Discrediting Secret Service complicity in the elimination of JFK…

[Paul Rigby]

Paul, you're missing -- intentionally or not -- Peter's important point. The assassinations you cite were carried out in plain sight -- but in the cases of JFK and MLK, the hitters were hidden.

Actually, CD, it was me, not Peter, who insisted the assassinations were carried out in plain site - a point with which you clearly agree.

The killer of RFK benefited from relatively sophisticated camouflage: the Sirhan distraction that confused perceptions and facilitated the further disguised point-blank shots.

Greer benefited from the fact the assassination site was at the end of the parade, at a relatively unpopulated site. He was further shield by the terrain, and the other vehicles in the motorcade. RFK's killer, by contrast, boasted the "sophisticated camouflage" of the victim's body; and was inevitably, like Greer, also seen shooting.

Now if you were more familiar with the fuller exposition of the Elm St shooting scenario which centers on Greer, you'd know that it, too, posits (a) decoy shot(s), only this time from the rear:

Fred Newcomb & Perry Adams, Murder from Within (Santa Barbara, Ca: Probe, 1974), Chapter 3, “Execution”:

“Just before a freeway sign, the driver began to slow down the presidential limousine.

Suddenly, a shot came from the top of Elm St., now a half block in back of the President. A Secret Service agent in the Vice-President's follow-up car had raised his left hand out of the partly open left, rear window. A revolver was fired skyward.

The crowd's attention was distracted from the presidential limousine by the sudden explosion.”

Late in the same chapter, the authors offer more on the subject:

The Decoy Shot

As the motorcade approached Elm St., an amateur photographer focused his movie camera on the presidential limousine and the front of the depository building. His lens also caught the Vice-President's follow-up car, the third car behind the limousine. This was perhaps a minute before the first shot was fired. The Vice-President' s follow-up car was approaching the left-hand turn into Elm St. when both of its rear doors opened, six to eight inches (Fig. 3-2). According to the film, no one got in or out of the car.

One witness, standing on the southeast corner of Elm and Houston Streets, saw the follow-up car's open doors. After it turned the corner, he "…heard the first report…" which he thought was a car's backfire. The Texas Highway Patrolman who was driving the Vice-President's car thought the shot "…appeared to come from the right rear of the Vice-President's car."

Many witnesses said that the first shot sounded like a "firecracker" or a "backfire" in the street.

Altgens' sixth photograph of those he took in Dealey Plaza (Fig. 3-3) tends to support the contention that someone in the motorcade fired a gun into the air at the intersection of Elm and Houston Streets, when the limousine was about 100 feet down Elm St.

Altgens' photograph, which was taken about three seconds after the decoy shot was fired, when enlarged (Fig. 3-4) shows Secret Service agent Warren W. Taylor, in the rear left seat, of the Vice-President's follow-up car. His arm is outside of the open car door; the configuration of his hand suggests he is holding a gun. Those people in the car immediately behind smelled gunpowder.

[Charles Drago]

[There, all very logical and rational - and light years away from baseless supposition.

Paul

Except the parts that are illogical, irrational, and wholly baseless.

The SS did it to preserve itself. Greer did it because he was a good Nazi.

The SS attempted to preserve itself by failing at its most important mission.

Greer was a cold-blooded killer who hated Catholics.

And the cover-up was undertaken to save one rogue agency of government and its anti-Papist hitter.

Okay ... I'm almost convinced.

[Charles Drago]

Actually, CD, it was me, not Peter, who insisted the assassinations were carried out in plain site - a point with which you clearly agree.

You declare the obvious with an air of discovery. The deaths occured in plain sight; the instruments of those deaths were not readily visible.

Greer benefited from the fact the assassination site was at the end of the parade, at a relatively unpopulated site. He was further shield by the terrain, and the other vehicles in the motorcade. RFK's killer, by contrast, boasted the "sophisticated camouflage" of the victim's body; and was inevitably, like Greer, also seen shooting.

"Shielded"??? Greer was in full view of any number of bystanders and photographers during the shooting sequence.

Are we both talking about the events in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas, at 12:30 PM on November 22, 1963? I know that I am.

As for RFK's killer: Please identify this person. It was not SBS. It was not Thane Eugene Cesar.

Now if you were more familiar with the fuller exposition of the Elm St shooting scenario which centers on Greer, you'd know that it, too, posits (a) decoy shot(s), only this time from the rear[.]

I'm quite familiar with the likely shooting scenario -- and now, thanks to you, with another fantasy version to join those of the WC and HSCA.

Of course at least one decoy shot was fired -- a fact which has zero probative value in terms of your hypothesis.

Altgens' photograph, which was taken about three seconds after the decoy shot was fired, when enlarged (Fig. 3-4) shows Secret Service agent Warren W. Taylor, in the rear left seat, of the Vice-President's follow-up car. His arm is outside of the open car door; the configuration of his hand suggests he is holding a gun. Those people in the car immediately behind smelled gunpowder.

Again, zero probative value for your case. And I have no problem whatsoever with the suggestion that Taylor was a co-conspirator.

See Evica's "Terrible Sound" essay for a truly rational and deep political analysis of the "firecracker," its origins and functions.

[Charles Drago]

Shots from inside the presidential limousine

1.Bobby Hargis (Police motorcycle outrider, left rear of limousine):
Mr. Stern: Do you recall your impression at the time regarding the shots?
Hargis: “Well, at the time it sounded like the shots were right next to me,” 6WCH294.

So the "left rear of the limousine" is "right next to" Greer's position? You're 0 for 1.

2. Austin Miller (railroad worker, on triple overpass):
Mr. Belin: “Where did the shots sound like they came from?”
Miller: “Well, the way it sounded like, it came from the, I would say right there in the car,” 6WCH225.

So the triple overpass affords an ideal acoustic environment for identification of shot origins in the Dealey Plaza echo chamber? 0 for 2.

3. Charles Brehm (carpet salesman, south curb of Elm St.): “Drehm [sic] seemed to think the shots came from in front or beside the President. He explained the President did not slump forward as if [sic] he would have after being shot from the rear,” “President Dead, Connally Shot,” The Dallas Times Herald, 22 November 1963, p.2 [cited by Joachim Joesten. Oswald: Assassin or Fall Guy? (London: Merlin Press, 1964), p.176.]

So "in front" and "beside" imply proximity and are not mutually exclusive in this case? 0 for 3.

4. Officer E. L. Boone (policeman, corner of Main and Houston Streets):" I heard three shots coming from the vicinity of where the President's car was,” 19WCH508.

So "from the vicinity" implies inside the car? 0 for 4.

5. Jack Franzen: “He said he heard the sound of an explosion which appeared to him to come from the President's car and ...small fragments flying inside the vehicle and immediately assumed someone had tossed a firecracker inside the automobile,” 22WCH840.

So Franzen could not possibly be describing the effects of one/both of the headshots and therefore must be describing a Greer shot? 0 for 5.

6. Mrs. Jack Franzen: “Shortly after the President’s automobile passed by…she heard a noise which sounded as if someone had thrown a firecracker into the President’s automobile…at approximately the same time she noticed dust or small pieces of debris flying from the President’s automobile,” 24WCH525.

As above. 0 for 6.

You and A-Rod should hang out in October. You have much in common.

7. James Altgens: “The last shot sounded like it came from the left side of the car, if it was close range because, if it were a pistol it would have to be fired at close range for any degree of accuracy," 7WCH518.

So "if it were a pistol" implies that "it" was a "pistol" to the exclusion of all other possibilities? And we're talking photographer Altgens and not ballistics expert Altgens? And "if it was close range" establishes same? 0 for 7.

8. Hugh Betzner, Jr.: “I cannot remember exactly where I was when I saw the following: I heard at least two shots fired and I saw what looked like a firecracker going off in the president's car. My assumption for this was because I saw fragments going up in the air,” 19WCH467

Please see my 0 for 5 and 0 for 6 responses. 0 for 7.

So, then, no one saw or heard shots from inside the presidential limousine?

Correct.

[Paul Rigby]

Actually, CD, it was me, not Peter, who insisted the assassinations were carried out in plain site - a point with which you clearly agree.

You declare the obvious with an air of discovery.

Hardly - I was right all along. You've simply dug yourself into a hole and no longer feel able to admit it.

[ The deaths occured in plain sight; the instruments of those deaths were not readily visible.

Fiddlesticks - you're in a rut, defending the demonstrably untrue:

RFK's killer was TEC, and he was seen shooting at RFK.

Greer was seen firing by eyewitnesses.

MLK's killer was seen in the bushes.

Malcolm X's assassination team boasted both diversionary and close range shooters: all were observed, some even apprehended post-killing.

Your claim is purest nonsense.

Greer benefited from the fact the assassination site was at the end of the parade, at a relatively unpopulated site. He was further shield by the terrain, and the other vehicles in the motorcade. RFK's killer, by contrast, boasted the "sophisticated camouflage" of the victim's body; and was inevitably, like Greer, also seen shooting.

"Shielded"??? Greer was in full view of any number of bystanders and photographers during the shooting sequence.

"Any number"? Hyperbolic folly, as you betray by your failure to comment on the sentence which concludes "at the end of the parade, at a relatively unpopulated site." Both true, as you know, but again can't bring yourself to acknowledge.

And as Elm Street dips and curves in the run toward the overpass, yes, Greer was "shielded" from many observers: by Kennedy's elevated seat position, the other occupants of the presidential limo, the cars following, their occupants, and the motorcycle outriders. All readily discernible in Altgens' most famous photo of the assassination (see extract below from MFW).

[Are we both talking about the events in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas, at 12:30 PM on November 22, 1963? I know that I am.

I rather think you've proved otherwise...

[As for RFK's killer: Please identify this person. It was not SBS. It was not Thane Eugene Cesar.

Oh dear. What have we here? TEC not the assassin? Really. Charles Drago, meet Dan Moldea.

[

Now if you were more familiar with the fuller exposition of the Elm St shooting scenario which centers on Greer, you'd know that it, too, posits (a) decoy shot(s), only this time from the rear[.]

I'm quite familiar with the likely shooting scenario -- and now, thanks to you, with another fantasy version to join those of the WC and HSCA.

Of course at least one decoy shot was fired -- a fact which has zero probative value in terms of your hypothesis.

In context, my point was perfectly clear and germane: It wasn't just RFK's murder which involved decoy shot(s), as you implied.

Altgens' photograph, which was taken about three seconds after the decoy shot was fired, when enlarged (Fig. 3-4) shows Secret Service agent Warren W. Taylor, in the rear left seat, of the Vice-President's follow-up car. His arm is outside of the open car door; the configuration of his hand suggests he is holding a gun. Those people in the car immediately behind smelled gunpowder.

Again, zero probative value for your case. And I have no problem whatsoever with the suggestion that Taylor was a co-conspirator.

See Evica's "Terrible Sound" essay for a truly rational and deep political analysis of the "firecracker," its origins and functions.

At last, some sense...but why the difference in standards with regard to proof? Surely Taylor's guilt must be established by the same exacting procees as Greer's?

[Paul Rigby]

Shots from inside the presidential limousine

1.Bobby Hargis (Police motorcycle outrider, left rear of limousine):
Mr. Stern: Do you recall your impression at the time regarding the shots?
Hargis: “Well, at the time it sounded like the shots were right next to me,” 6WCH294.

So the "left rear of the limousine" is "right next to" Greer's position? You're 0 for 1.

2. Austin Miller (railroad worker, on triple overpass):
Mr. Belin: “Where did the shots sound like they came from?”
Miller: “Well, the way it sounded like, it came from the, I would say right there in the car,” 6WCH225.

So the triple overpass affords an ideal acoustic environment for identification of shot origins in the Dealey Plaza echo chamber? 0 for 2.

3. Charles Brehm (carpet salesman, south curb of Elm St.): “Drehm [sic] seemed to think the shots came from in front or beside the President. He explained the President did not slump forward as if [sic] he would have after being shot from the rear,” “President Dead, Connally Shot,” The Dallas Times Herald, 22 November 1963, p.2 [cited by Joachim Joesten. Oswald: Assassin or Fall Guy? (London: Merlin Press, 1964), p.176.]

So "in front" and "beside" imply proximity and are not mutually exclusive in this case? 0 for 3.



So "from the vicinity" implies inside the car? 0 for 4.



So Franzen could not possibly be describing the effects of one/both of the headshots and therefore must be describing a Greer shot? 0 for 5.



As above. 0 for 6.

You and A-Rod should hang out in October. You have much in common.

7. James Altgens: “The last shot sounded like it came from the left side of the car, if it was close range because, if it were a pistol it would have to be fired at close range for any degree of accuracy," 7WCH518.

So "if it were a pistol" implies that "it" was a "pistol" to the exclusion of all other possibilities? And we're talking photographer Altgens and not ballistics expert Altgens? And "if it was close range" establishes same? 0 for 7.

8. Hugh Betzner, Jr.: “I cannot remember exactly where I was when I saw the following: I heard at least two shots fired and I saw what looked like a firecracker going off in the president's car. My assumption for this was because I saw fragments going up in the air,” 19WCH467

Please see my 0 for 5 and 0 for 6 responses. 0 for 7.

So, then, no one saw or heard shots from inside the presidential limousine?

Correct.

Arlen Specter, move over...lamentable stuff, CD, truly, embarrassingly, lamentable.

[Paul Rigby]

Did you attend the Specter/Posner/Bugliosi Institute of Illogic and Obfuscation? Because really, Paul, in too many respects you are beginning to resemble these characters.

From urbane, witty, jazz-loving liberal to white-fanged McCarthyite in just one thread. That 's quite some achievement, CD.

Let me know when you've finished with the bottom of the barrel - there's a whole, delicious underneath for you to feast on.

Shameful.

[Charles Drago]

[Oh dear. What have we here? TEC not the assassin? Really. Charles Drago, meet Dan Moldea.

Dan Moldea claims that Sirhan did it. I know and state for the record, here and elsewhere, that Sirhan did NOT shoot RFK.

Don't try to smear me, young man. Better than you have tried and failed.

I'm pretty much done with you, Paul. At least on this subject. I don't know how to deal with your frantic grasping at phantasms and your crippled and crippling "logic" other than to isolate you, on this subject, among a host of true believers for whom logic, common sense, and learning are trumped by ego and ignorance.

Quickdraw McGreer did it. Nobody saw him do it, but he was shielded, so how could he have been seen? Mrs. Kennedy knew, and she punished him with irony. Everyone who noted that shots came from the front and/or side clearly was noting that Greer did it. Everyone who postulates at least one decoy shot is offering proof that Greer did it. Everyone who honestly claimed to see matter being ejected from the car was confirming that Greer's shot was the cause. Everyone who honestly claimed to see an entrance wound on the left temple was confirming that Greer did it. Lyndon Johnson and John Connelly, in fearing the Secret Service, were implicitly acknowledging that Greer did it. There is not a scintilla of evidence to support your absurd, obsessive, simple-minded, and conspiracy-abetting conclustion that Greer did it, but Greer did it. To save the Secret Service. And the most complex cover-up known to man was instituted to protect the SS and its designated hit man.

Okay.

A dedicated entomologist taught a flea to respond to a human commands.

He would say, "Fly, fea," and the flea would fly.

Every time.

Then one day he cut off the flea's wings.

"Fly, flea," he commanded once again.

This time the flea did not fly.

And so the entomologist was prompted to conclude, "When one removes the wings from a flea, the flea becomes deaf."

Get your hearing checked, kid.

But I still love ya.

[Charles Drago]

Did you attend the Specter/Posner/Bugliosi Institute of Illogic and Obfuscation? Because really, Paul, in too many respects you are beginning to resemble these characters.

From urbane, witty, jazz-loving liberal to white-fanged McCarthyite in just one thread. That 's quite some achievement, CD.

Let me know when you've finished with the bottom of the barrel - there's a whole, delicious underneath for you to feast on.

Shameful.

As noted, I am quite finished with you.

[Peter Lemkin]

Actually, CD, it was me, not Peter, who insisted the assassinations were carried out in plain site - a point with which you clearly agree.

You declare the obvious with an air of discovery. The deaths occured in plain sight; the instruments of those deaths were not readily visible.

Greer benefited from the fact the assassination site was at the end of the parade, at a relatively unpopulated site. He was further shield by the terrain, and the other vehicles in the motorcade. RFK's killer, by contrast, boasted the "sophisticated camouflage" of the victim's body; and was inevitably, like Greer, also seen shooting.

"Shielded"??? Greer was in full view of any number of bystanders and photographers during the shooting sequence.

Are we both talking about the events in Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas, at 12:30 PM on November 22, 1963? I know that I am.

As for RFK's killer: Please identify this person. It was not SBS. It was not Thane Eugene Cesar.

Now if you were more familiar with the fuller exposition of the Elm St shooting scenario which centers on Greer, you'd know that it, too, posits (a) decoy shot(s), only this time from the rear[.]

I'm quite familiar with the likely shooting scenario -- and now, thanks to you, with another fantasy version to join those of the WC and HSCA.

Of course at least one decoy shot was fired -- a fact which has zero probative value in terms of your hypothesis.

Altgens' photograph, which was taken about three seconds after the decoy shot was fired, when enlarged (Fig. 3-4) shows Secret Service agent Warren W. Taylor, in the rear left seat, of the Vice-President's follow-up car. His arm is outside of the open car door; the configuration of his hand suggests he is holding a gun. Those people in the car immediately behind smelled gunpowder.

Again, zero probative value for your case. And I have no problem whatsoever with the suggestion that Taylor was a co-conspirator.

See Evica's "Terrible Sound" essay for a truly rational and deep political analysis of the "firecracker," its origins and functions.

Yes, CD got my point, but I think you failed to get it. While the executions were public the real shooters, the real means, the real magic tricks were done with deception and misdirection. Almost everyone in DP was looking at JFKs limo. RFK was shot in the kitchen where it was crowded and confused and few had their attention on him. Etc. While it is not impossible to imagine a scenario of the driver doing it, I find NO evidence this happened and it being the most dangerous of possible plans. By the way there is a book that posits a shot from the trunk, with the assassin in it....but both are IMO diversions from the real tricks that day.