Applying Logic and Critical Thinking to the JFK Assassination

[Andrew Mason]

This is the first post of several that I will present in this thread.

In numerous surveys done in the U.S. and Europe over the years, including fairly recently, the percentage of people who have said they believe JFK was killed by a conspiracy has ranged from 56% to 85%, with about 6% to 10% undecided. Even in the 1970s, surveys found that a sizable majority of Americans did not buy the Warren Commission's lone-gunman story. I think one of the reasons for the rejection of the single-assassin scenario is that it does not hold up when analyzed with logic and critical thinking.

The evidence is what one needs to base conclusions on. The evidence exists whether it is logical or not for it to exist.  Logic has more to do with assessing probabilities that the evidence that exists is wrong. Critical thinking is important in making sure one is not fooling oneself due to one's assumptions and biases. It is about looking objectively at the evidence, without bias or preconceived ideas, to reach conclusions that rationally follow from the evidence.

Let us begin by looking at the key issue of motive.

-- The lone-gunman theory is unable to provide a believable, credible motive for its alleged lone gunman. By all accounts, Oswald liked JFK. No one ever claimed to hear Oswald voice any intent to harm JFK. If Oswald's motive was to make a name for himself in history, why did he vehemently deny shooting JFK? If Oswald had killed JFK to make himself famous, one would logically expect that he would have proudly taken credit for JFK's death and announced his justifications to the world, but he did no such thing.

A lone-nut does not need a rational motive. So if you are assuming there must be a rational, credible motive you have just admitted you are approaching this with a pre-conceived idea about the assassin - that he cannot be a lone-nut.  I thought you were urging critical thinking.

But Oswald behaved in a completely different manner. At every opportunity, whether under police interrogation or when speaking with journalists, he fiercely denied shooting anyone, and he told the police--and his brother--that the evidence against him was fraudulent, even going so far as to claim he was a patsy.

You were expecting the assassin to admit guilt?  You forgot to mention that his brother never believed him.

Furthermore, according to the lone-gunman theory, Oswald tried to shoot right-wing extremist General Edwin Walker in April 1963. Now why, oh why, oh why would the same allegedly pro-Soviet and pro-Cuban Marxist who supposedly tried to shoot the ultra-conservative General Walker turn around and shoot the center-left JFK, who was publicly trying to make peace with the Soviets, especially given the fact that JFK had publicly disgraced Walker and had relieved Walker of command? That makes no sense.

If you are assuming Oswald did only what made sense you are abandoning critical thinking.  Given that Oswald did not speak Russian and had never been to a communist country, did it make sense for Oswald to move to the USSR in October 1959 after his discharge from the US Marines?  Did it make sense for him to file a request with the US Embassy in Moscow in October 1959 to revoke his US citizenship?

-- The conspiracy theory of the assassination can provide concrete, documented motives for its suspects. It has been amply documented, including with filmed interviews, that certain CIA officers who worked with the anti-Castro Cubans, along with some of the anti-Castro Cubans themselves, viscerally hated JFK and regarded him as a traitor. And we have two credible anecdotal accounts of CIA officers proudly admitting to close associates that they played a role in JFK's death.

One of the best books on evidence that some CIA officers and anti-Castro Cubans were involved in the assassination is former HSCA investigator Gaeton Fonzi's 1993 book The Last Investigation.

There is even stronger evidence of motive for certain Mafia elements. The historical record is clear, and no reputable scholar denies, that the Kennedy administration was waging an intense war against the Mafia, and that the Mafia viewed JFK and RFK as threats to their very existence.

Wiretaps recorded some Mafia leaders expressing a wish to see JFK dead before the assassination, and two informants reported that they heard Mafia leaders talking about a plot to kill Kennedy in the months leading up to JFK's death. Moreover, after the assassination, a government informant heard Mafia kingpin Carlos Marcello admit to playing a role in the assassination.

Three of the best books on the evidence that certain Mafia elements were involved in the assassination are Anthony Summers' 2013 book Not in Your Lifetime: The Defining Book on the J.F.K. Assassination (updated version), Lamar Waldron's 2013 book The Hidden History of the JFK Assassination, and Dr. David Kaiser's 2008 book The Road to Dallas: The Assassination of John F. Kennedy.

Summers was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2012 and has twice won the Crime Writers' Association's award for top non-fiction works. In recognition of his scholarship, Summers was made a Fellow of the Literary & Historical Society of University College Dublin.

Waldron is a respected journalist and historian. His historical research and non-fiction books have won praise from Publishers Weekly, Vanity Fair, the Boston Globe, the San Francisco Chronicle, and major publications in Europe. His research has been the subject of two prime-time specials on the Discovery Channel, produced by NBC News. He has been featured on CNN and the History Channel.

Kaiser is a respected historian. When Kaiser wrote his JFK book, he was a professor of history at the Naval War College. He later held professorships at Harvard University, Williams College, and Carnegie Mellon University. He earned his B.A. and Ph.D. in history from Harvard. He is now retired. (On a side note, Kaiser concluded that the HSCA's acoustical evidence was valid.)

If you are truly engaged in critical thinking, you might be wondering why they present no evidence - just hearsay anecdotes; and why these stories appear only in books written by people who make money off these kinds of stories.  You might also ask why they were able to bury the "truth" for 60+ years without a peep from anyone despite the need, conservatively, of hundreds if not thousands of people to carry out the plan and fabricate the evidence against Oswald and to cover it up afterward. 

[Kevin Balch]

Didn’t the bullet fired at Walker hit part of the window frame?

[John Corbett]

Didn’t the bullet fired at Walker hit part of the window frame?

I recently saw footage of the investigators going over the crime scene and it showed a bullet hole at the very bottom of the sash with the window open about a foot and a half. The fixed iron sights were zeroed at 200 meters meaning at such a short range, the rifle would shoot high, so if Oswald was trying to shoot Walker through the open window, it is understandable why he would miss high and strike the sash. I doubt he would have used the scope for such a short shot but even if he did, it would have to be adjusted for the short range. I don't even know if the scope could be adjusted down to the range Oswald was firing at.

[Mark Ulrik]

Didn’t the bullet fired at Walker hit part of the window frame?

Yes, and it nicked the window pane in the process.

[Mark Ulrik]

Didn’t the bullet fired at Walker hit part of the window frame?

This link might still be valid for another week:

https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/28924-oswald-and-the-shot-at-walker-redressing-the-balance/#findComment-495251

[Michael T. Griffith]

The evidence is what one needs to base conclusions on. The evidence exists whether it is logical or not for it to exist.  Logic has more to do with assessing probabilities that the evidence that exists is wrong. Critical thinking is important in making sure one is not fooling oneself due to one's assumptions and biases. It is about looking objectively at the evidence, without bias or preconceived ideas, to reach conclusions that rationally follow from the evidence.
A lone-nut does not need a rational motive. So if you are assuming there must be a rational, credible motive you have just admitted you are approaching this with a pre-conceived idea about the assassin - that he cannot be a lone-nut.  I thought you were urging critical thinking.You were expecting the assassin to admit guilt?  You forgot to mention that his brother never believed him.
If you are assuming Oswald did only what made sense you are abandoning critical thinking.  Given that Oswald did not speak Russian and had never been to a communist country, did it make sense for Oswald to move to the USSR in October 1959 after his discharge from the US Marines?  Did it make sense for him to file a request with the US Embassy in Moscow in October 1959 to revoke his US citizenship?
If you are truly engaged in critical thinking, you might be wondering why they present no evidence - just hearsay anecdotes; and why these stories appear only in books written by people who make money off these kinds of stories.  You might also ask why they were able to bury the "truth" for 60+ years without a peep from anyone despite the need, conservatively, of hundreds if not thousands of people to carry out the plan and fabricate the evidence against Oswald and to cover it up afterward.

You really should not try to pretend you understand logic and critical thinking, when you plainly do not. You are a diehard lone-gunman theorist who is determined to reject all contrary evidence no matter what. Some of your arguments make me wonder if you even actually understood my statements. Anyway, a few points in reply:

-- Oswald spoke a fair amount of Russian before he went to Russia, and his Russian got even better after living there for over 2 years. The fact that you don't know this indicates your research has been inadequate.

-- No, Oswald was not a nut. He was actually highly intelligent and a voracious reader. You assume he was a nut and then you accuse me of not thinking critically because I did not also assume this! I did not assume this because it is not true, because the evidence shows he was highly intelligent.

Oswald’s tested IQ scores generally ranged from 103 in the fourth grade to 118-119 on subsequent tests. His 118-119 scores put him in the above-average category. Historical and psychiatric evaluations consistently classified his overall intelligence as above average. Notes British scholar Anthony Summers,

. . . evidence suggests Oswald was far from stupid. School records show that in several subjects he was three years ahead of his class, and his intelligence was noted by his officers in the Marine Corps. (Not in Your Lifetime: The Defining Book on the JFK Assassination, p. 77).

It is odd and rather comical that you would cite Oswald's defection as evidence of his supposed mental illness while ignoring the many aspects of his defection that indicate he was a false defector working for U.S. intelligence.

-- Yes, I would certainly expect Oswald to have admitted his guilt if he had killed JFK to make a name for himself in history.

Now that we've established that Oswald was not a nut, what is your theory about his motive? The only motive offered by your side is that Oswald was desperate to make a name for himself in history because he felt so insecure, wronged, and under-appreciated.

-- Your problematic description of critical thinking seems to imply that you believe the majority of Americans and Europeans have failed to use logic and critical thinking with the JFK assassination and that that's why you are in the minority.

-- Your claim that pro-conspiracy JFKA books "present no evidence" proves that you've read few if any of them. A key component of critical thinking is to genuinely and thoroughly consider both sides of an argument before reaching a conclusion. You clearly have not done that.

-- I notice you brushed aside the reports of CIA officers and Mafia leaders admitting involvement in JFK's death, even though some of them are based on wiretap evidence. You have no problem accepting "hearsay anecdotes" that reflect negatively on Oswald, no matter how unlikely many of them are and even though a number of them have been proven to be false, but you wave aside accounts of CIA officers and Mafia leaders admitting guilt in the JFK because most of them are "hearsay anecdotes."

You even say that "these stories appear only in books written by people who make money off these kinds of stories." Oh, so former HSCA investigator Gaeton Fonzi was just out to make money with his book? And, BTW, some of those accounts come from informant reports and wiretaps.

One of your comments deserve special notice, because it reveals your bias and lack of research:

You might also ask why they were able to bury the "truth" for 60+ years without a peep from anyone despite the need, conservatively, of hundreds if not thousands of people to carry out the plan and fabricate the evidence against Oswald and to cover it up afterward.

One, where do you get "60+ years"? Fonzi's book, for example, came out in 1993, 30 years after the assassination and was substantially based on information that he obtained during the 1970s. Many of the accounts of Mafia leaders being involved in the assassination surfaced in the 1970s and 1980s--and, again, some were based on informant reports and wiretaps.

Two, it would not have required "hundreds if not thousands of people to carry out the plan and fabricate the evidence against Oswald and to cover it up afterward." That timeworn strawman has been knocked too many times to count. You guys just keep repeating the same debunked arguments over and over again, thread after thread, reply after reply, no matter how many times they're debunked before your very eyes.

The core problem here is that you simply don't know what you're talking about and you're too biased to do some actual research to educate yourself on the other side of the story.

There's a reason that only about 1/4 to 1/3 of the Western world buys your version of the assassination, and it's not because everyone who disagrees with you is failing to use logic and critical thinking--it's because you are failing to use logic and critical thinking.

[John Corbett]

-- No, Oswald was not a nut. He was actually highly intelligent and a voracious reader. You assume he was a nut and then you accuse me of not thinking critically because I did not also assume this! I did not assume this because it is not true, because the evidence shows he was highly intelligent.

The term "nut" is not a clinical term so it can mean different things to different people. I don't believe Oswald was legally insane but he clearly had a twisted mind. Anyone who believes in political assassinations of duly elected leaders is clearly not right in the head.