Weisberg's trash-the-critics book 'Inside the Assassination Industry'

[Richard Booth]

Harold did some valuable work in the early days. I don't think anyone doubts that.

But Mr. Booth is correct. If anyone in this community ever needed an editor, maybe two, it was Harold. Many people think that Post Mortem is a valuable book. It might be, but I could not read it. I never got past page 15. It is the only JFK book that I literally put down and never went back to.

And I think he flubbed a great opportunity. His book length reply to Posner was not nearly as powerful as it should have been.

I haven't read Case Open. Back in the 90s after reading Garrison's 'On the Trail of the Assassins,' I picked up a used copy of Whitewash. I was excited to get hold of such an early work on the Warren Commission. Imagine my dismay after plodding through a few pages and thinking "this is really hard to read. He's right...but...this is awful." So, I never did pick up Case Open based on the initial bad impression I got from Whitewash.

While I can't comment directly on Case Open, I can venture a guess: Weisberg possessed the records and the knowledge to debunk Posner's book, point by point, but I imagine the execution of that was probably bungled by his difficult prose. If you go by what he writes in 'Inside the Assassination Industry' this was probably exacerbated by the publisher taking a cleaver to what was probably already a poorly executed rebuttal.

Just goes to show that some of the luminaries in this field have made such great works not because they're excellent researchers, but in spite of it. In that respect, the skill it takes to write well isn't appreciated as much as it should be.

I think your writing, Jim, is superlative. It's a pleasure to read your stuff, with points made in a way that seems effortless to the reader. Walt Brown is also a pleasure to read (I'm thinking here of The Chronology and The People vs. Lee Harvey Oswald) with just the right amount of sarcasm and cynicism to make things fun.

All that said... I'll take Weisberg's obtuse overly complicated phraseology any day over someone who is slick but full of shit like Posner or Bugliosi. And as for the latter, his 'work' received a proper rebuttal. Knocked it out of the park (both the ten-part review that was on CTKA and Reclaiming Parkland)