JFK Assassination Forum
JFK Assassination Discussion & Debate => JFK Assassination Discussion & Debate => Topic started by: Michael T. Griffith on January 28, 2021, 01:53:26 PM
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Josiah Thompson's long-awaited new book Last Second in Dallas (University Press of Kansas, 2021), published last week, presents powerful evidence in support of the HSCA acoustical evidence, which proved there were at least two gunmen and at least four shots. Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence account for 98 pages of the book and include separate contributions by BBN scientists James Barger and Richard Mullen. Some highlights:
* Thompson utterly, totally, and completely destroys the NRC panel's report. Among other things, Thompson presents evidence that the panel rigged their PCC test to avoid confirming the acoustical evidence.
* Thompson demolishes the claim that the Fisher "I'll check it" transmission is not crosstalk. He proves, partly via a PCC test done by Mullen, that it most certainly is crosstalk, and that it proves that the dictabelt's gunfire impulses occurred during the assassination. Interestingly, Thompson notes that years ago Jim Bowles himself recognized the Fisher "I'll check it" transmission as a crosstalk transmission, and that the NRC panel attempted to conceal this fact in its report.
* Thompson once and for all resolves the problem of the Decker "hold everything" transmission, proving that it is irrelevant, that it is not time synchronous, and that it must be the result of an overdub that was produced during the copying process. Thompson, summarizing Barger's new research on the subject, presents evidence that Decker's "hold everything" transmission and the two Bellah transmissions were recorded during a separate recording session and not during the session that recorded the three scientifically established crosstalk transmissions, and that, crucially, they were recorded at a different recording speed.
* Thompson establishes that neither the HSCA nor the NRC panel used the original dictabelt recording, and that the extant recording is a second- or third-generation copy.
* Interestingly, Thompson reveals that when the NRC panel sent Dr. Barger a draft of their report, Barger replied with an 8-page critique, and that the panel declined to publish Barger's critique and did not address his objections in their report.
This is a very simplified, general summary of Thompson's chapters on the acoustics evidence. Dozens of the pages in those chapters get rather technical, but Thompson does a good job of putting the information in layman's terms. I have not mentioned some of Thompson's best evidence because doing so would require technical explanations that would take several paragraphs. Barger's and Mullen's chapters are a bit tougher reading, but even a newcomer will be able to grasp their significance.
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A few other points:
* Thompson makes a good case that the dictabelt recording contains five gunshot impulse patterns, and that G. Robert Blakey's reason for discounting the fourth rear gunshot impulse pattern is invalid. Thompson acknowledges that four shots from behind indicates two gunmen firing from the rear. He suggests the other rear gunman was in a building near the TSBD, such as the Dal-Tex Building.
* Thompson makes a strong case that the acoustics, along with photographic evidence and eyewitness accounts, support a shot at Z328, and that this shot, not Z313, was the final shot. He devotes an entire chapter to making the case for a shot at Z328.
* Thompson shows that the evidence clearly identifies Officer McClain's motorcycle as the bike that recorded the sounds found on the dictabelt recording.
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Mr Dale Myers: "the motorcycle officer in the Dorman film has a white object attached to the inside lower-left corner of his windshield. A similar white object is visible on McLain's motorcycle twelve seconds earlier, as depicted in the Hughes film" (emphasis added!)
Now I seem to recall that a few years back someone pointed out----------------quite correctly---------------that this white object (paperwork, evidently) is indeed similar... but different. It is fastened to the windshield at one angle in the Hughes film (on the left, below), and at another in the Dorman film (on the right, below).
(https://images2.imgbox.com/9f/21/HTdY7UbO_o.jpg)
Just sayin'
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Mr Dale Myers: "the motorcycle officer in the Dorman film has a white object attached to the inside lower-left corner of his windshield. A similar white object is visible on McLain's motorcycle twelve seconds earlier, as depicted in the Hughes film" (emphasis added!)
Now I seem to recall that a few years back someone pointed out----------------quite correctly---------------that this white object (paperwork, evidently) is indeed similar... but different. It is fastened to the windshield at one angle in the Hughes film (on the left, below), and at another in the Dorman film (on the right, below).
Just sayin'
Before you say anything else, you should read Thompson's book. McClain's bike recorded the gunfire.
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Before you say anything else, you should read Thompson's book. McClain's bike recorded the gunfire.
I look forward to doing so, Mr Griffith, but in the meantime............. do you believe that this is one and the same man-----------------
(https://images2.imgbox.com/9f/21/HTdY7UbO_o.jpg)
-----------------or has Mr Myers pulled a shenanigan?
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I look forward to doing so, Mr Griffith, but in the meantime............. do you believe that this is one and the same man-----------------
-----------------or has Mr Myers pulled a shenanigan?
I think Dr. Thomas soundly refuted Myers' research on the acoustical evidence years ago.
Myers' research on the Tippit shooting is also extremely problematic.
https://miketgriffith.com/files/malice.pdf
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I think Dr. Thomas soundly refuted Myers' research on the acoustical evidence years ago.
Myers' research on the Tippit shooting is also extremely problematic.
https://miketgriffith.com/files/malice.pdf
That doesn't answer my question. Is one and the same man?-----------------
(https://images2.imgbox.com/9f/21/HTdY7UbO_o.jpg)
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That doesn't answer my question. Is one and the same man?-----------------
Like I said, before you say anything else on the acoustical evidence, read Thompson's book. Thompson, with the help of Barger and Mullen, destroys the NRC panel's objections and proves that the five gunfire impulse patterns are in fact gunfire and that they were recorded during the assassination in Dealey Plaza.
I do not put any stock in Myers' photographic interpretations. His interpretations of key photographic evidence in the Tippit shooting and key parts of the Zapruder film are slipshod and dubious.
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FWIW, I added an article to my website last year trying to push Tink away from the Dictabelt nonsense. No matter what the tapes show, the photographic evidence proves beyond all doubt that McLain was not where the acoustics evidence requires him to be. As a consequence, I was hoping Tink would come up with a counter argument claiming the tape was recorded by McLain or someone else, but that they weren't where the acoustics experts thought they were. Upon reading his book, however, I see he avoided the photo evidence re McLain altogether, and focused on the shortcuts and/or deceptions of the Ramsey Panel.
So, no, the acoustics evidence has not been confirmed. The Ramsey Panel has been trashed, yes.
But the photo evidence still proves McLain was not where those pushing the acoustics needs him to have been.
http://www.patspeer.com/debunking-the-dictabelt (http://www.patspeer.com/debunking-the-dictabelt)
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Not to mention the fact that the vast majority of witnesses heard three clearly audible shots.
How does Thompson's work deal with that?
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I think Dr. Thomas soundly refuted Myers' research on the acoustical evidence years ago.
Myers' research on the Tippit shooting is also extremely problematic.
https://miketgriffith.com/files/malice.pdf
I read Myer's book, With Malice, years ago, and felt like tossing it out the window into the trash can as I read. As you've pointed out the book is full of falsehoods. A couple of items that really irk me are Myer's treatment of the information surrounding the BEIGE Jacket that was WHITE when it was first reported to have been "found". And the absolute BS about the wallet that was allegedly found near the Tippit squad car.
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FWIW, I added an article to my website last year trying to push Tink away from the Dictabelt nonsense. No matter what the tapes show, the photographic evidence proves beyond all doubt that McLain was not where the acoustics evidence requires him to be. As a consequence, I was hoping Tink would come up with a counter argument claiming the tape was recorded by McLain or someone else, but that they weren't where the acoustics experts thought they were. Upon reading his book, however, I see he avoided the photo evidence re McLain altogether, and focused on the shortcuts and/or deceptions of the Ramsey Panel.
So, no, the acoustics evidence has not been confirmed. The Ramsey Panel has been trashed, yes.
But the photo evidence still proves McLain was not where those pushing the acoustics needs him to have been.
http://www.patspeer.com/debunking-the-dictabelt (http://www.patspeer.com/debunking-the-dictabelt)
Dr. Thompson feels that Dr. Thomas has already sufficiently dealt with the issue of the photographic evidence regarding McClain's location.
https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Essay_-_The_Bike_With_the_Mike.html
https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Essay_-_Debugging_Bugliosi.html
Dr. Thompson's approach is to show that the dictabelt recording absolutely, positively contains at least four gunshot impulse patterns that were recorded in Dealey Plaza during the assassination, and that one of the shots came from the grassy knoll. So someone's microphone in Dealey Plaza recorded those gunshots, whether it was McClain's, Beilharz's, Price's, or someone else's mike. Personally, I find Dr. Thomas's research on the bike with the mike convincing.
The gunshot impulse patterns match the unique patterns of gunshots fired in Dealey Plaza. They have the echo speed and locational characteristics of shots that were fired in Dealey Plaza and that were recorded by a motorcycle moving in Dealey Plaza. Dr. Aschkenazy put it this way:
Mr. ASCHKENASY. Congressman Sawyer at that time asked the question, if somebody were to tell me that the motorcycle was not at Dealey Plaza--and he was in fact somewhere else and he was transmitting from another location--my response to him at that time was that I would ask to be told where that location is, and once told where it is, I would go there, and one thing I would expect to find is a replica of Dealey Plaza at that location. That is the only way it can come out. (5 HSCA 592)
I think it would be helpful to keep in mind that even the NRC panel admitted that there was only a 7% probability that the numerous locational correlations between the dictabelt gunshots and the test-firing gunshots were the result of chance (https://miketgriffith.com/files/hscaacous.pdf, pp. 12-13).
As for the argument that the vast majority of plaza witnesses said they heard three shots and that therefore this disproves the acoustical evidence, it is hard to believe that anyone is still pushing this patently silly, lame argument after all we now know about how the FBI and the DPD manipulated the eyewitness accounts, given that we now know that the shots in two shot groups came within fractions of a second of each other, and given that the Zapruder film plainly and clearly shows reactions to at least five shots.
https://miketgriffith.com/files/6shots.htm
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Dr. Thompson feels that Dr. Thomas has already sufficiently dealt with the issue of the photographic evidence regarding McClain's location.
https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Essay_-_The_Bike_With_the_Mike.html
https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Essay_-_Debugging_Bugliosi.html
Dr. Thompson's approach is to show that the dictabelt recording absolutely, positively contains at least four gunshot impulse patterns that were recorded in Dealey Plaza during the assassination, and that one of the shots came from the grassy knoll. So someone's microphone in Dealey Plaza recorded those gunshots, whether it was McClain's, Beilharz's, Price's, or someone else's mike. Personally, I find Dr. Thomas's research on the bike with the mike convincing.
The gunshot impulse patterns match the unique patterns of gunshots fired in Dealey Plaza. They have the echo speed and locational characteristics of shots that were fired in Dealey Plaza and that were recorded by a motorcycle moving in Dealey Plaza. Dr. Aschkenazy put it this way:
I think it would be helpful to keep in mind that even the NRC panel admitted that there was only a 7% probability that the numerous locational correlations between the dictabelt gunshots and the test-firing gunshots were the result of chance (https://miketgriffith.com/files/hscaacous.pdf, pp. 12-13).
As for the argument that the vast majority of plaza witnesses said they heard three shots and that therefore this disproves the acoustical evidence, it is hard to believe that anyone is still pushing this patently silly, lame argument after all we now know about how the FBI and the DPD manipulated the eyewitness accounts, given that we now know that the shots in two shot groups came within fractions of a second of each other, and given that the Zapruder film plainly and clearly shows reactions to at least five shots.
https://miketgriffith.com/files/6shots.htm
Hi Mike, I haven't read Thompson's new book,( and I probably won't, because I imagine it to be too "scholarly" for me.) However, Since Thompson has established himself to be a totally honest and candid man by admitting his error in his views of the Z film. ( At least he now believes that he was mistaken about the movement of JFK's head, and candidly accepts his error ) I'll accept that he knows what he's talkin about.....and leave it up to men like you to sort it out.
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As for the argument that the vast majority of plaza witnesses said they heard three shots and that therefore this disproves the acoustical evidence, it is hard to believe that anyone is still pushing this patently silly, lame argument after all we now know about how the FBI and the DPD manipulated the eyewitness accounts, given that we now know that the shots in two shot groups came within fractions of a second of each other, and given that the Zapruder film plainly and clearly shows reactions to at least five shots.
Over 160 witnesses described hearing three shots. Not just a majority but the vast majority of witnesses. Your assertion that the FBI and DPD manipulated all these witness accounts is childish. There's no point in asking you to provide evidence that any of these witnesses, in the decades that have passed, complained about having this aspect of their witness account altered. How can you justify the assertion these witness accounts were altered in the way you suggest? You can't.
You just want to get lost in the technical details of something that has already been blown out of the water.
Provide one scrap of evidence that any witness specifically mentioned having this aspect of their witness account changed. There is an unbelievably large witness group involved here, let alone the fact they would have mentioned it to friends and family.
You're talking nonsense.
"...given that we now know that the shots in two shot groups came within fractions of a second of each other,"
Do "we"?
I'd like to hear about this.
What's the one piece of hard evidence that confirms this assertion?
"...and given that the Zapruder film plainly and clearly shows reactions to at least five shots."
You tried to push this baloney in your thread - "Reactions to 6 Shots in the Zapruder Film".
The theory you put forward was crushed to such an extent you had to abandon your own thread!
I urge any reader to check this thread out.
You think you can just slide by these insurmountable problems to get lost in the technical argument but that won't be happening. Thumb1:
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Over 160 witnesses described hearing three shots. Not just a majority but the vast majority of witnesses. Your assertion that the FBI and DPD manipulated all these witness accounts is childish. There's no point in asking you to provide evidence that any of these witnesses, in the decades that have passed, complained about having this aspect of their witness account altered. How can you justify the assertion these witness accounts were altered in the way you suggest? You can't.
You just want to get lost in the technical details of something that has already been blown out of the water.
Provide one scrap of evidence that any witness specifically mentioned having this aspect of their witness account changed. There is an unbelievably large witness group involved here, let alone the fact they would have mentioned it to friends and family.
You're talking nonsense.
"...given that we now know that the shots in two shot groups came within fractions of a second of each other,"
Do "we"?
I'd like to hear about this.
What's the one piece of hard evidence that confirms this assertion?
"...and given that the Zapruder film plainly and clearly shows reactions to at least five shots."
You tried to push this baloney in your thread - "Reactions to 6 Shots in the Zapruder Film".
The theory you put forward was crushed to such an extent you had to abandon your own thread!
I urge any reader to check this thread out.
You think you can just slide by these insurmountable problems to get lost in the technical argument but that won't be happening. Thumb1:
Provide one scrap of evidence that any witness specifically mentioned having this aspect of their witness account changed.
Geeez, Dan, I can't believe that you'd invite scorn upon yourself like this... Have you never heard of Julia Ann Mercer......
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Provide one scrap of evidence that any witness specifically mentioned having this aspect of their witness account changed.
Geeez, Dan, I can't believe that you'd invite scorn upon yourself like this... Have you never heard of Julia Ann Mercer......
Erm...as I understand it Julia Ann Mercer never even heard the shots so how could she have her testimony changed regarding how many shots there were?
Go easy with the scorn ;)
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The paragraphs below are segments from chapter 18 of the first edition of Dr. Thomas’s book Hear No Evil (2010). Chapter 18 deals with the identification of the patrol bike with the open mike. Dr. Thomas spends considerable time in that chapter dealing with Dale Myers’ research on the position of McClain’s bike. To get the full impact of Dr. Thomas’s arguments, you need to read the entire chapter, because, as mentioned, the paragraphs below are only some of the paragraphs in the chapter.
A film of the President's visit compiled by Dallas Cinema Associates
contains a segment showing the motorcade on Main Street approaching
Dealey Plaza. Patrolman McLain, identified by his license plate number 352,
appears in the film at a position just a little back from one of the convertible
press camera cars (tenth in the motorcade) and just ahead of a car with
dignitaries.5 Farther up Main Street one can easily discern the motorcycles
flanking the presidential limousine. Importantly, there are no other
motorcycles between McLain and the President on the left-hand side of the
motorcade as it approached Dealey Plaza.
In testimony to the Assassinations Committee in December, 1978, McLain
confirmed the identification of himself in these films and other photographs.6
Importantly, McLain testified that his motorcycle radio had a chronic
problem with a sticky microphone relay. Of equal importance, McLain
recalled that he was in Dealey Plaza on Houston Street between Main and
Elm streets when he first heard the gunfire.7 The former patrolman also
testified that he followed the motorcade on to Parkland Hospital after the
shooting, and in fact, personally assisted Jacqueline Kennedy out of the
presidential Iimousine.8 His testimony on all counts was consistent with the
sounds on the DPD tapes, and, McLain's motorcycle was the only unit that
was in a position in the motorcade to have been at the acoustically defined
locations at the time of the shooting.
When McLain testified to the Assassinations Committee in 1978 his
testimony was supportive of the evidence on the police recordings. But over
time McLain came to recant his statements. In contradiction to his sworn
testimony, McLain later protested that his could not have been the
motorcycle with the open microphone. He would not have been tuned to the
wrong channel, he argued, and what's more, he now claimed, he did not even
proceed with the motorcade to Elm Street but had stopped on Houston
Street.9 Consequently, much of the dispute over McLain's location derives
from his memory of events.
Aside from McLain's account, all of the critics who have asserted that his
motorcycle was not at the acoustically required locations rely on an
erroneous time-line of the gunfire relative to the Zapruder film. . . .
The television documentary sponsored by ABC News entitled "Beyond
Conspiracy," relied on, but did not show, a computer animation of the "Leon
Zapruder" film, which it erroneously billed as the "only known film of the
murder." It touted the digital simulation of the assassination as providing
"concrete evidence" that refuted the acoustical analysis. Actually, the
computer simulation was developed by a known critic of JFK conspiracy
theories named Dale Myers, the author of a book on the Tippit murder.
Myers' analysis included several amateur films, but in particular the Hughes
film18 which showed McLain just before the shooting. Myers concluded that
the last frame showing McLain, at a distance of 174 ft south of the first
acoustically required location, corresponded to a point in time only a half
second before the first shot. If that were true then McLain would have had to
travel in excess of 200 mph to arrive at the requisite spot in time.
Unfortunately, the ABC documentary, first airing in 2004, was well into the
rerun phase before the details of Myers' analysis were made available by him
in 2007.19 Following the release of the documentary in 2004 an ad hoc group
of researchers attempted to duplicate Myers' analysis by synchronizing the
Hughes and Zapruder films. The group failed to reach a firm consensus, there
being no direct connection found between the films. As did Hughes,
Zapruder had filmed a sequence, stopped, and filmed another. The first 132
frame sequence of Zapruder's film anticipated the President's arrival.
Zapruder stopped filming, then began anew at frame 133 with the
Presidential limousine already on Elm Street. The end of the Hughes film,
and the beginning of the Zapruder sequence, both show Car-5 entering the
intersection at Elm and Houston. Thus, the Hughes sequence with McLain
appears to start at about the same time that Zapruder's sequence begins, plus
or minus a couple of seconds. These seconds are crucial.
Because there are no depicted events indisputably common to both films, the
key to establishing synchronization between the Hughes film and the
Zapruder film are the motorcade vehicles, such as Car-5, but also the press
cars on Houston Street. Because the press cars are in all instances further
along the route in the Zapruder film than they are in the Hughes film, the real
variable, and in essence the critical unknown, was the speed of the motorcade
during the un-filmed interval. The Hughes film is discontinuous. One
sequence shows the presidential limousine turning on to Elm Street from
Houston. The next sequence consists of 72 frames (about four seconds) that
show McLain traversing the intersection at Main and Houston (Fig. 18.5).
McLain appears in the middle two seconds of the filmed sequence. . . .
If Hughes' memory is accurate, then McLain had around six seconds to reach
the first acoustically identified position about 174 feet away from where he is
last seen. But, of course, eyewitness estimates of short lengths of time can be
inexact and one cannot rely on their memories as providing definitive
evidence. That is, Hughes' guesstimate of five seconds may easily have been
off by a few seconds at least. To frame the issue in a more exact perspective;
at a speed of I 0 mph, which equals 15 ft per second, McLain needed about
11 seconds to reach the acoustically specified position. But at 20 mph (30 ft
per sec) he could have covered the distance in only five and-a-half seconds,
in accord with Hughes' memory. Or, at speeds between 21-29 mph, McLain
could have covered the distance in as little as 3-5 seconds. Thus, in order to
conclude that the filmed evidence provided "concrete" proof refuting the
acoustical evidence one would have to prove that the Hughes film was
exposed less than a few seconds before the first shot. For the ABC
documentary, Myers had calculated that interval as only a half second. . . .
Another key assumption made by Myers was that during the un-filmed
interval between the Hughes and Zapruder film, the motorcade on Houston
Street had traveled at a steady, even pace of around 9 mph. Indeed, Car-8 can
be seen moving for an instant in the Zapruder film in the vicinity of frame
220 and its speed was around 9 mph. At that point it was about 56 ft north of
where it was seen in the Hughes film and if it had maintained a speed of 9
mph then McLain would have had Jess than two seconds to reach the
acoustically defined position. But how reliable was the assumption that the
instantaneous speed could be extrapolated over several car lengths, given that
the cars ahead were traveling slower? In particular, the Secret Service car
(Car-5) is seen in the Hughes film at the head of the column as it begins its
tum on to Elm Street. In the Zapruder film the front bumper of Car-5 comes
in to line with a lady dressed in red standing on the comer at Z-144. The
corresponding rear bumper reaches the lady in red exactly 34 frames later at
Z-178. Thus, at 18.3 frames per second it took the car 1. 9 seconds to go one
car length. The hard-top Mercury had a length of 215 inches, about 17.9 ft,
thus it had a speed of 9.4 ft per second, which equals 6.4 mph. How could the
cars behind it sustain a 40% greater velocity?
Clearly, it is much more likely that the cars were moving in accordion-like
fashion caused by slowing through the turns and speeding up in the
straightaways as the speed measurements indicate. Moreover, speeds of 6-9
mph would be achieved as much if not more by applying the brakes than the
accelerator, resulting in a slow and surge motion. That in fact, is the way the
police officers remembered it. . . .
The "coaches in a train" analogy is an accurate description of the model used
by Myers' for his animation. The point is that in this crucial analysis Myer's
had relied on inference and assumptions, not measurements. Actual
measurements show that the cars slowed through the turns and sped up on the
straightaways. A better inference would be, as anyone with experience with
traffic jams knows, those in the back of the pack slow much more than those
in front.
But it was not just the speed of the motorcade that Myers' had inferred, it
was the position of the cars. The exact position of Car-S as depicted in the
Hughes film was particularly ambiguous. It was one of the contentious points
that the ad hoc group had been unable to satisfactorily resolve. Myers
claimed to have used an exacting process, labeled "epipolar geometry," to
position the cars in his animation. Epipolar geometry is a method of stereo
imaging. To do stereo imaging one has to have two different camera views of
the same object, in this case, the cars on Houston Street. But because the
objects are in motion, the stereo pair analysis requires that they be
photographed at the same time, not at different times at different places.
More importantly, the "epipole" in the analysis is the depiction of the
opposing camera in each respective image of the object being measured. But
at no point does Zapruder appear in the Hughes film nor does Hughes appear
in the Zapruder film. So there are no epipoles and therefore no epipolar line
which is the baseline used in the triangulation process of an epipolar analysis.
Meyers had not done an epipolar analysis, at least not in the key analysis
involving the location of the cars on Houston Street.
Inasmuch as Myers could not have done as exacting an analysis as he had
claimed he had done, exactly how had Myers located Car-5 on Houston
Street. Presumably Myers had used simple "line of sight" procedures to align
the cars as seen in the Hughes frames with inanimate landmarks in the
camera's view in order to fix their positions on Houston Street. But the
accuracy of such procedure depends heavily on an accurate placement of said
camera. And while Zapruder's position was known, Hughes' position was
not. Although Myers' cites an exact position for Hughes at precisely 15.5 ft
west of the center line of Houston Street and 8.8 ft south of the center line of
Main Street, this was another inference and not one fixed by photographic
evidence. Researchers have yet to find a photograph depicting Hughes.
Although there is a consensus among analysts that Hughes was in line with
the middle of the three lanes of east bound traffic on Main Street, Myers had
arbitrarily placed Hughes in line with the inner most traffic stripe, that is, as
far north as might reasonably be inferred. Others have placed Hughes on the
opposite side of the lane, 11 ft away. Shifting Hughes' position northward
similarly shifts the projected position of the cars to the north, and effectively
shortens the timeline.
Through this combination of error (the timing of the first shot) and inferences
favorable to his thesis (on the speed and position of the cars) Myers made it
appear that McLain had only about one half of a second to cover the 174 ft
between his last filmed location and the acoustically required position.
Applying the actual speed of the cars of about 6-9 mph (about two seconds to
travel a car-length), and setting the cars only a half car length further south
adds about two seconds to the timeline, giving McLain about 3.5 seconds to
reach the specified location, requiring an average speed of 33 mph rather
than the 400 mph claimed by Myers. However, these calculations assume the
"coaches in a train" model for the motorcade. If the cars were slowing and
surging as the escort patrolmen remembered, then McLain had even more
time to reach the required location. Ultimately, the Hughes film only proves
that McLain was in a position some several seconds before the first shot such
that at a reasonable rate of speed he could have been in the right place at the
right time. In the Hughes film his motorcycle is traveling at 14.7 mph as he
made the turn from Main on to Houston, much faster than the cars in the
motorcade, and one might presume that he would speed up as he came out of
the turn. In that regard one has to consider again the information in the
Zapruder film. McLain either sped up, and caught up to Car-6 near the
intersection, or he slowed down to stay next to Car-l 0. And because Myers
had aligned the first shot to Z-frame-160 instead of the correct Z-175, the
critical information regarding the juxtaposition of the Mayor's car, sixth in
line, to the acoustically identified locations was also missed. This car was
particularly important in relating yet another film to the acoustical
hypothesis.
This film was shot from inside the book depository by an employee named
Elsie Dorman. The Dorman film shows a motorcycle cop arriving at the
intersection of Elm and Houston just ahead of the eleventh car in the
motorcade (Fig. 18.6). Because this motorcycle is in the same juxtaposition
with respect to the motorcade as McLain was in the Hughes' film, some
researchers jumped to the conclusion that it must be McLain. But
synchronizing the Dorman film to the Zapruder film shows that this
conclusion was premature. Moreover, whereas the Dorman film does not
show the positions where the suspect motorcycle was supposed to be, it
shows virtually all of the area where it was not supposed to be, and thus by
the process of elimination, indicates that McLain could only have been where
the acoustical evidence required; provided that the patrolman in the film is
not McLain.
The Dorman film is a discontinuous film with at least four sequences
showing the motorcade. Dorman was in a window on the fourth floor of the
book depository such that she was looking down on the signal light
controlling traffic at the intersection (Fig. 18.7). In one critical sequence the
film shows a portion of the motorcade on Elm Street ending just as the fifth
car in the line, the Secret Service car, enters from the left. Exasperatingly, the
predicted motorcycle position at that time was just behind Car-5. When she
resumed filming, Dorman's next sequence begins with the camera's view in
the same location but now shows the back half of Car-6, the Mayor's car, on
Elm Street, directly underneath the signal light. Thus maddeningly, the film
does not show the area of the street between Car-5 and Car-6 which is
exactly where McLain is predicted to be. This sequence lasts about seven
and-a-half seconds during which Dorman panned left towards the
intersection. Five seconds into this sequence a motorcycle cop appears and
over a 40 frame interval (about 2.5 sec) can be seen on Houston Street
arriving at the intersection with Elm. If the cop is McLain he is clearly out of
position and the acoustical evidence is invalidated just as Myers claims. But,
there is nothing in the physical appearance of the cop, or his motorcycle, that
would definitively identify him as McLain as opposed to the other possibility
that it is J.W. Courson, who was the next patrolman behind McLain. Here the
timing is again crucial. . . .
Both patrolmen, McLain and Courson, recounted seeing the incident with
Mrs. Kennedy and the Secret Service agent on the trunk of the car;
understandably an event that would have stuck in their memories, even if the
timing or sequence of events might not have. The officers had to have been
on Elm Street to have witnessed this event. McLain's revised version of
events in which he claimed that he saw Mrs. Kennedy on the trunk when he
had stopped on Houston Street half way between Main and Elm is thus
directly contradicted by the filmed evidence. If the cop in Dorman is
McLain, obviously he had not stopped on Houston Street, at least not at the
time that Mrs. Kennedy was on the trunk of the car as he recalled; and if the
cop is Courson, then McLain was even further down Elm Street because
Courson was behind him. In this regard, Courson's account is compelling.
"The limousine came to a stop and Mrs. Kennedy was on the back.
I noticed that as I came around the corner at Elm."22
Thus, Courson's account (not McLain's) is consistent with the timing of
events in the Dorman film, but only if the officer depicted is Courson. Of
course, no eyewitness memory can be taken as definitive. Rather it is the
hard evidence of the films that counts. And in that regard the Dorman film
provides another clue. If the officer in Dorman's film is Courson, then
McLain could only have been exactly where the acoustical evidence requires.
That is, just ahead of the Mayor's car as it is located at the start of the critical
sequence of the Dorman film.
In the end, the amateur films of the motorcade in Dealey Plaza are definitive
on the acoustical evidence only to the extent that McLain's motorcycle was
either in exactly the right place at the right time, in the vicinity of the
Mayor's car, or way back in the motorcade, and nowhere close. Assertions
to the contrary are based on unsupported inferences and miscalculations. The
ABC documentary's "concrete evidence" had feet of clay. The producers had
relied on an expert23 whose only credential was a bias against conspiracy
theories. Lost among the media hype and miscalculations is the simple fact
that the filmed evidence shows that there was a motorcycle in a position on
Houston Street before the shooting and on Elm Street after the shooting such
that at a reasonable rate of speed would have been in the acoustically
required locations; and that the only motorcycle that could have been in the
right locations, happened to be the one that had a problem with a sticky
microphone. (Hear No Evil, 2010, pp. 667-685)
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Erm...as I understand it Julia Ann Mercer never even heard the shots so how could she have her testimony changed regarding how many shots there were?
Go easy with the scorn ;)
I was referring to a witness who said that the authorities altered her account of what she had seen and reported. And there are many of them....But Mercer immediately popped into my mind.
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The paragraphs below are segments from chapter 18 of the first edition of Dr. Thomas’s book Hear No Evil (2010). Chapter 18 deals with the identification of the patrol bike with the open mike. Dr. Thomas spends considerable time in that chapter dealing with Dale Myers’ research on the position of McClain’s bike. To get the full impact of Dr. Thomas’s arguments, you need to read the entire chapter, because, as mentioned, the paragraphs below are only some of the paragraphs in the chapter.
Wow!!..... How can you keep track of the motorcycles and vehicles ???
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I was referring to a witness who said that the authorities altered her account of what she had seen and reported. And there are many of them....But Mercer immediately popped into my mind.
Yeah Walt, but I was specifically asking about the testimony of those who heard three audible shots during the assassination. There are over 160 such witnesses and Michael would have us believe that, because there is evidence of some witnesses having their testimonies altered - Mercer may be an example - then we can assume that this overwhelming majority of witnesses who heard three audible shots also had their testimonies tampered with.
Michael has to come up with this BS: because it is hard evidence that utterly refutes his wobbly theory that was so thoroughly demolished in his own thread - "Reactions to 6 Shots in the Zapruder Film".
You have misread what I've posted or misunderstood it but if you have any scrap of evidence that any of the 160+ witnesses who report hearing three shots have had their testimonies altered in this specific respect please let me know.
If you are unaware of a single instance you must surely conclude that this nonsense assertion by Michael is false, that the vast majority of witnesses did indeed hear three shots and that this indisputable, hard evidence makes a mockery of Michael's claims to five audible shots during the assassination
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Yeah Walt, but I was specifically asking about the testimony of those who heard three audible shots during the assassination. There are over 160 such witnesses and Michael would have us believe that, because there is evidence of some witnesses having their testimonies altered - Mercer may be an example - then we can assume that this overwhelming majority of witnesses who heard three audible shots also had their testimonies tampered with.
Michael has to come up with this BS: because it is hard evidence that utterly refutes his wobbly theory that was so thoroughly demolished in his own thread - "Reactions to 6 Shots in the Zapruder Film".
You have misread what I've posted or misunderstood it but if you have any scrap of evidence that any of the 160+ witnesses who report hearing three shots have had their testimonies altered in this specific respect please let me know.
If you are unaware of a single instance you must surely conclude that this nonsense assertion by Michael is false, that the vast majority of witnesses did indeed hear three shots and that this indisputable, hard evidence makes a mockery of Michael's claims to five audible shots during the assassination
the vast majority of witnesses did indeed hear three shots and that this indisputable,
Yes, you are absolutely right.... I'd say that about 98% of the witnesses who heard the explosions reported that they heard three shots....Although a significant number of them said they weren't sure that the first explosion was a rifle shot....
I'm sure that there were at least five shots fired ( maybe more) but a couple of the shots were inaudible....
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Dr. Thompson feels that Dr. Thomas has already sufficiently dealt with the issue of the photographic evidence regarding McClain's location.
https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Essay_-_The_Bike_With_the_Mike.html
https://www.maryferrell.org/pages/Essay_-_Debugging_Bugliosi.html
Dr. Thompson's approach is to show that the dictabelt recording absolutely, positively contains at least four gunshot impulse patterns that were recorded in Dealey Plaza during the assassination, and that one of the shots came from the grassy knoll. So someone's microphone in Dealey Plaza recorded those gunshots, whether it was McClain's, Beilharz's, Price's, or someone else's mike. Personally, I find Dr. Thomas's research on the bike with the mike convincing.
The gunshot impulse patterns match the unique patterns of gunshots fired in Dealey Plaza. They have the echo speed and locational characteristics of shots that were fired in Dealey Plaza and that were recorded by a motorcycle moving in Dealey Plaza. Dr. Aschkenazy put it this way:
I think it would be helpful to keep in mind that even the NRC panel admitted that there was only a 7% probability that the numerous locational correlations between the dictabelt gunshots and the test-firing gunshots were the result of chance (https://miketgriffith.com/files/hscaacous.pdf, pp. 12-13).
As for the argument that the vast majority of plaza witnesses said they heard three shots and that therefore this disproves the acoustical evidence, it is hard to believe that anyone is still pushing this patently silly, lame argument after all we now know about how the FBI and the DPD manipulated the eyewitness accounts, given that we now know that the shots in two shot groups came within fractions of a second of each other, and given that the Zapruder film plainly and clearly shows reactions to at least five shots.
https://miketgriffith.com/files/6shots.htm
The acoustics experts didn't just say the tape demonstrated four or more shots, they stated the tape picked up these shots from specific locations within the plaza at specific times. The HSCA said the bike with the mic was McLain's, and Thomas agreed.
The Z-film, Dorman film and Hughes film prove, however, that McLain was not where the HSCA said he was when the first shot was fired.
As a consequence, Thomas moved back the time of the first shot to frame 175.
But the Wiegman film and Bond 4 prove Wiegman--who was supposedly 2 cars behind McLain at the time of the first shot--was on the knoll for 7 seconds or more before McLain passed him by. Well, this makes no sense, seeing as he was on foot, and McLain was on a motorcycle.
I pointed this out to those working with Tink on his book early last year. It was too big a problem to overcome, and was subsequently ignored.
Upon reading Tink's book, moreover, it's easy to see why. He spends much of the book going after the Ramsey Panel and Alvarez specifically. And he's probably right to do so. That they may have been correct about the sounds on the tapes not being shots, to be clear, shouldn't lead us to forgive the deceptions Tink discovered in the working papers provided by Hoch.
As stated, my hope was Tink would find a way for the shots to be legit without their being recorded by McLain. I am disappointed that this was not done.
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the vast majority of witnesses did indeed hear three shots and that this indisputable,
Yes, you are absolutely right.... I'd say that about 98% of the witnesses who heard the explosions reported that they heard three shots....Although a significant number of them said they weren't sure that the first explosion was a rifle shot....
I'm sure that there were at least five shots fired ( maybe more) but a couple of the shots were inaudible....
Just out of curiosity Walt, what makes you sure there were inaudible shots?
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Quote from: Walt Cakebread on Today at 03:59:00 AM
the vast majority of witnesses did indeed hear three shots and that this indisputable,
Yes, you are absolutely right.... I'd say that about 98% of the witnesses who heard the explosions reported that they heard three shots....Although a significant number of them said they weren't sure that the first explosion was a rifle shot....
I'm sure that there were at least five shots fired ( maybe more) but a couple of the shots were inaudible....
Just out of curiosity Walt, what makes you sure there were inaudible shots?
It is astonishing to see anyone still arguing that there were only three shots because most of the witnesses reportedly only heard three shots, given that we know that the FBI and the DPD distorted what witnesses told them, given that some of the shots were fired nearly simultaneously and thus could have sounded like a single shot, given the accounts of extra shots hitting grass and pavement in Dealey Plaza (and some of those accounts are supported by photographic evidence), and given that the Zapruder film clearly shows reactions to six shots.
As for McClain, I quote from my article on the acoustical evidence:
Another claim that McClain made after he gave his HSCA testimony was that while he was still moving on Houston Street, he saw Mrs. Kennedy climb onto the trunk of the limousine. If true, this would put him in locations different from those indicated by the dictabelt recording at key times. However, McClain’s claim is unlikely. We know that Mrs. Kennedy climbed onto the limo’s trunk no more than 5 seconds after the final shot. Intervening crowds of people and structures would have been made it difficult for McClain to have seen Mrs. Kennedy on the trunk from Houston Street. But, if McClain was where the acoustical evidence places him at this time—on Elm Street—then he would have had a clear view of Mrs. Kennedy’s actions. Moreover, Patrolman Jimmy Courson, who was at least 40 feet behind McClain, said he saw Mrs. Kennedy on the trunk just as he was turning onto Elm Street. It appears that McClain changed his story in ways that would disqualify his motorcycle as the one whose mike recorded the sounds on the dictabelt tape. (https://miketgriffith.com/files/hscaacous.pdf)
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Just out of curiosity Walt, what makes you sure there were inaudible shots?
The major reason is the number of recorded bullet strikes .....
A) 2 bullets struck JFK ( possibly three )
B) 1 bullet struck Connally
C) 1 bullet stuck James Teague
D) 1 bullet struck the tuft on the south side of Elm
E) 1 bullet struck the cement curb along Elm street
f) 1 bullet struck the chrome molding
Some folks accept that some strikes were created by the same bullet.....Teague for example. Some folks believe that he was struck by a bullet that ricocheted ..... That's Possible, but not established.
The damage to the chrome molding was not caused by a light weight particle from a 6.5mm bullet..... It was struck by a heavy slow moving projectile with poor penetrating power.
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My challenge remains...
IF, as claimed, McLain was near the corner of Houston and Elm at the time of the first shot and rode his motorcycle 10-11 mph across the plaza, how is it that he's at the left of Bond 4, a photo showing cameraman Dave Wiegman (who was two cars behind McLain's supposed position at the time of the first shot, and who climbed from his car and ran towards the grassy knoll) filming the Newman family--an event that is not captured in Wiegman's film till roughly 30 seconds after the shooting?
I mean, McLain is just past Wiegman in Bond 4. And this means Wiegman was on the knoll and filming for 8-10 seconds before McLain rode past...
So how is it that the pedestrian Wiegman, who started out two cars behind McLain (should McLain have been where the acoustics requires him to have been) not only raced past McLain (who was presumed to have been on a motorcycle traveling 10 mph), but blew by him at such a velocity it required McLain seconds to catch up?
(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/proxy/j0jOQEvFZhBXopdNd6MR8K1Y9lKbS_yCB_X3BPW2PoJonQ95zhck-0FiGYpG80KvOrH5eIX3NJBk9s3ZrkjGyu3Q419PtdqBW3eMhjVC0f_DQZ05FrF6YO2pxzj65NSxwoNujxRCAIrttjc)
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It is astonishing to see anyone still arguing that there were only three shots because most of the witnesses reportedly only heard three shots, given that we know that the FBI and the DPD distorted what witnesses told them, given that some of the shots were fired nearly simultaneously and thus could have sounded like a single shot, given the accounts of extra shots hitting grass and pavement in Dealey Plaza (and some of those accounts are supported by photographic evidence), and given that the Zapruder film clearly shows reactions to six shots.
You've already made the above points and have yet to answer:
"...given that we know that the FBI and the DPD distorted what witnesses told them..."
Provide one scrap of evidence that any of the 160+ witnesses who testified to hearing three shots have had their testimony altered. To even suggest anything close to this amount of people had their testimonies altered, and not one instance has come to life is, is Tinfoil Town at it's best. I believe it's unacceptable to simply allow someone to spout such nonsense and go unchallenged.
If you cannot provide any evidence you are clearly wrong/deluded/tinfoil.
"...given that some of the shots were fired nearly simultaneously..."
Evidence for this assertion please.
It sounds like more made-up BS: to me.
How do you think you're just going to say these things and go unchallenged.
"...given that the Zapruder film clearly shows reactions to six shots."
It's astonishing you are still pushing this utter garbage considering the lesson you were taught on your own thread - "Reactions to 6 Shots in the Zapruder Film" - a thread you were forced to abandon after being schooled regarding your childish arguments.
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Many of us here know that there are some people who will never admit there is hard evidence of conspiracy, no matter how powerful and clear the evidence is. They simply will not admit it because they are, for whatever reason, absolutely determined to accept the lone-gunman theory. Even after the irrefutable proof that has emerged that the autopsy skull x-rays were altered, there are still researchers, including some multiple-gunmen theorists, who refuse to acknowledge it.
To any open-minded, reasonable person, the HSCA acoustical evidence is clear, compelling evidence that more than one gunman was involved and that more than three shots were fired. In some ways, the acoustical evidence is the most intricate, sophisticated, and impressive evidence of conspiracy in existence. The locational correlations between the dictabelt gunshot impulse patterns and the test-firing shots are stunning. Even the NRC panel admitted that their own calculations showed that the probability that those correlations resulted from chance was only 7%.
There's an old saying: If someone is determined not to believe something, no amount of contrary evidence will change his mind.
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Whatever the implications, if any, for the acoustics evidence, I am not satisfied that these two motorcycle officers are one and the same man..............
(https://images2.imgbox.com/9f/21/HTdY7UbO_o.jpg)
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There's an old saying: If someone is determined not to believe something, no amount of contrary evidence will change his mind.
You don't think the testimonies of 160+ witnesses is "contrary evidence"??
You are the one in denial.
You are the one making wild assertions about the testimonies of these witnesses being altered because it's 'contrary' to your belief.
And when asked to qualify these assertions you've got nothing.
It's almost as if you're determined not to believe this hard evidence that completely undermines your position.
Provide examples that any of these witness statements were altered. If you can't, then accept there is a serious weakness with what you are proposing.
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Many of us here know that there are some people who will never admit there is hard evidence of conspiracy, no matter how powerful and clear the evidence is. They simply will not admit it because they are, for whatever reason, absolutely determined to accept the lone-gunman theory. Even after the irrefutable proof that has emerged that the autopsy skull x-rays were altered, there are still researchers, including some multiple-gunmen theorists, who refuse to acknowledge it.
To any open-minded, reasonable person, the HSCA acoustical evidence is clear, compelling evidence that more than one gunman was involved and that more than three shots were fired. In some ways, the acoustical evidence is the most intricate, sophisticated, and impressive evidence of conspiracy in existence. The locational correlations between the dictabelt gunshot impulse patterns and the test-firing shots are stunning. Even the NRC panel admitted that their own calculations showed that the probability that those correlations resulted from chance was only 7%.
There's an old saying: If someone is determined not to believe something, no amount of contrary evidence will change his mind.
If I'm reading this correctly, Michael is claiming that there are two conspiracy facts which any open-minded reasonable person should accept--and that these two are the alteration of the x-rays and the existence of too many shots on the dictabelt.
This would appear to be a dig at me personally. Although I accept many conspiracy facts (e.g. that the single-bullet theory is garbage) and have come to embrace a number of previously overlooked conspiracy facts (e.g. that the NAA of the paraffin casts suggests Oswald did not fire a rifle on 11-22-63) the two facts cited are two that I have publicly disputed.
The irony, of course, is that the proponent of one of his preferred facts (that the x-rays were altered), has long been a disputer of his other preferred fact (that the dictabelt proves four shots were fired).
One can only wonder then if he's written Dr. Mantik and informed him that he too is close-minded and unreasonable.
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Josiah Thompson's long-awaited new book Last Second in Dallas (University Press of Kansas, 2021), published last week, presents powerful evidence in support of the HSCA acoustical evidence, which proved there were at least two gunmen and at least four shots. Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence account for 98 pages of the book and include separate contributions by BBN scientists James Barger and Richard Mullen. Some highlights:
* Thompson utterly, totally, and completely destroys the NRC panel's report. Among other things, Thompson presents evidence that the panel rigged their PCC test to avoid confirming the acoustical evidence.
* Thompson demolishes the claim that the Fisher "I'll check it" transmission is not crosstalk. He proves, partly via a PCC test done by Mullen, that it most certainly is crosstalk, and that it proves that the dictabelt's gunfire impulses occurred during the assassination. Interestingly, Thompson notes that years ago Jim Bowles himself recognized the Fisher "I'll check it" transmission as a crosstalk transmission, and that the NRC panel attempted to conceal this fact in its report.
* Thompson once and for all resolves the problem of the Decker "hold everything" transmission, proving that it is irrelevant, that it is not time synchronous, and that it must be the result of an overdub that was produced during the copying process. Thompson, summarizing Barger's new research on the subject, presents evidence that Decker's "hold everything" transmission and the two Bellah transmissions were recorded during a separate recording session and not during the session that recorded the three scientifically established crosstalk transmissions, and that, crucially, they were recorded at a different recording speed.
* Thompson establishes that neither the HSCA nor the NRC panel used the original dictabelt recording, and that the extant recording is a second- or third-generation copy.
* Interestingly, Thompson reveals that when the NRC panel sent Dr. Barger a draft of their report, Barger replied with an 8-page critique, and that the panel declined to publish Barger's critique and did not address his objections in their report.
This is a very simplified, general summary of Thompson's chapters on the acoustics evidence. Dozens of the pages in those chapters get rather technical, but Thompson does a good job of putting the information in layman's terms. I have not mentioned some of Thompson's best evidence because doing so would require technical explanations that would take several paragraphs. Barger's and Mullen's chapters are a bit tougher reading, but even a newcomer will be able to grasp their significance.
You wish.
Barger's analysis self-destructs on figure 23-6 on page 344 (it's also reproduced as Figure A-4 in Barger's appendix on page 373). To explain why, remember that the DPD recording system was designed to record only if there was a transmission to record. Normally, the system only recorded intermittently. However, at about 12:28 on November 22, 1963, a microphone on a police motorcycle stuck in the transmit position, broadcasting a steady stream of background noise back to the city hall until about 12:35. This event kept the Dictabelt machine on Channel 1 continuously recording during that interval. At the same time, Channel 2 was operating intermittently, as designed. Because of this, the channel 2 recording consistently loses time against its channel 1 counterpart during this period. If you plot the crosstalk events for channel one along one line, do the same for channel 2, and compare the resulting plots, you'll notice that Channel 2 does indeed lose time to channel one:
from the HOLD crosstalk to the BELLAH1 crosstalk
from the BELLAH1 crosstalk to the BELLAH2 crosstalk
from the BELLAH2 crosstalk to the ATTENTION simulcast
from the ATTENTION simulcast to the I'VE GOT crosstalk
The lone exception is the interval between the putative "I'll check it" crosstalk and the HOLD crosstalk. Between these two points, channel 2 gains about 80 seconds on channel 1. Channel 1 is running continuously at this point, so there is no way that channel two could gain time on channel 1 here. That makes "I'll check it" the outlier. If any external signal was somehow dubbed into the recordings, it's the channel one "I'll check it."
Mullen's critique of the NAS panel's use of PCC is more complex, but it revolves around the use of time scaling various bits of the recordings. Barger and Mullen say that there are multiple overlapping bits of power supply hum in the recording, so choosing which one (or which combination) to use for proper scaling and where to apply it looks to be a significant issue, and probably will be argued about quite a bit in higher circles.
However, PCC is not the only issue that the NAS panel raised with the alleged Fisher crosstalk. They also noted that the supposed "I'll check it" transmission is accompanied by heterodyning, indicating that this particular transmission was native to channel one. The heterodyning occurs when two transmitters attempt to transmit at the same time and interfere with each other. In this case, someone tried to transmit a message while the radio on the open mike bike was transmitting the sweet rumble of Harley Davidson. Crosstalk wouldn't generate a heterodyne like that. No heterodyning accompanies Fisher's channel 2 transmission, nor is there good reason to expect it to, so there is no reason to expect that the heterodyne was carried over from channel 2 to channel one. So far as I've read, I see no mention of this problem by Thompson, Barger, or Mullen. I'm still reading through it, but heterodyning only gets one mention in the index, and it's a trivial reference that doesn't address the NAS panel's point.
BTW, the appearance of the Decker crosstalk on channel 1 has a greater significance than one might expect. Weiss and Aschkenazy's analysis of the "GK shot" is predicated on the assumption that the impulse pattern in question is either a (synthetically-derived) gunshot or a series of random impulses (basically, noise). However, the Decker crosstalk overlies the area where the BRSA/WA "shots" are found. That changes the situation. Proper probabilistic analysis would require the Decker crosstalk be accounted for as a partial or whole source of the "shots" as well as the string-of-random-impulse hypothesis. This is true no matter the origin of "hold everything secure" on channel one.
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Although I accept many conspiracy facts (e.g. that the single-bullet theory is garbage)
"I inspected these spines and spoke to these chiropractors, and they both confirmed without any hesitation whatsoever that there was "no way" a bullet could pass between the transverse processes of C7 and T1 without striking bone." [P. Speer]
“There is an undisplaced fracture of the proximal portion of the right transverse process of T1 (or the region of the costovertebral junction)”
Quote from the report of the HSCA consulting radiologist, G.M. McDonnel, MD, in: HSCA vol.7: 219.
[see https://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0115a.htm]
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"I inspected these spines and spoke to these chiropractors, and they both confirmed without any hesitation whatsoever that there was "no way" a bullet could pass between the transverse processes of C7 and T1 without striking bone." [P. Speer]
“There is an undisplaced fracture of the proximal portion of the right transverse process of T1 (or the region of the costovertebral junction)”
Quote from the report of the HSCA consulting radiologist, G.M. McDonnel, MD, in: HSCA vol.7: 219.
[see https://www.history-matters.com/archive/jfk/hsca/reportvols/vol7/html/HSCA_Vol7_0115a.htm]
Yes, but the nose of CE 399 was unblemished prior to the FBI's cutting off a piece for testing. It becomes clear then that CE 399 did not strike the spine upon entrance to the back of JFK. This is why Baden etc propose the T-1 process was broken by the temporary cavity of the bullet, and not the bullet itself.
And that is why I consulted with the chiropractors. They confirmed what I already suspected--that there was no way a bullet could pass between the C-7 and T-1 process without actually striking the bone. John McAdams had assured me he'd tested this with dowels etc. and that a bullet could slide between the processes without hitting bone. I asked him to show me an image of his doing so. He failed to do so, and the chiropractors confirmed to me that this was nonsense.
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Yes, but the nose of CE 399 was unblemished prior to the FBI's cutting off a piece for testing. It becomes clear then that CE 399 did not strike the spine upon entrance to the back of JFK. This is why Baden etc propose the T-1 process was broken by the temporary cavity of the bullet, and not the bullet itself.
And that is why I consulted with the chiropractors. They confirmed what I already suspected--that there was no way a bullet could pass between the C-7 and T-1 process without actually striking the bone. John McAdams had assured me he'd tested this with dowels etc. and that a bullet could slide between the processes without hitting bone. I asked him to show me an image of his doing so. He failed to do so, and the chiropractors confirmed to me that this was nonsense.
Fair enough.
Personally, I don't believe CE 399 has anything to do with the actual shooting.
If the argument is the bullet couldn't have hit the spine because CE 399 was unblemished then I'm more inclined to think the bullet did pass between the C-7 and T-1 process, and this caused the fracture and that he bullet that did this fragmented on JBC's wrist.
The Magic Bullet is garbage because it relies on CE 399
The Single Bullet is just a bullet - not CE 399. A bullet passing through both men is not really that big a stretch. It is if you believe that bullet was CE 399
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Fair enough.
Personally, I don't believe CE 399 has anything to do with the actual shooting.
If the argument is the bullet couldn't have hit the spine because CE 399 was unblemished then I'm more inclined to think the bullet did pass between the C-7 and T-1 process, and this caused the fracture and that he bullet that did this fragmented on JBC's wrist.
The Magic Bullet is garbage because it relies on CE 399
The Single Bullet is just a bullet - not CE 399. A bullet passing through both men is not really that big a stretch. It is if you believe that bullet was CE 399
If CE 399 was planted then how could the planters know beforehand how many other bullets (or fragments) would be recovered? How could they have known that CE 399 would not be the "one bullet too many" that would blow the whole plot? And they planted it on a hospital gurney? They were awfully lucky that it was found.
This entire aspect of their plan (if there was one) is an enormous risk. One that makes no sense to me. Too many things to easily go wrong; too many things to have to control; too many moving parts. That doesn't prove it didn't happen; it just makes it seem very odd to me.
Second: I don't see how a bullet could strike JC in the location that it did and at (roughly) the time on the Z film that I think it did and not go through JFK. Kennedy is blocking the view for a sniper. It's impossible, as I see it, for a sniper to hit JC in the back. A sniper's view is blocked. Even if there was a second sniper then where could he have been located? It seems to me that the evidence tracing a bullet backwards would have two men in the sniper's nest? Or very close by.
If you look at the alternative explanations for the wounds on JC they make no sense to me (the bullet that struck JC's thigh, according to his doctor, barely penetrated the skin: so what happened to it?). Which leaves us with the best explanation available: one bullet hitting both men.
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If CE 399 was planted then how could the planters know beforehand how many other bullets (or fragments) would be recovered? How could they have known that CE 399 would not be the "one bullet too many" that would blow the whole plot? And they planted it on a hospital gurney? They were awfully lucky that it was found.
This entire aspect of their plan (if there was one) is an enormous risk. One that makes no sense to me. Too many things to easily go wrong; too many things to have to control; too many moving parts. That doesn't prove it didn't happen; it just makes it seem very odd to me.
Second: I don't see how a bullet could strike JC in the location that it did and at (roughly) the time on the Z film that I think it did and not go through JFK. Kennedy is blocking the view for a sniper. It's impossible, as I see it, for a sniper to hit JC in the back. A sniper's view is blocked. Even if there was a second sniper then where could he have been located? It seems to me that the evidence tracing a bullet backwards would have two men in the sniper's nest? Or very close by.
If you look at the alternative explanations for the wounds on JC they make no sense to me (the bullet that struck JC's thigh, according to his doctor, barely penetrated the skin: so what happened to it?). Which leaves us with the best explanation available: one bullet hitting both men.
I agree a single bullet went through both men, I just don't believe CE 399 nicked JFK's spine, crushed JBC's rib then shattered his wrist (at which point I believe it fragmented.)
"If CE 399 was planted then how could the planters know beforehand how many other bullets (or fragments) would be recovered?"
This is just pure speculation but clean out the limo while it's parked outside Parkland and have people scouring Dealey Plaza picking up any evidence of bullets they might find.
On his website, Pat relates an amusing story about a nurse complaining about how she wished people would stop leaving bullets lying around.
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To put the NRC panel's admission about the locational correlations into perspective, the panel's 7% probability that the correlations resulted from chance means the odds that they did not result from chance are greater than 13 out of 14.
Then, couple this with the fantastically remote odds that chance caused the correlations between the dictabelt's grassy knoll gunshot impulse pattern and the test-firing grassy knoll gunshot impulse patterns. Dr. Thomas has proved that those odds are 1 in 100,000.
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To put the NRC panel's admission about the locational correlations into perspective, the panel's 7% probability that the correlations resulted from chance means the odds that they did not result from chance are greater than 13 out of 14.
Then, couple this with the fantastically remote odds that chance caused the correlations between the dictabelt's grassy knoll gunshot impulse pattern and the test-firing grassy knoll gunshot impulse patterns. Dr. Thomas has proved that those odds are 1 in 100,000.
Both the NRC "7%" and Dr Thomas' calculations involve the comparison of an abstracted and simplified extract from the dictabelt against the results of a pen-and-paper simulation of the echos of a gunshot from the grassy knoll. An old friend of mine, who wound up with a PhD in experimental physics, once called this sort of thing "lab reality." It works well in a physics lab where experimenters filter out extraneous inputs and other noise long before the the experiment begins. It doesn't work quite as neatly given real world data where variables aren't so easily isolated. The work of Weiss & Aschkenazi, Thomas, and the NRC on this particular subject are best thought of with that reality in mind.
The bigger issue is the timing of the "hold everything" crosstalk, which invalidates any probability calculations that W&A, Thomas, and the NRC came up with.
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If CE 399 was planted then how could the planters know beforehand how many other bullets (or fragments) would be recovered? How could they have known that CE 399 would not be the "one bullet too many" that would blow the whole plot? And they planted it on a hospital gurney? They were awfully lucky that it was found.
This entire aspect of their plan (if there was one) is an enormous risk. One that makes no sense to me. Too many things to easily go wrong; too many things to have to control; too many moving parts. That doesn't prove it didn't happen; it just makes it seem very odd to me.
Second: I don't see how a bullet could strike JC in the location that it did and at (roughly) the time on the Z film that I think it did and not go through JFK. Kennedy is blocking the view for a sniper. It's impossible, as I see it, for a sniper to hit JC in the back. A sniper's view is blocked. Even if there was a second sniper then where could he have been located? It seems to me that the evidence tracing a bullet backwards would have two men in the sniper's nest? Or very close by.
If you look at the alternative explanations for the wounds on JC they make no sense to me (the bullet that struck JC's thigh, according to his doctor, barely penetrated the skin: so what happened to it?). Which leaves us with the best explanation available: one bullet hitting both men.
If CE 399 was planted then how could the planters know beforehand how many other bullets (or fragments) would be recovered? How could they have known that CE 399 would not be the "one bullet too many" that would blow the whole plot? And they planted it on a hospital gurney? They were awfully lucky that it was found.
What makes you think the bullet now in evidence as CE 399 was ever at Parkland Hospital?
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Josiah Thompson's long-awaited new book Last Second in Dallas (University Press of Kansas, 2021), published last week, presents powerful evidence in support of the HSCA acoustical evidence, which proved there were at least two gunmen and at least four shots. Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence account for 98 pages of the book and include separate contributions by BBN scientists James Barger and Richard Mullen.
Actually, the chapters on the acoustical evidence total 114 pages, not 98 pages. I failed to count chapter 11. Chapter 11 reviews the basics of the acoustics evidence: the initial screening tests done on the dictabelt impulse patterns, the subsequent screening tests, the WA analysis of the BBN screening test data, the Dealey Plaza test firing, the BBN analysis of the test firing data, and the WA analysis of the test firing data relating to the grassy knoll shot.
Chapters 12-16 focus on the Zapruder film but spend a few paragraphs here and there on the correlations between the film and the dictabelt gunshot impulse patterns.
Thompson then resumes his discussion of the acoustics evidence in chapter 17.
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Josiah Thompson's long-awaited new book Last Second in Dallas (University Press of Kansas, 2021), published last week, presents powerful evidence in support of the HSCA acoustical evidence, which proved there were at least two gunmen and at least four shots. Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence account for 98 pages of the book and include separate contributions by BBN scientists James Barger and Richard Mullen. Some highlights:
You've gotten a little over excited. Thompson has made claims. They are subject to error, and are mostly wrong.
* Thompson utterly, totally, and completely destroys the NRC panel's report. Among other things, Thompson presents evidence that the panel rigged their PCC test to avoid confirming the acoustical evidence.
No, Thompson generally misrepresents what the NRC report says, and there was no rigging of the PCC test. The PCC test showed CHECK was not crosstalk. It still does.
* Thompson demolishes the claim that the Fisher "I'll check it" transmission is not crosstalk. He proves, partly via a PCC test done by Mullen, that it most certainly is crosstalk, and that it proves that the dictabelt's gunfire impulses occurred during the assassination. Interestingly, Thompson notes that years ago Jim Bowles himself recognized the Fisher "I'll check it" transmission as a crosstalk transmission, and that the NRC panel attempted to conceal this fact in its report.
He has not proven the CHECK is crosstalk. He acts like he has, but doesn't actually have the goods there. Mullen's PCC test actually proves the opposite, for reasons that will be explained later. There is no proof anywhere in the book that the impulses occurred during the assassination.
Bowles noted CHECK as a crosstalk, and the NRC panel tested the possibility and found that it was not. There was no concealment. There was no reason to knowingly include Bowles' error in their transcript, and the transcript wasn't the evidence. The recordings are the evidence.
* Thompson once and for all resolves the problem of the Decker "hold everything" transmission, proving that it is irrelevant, that it is not time synchronous, and that it must be the result of an overdub that was produced during the copying process. Thompson, summarizing Barger's new research on the subject, presents evidence that Decker's "hold everything" transmission and the two Bellah transmissions were recorded during a separate recording session and not during the session that recorded the three scientifically established crosstalk transmissions, and that, crucially, they were recorded at a different recording speed.
Again, these are claims. They are wrong. Provably so, and that will be shown.
* Thompson establishes that neither the HSCA nor the NRC panel used the original dictabelt recording, and that the extant recording is a second- or third-generation copy.
He does no such thing. He wants to think so, and tries to cast doubt on it, but no such proof is in the book.
* Interestingly, Thompson reveals that when the NRC panel sent Dr. Barger a draft of their report, Barger replied with an 8-page critique, and that the panel declined to publish Barger's critique and did not address his objections in their report.
There was no expectation that they would publish Barger's letter in their report, and Barger's letter didn't contain anything that would debunk what the panel found.
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Dr. Thompson's approach is to show that the dictabelt recording absolutely, positively contains at least four gunshot impulse patterns that were recorded in Dealey Plaza during the assassination, and that one of the shots came from the grassy knoll. So someone's microphone in Dealey Plaza recorded those gunshots, whether it was McClain's, Beilharz's, Price's, or someone else's mike. Personally, I find Dr. Thomas's research on the bike with the mike convincing.
Dr. Thompson?
This is not true. The book contains no proof that four gunshots are on the recording. It doesn't even claim to prove that. It simply assumes that previous work showed that.
The gunshot impulse patterns match the unique patterns of gunshots fired in Dealey Plaza. They have the echo speed and locational characteristics of shots that were fired in Dealey Plaza and that were recorded by a motorcycle moving in Dealey Plaza. Dr. Aschkenazy put it this way:
No, they aren't unique matches. Don't forget, BBN threw out matches because they were impossible shooting trajectories. So if a match is a unique proof, how can throwing any out be justified? It's because BBN knew that simply getting match the way they did doesn't prove anything, and they never claimed it did.
I think it would be helpful to keep in mind that even the NRC panel admitted that there was only a 7% probability that the numerous locational correlations between the dictabelt gunshots and the test-firing gunshots were the result of chance (https://miketgriffith.com/files/hscaacous.pdf, pp. 12-13).
It wasn't random chance. That doesn't mean there was gunfire.
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You've gotten a little over excited. Thompson has made claims. They are subject to error, and are mostly wrong.
No, Thompson generally misrepresents what the NRC report says, and there was no rigging of the PCC test. The PCC test showed CHECK was not crosstalk. It still does.
He has not proven the CHECK is crosstalk. He acts like he has, but doesn't actually have the goods there. Mullen's PCC test actually proves the opposite, for reasons that will be explained later. There is no proof anywhere in the book that the impulses occurred during the assassination.
Bowles noted CHECK as a crosstalk, and the NRC panel tested the possibility and found that it was not. There was no concealment. There was no reason to knowingly include Bowles' error in their transcript, and the transcript wasn't the evidence. The recordings are the evidence.
Again, these are claims. They are wrong. Provably so, and that will be shown.
He does no such thing. He wants to think so, and tries to cast doubt on it, but no such proof is in the book.
There was no expectation that they would publish Barger's letter in their report, and Barger's letter didn't contain anything that would debunk what the panel found.
Wow, I see why McAdams loves you as a source. Your claims are erroneous. I will simply leave it to each reader to compare your comments about Thompson's acoustics chapters with the acoustics chapters themselves. People like you will never admit that the acoustical evidence proves at least four shots were fired at JFK.
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Wow, I see why McAdams loves you as a source. Your claims are erroneous. I will simply leave it to each reader to compare your comments about Thompson's acoustics chapters with the acoustics chapters themselves. People like you will never admit that the acoustical evidence proves at least four shots were fired at JFK.
That is an irrational response. I spoke the truth. If Thompson disagrees with me that does not mean I'm the one that's wrong. Same goes if you disagree with me. If you actually have a reasonable argument to make, do so.
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The lone exception is the interval between the putative "I'll check it" crosstalk and the HOLD crosstalk. Between these two points, channel 2 gains about 80 seconds on channel 1. Channel 1 is running continuously at this point, so there is no way that channel two could gain time on channel 1 here. That makes "I'll check it" the outlier. If any external signal was somehow dubbed into the recordings, it's the channel one "I'll check it."
This right here. Of course I pointed out that they were requiring channel 1 to lose time, and the fix became to postulate really absurd speed warps on channel 2.
Mullen's critique of the NAS panel's use of PCC is more complex, but it revolves around the use of time scaling various bits of the recordings. Barger and Mullen say that there are multiple overlapping bits of power supply hum in the recording, so choosing which one (or which combination) to use for proper scaling and where to apply it looks to be a significant issue, and probably will be argued about quite a bit in higher circles.
It's worse than that. Note that Mullen's PCC result requires a 1.15 time scaling, on a recording that they've elsewhere agreed is already running at the correct speed. It falsifies itself.
However, PCC is not the only issue that the NAS panel raised with the alleged Fisher crosstalk. They also noted that the supposed "I'll check it" transmission is accompanied by heterodyning, indicating that this particular transmission was native to channel one. The heterodyning occurs when two transmitters attempt to transmit at the same time and interfere with each other. In this case, someone tried to transmit a message while the radio on the open mike bike was transmitting the sweet rumble of Harley Davidson. Crosstalk wouldn't generate a heterodyne like that. No heterodyning accompanies Fisher's channel 2 transmission, nor is there good reason to expect it to, so there is no reason to expect that the heterodyne was carried over from channel 2 to channel one. So far as I've read, I see no mention of this problem by Thompson, Barger, or Mullen. I'm still reading through it, but heterodyning only gets one mention in the index, and it's a trivial reference that doesn't address the NAS panel's point.
Correct.
BTW, the appearance of the Decker crosstalk on channel 1 has a greater significance than one might expect. Weiss and Aschkenazy's analysis of the "GK shot" is predicated on the assumption that the impulse pattern in question is either a (synthetically-derived) gunshot or a series of random impulses (basically, noise). However, the Decker crosstalk overlies the area where the BRSA/WA "shots" are found. That changes the situation. Proper probabilistic analysis would require the Decker crosstalk be accounted for as a partial or whole source of the "shots" as well as the string-of-random-impulse hypothesis. This is true no matter the origin of "hold everything secure" on channel one.
Yes. Just one of the problems with the WA probability result.
Michael
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Wow, I see why McAdams loves you as a source. Your claims are erroneous. I will simply leave it to each reader to compare your comments about Thompson's acoustics chapters with the acoustics chapters themselves. People like you will never admit that the acoustical evidence proves at least four shots were fired at JFK.
McAdams isn't the only person who likes O'Dell's work. Thompseon does too, and mentions O'Dell quite favorably. Did you not actually read the book?
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McAdams isn't the only person who likes O'Dell's work. Thompseon does too, and mentions O'Dell quite favorably. Did you not actually read the book?
If you actually read the book, you'll see that Thompson commends O'Dell for his raw-data research, not for his claims about the data. Dr. Thomas has said the same thing: that O'Dell has done good raw-data work but that his claims about the data are wrong. By the way, Dr. Thomas spends several pages in Hear No Evil responding to O'Dell's claims.
Folks, go read Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence and also Dr. Barger's and Dr. Mullen's appendices, and then make up your own minds.
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There was no expectation that they would publish Barger's letter in their report, and Barger's letter didn't contain anything that would debunk what the panel found.
Hogwash. Barger's letter, among other things, presented evidence that the Decker "hold everything" transmission had to be an artifact, not crosstalk.
And one would think that the NRC panel would have at least addressed the counter arguments that Barger presented in his letter, but they ignored them because they had no answer for them.
Quote from: Michael T. Griffith on January 30, 2021, 01:05:26 PM
I think it would be helpful to keep in mind that even the NRC panel admitted that there was only a 7% probability that the numerous locational correlations between the dictabelt gunshots and the test-firing gunshots were the result of chance (https://miketgriffith.com/files/hscaacous.pdf, pp. 12-13).
It wasn't random chance. That doesn't mean there was gunfire.
More hogwash. I wonder if you understand what we're talking about here. The NRC panel was responding to BBN's powerful observation about the amazing locational correlations between the gunshot impulse patterns and the test-firing impulse patterns. By disputing one of the values that the BBN scientists assigned, the NRC panel reduced the probability of gunfire from over 99% to 93%.
Figure 22 in the BBN report shows the microphone positions along the motorcycle route where high correlations were obtained. The BBN scientists referred to this figure in explaining why there was less than a 1% probability that chance caused the time-distance correlations:
Even a brief glance at Fig. 22 shows that the microphone locations that correspond to correlations at the three times after the first impulse tend to progress uniformly forward along the motorcade route. This conclusion can be quantified statistically by the chi-square test. If the motorcycle were not moving through Dealey Plaza at the time of the assassination, the distance along the motorcade route would be a meaningless coordinate, and the microphone locations for the correlations that exceed the detection threshold would occur at random. When the chart in Fig. 22 is partitioned into a 2 x 2 table by separating time at 5 sec and distance at 250 ft, we find 1, 6, 8, and 0 correlations in the four sections reading from left to right, top to bottom. But the expected number of correlations to be found in these four sections, if the correlations occurred at random, are 4.2, 2.8, 4.8, 3.2. The value of chi-square for the observed and expected values is equal to 11.4. There is only 1 degree of freedom in this 2 x 2 table, and the probability that this large value of chi-square could occur at random is less than 1%. Therefore, there is little doubt that the distance coordinate is meaningful, and we conclude that the motorcycle was moving through Dealey Plaza and did, in fact, detect the sounds of gunfire. (BBN report, 8 HSCA 104)
The NRC panel made no effort to explain the significance of the fact that their own calculation found a 93% probability that the locational correlations occurred because the impulse patterns on the police tape were recorded by a motorcycle in Dealey Plaza during the assassination. In fact, they did not even specifically mention this. They simply noted that they determined the probability of chance was 7 percent and acted as though they had dealt a strong blow to the BBN report. Yes, 7% is more than "less than 1%," but it is still an extremely low probability of chance.
What makes the locational correlations especially powerful is that they show the correct pace and distance of movement that one would expect if the mic were on a motorcycle that was moving along the motorcade route.
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If you actually read the book, you'll see that Thompson commends O'Dell for his raw-data research, not for his claims about the data. Dr. Thomas has said the same thing: that O'Dell has done good raw-data work but that his claims about the data are wrong. By the way, Dr. Thomas spends several pages in Hear No Evil responding to O'Dell's claims.
Not really. He responds to positions that I also may hold, but I don't think he responds directly to me much.
Thompson specifically cites my work with the recordings, that's true. Of course you're only reading one side of an argument and don't know what was left out. There was more than providing raw data. The book, and Barger's work, have changed significantly from the early drafts because I had to explain to them multiple times where they were getting things wrong. An entire section full of glowing praise, about when he came to visit me, was edited out. Putting all that in would be boring, and wouldn't quite fit the story being told. The point being, you don't have the full story.
Folks, go read Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence and also Dr. Barger's and Dr. Mullen's appendices, and then make up your own minds.
They can't really do that until they read the other side, which isn't available yet.
Michael
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Hogwash. Barger's letter, among other things, presented evidence that the Decker "hold everything" transmission had to be an artifact, not crosstalk.
No, it presented ideas Barger thought would be worth pursuing. Nothing says those ideas would pay out.
And one would think that the NRC panel would have at least addressed the counter arguments that Barger presented in his letter, but they ignored them because they had no answer for them.
You are attaching too much significance to that letter. There's no reason to expect the NRC to publish a response to a private letter. And the letter wasn't a counter argument.
More hogwash. I wonder if you understand what we're talking about here.
Uh yeah, I do.
The NRC panel was responding to BBN's powerful observation about the amazing locational correlations between the gunshot impulse patterns and the test-firing impulse patterns. By disputing one of the values that the BBN scientists assigned, the NRC panel reduced the probability of gunfire from over 99% to 93%.
BBN/WA presented a probability calculation and the NRC panel responded to some of the math. It's also true that the probability result was not the probability of a gunshot. That's a basic error that BBN/WA made. They were not "amazing locational correlations". The parameters were loose enough to correlate to many possible patterns.
Figure 22 in the BBN report shows the microphone positions along the motorcycle route where high correlations were obtained. The BBN scientists referred to this figure in explaining why there was less than a 1% probability that chance caused the time-distance correlations:
After having removed correlations that didn't fit.
The NRC panel made no effort to explain the significance of the fact that their own calculation found a 93% probability that the locational correlations occurred because the impulse patterns on the police tape were recorded by a motorcycle in Dealey Plaza during the assassination. In fact, they did not even specifically mention this. They simply noted that they determined the probability of chance was 7 percent and acted as though they had dealt a strong blow to the BBN report. Yes, 7% is more than "less than 1%," but it is still an extremely low probability of chance.
It was not a 93% probability that that the patterns were recorded by a motorcycle in Dealey Plaza. You are mis-stating the results. That's not what the number meant, whatever it is. Which is why whatever that number is does not matter.
What makes the locational correlations especially powerful is that they show the correct pace and distance of movement that one would expect if the mic were on a motorcycle that was moving along the motorcade route.
Again, after removing things that didn't fit.
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If you actually read the book, you'll see that Thompson commends O'Dell for his raw-data research, not for his claims about the data. Dr. Thomas has said the same thing: that O'Dell has done good raw-data work but that his claims about the data are wrong. By the way, Dr. Thomas spends several pages in Hear No Evil responding to O'Dell's claims.
Folks, go read Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence and also Dr. Barger's and Dr. Mullen's appendices, and then make up your own minds.
Thompson still commends O'Dell in the book, and says nothing negative about him or what he's done.
As for Dr Thomas, he's in the same boat as Barger. Synchronizing the two channels on the assumption of an alleged "I'll check it" "crosstalk" requires channel 2 gaining time on channel 1 during a period where channel 1 is recording continuously and channel 2 is only recording intermittently. That is, at a time that channel 2 is not only consistently losing time on channel 1, and where channel 2 cannot possibly gain time on channel 1. This is true if you compare alleged "I'll check it" event to "hold everything," "you want me," "Attention," or "I've got" events. The timing that Barger and Thomas assert simply cannot happen the way that they claim it did.
Folks, go read Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence and also Dr. Barger's and Dr. Mullen's appendices, and then make up your own minds.
I'm not sure how many readers are really going to understand the PCC part. That's a pretty esoteric subject. As for the timing and synchronization problem, I'd have them graph out the timing data given in the book, and analyze it for themselves.
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Not really. He responds to positions that I also may hold, but I don't think he responds directly to me much.
Thompson specifically cites my work with the recordings, that's true. Of course you're only reading one side of an argument and don't know what was left out. There was more than providing raw data. The book, and Barger's work, have changed significantly from the early drafts because I had to explain to them multiple times where they were getting things wrong. An entire section full of glowing praise, about when he came to visit me, was edited out. Putting all that in would be boring, and wouldn't quite fit the story being told. The point being, you don't have the full story.
They probably removed that praise when they realized that you are not dealing objectively and accurately with the acoustical evidence. Your claim that Decker's "hold" transmission is still crosstalk indicates a refusal to face obvious fact. There are three compelling indicators that "hold" must be, absolutely must be, an overdub, not crosstalk.
Similarly, your objectivity and credibility are called into serious question by your response to the NRC panel's admission that there's only a 7% probability that the locational correlations were caused by chance. To simply say "Well, that doesn't mean the impulse patterns are assassination gunshots" suggests a fanatical refusal to deal with the evidence forthrightly and credibly.
And we haven't even talked about the remarkable correlations involving windshield distortions and N-waves. These are two more powerful evidentiary items that prove to any candid, objective observer that the suspect impulse patterns represent gunfire from Dealey Plaza during the assassination.
Nor have we talked about the WA sonar analysis of the grassy knoll shot. WA determined that the probability that chance caused the amazing correlations that they discovered was no more than 5% and was actually "considerably" lower than 5%. The NRC panel increased the probability of chance from 5% or less to 22% by making some clearly erroneous assumptions about key values. Dr. Thomas has demonstrated that if we use much more reasonable values than the ones the NRC panel used, the probability that chance caused the sonar analysis correlations plummets down to 1 in 100,000.
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They probably removed that praise when they realized that you are not dealing objectively and accurately with the acoustical evidence. Your claim that Decker's "hold" transmission is still crosstalk indicates a refusal to face obvious fact. There are three compelling indicators that "hold" must be, absolutely must be, an overdub, not crosstalk.
You assume that if I disagree with you that I'm not being objective. That's not how it works.
Similarly, your objectivity and credibility are called into serious question by your response to the NRC panel's admission that there's only a 7% probability that the locational correlations were caused by chance. To simply say "Well, that doesn't mean the impulse patterns are assassination gunshots" suggests a fanatical refusal to deal with the evidence forthrightly and credibly.
Called into question in your mind, but see above. In fact, I'm correct about that and it's you that needs to learn something about it.
And we haven't even talked about the remarkable correlations involving windshield distortions and N-waves. These are two more powerful evidentiary items that prove to any candid, objective observer that the suspect impulse patterns represent gunfire from Dealey Plaza during the assassination.
As an "objective observer", you must have done something to demonstrate the existence of these N-waves. Please post it here.
Nor have we talked about the WA sonar analysis of the grassy knoll shot. WA determined that the probability that chance caused the amazing correlations that they discovered was no more than 5% and was actually "considerably" lower than 5%. The NRC panel increased the probability of chance from 5% or less to 22% by making some clearly erroneous assumptions about key values. Dr. Thomas has demonstrated that if we use much more reasonable values than the ones the NRC panel used, the probability that chance caused the sonar analysis correlations plummets down to 1 in 100,000.
But I have talked about that, and done more than talk. It's not amazing at all. And as already mentioned, that probability calculation is not the probability of a shot from the grassy knoll. They are wrong about that. And you have a lot to learn about the subject.
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It might be helpful to point out that Michael O'Dell also denies there is acoustic evidence of multiple gunmen in the RFK assassination, and that he is in the minority among acoustics experts who have studied the recording. The experts who've determined that the recording contains many more gunshot impulses than Sirhan's gun could have fired have far more experience and qualifications than O'Dell has. I just thought this would be worth noting.
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Also acoustics won't demonstrate shots firing at the same time nor the obvious silencers that may have been used.
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Josiah Thompson's long-awaited new book Last Second in Dallas (University Press of Kansas, 2021), published last week, presents powerful evidence in support of the HSCA acoustical evidence, which proved there were at least two gunmen and at least four shots. Thompson's chapters on the acoustical evidence account for 98 pages of the book and include separate contributions by BBN scientists James Barger and Richard Mullen. Some highlights:
* Thompson utterly, totally, and completely destroys the NRC panel's report. Among other things, Thompson presents evidence that the panel rigged their PCC test to avoid confirming the acoustical evidence.
* Thompson demolishes the claim that the Fisher "I'll check it" transmission is not crosstalk. He proves, partly via a PCC test done by Mullen, that it most certainly is crosstalk, and that it proves that the dictabelt's gunfire impulses occurred during the assassination. Interestingly, Thompson notes that years ago Jim Bowles himself recognized the Fisher "I'll check it" transmission as a crosstalk transmission, and that the NRC panel attempted to conceal this fact in its report.
* Thompson once and for all resolves the problem of the Decker "hold everything" transmission, proving that it is irrelevant, that it is not time synchronous, and that it must be the result of an overdub that was produced during the copying process. Thompson, summarizing Barger's new research on the subject, presents evidence that Decker's "hold everything" transmission and the two Bellah transmissions were recorded during a separate recording session and not during the session that recorded the three scientifically established crosstalk transmissions, and that, crucially, they were recorded at a different recording speed.
* Thompson establishes that neither the HSCA nor the NRC panel used the original dictabelt recording, and that the extant recording is a second- or third-generation copy.
* Interestingly, Thompson reveals that when the NRC panel sent Dr. Barger a draft of their report, Barger replied with an 8-page critique, and that the panel declined to publish Barger's critique and did not address his objections in their report.
This is a very simplified, general summary of Thompson's chapters on the acoustics evidence. Dozens of the pages in those chapters get rather technical, but Thompson does a good job of putting the information in layman's terms. I have not mentioned some of Thompson's best evidence because doing so would require technical explanations that would take several paragraphs. Barger's and Mullen's chapters are a bit tougher reading, but even a newcomer will be able to grasp their significance.
Thompson doesn't understand the acoustics at all. He supports the gigantic erroneous conclusions of Don Thomas. Apparently, you are not aware the there is a huge chapter on the acoustics in the book Reclaiming History by Vince Bugliosi. The entire history of the Dictabelt recording and the acoustics in general is covered from the moment Mary Ferrell uttered the words "Dallas police recordings" to the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) pre-trial hearings. Bugliosi covered every , single aspect and detail--most of it it unknown to students of the assassination--within that long chapter. Not only was Thomas' theory destroyed in 2004 mostly through the work of one Michael O'Dell, but by the Ramsey panel scientists who regrouped to examine and rebut Thomas second failed attempt at claiming the HSCA was correct. Michael O'Dell, alone, disproved Thomas' first attempt to defend the conclusions reached by the BBN and W&A scientists, which Thomas produced in 2001. It's all available online. I then provided further proof that Thomas' second attmpt at defending the HSCA acoustic experts fails hugely by providing proof that Thomas' nonsense about an instance of crosstalk occurring about 3 seconds before the first "Impulse" that the HSCA acoustic experts claimed was the first of 4 gunshots they claim they found. Not only is my work at destroying Thomas's "crosstalk" claim included within the acoustics chapter in Reclaiming History, I also was published on the Internet rebutting Thomas's claim that Vince Bugliosi and I were "Bamboozled", when Thomas tried rebutting what I pointed out in Reclaiming History about the "crosstalk" instance Thomas uses as the basis of his conclusion that the HSCA was correct. Since most conspiracy buffs refuse to read Reclaiming History I suggest reading my article, which is very brief and to the point, and proves once and for always that what Thomas claims is "crosstalk" is not "crosstalk" at all. Please read: http://jfkfiles.blogspot.com/2007/07/of-crosstalk-and-bells-rebuttal-to-don.html
Mr. Griffith, Thompson's book does not prove that the HSCA were correct at all. Had I known what Mr. Thompson was doing with the acoustics for his book, I would have shared this information with him, which could have caused him to hesitate supporting the Don Thomas conclusion. He was more interested in the history of what took place when I discovered the Sheriff Decker crosstalk that disproved the gunshot theory on the Dictabelt.
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Also acoustics won't demonstrate shots firing at the same time nor the obvious silencers that may have been used.
A prospect that has remained ignored.
Consider reports from ear witnesses [including policemen] that the shots 'sounded differently' as they were fired.
I think all that acoustic stuff is a bunch of crap.
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I believe in HSCA Acoustical evidence but it doesn't capture the essence of multiple shooters. Did they get those "four sounds" yes. IMO the Acoustical evidence doesn't match just how many shots were fired and nor should they.
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I believe in HSCA Acoustical evidence but it doesn't capture the essence of multiple shooters. Did they get those "four sounds" yes. IMO the Acoustical evidence doesn't match just how many shots were fired and nor should they.
How can you believe in something that doesn't exist? There are no gunshots on that Dictabelt. The was a pharse purpetrated on the American people bythe government. Do you undertand the acoustics, or are you just agreeing with Don Thomas because he's a conspiracy writer?
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Nice to meet you and know where you stand. Have a great life.
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A rock drummer, a lawyer, and an entomologist walk into a bar…
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A rock drummer, a lawyer, and an entomologist walk into a bar…
Who are the rock drummer and the lawyer? I know who Donald Thomas so you don't have say who he is.
Does this sound even remotely close to "rock" music, John?:
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If CE 399 was planted then how could the planters know beforehand how many other bullets (or fragments) would be recovered? How could they have known that CE 399 would not be the "one bullet too many" that would blow the whole plot? And they planted it on a hospital gurney? They were awfully lucky that it was found.
What makes you think the bullet now in evidence as CE 399 was ever at Parkland Hospital?
Good point. Weren't the first observations of a bullet with a pointed tip?
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Who are the rock drummer and the lawyer? I know who Donald Thomas so you don't have say who he is.
Does this sound even remotely close to "rock" music, John?:
;)
Sorry to be off topic but nice post Steve. I believe I mentioned to you elsewhere that I saw Carl Palmer on his ELP Legacy tour in 2017 with two outstanding musicians (guitarist and bassist).
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I thought that Dr. Donald B. Thomas adequately addressed the acoustical evidence in Chapter 17 and 18 of his book Hear No Evil, See No Evil (in Chapter 18, he refers to certain film frames or photographs to confirm McLain's position). I also recall Thomas' visual presentation at a JFK Lancer Conference demonstrating that McLain was in the correct position. I believe it's available on DVD through JFK Lancer Publications.
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A prospect that has remained ignored.
Consider reports from ear witnesses [including policemen] that the shots 'sounded differently' as they were fired.
I think all that acoustic stuff is a bunch of crap.
The majority of the ear witnesses said that the first shot was different then the next two shots.....And I believe their ears were telling them the truth....The first "Shot" ( explosion) was not a weapon being discharged....It was the signal for the assassination teams to open fire. Some of the shots were not audible because they were fired from a silencer equipped weapon.
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A rock drummer, a lawyer, and an entomologist walk into a bar…
This sounds like belly laugher...... Let's hear the rest of the story.... Does the entomologist buy a glass of Raid for the Lawyer?
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The majority of the ear witnesses said that the first shot was different then the next two shots.....And I believe their ears were telling them the truth....The first "Shot" ( explosion) was not a weapon being discharged....It was the signal for the assassination teams to open fire. Some of the shots were not audible because they were fired from a silencer equipped weapon.
Trying to think of an assassination where there's a loud "signal" to begin firing. Only thing similar are the World War coordinated mass-troop attacks that were sometimes signaled to start by a flare.
Take the case of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand which happened 108 years ago tomorrow. Six assassins stationed along the route acted on their own volition. Two passed on their chance, a third threw a bomb, and the other three (including the one who would kill Ferdinand on the return journey) failed to act. No signal; just one assassin who got lucky.
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Trying to think of an assassination where there's a loud "signal" to begin firing. Only thing similar are the World War coordinated mass-troop attacks that were sometimes signaled to start by a flare.
Take the case of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand which happened 108 years ago tomorrow. Six assassins stationed along the route acted on their own volition. Two passed on their chance, a third threw a bomb, and the other three (including the one who would kill Ferdinand on the return journey) failed to act. No signal; just one assassin who got lucky.
So you think the coup had to have been performed at least once prior to 11/22/63? How silly...... is that?
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;)
Sorry to be off topic but nice post Steve. I believe I mentioned to you elsewhere that I saw Carl Palmer on his ELP Legacy tour in 2017 with two outstanding musicians (guitarist and bassist).
Hi Gerry, Thanks. You're very fortunate to have seen Carl Palmer's band. I much prefer him with a keyboardist, but the guitarist and bassist are phenomenal, and play the music of ELP outstandingly.
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The majority of the ear witnesses said that the first shot was different then the next two shots.....And I believe their ears were telling them the truth....The first "Shot" ( explosion) was not a weapon being discharged....It was the signal for the assassination teams to open fire. Some of the shots were not audible because they were fired from a silencer equipped weapon.
Why would your fantasy assassins need a "signal" at that point? They are presumably in place with their weapons. The motorcade is visible to them. Point and shoot would appear to be all that is left to be done. But they need a signal to fire? I thought your red rings were a signal? That's a lot going on at the last moment for no apparent reason.
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I thought that Dr. Donald B. Thomas adequately addressed the acoustical evidence in Chapter 17 and 18 of his book Hear No Evil, See No Evil (in Chapter 18, he refers to certain film frames or photographs to confirm McLain's position). I also recall Thomas' visual presentation at a JFK Lancer Conference demonstrating that McLain was in the correct position. I believe it's available on DVD through JFK Lancer Publications.
Hi again, Gerry.
If I may, I wrote this article in response to a piece that Don Thomas wrote about Vince Bugliosi and myself, where he claimed that Vince and I were "Bamboozled". The sad thing is, is that Thomas just doesn't know what he's talking about. As you will see, one little sound disproves Thomas' entire theory regarding a second instance of crosstalk that he claims precede the sounds BBN claimed were gunshots. This sound called "Heterodyne tones" surround the voice Thomas says is crosstalk. The voice of Sheriff Decker, which as you know is labeled "crosstalk" and it contains no heterodyne tones becuase it wasn't spoken over the channel one radio frequency, rather, it was picked up from the loudspeaker of another police radio tuned to channel two, and it was picked up by an already open microphone that is stuck open. This piece I wrote is similar to the paper Vince Bugliosi asked me to write for his book, which appears in the "End Notes" (CD Rom) of his book, but with some additional information. Some of which includes the erroneously labeled "Carillon Bell" that isn't a "bell" at all, which I proved in 1982, and the people at IBM confirmed. It's electronic interfernce which occurred throughout the channel 2 radio frequency that day, making many different sounds, and these sounds only occurred during the time when the dispatcher's microphone was keyed on. IBM produced a report on the sound, along with the topic of the entire DPD open microphone investigation. I hope you will take time and read these articles to give you a better understanding of the open microphone sequence on the Dallas police Dictabelt recording of channel one, and the Gray Audograph recording of channel two. Thanks so much.
https://jfkfiles.blogspot.com/2007/07/of-crosstalk-and-bells-rebuttal-to-don.html
https://www.jfk-online.com/acousibm00.html
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Interesting: Not one of the critics in this thread has anything close to the qualifications of Dr. Barger, Dr. Mullen, or Dr. Thomas.
And let's keep in mind that even the Ramsey Panel (NRC/NAS panel) said there was a 93% probability that the locational correlations occurred because the impulse patterns on the police tape were recorded by a motorcycle in Dealey Plaza during the assassination.
Let's also keep in mind that the Ramsey Panel admitted that by their own calculations there was a 78% chance that the 145.15 impulse pattern was caused by gunfire from the grassy knoll.
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Interesting: Not one of the critics in this thread has anything close to the qualifications of Dr. Barger, Dr. Mullen, or Dr. Thomas.
And let's keep in mind that even the Ramsey Panel (NRC/NAS panel) said there was a 93% probability that the locational correlations occurred because the impulse patterns on the police tape were recorded by a motorcycle in Dealey Plaza during the assassination.
Let's also keep in mind that the Ramsey Panel admitted that by their own calculations there was a 78% chance that the 145.15 impulse pattern was caused by gunfire from the grassy knoll.
Excuse me? What qualifications does Don Thomas have with the acoustics? His paper released in 2001 was disputed by Michael O'Dell. Why? How? Thomas was using inferior copies of channel 2 Dallas police recording to perform his timing analysis with. He used the copy made during 1964 by DPD Communications Supervisor James C. Bowles. That was a big mistake because many transmissions were missing words--which threw off the timing, some transmissions were completely absent from the Bowles copy. All because of these factors, Thomas's timing was well off base.
He concurred that Michael O'Dell was correct, and that was the end of that.
Then, he decided to try again. And he failed at his second try as well. You can read about it here: https://jfkfiles.blogspot.com/2007/07/of-crosstalk-and-bells-rebuttal-to-don.html
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Why would Bowles’ copy be missing anything?
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Why would Bowles’ copy be missing anything?
You'll find the answer here. This has been available on the internet since 1997 on John McAdams website, and has been accessed for TV documentaries and books over the years. : https://www.jfk-assassination.net/barber.htm
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Thanks Steve. That’s an interesting read. But unfortunately it doesn’t answer the question of why Bowles’ copy would be missing anything.
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Thompson doesn't understand the acoustics at all. He supports the gigantic erroneous conclusions of Don Thomas. Apparently, you are not aware the there is a huge chapter on the acoustics in the book Reclaiming History by Vince Bugliosi. The entire history of the Dictabelt recording and the acoustics in general is covered from the moment Mary Ferrell uttered the words "Dallas police recordings" to the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) pre-trial hearings. Bugliosi covered every , single aspect and detail--most of it it unknown to students of the assassination--within that long chapter. Not only was Thomas' theory destroyed in 2004 mostly through the work of one Michael O'Dell, but by the Ramsey panel scientists who regrouped to examine and rebut Thomas second failed attempt at claiming the HSCA was correct. Michael O'Dell, alone, disproved Thomas' first attempt to defend the conclusions reached by the BBN and W&A scientists, which Thomas produced in 2001. It's all available online. I then provided further proof that Thomas' second attmpt at defending the HSCA acoustic experts fails hugely by providing proof that Thomas' nonsense about an instance of crosstalk occurring about 3 seconds before the first "Impulse" that the HSCA acoustic experts claimed was the first of 4 gunshots they claim they found. Not only is my work at destroying Thomas's "crosstalk" claim included within the acoustics chapter in Reclaiming History, I also was published on the Internet rebutting Thomas's claim that Vince Bugliosi and I were "Bamboozled", when Thomas tried rebutting what I pointed out in Reclaiming History about the "crosstalk" instance Thomas uses as the basis of his conclusion that the HSCA was correct. Since most conspiracy buffs refuse to read Reclaiming History I suggest reading my article, which is very brief and to the point, and proves once and for always that what Thomas claims is "crosstalk" is not "crosstalk" at all. Please read: http://jfkfiles.blogspot.com/2007/07/of-crosstalk-and-bells-rebuttal-to-don.html
Mr. Griffith, Thompson's book does not prove that the HSCA were correct at all. Had I known what Mr. Thompson was doing with the acoustics for his book, I would have shared this information with him, which could have caused him to hesitate supporting the Don Thomas conclusion. He was more interested in the history of what took place when I discovered the Sheriff Decker crosstalk that disproved the gunshot theory on the Dictabelt.
This thread might be the main skirmish on this forum re dictabelt stuff.