Book Review: JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters by James W. Douglass

In a clear and reasonable manner James W. Douglass dresses the table and defines the issue of John Kennedy’s assassination like no other writer in recent times. Ever since it happened it looks suspicious but it’s hard for the average person to define what that is, or what that feeling in the gut that something is not right here. James W. Douglass defines why it happened and in such an elegantly simple way, an epiphany envelopes the mind while taking it all in. You get the “ah-ha” moment as it all comes into focus. It is the defining of a reason why and how, that matters. And that opens it all up to a sensible explanation of how a conspiracy can develop and overwhelm a powerful leader.

Without being excessively wordy James W. Douglass succeeds humbly at providing us a clear, concise, and fast paced treatment of what happened. One can sense, if you read a lot of these books, the “best of” points from other researchers. Such as the Deep Politics of Peter Dale Scott; the Oswald doppelganger of John Armstrong’s research; the CIA manipulations of our leaders as L. Fletcher Proudy documented in The Secret Team; the CIA’s relationship with Lee Oswald from the work of John Newman, and so on, and so on. Douglass weaves it all together into a cohesive whole giving us the key, the motive like one would experience from a true crime story.

And provide a motive he does. We always instinctually knew it was never with the skinny guy in the white tee shirt. It was that cabal of military men hell-bent for war, their corporate suppliers, and the spooks playing puppet master behind the scenes. As John Kennedy found out there, there were more than one King in Camelot. He attempted to reign in this volatile group of players and it backfired. They got him. And this is the main thing to be learned from this book. The major players were setting it up and Douglass lays it all out like a master mason, assembling all of the bricks together to form the tomb.

His book is so well structured Douglass can slay the arguments of the lone nut salesmen without having to mention their names or debate them. Vince Bugliosi’s take on the assassination looks petty and shallow in comparison as he assumes the role of the Warren Commission’s defense attorney, slinging insults and dismissing evidence that betrays the Word of Warren; Norman Mailer is so befuddled at Oswald’s motive, he has to take on the role mind reader to find out what Oswald’s intentions were; Gerald Posner is a troll shilling for his masters and the truth is not for discovery, the narrative is. All these men are in a state of denial, to the point of crafting senseless schemes. Douglass points this out time and time again throughout the book that only a conspiracy works or makes any sense.

Forever it seems, we will be left without the names of the guilty. Douglass is no better with that than any other writer on this task. He is not to be faulted as it is the great unknown of the assassination. What we have and Douglass documents, is the paths to Dallas and the covering up of and by the action teams, but never that core group or a chronicling of their plotting. All that is left behind is their footprints. In many ways it was the perfect crime like only the Nation Security State can assemble and cast into the fire. After all, if the State commits a crime, then how is the State to be prosecuted? If anyone points a finger or lifts a word they will be dealt with by the power invested in them. (Which seems to lessen with time but never fully dies.)

Most people don’t realize we live in National Security State that Harry Truman singed into law in 1947. It became his only regret while in office. And that National Security State now thrives outside of the constitutional framework of our government. Our Founders were wise to institute checks and balances but sly forms of tyranny disguised as security will arise. And it only grows as we saw with the Patriot Act and later the Military Commissions Act. The Founders did the best they could to break the Divine Right of Kings, but that spirit keeps rising from the dead and threatens any leader who believes in liberty.

Until something else is published, James Douglass’ book will not be surpassed for years to come. If you only read one book on the assassination of John F. Kennedy, make it this one.

JFK and the Unspeakable: Why He Died and Why It Matters by James W. Douglass.

Hardcover: 510 pages
Publisher: Orbis Books (April 30, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1570757550
ISBN-13: 978-1570757556

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The Discovery Channel Frames Oswald Again

In their special broadcast last night, JFK: The Ruby Connection, The Discovery Channel, which by now is getting good at being a helpful tool of government propaganda, landed another rotten egg with their look at Jack Ruby being a mob hit-man out to silence Oswald. I had a bad feeling about this show knowing what a track record the Discovery Channel has in doing JFK assassination specials and always determining the Warren Commission was right and there was no conspiracy in John Kennedy’s death. This was quite evident in the special they aired a few years ago, Inside the Target Car. It was an embarrassment featuring Dale Myers computer animations of the assassination (make sure you check out Pat Speer’s great analysis of this on his at web site at, www.patspeer.com) and other misleading information to assure the viewer that only Oswald was shooting from behind.

As usual, this latest production was a biased one-sided affair, brushing off Ruby’s intent to kill Oswald not as premeditated but a random event. It featured the typical Discovery Channel stye, the usual cherry picking of the evidence so everything comes out tidy with no loose ends. Of course, nothing is neat or tidy. Seeing it hosted and narrated by Gary Mack was the final nail in the coffin. He was instrumental in the “Target Car” show and many others. When you see his involvement there will only be one conclusion--the Warren Commission was right and there will be no dissenting opinions.

Enter Gary Mack
Gary Mack, dubbed by researcher James Eugenio as, “The Discovery Channel's Dan Rather” is a rather notorious figure in JFK research circles. A man on the side of conspiracy till he went to the dark side of the force. Mack is curator and spokesman for the Sixth Floor Museum, and the purpose of the museum is to promote the Warren Commission’s conclusion of Oswald being the long gunman and to attack all critics of the Commission. (Evidenced by the museum bookstore which features no conspiracy JFK books.) Before his about-face, Mack was instrumental in getting the dictatape recordings to the HSCA and that became the basis of their assessment for a conspiracy. He was also involved with the badgeman photo which some believe is a man wearing a badge firing from the grassy knoll. His conversion apparently came when he was offered a position with a six figure salary, after he lost his job, his marriage, and his house. Obviously, this deal meant no more conspiracy talk.

In his neatly trimmed gray hair and smartly pressed shirts Gary Mack comes off in the show as a reasonable, respectable guy. Certainly not the type to sign up for college classes on the JFK assassination and then heckle featured speakers (along with his pal Dave Perry), but this is exactly what he was observed doing in a class taught by author/researcher Jim Marrs. Or a man that publicly goes by an allis when his real name is Larry Dunkel. To add to the high-tech mood of the show, Mack is shown drawing paths on maps floating holographic style in the air. Looks cool but is mostly eye candy promoting a modern “scientific” look which ultimately doesn’t tell you much except what they want you to know.

The Stuff They Left Out
In these cherry-picked presentations there is a lot left on the cutting room floor. Which of course, is the good stuff. Since the case is built that Jack Ruby just randomly showed up with a gun to kill Lee Oswald, it is never told that Ruby was stalking Oswald from the beginning. When Huston Post reporter Alonzo Huskiness asked Ruby’s attorney Tom Howard, if Ruby was packing his gun at the Friday night press conference, Howard acknowledged that he was. Ruby had called the police department numerous times inquiring when Oswald was going to be moved to the courthouse for sentencing. So close to the DPD, Ruby was in the station building at the time Oswald was being interrogated and tried to enter but was prevented from doing so. The producers of this show want it to seem that Ruby just got lucky and happened to show up at the right place at the right time when in actuality, Ruby was all over the place from the Dallas Police station to the Parkland Hospital.

They went into much detail about the various members of the press and police that were in the basement at the time of the shooting. One person never mentioned was Ruby’s attorney, Tom Howard. He was there at the same time Ruby was and seen at the jail office window. He left just before the shooting but appeared at the Sheriff’s office just a few moments later with a writ seeking Ruby’s release. This was accomplished before the mortally wounded Oswald made it Parkland hospital, making it appear that the writ was crafted far earlier than the shooting. How is that for speedy lawyer work? Can this be so? It would be interesting to research Howard’s background and see who his other clients were. He certainly got there early enough with the proper paperwork. Perhaps too early. In 1965 at the age of 48 Tom Howard died of heart attack, taking his secrets with him.

While it was menaced that Ruby was pretending to be a reporter at the Friday night press conference, complete with a film image of Ruby being there wearing his glasses looking oh, so, journalistic. It was at this press conference that Ruby corrected DA Henry Wade when he mispronounced the name of the Fair Play For Cuba Committee. How did Ruby know? It was not as if the FPCC was a well known organization. Nor was Ruby known to have been affiliated with such pro-Castro groups. Maybe Ruby’s familiarity was because he knew Lee Oswald’s affiliation with it. Of course that was never looked into like an honest, open investigation would have.

In Closing
The amount of facts left out of these so-called documentaries is a travesty that seems to have no end. As if doing this over and over again is going to turn the public away from the conspiratorial view that a majority of us have. You would think to be fair they would employ some balance. It’s not as if there aren’t an army of conspiracy based researchers out there. Or for that matter, just ordinary investigators that have found contradictions in the official narrative. People like Pat Speer. It’s always the critics and their point of view that is under scrutiny, never the government’s claims. I think the public is not as dumb as the producers of these shows perceive them to be. After all, these one-sided dog and pony shows never change the majority opinion.

Pamela McElwain-Brown, an expert on the presidential limousine, was hired by Discovery as a consultant for the Inside the Target Car special. What was supposed to be an investigation of the limousine as a crime scene turned out instead to be more of a method for proving the lone gunman theory, once more. In the end, none of Pamela’s research was used. She said in an interview on Black Op Radio that the show turned out to be, “Too much spectacle without substance.” Watching an alleged expert with a phony name, creating his etch-a-sketch holographic drawings with a finger, is a good analogy for that.

One thing they can never get away from. Lee Oswald was killed before he could have a trial. And if even if it is not true, it will always look like he was silenced on purpose.


Sources:
http://www.ctka.net/2009/target_car_jd3.html; (Pamela McElwain-Brown) http://www.in-broad-daylight.com/; http://www.patspeer.com; http://www.blackopradio.com; Books: Harvey and Lee, Crossfire, Farewell to Justice, Reclaiming History


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Where JFK Researchers Fear to Tread

Most researchers, especially those that are conspiracy bound (which seem to be most writers on the subject these days), mostly do not go near the issue of Oswald being a doppelganger despite the obvious discrepancies in his narrative. Most will agree that Oswald was being impersonated during his Mexico trip, such as Jeff Morley (Our Man in Mexico) and John Newman (Oswald and the CIA). However, it seems for most researchers find the subject is too weird even for them. In fact, it’s almost taboo. Author and researcher John Armstrong is the only person to seriously tackle the subject and he does so in a big way. Besides the doppelganger issue which is the main focus of the book, the sheer amount of detail he documents of the Kennedy assassination is staggering. It makes a good overall source book on the assassination. Jim Marrs has a section in Crossfire on Oswald doubles and Vince Bugliosi in Reclaiming History mentions it but then dismisses the subject as fringe kook material. In my growing library of Kennedy assassination books not much else is available. Why?

The Silvia Odio Incident
Quite well known in the annals of the JFK assassination is the story of Silvia Odio, the daughter of Armado Odio, trucking magnate of pre-Castro Cuba. Well known in that her story is evidence for conspiracy and a thorn in the side of the Warren Commission and its defenders.

The eldest of 10 children Silvia along with other family members fled Castro’s Cuba and in September of 1963 was temporally staying with her sister Annie in Dallas. There father Amador along with their mother were imprisoned by Castro after uncovered plotting against him. Amador had the largest trucking company in Cuba before Fidel Castro came to power. This is an important point to consider because one day in September of 1963, two Cubans and an American came knocking at her door, ostensibly to ask for help for her father’s organization, JURE. The Cubans introduced themselves as Leopoldo and Angelo, with the American introducing himself as Leon Oswald. Suspicious of these men, and later being warned by her father imprisoned in Cuba, she had nothing more to do with them. Later, when watching the results of the assassination on television and seeing the arrest of the alleged killer of the President she recognized Lee Harvey Oswald as the young man that introduced himself as Leon Oswald at her door.

Silvia Odio gave her testimony to the Warren Commission on this incident but shortly before the Warren Report was released they dismissed her story, saying she was mistaken, much to her disgust. She resented be told that she didn’t know who she was looking at and speaking with. Years later she would give her testimony again to the House Select Committee on Assassinations and they agreed her story was true. (It should be pointed out that there is more than one witness to this event. Her sister Annie who answered the door, saw Oswald and the Cubans and overhead the entire conversation. Her testimony was never taken by the FBI, Warren Commission or later, the HSCA.)


Timelines Askew
However, there is more to it than just additional lines of conspiracy and Oswald being seen with people when he was cast as a loner. Authors, Larry Hancock, Gaeton Fonzi, Joan Mellen, Peter Dale Scott, John Newman, and Lamar Waldron all give Silvia Odio credibility in her story of meeting Lee “Leon” Oswald prior to the assassination and his interaction with Cuban exiles. However, none of these authors make the connection of Oswald’s meeting with Odio and his bus trip to Mexico City. Because the FBI narrowed down the timeline of the Silvia/Leon meeting to September 26, the same exact time Oswald is traveling in Mexico. The implications are of more than one Lee Oswald in play. No wonder the Warren Commission (and Hoover behind the scenes) dismissed her account! Oswald being in Mexico at this precise date is verified by almost ten witnesses which includes fellow bus passengers and the hotel staff in Mexico City. There are also Hotel records to verify the date as well.

And this not the only sighting of Lee Oswald in Dallas on that date. Henry McCluskey, an Interstate Claims clerk for the TEC (Texas Employment Commission) remarked that Lee Oswald showed up on either the 25th or the 26th of September and gave him an address correction which he filled on an Interstate Claims form. He related this to the Warren Commission and was interviewed at home by attorney Albert Jenner. Jenner would conclude his testimony was hearsay. Typical. He has to so they can avoid the conflict. McCluskey would never be interviewed by the FBI or the WC. Interestingly the Interstate Claims form shows signs of tampering. The top was meant to be cut off in a straight line but that was not possible since the “P.O.” was written too high off the baseline. Whoever cut it did so by carving around the two letters. An amateurish job at best. This was done in the FBI’s possession and represents the tampering of evidence. Why would they do that? Because the date of September 25 or 26 would be written there and would show Oswald at Dallas and Mexico two at the same time.

Fearing to Tread
I must admit when I first started looking into the subject of Oswald doubles there was that sense of it being a far out subject not worthy of exploring. It’s gets even weirder when one considers that if it was an intelligence project, it starts when Lee Oswald is a teenager. That means there has to be a double for his mother as well. It takes a turn for the worse when you have two sets of doubles loose leaving a lengthy and contradicting witness and paper trail. And that is an important point; there is a paper trail to this that is so conflicting the only way to resolve it is to have two sets of sons and mothers. Just hunt through the Warren Commission’s 26 volumes and a lot of vexing things will be unearthed. Still more is waiting for us as there is a ton of paperwork still to be released from the various investigations. One day perhaps we’ll find out who John and Minnie Smith are, or the contents of the still unreleased tax returns of Marguerite Oswald from 1956-62, also marked, “referred...postponed in full.” There is no sound reason for any of this if these are normal people.

I can honestly understand why so many researchers don’t go near the subject even with the evidence staring them right in the face. This is not clearly not the case with John Armstrong who has written the definitive book on the subject in his Harvey and Lee. He’s a voice crying in the wilderness and I applaud him for his courage to pursue this subject. I’ve long held that there is more to the assassination of JFK than his murder. This business of doubles running about, appearing in places they should not be has possibilities for a tie-in to the deep cover that surrounds the assassination.

Epilogue
As I have noted in this piece, virtually no assassination author that believes Silvia Odio’s account of seeing Lee Oswald, connects the timing conflict between her encounter and Oswald being on the bus headed to Mexico City. Either one occurred or one did not. Or perhaps both did occur and Lee Oswald’s double was at her door with the Cubans. I have only stated one example here, but there are many more examples of this occurring all through the investigation.

Obviously, a lot of worms are going to escape if this can is opened. And there is more than one can.


Sources:
Armstrong, John, Harvey and Lee; Newman, John, Oswald and the CIA; McKnight, Gerald, Breach of Trust; Warren Commission Report; Douglass, James, JFK and the Unspeakable; www.ctka.net (Probe Magazine article archive); www.history-matters.com; Mellen, Joan, A Farewell to Justice, Marrs, Jim, Crossfire; Scott, Peter Dale, Deep Politics and the Death of JFK, Fonzi, Gaeton; The Last Investigation

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400 Dallas Police Department Photos Online

400 photographs from the Dallas Police Department have been indexed an placed online. Of interest, two photographs of cameras not known of before and more importantly, photographs of fingerprint cards taken from curtain rods. This is quite significant because Oswald is alleged to have brought in a package of curtain rods to work the morning of the assassination. It’s been held that this was actually the disassembled Mannlicher-Carcano rifle concealed in the package. But only one witness, Wesley Frasier testifies to this. At any rate, nothing related to curtain rods has surfaced before.

Also of interest is the curious “cut out” photo of Oswald from the backyard. What were they trying to do there? Frame somebody? Please....

LINK

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Who Bought The Guns?

Who Bought The Guns, has been updated at my Substack page.