Wait, which side are you describing? I’ve seen closed-minded true believers on both.
I respectfully disagree. “What the fuck will satisy you, tinfoil?” is certainly more like a spittle-laced rant than it is an element of rational discourse.
Furthermore, I can discern nothing offensive about what I wrote that would mandate moderator intervention. It strikes me more like a selective effort at false equivalence.
Good point.
I myself believe that the Warren commission got the thing largely correct. Oswald, acting alone, killed the President. Is every word of the Warren commission correct? Hell no. If we got 1,000 experts to rewrite the thing today, we'd get something wrong.
But minor nit pics with the facts do not a conspiracy make. No matter how many experts look at the photos and say they aren't faked, it doesn't matter. How many pictures of your wife did you take in the back yard four years ago? One? Three? I'd challenge you to remember exactly how many you took. But you'd remember if you took any with her holding a gun. And you'd recognize it when presented to you. It's his gun. Doesn't matter. His finger and palm prints on the gun. Doesn't matter. He worked in, and was seem in the building. Doesn't matter. Lindsey Lohan does a couple of lines in a bathroom and the pic are on line in about 5 minutes. But hundreds(?) of people are involved in the crime of the century, and 44 years later none of these folks have come forward with proof?
I think most of the folks on the non-conspiracy side are closed minded now, because there are no new arguments, and no new, plausible evidence. I for one was very skeptical, and open minded when I was in my teens and early 20's. I think most people were. But I'm middle aged now. And after 25 years I've quite frankly had my fill with tired, pseudo science and crackpot theories. So now, alas, I am understandably and logically closed minded.Given that I had already admonished the poster on that very post, I see it as you trying to sneak in an unnecessary cheap shot after a Mod had already indicated that the rhetoric was getting too heated. Had you posted within a minute or two of my admonishment (or had I not posted, at all), I’d have let it slide as a timing issue. However, you had plenty of time to see that they had already been chastised. It is not a matter of false equivalence; it is a matter of remaining civil in GD.
[ /Moderating ]
I was in the midst of trying to find the links I ended up posting, and particularly what I had read recently about the oddities involved with the de Mohrenschildt photo. I wasn’t able to find the source I had read recently about the oddities involved with the cops who found the negatives in the first place (something about them not being logged in at the scene that day, but I couldn’t find it).
It apparently took me more than at least 16 minutes to do that. Your post wasn’t up when I saw and began my response. I first saw it after I posted mine. I didn’t think it enough of an issue to edit it out.
What I am finding frustrating is that, while I see the possibility of a lot of “there” being there, sorting through the histrionics and overblown claims from both sides makes it difficult to pin down specific facts. What I do know is that Oswald was not placed in the “sniper’s nest” beyond a shadow of a doubt, and the chain of custody of a lot of evidence, including the body, car, and photographs, was broken. Until 1965 (click on the “Notes” link for the date), killing the president or vice president was not a Federal crime and the murder should’ve been handled by the Dallas Police Department, with the Secret Service and FBI helping where requested. Instead, the Secret Service took custody of pretty much everying useful, pushing the DPD out of the loop. Had it gone to trial in a Texas court, as the law required, a decent defense lawyer could’ve gotten most of the best evidence ruled inadmissible and Oswald would’ve walked.
Of course, it being 1963, in Texas, Oswald being white, and local boy LBJ being made president by his actions, Oswald might’ve gotten the keys to the city and a date with the captain of the Kilgore Rangerettes. 
Hell, there are plenty of oddities with George de Mohrenschildt, himself! My personal theory for why he hung out with Oswald had nothing to do with his shady and spooky past. I think he was trying to get into Marina’s pants.
When in doubt, don’t follow the money or the politics. Follow the guy’s pecker. 
Excuse my extreme tardiness here, but our Internet software wigged out on June 2 and I’ve just now escaped from cyberexile.
Looks like things have gotten a little wired here, so I’d better respond to this post before I study the gore that follows it. . . .
Huh. I’m looking at the three photos as published in Groden and Livingstone’s High Treason, and I’ll be hanged if I can see anything in Oswald’s posture that defies physics. I’ll presume you refer to CE-133-A, where he appears to be listing five degrees to starboard. I have no problem striking that pose.
Yeah, there are zealots on the no conspiracy side of the debate. But there are also responsible people on that side (I fancy myself to be one). There also are zealots (and responsible people) on the conspiracy side. I’m certain Bugliosi would say that your observation “doesn’t go anywhere”; i.e., “So what?” Serious discussion is based on evidence, not personalities.
It’s time to ask you what I usually ask someone in these JFK assassination threads: Have you ever read the Warren Report, cover to cover? To paraphrase Ewell Gibbons or Wilfred Brimley or whoever it was, “Know what’s in it before you refuse to swallow it.”
Probably Gibbons. Despite his diabetes, Brimley looks like he’s not picky about what he swallows.
I have read the Warren Report, though not the 26 volumes of hearings and exhibits.
Okay, I’ll buy that it’s not impossible.
I’ve certainly seen a great deal of zealotry on the conspiracy side of things. I haven’t typically seen an equivalent level of emotionality on the single shooter side of things, but clearly it isn’t impossible.
I did buy the single available volume at the bookstore, but I understood it to be abridged from the entire report. I skimmed through it, but did not read it cover to cover.
I did take a trip to Dallas just to go to Dealy Plaza, and also to see strippers wearing chaps. We didn’t find any of the latter, and were very disappointed. The only information I got from being in Dealy Plaza itself was an understanding of how difficult, in my opinion, it would have been to look up to the sixth floor window and get a description of a person suitable to then track down Oswald. Of course, my perception was biased, and there wasn’t anyone leaning out the window with a rifle at the time.
I overlooked this earlier:
Remember when I said that, with Bugliosi, his Endnotes are required reading? Well, I failed to heed my own advice when I cited him on Detective Combest’s “Jack, you son of a bitch, don’t” statement. There is more (Reclaiming History, Endnotes p. 111). After noting that Combest, on the afternoon of the shooting, told a reporter what he had said, Bugliosi writes:
He goes on to say the FBI analyzed a recording made by radio reporter Ike Pappas (in uncropped photos of the shooting, he’s the guy to the right with a microphone in his right hand and a tape machine in his left) but they couldn’t make out what, if anything, Ruby said. Nothing is said about other audio recordings. (We can be sure the audio on the live video feeds was recorded. There’s a good chance other radio reporters were rolling tape, and some of the film crews may have recorded sound.) My interpretation, for what it’s worth, is that Combest and Ruby both basically said what they said they said, and McMillon melded the two statements into one. (So, go easy on Mom, Guin.)
Loathe as I am to return to this piddling subject, I feel a need to dump a bucket of common sense on Hentor’s comment that the “impossible” posture of the subject in the Neely Street photos must have been the work of forgers: Think about it for a minute. If you are forging a photo and really want to fool people, are you going to (needlessly) warp the image into an impossible pose, thus making it obvious to one and all that the picture is a fake? Hell, no! (Bonus observation from Bugliosi: Why would the forgers produce three photographs, thus trebling the chances of someone spotting some sign of their fakery, when one photograph would have served their purpose just fine?) Incidentally, when Oswald provided his interrogators, at their request, a detailed list of the places he had lived, he omitted the two months he resided at the Neely Street address where the photos were taken. Hmmmm.
Finally, let me return to the original question of this thread, viz., whether conspiracy theorists should be shunned. After reading half of Bugliosi’s book I would say: It depends. There are people in the conspiracy community who are sincere in their efforts and careful in their scholarship. They should not be shunned, but engaged in what one hopes will be constructive dialog. But those folks who write or argue with reckless disregard of not only the evidence but also of common sense (not to mention those few who are just plain batshit crazy) should not only be shunned, but perhaps also strapped to Wile E. Coyote and shoved off the nearest cliff.
(Disclaimer: the last phrase is just hyperbole; honest.)
Sorry to hear the first expedition was a bust.
The description of the suspect that the police broadcast was typically vague; something along the lines of white male, medium height, medium build, dark hair. Bugliosi feels certain that Tippit stopped Oswald not on the basis of the description, but because Oswald somehow appeared suspicious (probably, because Oswald was flat-out bookin’ which, if he had indeed just shot the president, he likely would have been). My own hunch is that, had Oswald not somehow attracted Tippit’s attention and then plugged him, he could well have skipped town and, for awhile, evaded capture.
One other observation on Oswald’s post-assassination behavior. After hearing of the assassination he concluded that there would be no more work that day and was free to go. (But think about it: the assassination happened down the street from the building in which he worked. Why would that effect Depository operations? Looks like Oswald knew the building was part of the crime scene. Anyway.) In his haste to enjoy his unexpected afternoon off, Oswald leaves behind the nearly-full bottle of pop he had just bought, his jacket, and those curtain rods which he went through so damned much trouble to get. (Also, if Friday were payday, as it so often is with blue-collar jobs, he left behind his paycheck. But I must point out that I’ve seen no evidence of this one way or the other. The possibility seems not to have occured to anyone.) I picture his Coke, jacket, curtain rods and paycheck standing by the front window of the Depository, forlornly watching Oswald abandon them. This is the behavior of a patsy?
I don’t think any of the witnesses claimed to actually see the shooter in the window. A large number said they thought they had heard the shots coming the book depository. The police sealed off the building as a precaution and rounded up all the employees. Oswald’s supervisor told the police that Oswald was missing and gave them a brief description of what he looked like. That description of a possible suspect was sent out by radio to police officers across the city. Officer Tibbit saw a man matching the description walking down the street looking nervous, called him over to talk to him, and was gunned down.
I’m pretty sure a man who worked in the building across the street, on a parallel floor, said he saw Oswald shooting or preparing to shoot.
Well, in his “defense,” Oswald was a pitifully poor employee, quitting those jobs where he hadn’t gotten fired. Completely incompetent in just about everything he did; the assasination was about the only thing he’d done right in years, which could be used to argue against his complicity. 
Reading various CT articles and books, he strikes me as being like Kevin Spacey, in The Usual Suspects: shifting from inept “Verbal” to mastermind Kaiser Soeze as the situation requires, except I can’t imagine him taking a bath on his own without drowning. In some ways the perfect patsy.
Actually, you’re right about that. And after a bit of research I see he did give a description of the man he saw to police. But my main point still stands – the question of whether someone could give an accurate description of Oswald from glimpsing him in the window is moot because the police already had a description of him from his supervisor.
I’m not sure any of them saw Oswald from the building across the street, but several saw him on the sixth floor, including a few who said they saw him with a gun.
But why go back outside to be bookin’ out in plain sight in the first place?
Does Bugliosi deal with Earline Robert’s statement that a cop car pulled up outside Oswald’s residence and honked it’s horn twice?
Your observations certainly cast doubt on an argument that Oswald had no involvement whatsoever. I’d say, on the other hand, that they make perfect sense for a patsy - someone with marginal involvement who realizes that the shit that just went down might be laid at his feet.
Actually, Howard Brennan is cited as the source of the description that went out over the radio, leading, supposedly, to Tippit stopping Oswald.
I second the regret that you weren’t able to take care of the stripper thing 
On another note, when I went to the school book depository, I was flat out amazed how easy that shot would have been. While I’m in the military and a good shot, I’m by no means the best. But with a scope, laying the rifle against a window jam at a target moving at 12 miles an hour? I could have done it. That shot is by no means very difficult at all.
If he doesn’t, others have: