Where the new evidence points - Jim DiEugenio

[TLR]

A nice look at what the ARRB revealed:

http://consortiumnews.com/2013/11/19/where-new-jfk-evidence-points/

[D.K.Garretson]

Excellent summary. Too bad that comments below the article aren't disabled. 

[echelon]

Yes, a helpful summary.  This bit stuck out for me:

While President Johnson may have raised the specter of a nuclear conflagration in 1963, the later motives for the continuing cover-up – and the intensity of the attacks on anyone who has questioned the official version – can best be explained by the institutional self-interests of the government agencies that would be implicated in the cover-up or the actual crime.

Along with fierce resistance from the CIA and the FBI, there was the close-minded response to the new evidence from the gatekeepers of the major U.S. news media. Ridiculing authors and investigators who challenged the Warren Commission’s findings became something of a litmus test for measuring a journalist’s fitness to get a good-paying job in the mainstream press.

[...]

Despite this new evidence, there are many programs being broadcast this month about both President Kennedy and his murder, e.g. Bill O’Reilly’s Killing Kennedy. Not a single one will present anywhere near a representative selection of the new evidentiary discoveries made by the ARRB. Yet, this information is crucial to understanding where the United States finds itself today, a country awash in excessive secrecy and growing public distrust.


I quite understand why the individuals involved in the intelligence or other government agencies would (a) have gone along with the cover-up for a number of reasons, including the WWIII scenario, and (b) have wanted to remain consistent with their original pronouncements in order to retain an illusory appearance of integrity.  There is quite a lot of inertia implied by those two statements, or "institutional self-interest" if you will.

What I just don't get at all is why hardly anybody in the media has put their head above the parapet and started to honestly investigate the new evidence that has been presented over the years.  What is it about the media in general, and every investigative journalist in particular, that obliges them to toe the party line?  What are they afraid of?  In July or August 2013 - or on any other date over the past year or five, 10 or 20 years - what threats are being made to whom and in what circumstances?

I know that some people will say that this systematic blindness is related to "the good of the country", etc., etc..  But it has to be more than that.

Surely.

[D.K.Garretson]

I think some of the blindness is 'institutional'; a reflection of the culture in which these folks are raised.  In other words, certain behaviors and viewpoints are implicit in the governing media, and those that test those established boundaries do not go far, and thus, have no voice.

[TLR]

There is a certain paradigm that people like Chris Matthews, Rachel Maddow, Anthony Lewis and others can't accept or their heads would split open. There are too many apple-carts that would be upset, and illusions shattered, if people honestly looked at how our government functions. Matthews wouldn't be able to focus exclusively on the partisan horse race, or talk about how friendly Reagan and Tip O'Neill were, or how great the Peace Corps was.

Eric Norden wrote this in The Realist in 1966:

http://www.ep.tc/realist/a-b-set/09.html

“Liberals, however, do not even possess the one virtue of most fanatics: loyalty. Libs pursue their vendettas with vicious vigor, but they are equally prepared to jettison the ostensible object of their devotion when the transcendent interests of the power structure are threatened, as in the case of the Kennedy assassination. The grief of the libs at the loss of their young champion did not extend to a dedication to uncover the truth about his death; as soon as the indicators pointed, not to a lone assassin, but a well-organized conspiracy within agencies of the federal government, including the FBI and the CIA, the liberals looked the other way. JFK could be mourned, but not avenged; too many apple-carts would be upset in the process. At the upper-level of the Liberal Establishment there was a desperate effort, conscious and cynical, to cover up all traces of conspiracy and reassure the American people that all was still for the best in the best of all possible worlds…To even entertain the suspicion that elements of this most wondrous of all governments, whether in the intelligence networks or the political police, could band together to liquidate the presiding High Brahmin, and then coolly cover up their deeds, would shake the average liberal’s neat and soothing assumptions about his world to their very roots. Such things could and do happen with depressing regularity in many other countries but never, never, of course, in America. Thus, those who challenged the Establishment’s version of events were ‘extremists’ with one or another different axes to grind, perhaps paranoid and at the very least victims of a ‘conspiratorial view of history.’ History is not, of course, a succession of conspiracies; what liberals conveniently forgot was that there are conspiracies in history. The world, much less America, is not the tidy design of the League of Women Voters; it can happen here. But the blood of John Kennedy was a small price to pay for the preservation of liberal delusions.” 

[echelon]

Thanks TLR, that's a very interesting paragraph.

I already have it clear in my head that President Kennedy was killed by - or at the behest of - certain members of the conservative right wing of the US elite.  (In fact, Charles Drago would say that they were actually part of a pan-national - not national - elite, but let's leave that to one side).  If we are now also saying that the more liberal elements of the same establishment - if such people are permitted or even admitted to exist in America! - could see (and understand) what had happened but chose to put their collective heads in the sand ... then who is left?  What has happened to democracy?

If the governmental and societal systems don't constantly check and counter-balance themselves then there isn't any hope for anybody.  All extremes become possible because nobody will gainsay them.  Look at what happened in Germany in the 1930s.

As Edmund Burke (probably) said:  "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing".

Is that what we are saying?  Personally, it seems to me that the original sponsors of the assassination would want us to think like that, so that we would believe there's no point in challenging them further.

[echelon]

I think some of the blindness is 'institutional'; a reflection of the culture in which these folks are raised.  In other words, certain behaviors and viewpoints are implicit in the governing media, and those that test those established boundaries do not go far, and thus, have no voice.

Hi Ken, and welcome to the forum.

Yes, I agree with you to a certain extent.  Thus "the governing media" is a good term for it (a Scott-ism, I think).  But how does that institutional blindness extend far outside the system and across the oceans of the world, so that it contaminates so-called free thinkers and investigative journalists (and their publishers) far from the American borders (and courts)?

I mean, why do they get involved in the first place if they feel that they cannot speak the truth?  All such people have to do is to say nothing; their silence would speak volumes.  On the other hand, by mouthing the party line in two hour, slickly-produced presentations they take sides and they make the situation worse.

[TLR]

Thanks TLR, that's a very interesting paragraph.

I already have it clear in my head that President Kennedy was killed by - or at the behest of - certain members of the conservative right wing of the US elite.  (In fact, Charles Drago would say that they were actually part of a pan-national - not national - elite, but let's leave that to one side).  If we are now also saying that the more liberal elements of the same establishment - if such people are permitted or even admitted to exist in America! - could see (and understand) what had happened but chose to put their collective heads in the sand ... then who is left?  What has happened to democracy?

If the governmental and societal systems don't constantly check and counter-balance themselves then there isn't any hope for anybody.  All extremes become possible because nobody will gainsay them.  Look at what happened in Germany in the 1930s.

As Edmund Burke (probably) said:  "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing".

Is that what we are saying?  Personally, it seems to me that the original sponsors of the assassination would want us to think like that, so that we would believe there's no point in challenging them further.

I don't think that the Left/Right Democrat/Republican thing matters nearly as much inside the corridors of power as we - the public - have been trained to think it does. Witness the circling of the wagons by nearly everybody in the political-media-academic establishment when it comes to this story. The truth about the JFK assassination threatens to discredit all of the institutions of power. If they had just come out with the truth in 1963-64, it would have been very painful and disruptive, but the country would have healed and moved on, and probably grown healthier.

But the cover-up has poisoned the system, a system that already wasn't healthy. I keep comparing it to the way the Japanese government is in denial about horrible war crimes committed during WWII. The truth threatens too many powerful institutions there.

http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jan/18/opinion/la-oe-guttentag-japan-nanking-20130118

[echelon]

I don't think that the Left/Right Democrat/Republican thing matters nearly as much inside the corridors of power as we - the public - have been trained to think it does. Witness the circling of the wagons by nearly everybody in the political-media-academic establishment when it comes to this story. The truth about the JFK assassination threatens to discredit all of the institutions of power. If they had just come out with the truth in 1963-64, it would have been very painful and disruptive, but the country would have healed and moved on, and probably grown healthier.

But the cover-up has poisoned the system, a system that already wasn't healthy. I keep comparing it to the way the Japanese government is in denial about horrible war crimes committed during WWII. The truth threatens too many powerful institutions there.

http://articles.latimes.com/2013/jan/18/opinion/la-oe-guttentag-japan-nanking-20130118

Yes, I don't profess to understand the distinctions between the Republicans and the Democrats.  Mind you, what's the essential difference between New Labour and the Tories over here?  A question of degree, perhaps, but they both have very similar philosophies, and are run by (mostly) men from very similar backgrounds.  And similar to all your (mostly) men too.

So then, one could argue that the broken nature of the system (and the concomitant refusal to accept that it is broken or even to discuss it) is the most important issue that we should be debating.  Even more important than the Kennedy assassination, which was just one manifestation of something much larger, something much more troubling?

[echelon]

Jacob Hornberger (over at The Future of Freedom Foundation) draws parallels between the JFK assassination and possible CIA involvement in the deaths of two American journalists in Chile in 1973.

Letʼs assume, just for argumentʼs sake, that the CIA did, in fact, orchestrate or participate in the assassinations of Americans Charles Horman and Frank Teruggi and that the CIA wanted to keep it secret. Wouldnʼt one of the principal things the CIA would do is erect an impenetrable stone wall around the CIA in order to prevent any evidence of CIA complicity in the assassinations to surface?

If neither of the other two branches of the federal government - the legislative branch and the judicial branch - or, for that matter, the Justice Department as part of the executive branch - is able or willing to penetrate the CIAʼs stone wall, then how is one expected to come up with direct evidence that the CIA has committed the crime? It would, in fact, be the perfect crime, one that could be committed with impunity, with the CIA knowing that no one could penetrate its stone wall protecting the secrecy of its commission of the crime. The stone wall would also encourage the CIAʼs advocates in the mainstream press, along with its supporters in Congress and the federal judiciary, to declare, with straight faces, that no one has ever come up with direct evidence that the CIA committed the crime.

[...]

It seems to me that a governmental system is fundamentally flawed when a federal agency wields the power to shield itself from a targeted investigation from Congress, the Justice Department, and the federal courts into whether that agency orchestrated the assassination of an American citizen or participated in the assassination, especially when there is circumstantial evidence that points in that direction.

The same principle holds true, of course, in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

[...]

Not surprisingly, the Washington establishment, mainstream public officials like Judge Tunheim, and much of the mainstream press take the position that there must be an innocent explanation (e.g., “national security”) as to why the CIA is still fighting fiercely to keep its JFK-related records secret from the American people rather than constitute part of a criminal cover-up. Itʼs what I call the Inconceivable Doctrine - the notion that itʼs just inconceivable that the CIA would assassinate an American citizen, or at least one who is a U.S. official, in the quest to protect “national security”. Oh sure, they do consider it conceivable that that sort of thing could happen in foreign countries or even that the CIA would assassinate foreigners, including foreign political leaders. But the notion that the CIA would assassinate a U.S. official who was thought to pose a threat to “national security” is simply considered inconceivable.

(Emphasis added).

http://fff.org/explore-freedom/article/the-cia-vs-kennedy-horman-and-teruggi/

[Phil Dragoo]

Jim notes that despite Stone's JFK leading to public outrage, congressional hearings, establishment of the ARRB and much new evidence the government media does not give it any coverage.

From Gerald Posner Case Closed to Vincent Bugliosi Reclaiming History to Bill O'Bloviator Lone Nut Today, Lone Nut Tomorrow, Lone Nut Forever, the Ministry of Truth publishes Big Brother's earwax, on the tube, the celluloid, the glossy magazine, the bound pulp suitable for gathering dust.

The point of November 11, 1963 was the president works for us; you will listen to us.  When the president or you are inconvenient either or both are expendable, unpersons-in-waiting.

I have DiEugenio's Destiny Betrayed II and it is an excellent presentation of the case which so worried Helms and Hoover they mounted the greatest domestic effort to destroy the case and the man behind it, later admitting the defendant was "nash"--"one of ours" in the parlance of Nagell's world.

I have DiEugenio's Reclaiming Parkland.  Vincent Bugliosi has nothing.  His 2600 pages of pulp and kilobytes are fluff, bluff, lies and mattress stuffing.

Dulles on the commission was key, and Acheson was one of the few who foisted the commission on Hoover and Johnson.  And Acheson's daughter was married to William Bundy while McGeorge was Dulles' man.

Of course Joannides and Phillips were key--as was Angleton who hid the Kostikov meet with the imposter from Hoover until the day of the assassination.

The whole Mexico City deal was to contaminate Oswald so all agencies would clam up, dummy up, cover up.

Forty saw the occipitoparietal wound at Parkland and Bethesda.  Perry told McClelland he thought, "they were going to kill me"--and of course Blakey and the naval officers enforced censorship.

They covered up a conspiracy.  In a murder.  Blakey's alive and should be in jail.

Would O'Blovio have a job if he pursued justice.  Would any professor have tenure.  Would any intelligence officer be alive.

We're ruled by a pompous elite of Hollow Men

And that "wilderness of mirrors" line--

Angleton stole it from Eliot's Gerontion

Yet on many fronts the Castle is being mined by sappers

Snowden escaped its walls as the townspeople refused to attack Syria on the king's unhinged command

Humpty Dumpty has egg on his face and is the last to snap. . .a la Ceaușescu

[echelon]

DiEugenio's summary of where we are after 50 years:

http://ctka.net/2014/state_of_case.html

It's interesting that he quoted Larry Sabato extensively, given that he slated his book:

http://www.ctka.net/reviews/sabato_2.html

One very interesting link hidden in the depths of the article leads to a whole chapter about Oswald in Mexico City.  It appears to have been left out of DiEugenio's recent book "Reclaiming Parkland", although I know nothing further than that.

http://feralhouse.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Oswald-in-Mexico-_-excised-from-Reclaiming-Parkland.pdf

Anyway, a bit of light reading for us all to welcome in another year.