JFK Assassination Forum

  The extended firing time for 3 shots from sniper's nest is important for several reasons. For starters, the 11+ seconds elapsed firing time claims that Oswald fired shot #1: (1) STANDING UP, (2) fired almost STRAIGHT DOWN, (3) through a 1/2 open window. This is ridiculous, but it does get bullhorn'd via National Geographic and the Sixth Floor Museum. The extension of the elapsed firing time is being ballyhoo'd in order to get around Oswald's carcano being a WW2 Bolt Action Rifle.  There is Zero Evidence to support this extended firing time.   

So who cares? As I noted, even the WC conceded the possibility of only two shots, the first being the shot in the back (as Pat Speer believes it was, and I tend to agree). The whole "early missed shot" thing is mostly just a red herring. CT wackos are desperate for three shots in an "impossibly short" time because then IT COULDN'T HAVE BEEN OSWALD!!! YEE-HA!!! LNers are desperate to expand the time for obvious reasons. But the arguments as to when the mysterious missed first shot was taken just go round and round to nowhere. It is a FACT that a number of credible witnesses heard two shots that were virtually simultaneous - this is far more compelling evidence that Oswald perhaps could not have fired them, because what these witnesses describe is indeed "impossibly short." As Pat Speer notes, typically the head shot is the SECOND shot in this sequence, meaning that if there actually was a missed shot it would have been the THIRD shot, virtually simultaneous with the head shot. This is a far more compelling CT argument than arguing about an early missed shot and whether Oswald could have fired three shots in six seconds (as the videos posted by Ben Cole show that he clearly could have). Add the fact that the head shot was uncannily precise and fragmentary and, voila, you have a Mafia pro in the Dal Tex building or something like that. 

Here's one video that Ben previously posted:

I'm beginning to think the endless speculation as to how long Oswald had to fire the shots is pretty much a red herring. Ben Cole posted somewhere - perhaps here - several YouTube videos of guys firing a Carcano with absolutely jaw-dropping rapidity.

What is NOT a red herring, it seems to me, is the number of really solid witnesses who described the second and third shots as nearly simultaneous. There is an old (2010) thread at the Ed Forum on this subject, https://educationforum.ipbhost.com/topic/16384-shot-sequence-descriptions/, where Pat Speer summarizes his meticulous research thusly (and I believe accurately):

Chapters 5 through 9 at patspeer.com are devoted to the eyewitness evidence, and show how the eyewitness statements, when taken as a whole, are quite clear on several points. One is that the first of the three shots heard by most witnesses hit Kennedy. Two is that the last two shots were fired quite close together. Although slightly less clear, a third point was nevertheless surprising – I certainly didn't expect it. The head shot was the FIRST of the last two shots fired closely together, and the second of the three shots heard by most witnesses.

When you examine what those witnesses said, "quite close together" is more like REALLY close together - i.e., "on top of each other," "bang bang," "bunched together," etc. It isn't anything like "three or four seconds." It certainly isn't the 4.8 to 5.6 seconds estimated by the WC. Regardless of whether the total sequence was as "long" as ten seconds or as short as six, numerous witnesses pereived the last two shots being noticeably closer together within that sequence.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t see that the WC or HSCA (firearms and acoustics panels) really focused on this issue. The focus seems to have been more on the perceived location and overall timing of the shots but not much on the fact that so many perceived the second and third shots as essentially simultaneous. (I was surprised to be reminded that the WC was actually quite open-minded, conceding the possibility of only two shots and that the three-shot witnesses may have been influenced by media coverage.)

Here’s the famous Lee Bowers interview where he describes the shot sequence beginning at about 5:35, with the second and third being “almost on top of each other.” He’s a good witness because he was physically removed from the immediate reverberations and echoes and whatnot. If he were alone in his description, that would be one thing – but he’s not. As I say … troubling.

The CT community would do itself a big favor if it would focus on these aspects that are genuinely troubling and less on ideologically-driven silliness and supposed plots and cover-ups that are closer to science fiction.

A strong, potato-based form of alcohol after about 30 minutes.

   Known as "Bathtub Gin" during Prohibition.

Bring back Ripple, or Thunderbird, the real stuff.

In college, we got a guy so drunk on Bali Hai that he agreed to eat an unlit cigar. He threw up on the floor about 3/4 of the way through. Well, it seemed funny at the time. Maybe you had to be there.

If you're going to keep repeating that mantra ad infinium, the least you could do is change up the vocabulary a bit from time to time.

I looked up "pot calling kettle black" in my authoritative Dictionary of Useful Idioms for Useful Idiots. It gave only one example, but it was apt: "For example, for Thomas Graves to accuse anyone else on earth of using repetitive vocabulary and repeating the same points to the extent of near-maddening tediousness would constititute a paradigmatic example of the idom 'pot calling kettle black.' This example is so extreme that it is unilikely ever to occur in the real world, but it does serve to illustrate the idiom in its most extreme form."