Yes, this! And I will add that Vincent Bugliosi’s huge book is worth at least five other books. So, I think essentially this should equal six books….   

I assumed we were talking about a newcomer with a genuine interest in becoming "involved" in the JFKA. Reading the WR report and Bugliosi right off the bat would certainly serve to indoctrinate a newcomer into the LN narrative, but this would be like a CTer suggesting that a newcomer read Doug Horne's or Jim DiEugenio's work first. In my responses, I was not talking about "indoctrinating a newcomer into my view of the truth of the JFKA" but more in the vein of "preparing a newcomer to think rationally about the JFKA" when he dives into the LN and CT literature. To be fair to MTG (eek!) his list is at least somewhat balanced, albeit with books I wouldn't recommend. If I were following his approach, I would've recommended what I regard as the three best LN-oriented books and the three best CT-oriented books, but I really don't think this is the way for a newcomer to begin.

LP--

You are making the irrational assumption that state and private actors always make rational decisions.

Why did Puerto Rican nationals try to assassinate then-President Truman in 1950? Surely, if successful, such an assassination would have only backfired.

Remember, when ideology and nationalism, or ethnocentrism, or ethnic bias get involved, rational thought and behavior often goes out the window. 

The Alpha-66 crowd said that they had been betrayed by JFK, at BoP, and their friends and comrades died for nothing.

The G2-DGI'ers knew that JFK had been trying to assassinate Castro for years.

A couple-three hotheads....a couple guns...all you need.

As for LHO being "nutty"...that might be viewed as a plus. A nutty LHO's testimony might be taken with a grain of salt, and more-easily dismissed, providing plausible deniability.

Anyway, I am not sure LHO was regarded as all that nutty pre-JFKA.

I think a more careful distinction needs to be made between (1) "Castro and/or G2" being behind the JFKA, (2) "Castro and/or G2" encouraging the JFKA, and (3) "a couple of angry pro-Castro wackos who might've thought they were doing something helpful" encouraging Oswald to kill JFK. They all seem to get blended together in the "Castro/Cuba" narrative. Only #3 has any plausibility and would account for the irrationality I'm talking about.

JC--

I am no fan of the Soviet Union then, or Russia now.

But the word "rational" covers a lot of ground.

Trying to start a life in Russia might speak to an ideological bent, in an otherwise rational person.

That is, no one has ever said LHO was schizo, or fabricated memories, or misunderstood basic instructions, etc. Indeed LHO, as Marine, was advanced into relatively high-end radar work at the Atsugi airbase in Japan.

I doubt some whacko would be able to do that.

I do regard someone shooting at major public figures, or any innocent person, as likely mentally ill, even if lucid. I am a layman in these matters.

Tough call on LHO. The DPD'ers who interviewed him post-JFKA thought him lucid, perfidious and abrasive.

As for low-level DGI, G2 or Apha-66'ers, they might regard LHO as very useful.

I don't believe Oswald was insane in a legal sense, but he clearly wasn't playing with a full deck.

You just can't help yourself, can you? This thread is supposed to be a chance for people to list the top six books they would recommend to a newcomer. But, of course, you only list five books and then deluge us with more of your endless, pompous posturing that everyone who disagrees with you is part of the lunatic fringe and/or has a conspiracy-prone mindset and/or has a warped mind and/or has a form of mental illness, blah, blah, blah--after, that is, you announce that you will talk about your supposedly high IQ and academic honors if anyone asks.

Uh, you might want to review my first post here and YOUR response, he of the conveniently short memory. You will see that it was YOU who went off on a tangential rant. You repeatedly - incessantly - mischaracterize what others have said and then respond to that straw man. In my interactions on perhaps 30 internet forums dating back to 1996, you are among the most grimly humorless, thin-skinned, self-important, just-flat-whacked-out characters I have encountered. Fortunately, most here are perceptive enough to see you for what you are.

JC--

I am no fan of the Soviet Union then, or Russia now.

But the word "rational" covers a lot of ground.

Trying to start a life in Russia might speak to an ideological bent, in an otherwise rational person.

That is, no one has ever said LHO was schizo, or fabricated memories, or misunderstood basic instructions, etc. Indeed LHO, as Marine, was advanced into relatively high-end radar work at the Atsugi airbase in Japan.

I doubt some whacko would be able to do that.

I do regard someone shooting at major public figures, or any innocent person, as likely mentally ill, even if lucid. I am a layman in these matters.

Tough call on LHO. The DPD'ers who interviewed him post-JFKA thought him lucid, perfidious and abrasive.

As for low-level DGI, G2 or Apha-66'ers, they might regard LHO as very useful.