarre interpretations? They get what it means. and you don't, instead believing in a 27 inch long package?

Have you read ANY of this thread?

I - i.e., Lance - supposedly believe in a 27" package. WHAT???

I believe it was me - i.e., Lance - who SUGGESTED Randle was covering for her brother. In any event, I fleshed out that notion EXTENSIVELY on this thread. I said I was willing to chalk up Frazier's and Randle's estimates to innocent mistakes but that deflecting suspicion from Frazier was a distinct possibility.

“That would have him lurching along like the Hunchback of Notre Dame.”

That is exactly the point. He would have been if the bag was 27 inches and him carrying it the way it was described.  It is all about “and the bottom he carried it this way”, “and it almost touched the ground as he carried it”. Think of her statement as being from the ground up, not the top down. She always returned to describing the bag almost touching the ground.

Your mistake, I believe, is in insisting that "carried this way" means Oswald had his left hand on the package. Randle said nothing about his left hand, as Michael keeps pointing out. I believe, and as far as I know so does pretty much everyone else, that Randle is simply describing Oswald holding the top of the package in his right hand with the bottom end nearly reaching the ground, and that "carried this way" simply and reasonably means "with the package hanging down toward the ground as he walked along."

If you believe the bag was 27 inches long, how does LHO get the rifle to the TSBD? You do not need to disassemble the rifle to get it to fit in the bag.

 The answer is:

Yes, to being bent over, if the bag is 27 inches long

No, to being bent over, if the bag is 42 inches long.

This was Linnie's very first statement on the bag.
FBI 11/22

RANDLE stated that about 7:15 a.m., November 22, 1963, she looked out of a window of her residence and observed LEE HARVEY OSWALD walking up her driveway and saw him put a long brown package, approximately 3 feet by 6 inches, in the back seat area of WESLEY FRAZIER's 1954 black Chevrolet four door automobile. Thereafter, she observed OSWALD walk to the front, or entrance area, of her residence where he waited for FRAZIER to come out of the house and give him a ride to work.

 
 She changed her estimation to support her brother but not her description of how it was being carried. She cannot describe him carrying a 27 inch bag the same way as a 42 inch bag and the rifle almost touched the ground. 

The 12/2 FBI statement has him carrying it even different yet. Thumb down like a baseball player instead of thumb up like John’s depiction. Which is what everyone has assumed.

The WC witness statements are riddled with answers, like hers, that contradict other answers. JBC and Nellie, A Rowland, Hickey, Kellerman, etc. The inconsistency in their answers is how they showed they were changing their stories, and their statements were somewhat unreliable. They do not pass any judgement on JBC and Nellie but instead reveal their inconsistencies on key points. 

Read her statement the way she stated it without a bias. Her description of how the bag was being carried confirms it was longer than 27 inches.

The basis of her testimony was he gripped the top and carried the bottom. Two very different actions.

This may be the most bizarre single post I've ever responded to.

I - i.e., Lance - HAVE NEVER SUGGESTED IN ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM that I thought the bag was 27".

We have discussed Randle's original three-foot estimate EXTENSIVELY on this thread. I have MADE CLEAR that I believe this was a correct estimate and that her changed story was to conform to her brother's story, either simply not to make him look silly or to deflect suspicion away from him. WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT???

I believe the disassembled rifle was in the package and that the package was the length of the disassembled rifle. IS THAT CLEAR? I believe it's unlikely that Oswald assembled the rifle in the Paine garage and carried it full-length because (1) this would have been very risky and (2) the package would have less plausibly resembled curtain rods. IS THAT CLEAR?

Regardless of the length of the package, if he "carried the bottom" with his left hand and the bottom "almost touched the ground," he would have been bent over like Quasimodo. That is not only physically silly, but it is not the most plausible or reasonable interpretation of what Randle said.

To repeat: I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT OR HOW YOU COULD POSSIBLY BE SO CONFUSED AS TO THINK I HOLD THE POSITIONS YOU APPATRENTLY THINK I DO.

It truly appears to me that you are quoting me but actually responding to someone else because NOTHING you have said meshes with ANYTHING I have said throughout umpteen posts on this thread.

Oh, lest I forget: Your "baseball bat" analogy. The 12/2/63 FBI report simply says that McNeely "grasped the TOP OF THIS SACK with his RIGHT HAND, much like a right handed batter would PICK UP A BASEBALL BAT when approaching the plate." Perhaps you are not a baseball fan, but right-handed batters do not carry a bat in both hands as they approach the plate. They carry it like I believe Randle was describing - knob end in hand, bat dangling toward ground. Randle specifically said at the WC that the bulky end was toward the ground and that Oswald "gripped" the other end in his right hand "like this," which would indeed have him holding the package precisely the way a batter holds the knob end of a bat as he approaches the plate. (Interestingly, the average length of an MLB bat is 34", and the rules allow bats up to 42".)

Are we done, or do you require further clarification of what I - i.e., Lance - have been saying throughout this entire thread?

[Zeon Mason]

No palm and multiple fingerprints found at the top of the bag and none found at the bottom of the bag either.

Just that one 1/2  inch index finger print at the top and a palm print and multiple fingers at the middle of the bag.

If the bag was carried at the top with just the one hand then the pressure of that hand to keep the  8lb bag slipping should have left a palm and multi finger print at the top of the bag just like the middle of bag palm print.

If carried as Frazier thought he saw: the bag being pressed into the palm (cup) of the right hand,  then there  should have been some significant print left there also.

So what we have is a curious discrepancy where prints were found on the bag, vs where 2 witness say they saw a hand carrying the bag.

Is the explanation due to the time factor of when the 2 witness saw the bag carried at about 8:00 am? Evaporation of those prints over a 4.5 hour period of time, vs  at 12:20pm , if Oswald carried the bag with rifle now assembled in it , to the SE window, then he gripped the middle of the bag leaving the middle palm print, which did NOT evaporate because the bag was found within about 1 hour after the shots?

[John Iacoletti]

Someone who is truly and honestly neutral on what happened, is agnostic on what occurred that day in Dallas and has no set opinion on whether it was Oswald alone or a cast of thousands, would, on the bag question (and others), challenge every explanation as to what it contained and not just one. Viz., that it contained a rifle, that it contained curtain rods, that it contained a lunch, or that it contained something else. Each theory would be challenged.

Maybe because it's only the rifle fans who present their imaginary stories as fact.

[John Iacoletti]

I thought that's what I was trying to do with this entire thread?

OK, the package contained curtain rods: Answer the questions I posed and explain how that makes sense.

OK, it contained a lunch: Answer the questions I posed and explain how that makes sense.

OK, it contained something other than a rifle, curtain rods or a lunch: Answer the questions I posed and explain how that makes sense.

Then we'll assess the plausibility of each explanation and see if any reaches the same level of plausibility as the disassembled rifle.

We will reach some level of conviction that the package contained whatever the most plausible explanation suggests it contained.

That's how reasoning works, except in conspiracy world.

The problem is that none of it has any plausibility.  It's all guesswork.

[John Iacoletti]

It is a reasonable inference that Oswald brought the gun to work that morning:

A. Oswald's gun was found at the murder scene.

Except you forgot to prove that it was "Oswald's gun".

B. Oswald's gun was last seen in Ruth Paine's garage wrapped in a blanket made with brown and green fibres. 

Except you forgot to prove that it was a rifle in the blanket (especially the Carcano).

C. Oswald was in Ruth Paine's garage the night before the murder 

And the evidence for that?  Ruth Paine noticed that a light was left on.   

D. Oswald took a long package wrapped in brown paper to work on the day of the murder. 

Not long enough

E.  Oswald told Buell Frazier that it contained curtain rods for his room.

Not relevant to a rifle.

 
F. Oswald's room did not need curtains. 

You don't know that. And curtain rods aren't curtains.

G. No curtain rods were found at the TSBD and Oswald did not leave the TSBD carrying a long package. 

Who looked for curtain rods at the TSBD? And nobody knows what Oswald left with.

H. A long paper package similar to the package described by Buell Frazier and Linnie Mae Randle was found in the murder scene

Was it really?  All we got was a photo with a dotted line drawn on it.

and it was found to have Oswald's palm print on it.

Irrelevant to a rifle.

It also contained fibres that were indistinguishable from fibres from the blanket in which the rifle had been wrapped.

a) fibers cannot be uniquely matched to a specific object, like a blanket
b) there is a photo showing the wrapper lying on top of the blanket on a table

Any juror could easily draw the inference that Oswald took his gun to work on the morning of 22Nov63.

Only if manipulated with a series of false, misleading, or unsubstantiated claims like the above.

[John Iacoletti]

5. Marina said the disassembled rifle was wrapped in a blanket in the Paine garage. There was no reason for her to lie, especially since she thought it was still there.

You were right when you said you're not an expert on the assassination.  Marina never said anything about a disassembled rifle.

6. Michael Paine testified about the contents of the blanket, his testimony being a near-perfect match for the disassembled rifle and his estimate of the length being 37".

His testimony was a perfect match for camping equipment.  He even made a drawing.

17. Oswald said he had brought a lunch, again making Frazier appear to be a liar; when Holmes asked if it had possibly been brought in a large grocery sack, Oswald quickly agreed with this highly improbable suggestion because he knew he had been carrying a large package.

Holmes never said he asked Oswald if it had possibly been brought in a large grocery sack.

18. The likelihood of someone carrying a sandwich and apple in a large grocery sack is close to nil; Oswald offered no explanation for where the sack might be.

When did anybody ask him where the sack might be?  Once you start getting into "likelihood" arguments you are outside the realm of evidence.

And before you try to shift the burden yet again, I haven't (and I won't) concoct a similar chain of "reasoning" for a lunch or for curtain rods, because I don't claim to know what was in the package. You can either prove it was a disassembled rifle or you cannot.

[John Iacoletti]

Eyewitnesses make mistakes all the time, which is precisely why eyewitness testimony is widely regarded as unreliable.

And then you proceed to make an argument almost completely based on eyewitness testimony, or even worse, what you think "is plausible".