81
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: The Pic that will flip an LN'r...!
« Last post by Jake Maxwell on April 25, 2025, 02:57:56 AM »This might help orient your view...
Recent Posts
This might help orient your view...
82
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: I understand the HOW but not the WHY
« Last post by Jon Banks on April 25, 2025, 02:47:37 AM »No, not at all. Theology, by necessity, is entirely speculative. The UFO phenomenon (which I have experienced) is a genuine phenomenon, but what it is remains entirely speculative. Virtually all the phenomena with which psychical research deals (a number of which I have experienced) are well-established, but what they are and what they mean remains entirely speculative. Ditto with the Shroud of Turin and the NDE phenomenon, another two of my pet interests but also largely speculative. I speculate, speculate, speculate along with everyone else. But there is rational, logical speculation and Gee Whiz, True Believer speculation that is driven more by cognitive bias and wishful thinking than evidence and rational analysis. Since I share some of the conspiracy-prone mindset myself, I (thanks largely to my legal training) make an effort to stay in the ballpark of evidence and rational analysis. All areas of Weirdness, including the JFKA (in spades), are rife with folks who simply aren't thinking clearly.
Mostly it's harmless, but certainly many psychologists and sociologists think it isn't necessarily harmless. One could make an argument that irresponsible JFKA conspiracy theorizing has had some very harmful ripple effects.
But do you at least acknowledge that not all JFKA speculation is the same?
There are some people like Josiah Thompason for example, who don't propose theories about "who really killed JFK". They just identify the holes in the LN narrative.
Another group are people who speculate about who might've killed JFK but stay in the realm of plausible alternative theories (ie the mob, the CIA, the Cubans, the KGB, etc). I consider myself part of this group.
The final group are people who speculate about who might've killed JFK but go into the realm of implausible theories about who killed JFK and play fast and loose with the facts of the case.
Should all three groups of people be viewed the same? I don't think so. Nor do I view all conspiracy theories in general as the same.
Speculating about a conspiracy in the Kennedy assassination isn't as ridiculous as speculating that 'the Moon landing was faked', or that '9/11 was an inside job', or the 'Q-Anon' and 'Pizzagate' theories.
83
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: Was the JFK records release a dud? Is Conspiracy World on the brink?
« Last post by Lance Payette on April 25, 2025, 02:41:11 AM »There's too much going on in the world today for most people to care about a cold case from 60+ years ago. At least that's what I hear sometimes from younger people.
Yes, the JFKA conspiracy community does comprise a large percentage of Old White Men (hey, that's me) with a nostalgic, rose-colored view of JFK (hey, that's not me, although I certainly would have preferred that he lived to a ripe old age).
For someone who is 20 today, the JFKA would be to him or her like an event that had occurred in 1908 would have been to me when I was 20 - pretty ancient history, and the world moves WAY faster now than when I was 20. Hence the effort, I believe, on the part of the Old White Men to make the JFKA seem as though it's still highly relevant to the world of today, which I don't think it is at all.
Maybe I'll start a James Garfield assassination community and see if I can interest some Really Old White Men.
84
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: I understand the HOW but not the WHY
« Last post by Lance Payette on April 25, 2025, 02:23:43 AM »That's a fair response. My only objection is that you seem to think there's something wrong with people speculating about unexplained phenomenons or unresolved history.
No, not at all. Theology, by necessity, is entirely speculative. The UFO phenomenon (which I have experienced) is a genuine phenomenon, but what it is remains entirely speculative. Virtually all the phenomena with which psychical research deals (a number of which I have experienced) are well-established, but what they are and what they mean remains entirely speculative. Ditto with the Shroud of Turin and the NDE phenomenon, another two of my pet interests but also largely speculative. I speculate, speculate, speculate along with everyone else. But there is rational, logical speculation and Gee Whiz, True Believer speculation that is driven more by cognitive bias and wishful thinking than evidence and rational analysis. Since I share some of the conspiracy-prone mindset myself, I (thanks largely to my legal training) make an effort to stay in the ballpark of evidence and rational analysis. All areas of Weirdness, including the JFKA (in spades), are rife with folks who simply aren't thinking clearly.
Quote
Speculating about UFOs or the JFK assassination harms no one. Millions of rational and intelligent people aren't convinced by the LN narrative and that's not likely to ever change given all the weird stuff in the JFK assassination and the investigations. So it is futile to keep trying to change people's minds.
Mostly it's harmless, but certainly many psychologists and sociologists think it isn't necessarily harmless. One could make an argument that irresponsible JFKA conspiracy theorizing has had some very harmful ripple effects.
Quote
As for myself, despite being a millennial, I personally have always been fascinated with the history and pop culture of the 1960s. The assassinations of political leaders in the 60s, the Vietnam war, the Manson murders, and the music of the 60s are often on my list of topics to research.
Well, hey, I lived through the 50's and 60's and once had a collection of thousands of 45s that were catalogued and cross-referenced in absurd detail. I was a legend. I once had a woman I'd never even met walk up to me at a party in the 80s and ask, as a test, "Who sang Red Rubber Ball." I replied, "The Cyrkle - C-Y-R-K-L-E," and started reciting the lyrics. She walked away shaking her head and saying, "It's true, it's true." So start some inappropriate threads on THAT subject, which will be way more interesting than the JFKA!
85
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: Was the JFK records release a dud? Is Conspiracy World on the brink?
« Last post by Jon Banks on April 25, 2025, 02:19:00 AM »OK, that's a rational and realistic perspective, but don't you think most people thought (and had been led to believe) there was going to be something BIG?
As with the Jeffrey Epstein files, I think most people are now resigned to the fact that any documents that the government doesn't want the public to see will never voluntarily be disclosed to the public.
Many people on the internet were disappointed with the way the Trump administration handled the Epstein files. In contrast, I haven't seen the same levels of disappointment on the JFK files.
Do you think it's realistic to believe the sort of conspiracy theorizing that has gone on for 60+ years will continue indefinitely, or is it right on the edge of fading away?
It will continue indefinitely because the facts of the JFK assassination leave a lot of room for speculation but I think as time goes on, interest in the Kennedy assassination will decline regardless.
There's too much going on in the world today for most people to care about a cold case from 60+ years ago. At least that's what I hear sometimes from younger people.
86
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: The Pic that will flip an LN'r...!
« Last post by Tom Graves on April 25, 2025, 02:13:46 AM »How did we miss this one all these years! [sic]
This should flip a few LN'rs... and if it does, let us know!
1) I think you should blow them up some more.
2) Who is "us"? You and Vladimir Putin?
87
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: Two Wallets? Nope.
« Last post by Jon Banks on April 25, 2025, 02:04:38 AM »That makes no sense. If the DPD is going to suppress finding a wallet, which one is it going to be? The one found in his pocket when arrested or the one left at the scene of the murder of a cop? Obviously, they would claim to have found the more highly incriminating wallet at the crime scene and put anything necessary in that wallet. If they had planted a wallet there, anyone with half a brain would have anticipated that Oswald would have had a second wallet on his possession when arrested. They wouldn't have been surprised by that. Again, what would the police had done if they found a discarded wallet at the Tippit murder scene? They would have immediately radioed in the identity of the owner of that wallet as a potential suspect. That didn't happen. It is not a wallet found at the crime scene. My best guess is Tippit's citation book or the wallet of a witness.
What also doesn't make sense is that none of the reports from 11/22/63 mentioned the Hidell ID being in the contents of Oswald's wallet. As someone noted earlier on this topic, officer Bentley didn't mention the Hiddell ID when he went on TV that day and described the contents of Oswald's wallet. The whole thing is peculiar.
The film footage and photo from the Tippit crime scene indirectly corroborates the FBI agent's (Barrett?) claim about Oswald's wallet being found before he was arrested (assuming the wallet in the film footage wasn't Tippit's).
What explains the discrepancy? I don't know.
Here's an article from 2013 on the two wallets mystery:
Wallet mystery from Officer Tippit's murder settled after 50 years
DALLAS No other crimes have been more analyzed or scrutinized than what happened in Dallas a half-century ago.
'It's been picked apart for decades,' said Farris Rookstool III, JFK historian and former FBI analyst, 'but the tragedy of this is no one has ever taken the due diligence of time to really put these pieces together until now.'
After five decades, Rookstool is sharing the strongest evidence yet that Lee Harvey Oswald murdered Dallas police Officer J.D. Tippit.
'The wallet puts him definitively at the scene of the crime,' Rookstool said.
Oswald's wallet has been a persistent mystery in recent years one Rookstool started studying. The mysterious billfold first appeared on WFAA in the afternoon of November 22, 1963.
WFAA program director Jay Watson, anchoring live coverage of the assassination, asked Channel 8 photographer Ron Reiland to join him on set and discuss film that Reiland just shot on the Oak Cliff street where Tippit was slain.
'Let's roll the film and we'll narrate it as we go,' Watson said on air.
Reiland, describing each scene to Watson, presumed the wallet seen on the film belonged to Officer Tippit.
'There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that this is Oswald's wallet,' Rookstool said.
So, Rookstool set out to prove it.
He compared the Channel 8 black-and-white film to Oswald's actual wallet in the National Archives. On each of them, circular snaps are visible, along with metal strips and perhaps the biggest similarity a zipper over the cash compartment.
Oswald's wallet is a different color and has different characteristics than Tippit's.
This month, for the first time, Marie Tippit shared her late husband's wallet with WFAA. Tippit's is black, has a different style snap no metal bar like Oswald's and does not have a zipper over the cash compartment.
A half hour east of Birmingham, Alabama is the only man alive today who saw Oswald's wallet at Tippit's murder scene.
'As I walked up, I happened to not knowingly step in a puddle of blood, which was Tippit's blood,' retired FBI Special Agent Bob Barrett recalled. 'I thought, 'Oh God, what have I done?''
He spent 27 years in the FBI and was asked to go to the Tippit murder scene that day by his friend, Dallas County Sheriff Bill Decker.
After arriving at 10th and Patton in North Oak Cliff, Barrett said, he recognized a Dallas police captain thumbing through a billfold.
'He said, 'Bob, you know all the crooks in town, all the hoodlums, etc. You ever heard of a Lee Harvey Oswald?' I said, 'No, I never have.' He said 'How about an Alec Hiddell?' I said, 'No. I never have heard of him either,'' Barrett explained. 'Why would they be asking me questions about Oswald and Hiddell if it wasn't in that wallet?'
In addition, the first Dallas cop on the Tippit crime scene said he actually recovered the wallet.
Sgt. Kenneth Croy, a reserve officer at the time, put it in writing on an 8' x 10' picture for Rookstool.
'First on the scene, recovered Oswald's wallet there, too,' Croy wrote on an image of Tippit's patrol car.
But officially, Dallas police told a different story. The department said it got Oswald's wallet from Oswald himself after his arrest a short time later at the Texas Theatre.
Barrett and Rookstool believe police made that up for the official report because too many officers handled the crucial piece of evidence at the shooting scene.
'They said they took the wallet out of his pocket in the car? That's so much hogwash,' Barrett said. 'That wallet was in [Captain] Westbrook's hand.'
'Bob's in Alabama. Kenneth Croy is in Hamilton, Texas,' Rookstool said. 'They had no relationship with each other than the fate of history put them at the scene of a crime.'
Rookstool says the testimony of Barrett and Croy, Tippit's billfold, and the WFAA film prove that Oswald's wallet was at the scene of the policeman's murder.
More than shell casings and eyewitness recollections, it is the first hard evidence placing Oswald there on that day.
It's significant in tying off a historical loose end and perfecting the record fifty years later.
https://www.wfaa.com/article/news/wallet-mystery-from-officer-tippits-murder-settled-after-50-years/287-306016477
88
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: The Pic that will flip an LN'r...!
« Last post by Lance Payette on April 25, 2025, 01:59:46 AM »This one's for Lance!
Thanks, but what am I supposed to see? On the others, I could at least "sorta kinda" convince myself there was a face, but here I'm having difficulty. Is the arrow in the "For Lance" photo supposed to be pointing at a gun (or perhaps a scope)?
89
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: I understand the HOW but not the WHY
« Last post by Jon Banks on April 25, 2025, 01:54:45 AM »A fair question. In certain subject matter areas - Christian theology, the UFO phenomenon, psychical research, golf, and (to a lesser extent) the JFKA - I have accumulated such a large body of knowledge that I almost feel a responsibility to do something with it. With regard to the JFKA (as well as theology and the UFO phenomenon), I'm always under the illusion that I can help people focus their thinking and understand where they may have gone awry; it's futile, indeed an illusion, but I persist. Moreover, all my life I have written humor, and the JFKA is an almost irresistible outlet for silliness; since I am my own best audience, I enjoy exercising my propensity for silliness even if no one else does!Lastly, exploring and exploding the occasional factoid is very similar to what I did in my legal career and just kind of fun even if I actually care nothing about the factoid. But then I'll get bored and realize it all goes nowhere, and eventually I'll move on. I did pull the plug at the Ed Forum (no regrets) and once here (as Martin keeps reminding me), but then I'll get stuck in the house by the weather and return to something like this forum as an outlet for my pedantry and silliness. Someday, probably soon, everyone will realize (perhaps to their relief!) that they haven't see Lance in months.
That's a fair response. My only objection is that you seem to think there's something wrong with people speculating about unexplained phenomenons or unresolved history.
Speculating about UFOs or the JFK assassination harms no one. Millions of rational and intelligent people aren't convinced by the LN narrative and that's not likely to ever change given all the weird stuff in the JFK assassination and the investigations. So it is futile to keep trying to change people's minds.
As for myself, despite being a millennial, I personally have always been fascinated with the history and pop culture of the 1960s. The assassinations of political leaders in the 60s, the Vietnam war, the Manson murders, and the music of the 60s are often on my list of topics to research.
90
JFK Assassination Plus General Discussion And Debate / Re: Was the JFK records release a dud? Is Conspiracy World on the brink?
« Last post by Lance Payette on April 25, 2025, 01:49:23 AM »Most of the recently released files were previously released with redactions. While it's good to see the unredacted files, there isn't a ton of new information so far.
From what I understand, the files that most people want to see, are still being withheld (ie the Bill Harvey, David Atlee Philips, and George Joannides files).
The most interesting JFK related document for me was the Schlessinger memo. It gives insight into how the Kennedy administration viewed the CIA in the aftermath of the Bay of Pigs.
There's some interesting non-JFK assassination related stuff about James Angelton and CIA operations around the world.
It's not a "dud" unless you had the expectation that there's a "smoking gun" hidden in the JFK files. I doubt there is a smoking gun in the government files but there likely are some interesting pieces of information that shed light on some mysteries.
OK, that's a rational and realistic perspective, but don't you think most people thought (and had been led to believe) there was going to be something BIG?
Do you think it's realistic to believe the sort of conspiracy theorizing that has gone on for 60+ years will continue indefinitely, or is it right on the edge of fading away?
It reminds me of the seemingly endless hysteria within the evangelical Christian community over an imminent Rapture by Jesus (or Second Coming, if the Rapture isn't part of your theology). It was at a fever pitch when I was in college in 1970, and it's at a fever pitch once again. I think you can only play the imminent Rapture card so many times. If it hasn't happened in the next 50 years, it's going to become a tough sell.