Nelson's LBJ Mastermind book

[James H. Fetzer]

I do not want to get in the way of what should be a most interesting exchange between Morgan Reynolds and Charles Drago, especially since I have already done what I can to explain that Charles' position suffers from the straw man by adopting an exaggerated conception of what it would take to qualify as the "mastermind" of JFK's assassination. No one had a larger role and most certainly not some abstraction.

Appeals to some nebulous "national security state" don't face up to the fact that real decisions affecting the course of events are made by real people who are in positions of power. No one was in a stronger position of power--for a multiplicity of reasons--at that historical moment in time than was Vice President Lyndon Baines Johnson. Read Madeleine and Billy Sol but don't forget the historians. LBJ was a master of power.

No one has a stronger claim on that distinction than LBJ as the pivotal played both BEFORE and AFTER the ambush in Dallas. Lyndon was the one who stood to gain the most and who had the least to lose. He was in desperate straits and knew how to push the buttons and pull the levers of power. And he had no inhibitions about taking out his political enemies or even his own sister, if she became "inconvenient" to him. He had his own hitman!

Lies occur when someone deliberately makes an assertion that they know to be false with the intention of misleading their audience. Disinformation, similarly, involves the deliberate assertion (propagation, dissemination) of information they know to be false with the intention to mislead their audience. Typically, as in the case of the reasons Bush and Cheney gave for invading Iraq, it is promulgated for political purposes.

The selective use of evidence can be part of a disinfo op, but it is not strictly necessary, as long as there are ways to present it that make it plausible. Articles in The New York Times, for example, were used to bolster the case for invading Iraq, even though those reasons were not well-founded. It follows that having verifiable evidence is not a requirement for the deployment of disinformation.

So claiming that the key to it is "the selective use of verifiable fact" is incorrect. The selective use of fabricated evidence can work just as well, as occurred when Bush and Cheney claimed that Saddam was seeking yellowcake from Niger, which turned out to be based upon crudely forged documents. What was "verifiable" was not fact and, indeed, facts tend to pose obstacles to the use of disinformation.

Demonizing Saddam Hussein was in itself an act of disinformation, where, in that case, the history of his conduct of the affairs of the nation were subject to exaggeration. We thought we could pin the existence of WMDs on him because we had sold them to him, but Saddam had skillfully disposed of them in anticipation of that being used against him, as UN inspectors would subsequently confirm.

My contribution here is meant to be conceptual. While it is the case that the best sources of disinformation offer a proportion of truth and fiction on the order of 80/20, the parallel with lying is quite appropriate. I would even go so far as to suggest that these continued attacks on Seymour Hersh are an example, since he has done so much to expose malfeasance at home and abroad. Attacking him is wrong.

I am still astounded that, when well-placed sources from Jack Ruby to Evelyn Lincoln finger LBJ as the pivotal player--where Ruby said the assassination would not have taken place had someone else been the Vice President--and Phil Nelson has given us such a superb study of his warped character and political genius, this is still supposed to be a debatable issue! I think Morgan has it just about right.

In my most recent post above I added the following material:

Your understanding of disinformation seems rather superficial, if I may say. "Disinformation" and "lies" are not synonymous. The spreading of false information is but one component of a disinformation operation -- the key element of which is the selective presentation of verifiable fact. Nelson tells us nothing we did not already know. A great deal of what he professes to be true is true. Like all disinformationalists he uses such statements of fact to establish his bona fides, and then goes on to present, for example, the Hersh abominations as fact with the expectation that his readers will accept these arguments from authority.

Previously on this thread I have demonstrated how Nelson has attempted to back away from his now crumbling "mastermind" deception even though in his book he steadfastly maintains, in no uncertain terms, that LBJ did indeed supply the directing or creative intelligence for the assassination conspiracy. You tell me the proper word to describe Nelson's action.

To it I would add this: If in fact LBJ embodied the directing or creative intelligence for the JFK assassination conspiracy, then surely it follows that he would have played the same role in the MLK and RFK plots. Or will you argue that LBJ's genius was so staggering that others used his perfect plan as a template upon which to base subsequent deep political murders?

Also, remember that, as I've documented elsewhere in this too-long thread, Nelson claims that LBJ was hands-on throughout the plot, pre- and post-shooting. He allegedly was handling "hundreds or thousands" of coverup details. Keep this in mind if you choose to argue that LBJ simply gave the orders and let others devise the particulars.

Finally, I'd like you to tell me what kind of "mastermind" stages a presidential assassination in his home state and sends his publicly acknowledged closest advisors to oversee details?