October 4, 2013, - 6:40 pm

Wknd Box Office: Gravity, Parkland, Runner Runner, Inequality for All

By Debbie Schlussel

One fabulous new movie in theaters, this weekend, as we get closer and closer to the better movies in the Thanksgiving and Christmas season.

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* “Gravity“: A great movie adventure. The best thing about this movie is that it is visually stunning. Although I saw it in 2D, this is one of those that is worth shelling out the extra few bucks for 3D and/or IMAX. It makes it even more real when space debris is traveling at the astronauts in this movie (and you) at 100,000 miles an hour. The worst thing about this movie: the male astronaut, who knows exactly what he’s doing and does everything right, isn’t rewarded. The female astronaut, who is in a panic, doesn’t listen, and doesn’t stop talking, is.

The story: George Clooney and Sandra Bullock are American astronauts up in space to repair satellites. Suddenly, space debris from a destroyed satellite is traveling at them at very high speed and velocity, putting them in danger. Soon, they are stuck floating in space alone and without help, as their space shuttle is destroyed, and everyone on it is dead. And they are unable to communicate with NASA or anyone else but each other. They have limited oxygen supply and need to find a way out and home.






George Clooney is only in about a fifth of the movie. The real star is Sandra Bullock. I like this kind of movie, where survival is the goal and those trying to survive are all alone in an environment in which they must rely on brainpower and wit to stay alive. So, I enjoyed this. Add to that, space and beautiful visuals and special effects, and you have a great movie.

I didn’t need to hear or know the tragic sob story behind Sandra Bullock’s life on earth, but that’s very brief and a tiny part of the movie, and doesn’t really take away from it much.

This is the first of Oscar-hyped movies about survival. The next one, which is very similar, is “All is Lost,” coming out later this month, with Robert Redford playing a man trying to survive while lost at sea in the Indian Ocean. The movies have interesting similarities and differences and make great companion movie viewing about survival in different atmospheres. Stay tuned for my review on that one.

And, for now, go see this. It’s fun, thrilling, suspenseful, and entertaining. A great escapist movie. Odds are that you’ll enjoy it, as I did.

THREE-AND-A-HALF REAGANS
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Watch the trailer . . .

* “Parkland“: This is about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, the days surrounding it, and the hospital, Parkland, to where the bodies of both the dead President and his assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, were taken. At first, I expected to hate this movie and wondered what it could possibly show us. After all, half of Kennedy’s head was blown off, so I wondered, what is there to show? As we all know, efforts to revive the President were futile, and even if they were able to, were we gonna have a President walking around with half of a head? But I was pleasantly surprised, and the movie–even if overly sad and melodramatic–was much better than I expected, and it made me think a lot, including about angles that weren’t covered in it.

In an age where many Americans know only the history of the Kardashians and/or the Jay-Z/Beyonce Knowles Carters but not actual, real American history, this is a nice tutorial on the JFK assassination, the 50th anniversary of which takes place this November. However, for the rest of us, you won’t learn much new stuff, but the movie does explore interesting points, such as the reaction of Oswald’s brother and his encounter with the assassin sibling at the police station after the shooting. One glaring omission: the movie never mentions Jack Ruby, though there is notice of the assassination of Lee Harvey Oswald, and it never explores or even quickly asks why Ruby killed Oswald.

Still, I found the movie interesting and entertaining, and American history buffs will probably still enjoy it. One caveat: there are more men crying onscreen in this movie than at a showing of “Brokeback Mountain” in West Hollywood. It’s a little unsettling.

Paul Giamatti is probably the most memorable actor in the movie, as his portrayal of a morally centered and deeply affected Abraham Zapruder, the Jewish immigrant clothing maker who took the only film of the assassination. In the age of TMZ, it is touching to see his negotiations with LIFE Magazine, in which he insists that LIFE not publish stills from his movie that show “a dignified President in an undignified position.” Today, those pictures would be all over the place, as we now live in undignified times where anything goes and all gruesome death photos are published, except the ones of the only man we’ve (actually Obama has) raised as more holy than the rest of us, Osama Bin Laden. Zapruder talks about how his father took them away from Europe to escape certain death, and he is extremely sensitive to the situation in which he finds himself now.

If you are looking for conspiracy theories here, you won’t find them, except for the crazed, delusional ravings from Lee Harvey Oswald’s mother (Jacki Weaver), who insists that her son was a trained CIA agent and is deserving of full burial in Arlington National Cemetery.

The movie is a little maudlin and macabre at times. We see Mrs. Kennedy giving an emergency room nurse a piece of the President’s skull and brain that landed on her during the assassination. And there is a scene in which Secret Service agents struggle to get Kennedy’s coffin onto the plane and have to cut out sections of it.

But there are touching moments and interesting ones, such as the scene in which Catholic Secret Service agents kneel and pray at the President’s coffin on the plane in mid-air, and the scene contrasting the funerals of the President and his assassin. (Billy Bob Thornton co-stars in this as a senior Secret Service agent.)

The movie is based on the book “Four Days in November: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy,” by Vincent Bugliosi. I wondered about the accuracy of certain things. Is it true, for instance, that the FBI received a bomb threat from Oswald, ten days before the JFK assassination and ignored it? Is it true that, after Oswald was assassinated, agents in the Dallas FBI office burned the bomb threat letter, destroying all evidence of that?

The postscripts in the movie are interesting, telling us what happened to the doctors who tried to revive Kennedy, the Secret Service agents on his detail, Oswald’s mother, and so on. But the postscripts are lacking. They don’t tell us what happened to Oswald’s wife and kids, who remained in Texas. Check out the video interview of Oswald’s daughter, June, below; I don’t agree with her conspiracy theories, but the interview is interesting, nonetheles). The postscripts also don’t tell us that the Zapruder family got $16 million from the federal government as compensation for the feds taking the Zapruder film under eminent domain laws. And, again, Jack Ruby is just never mentioned anywhere.

Still, if you like history, you’ll probably like this, as I did, if you can ignore the overwrought melodramatics. And, as with me, it might inspire you to look further into the matters covered in the movie.

TWO-AND-A-HALF REAGANS
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Watch the trailer . . .

* “Runner Runner“: Two annoying words: Ben Affleck. I hated this movie, and I felt like I’d seen it a million times before, including the first time, when I saw the movie, “Wall Street.” This is a different setting, but it’s basically the same story, minus the “Greed is Good” speech. The movie was long, boring, pointless, and I struggled to stay awake, as it moves very slowly.

Justin Timberlake plays a working class student at Princeton University who is an “affiliate” of an online gambling site owned by Ben Affleck. The site primarily specializes in poker. An affiliate has customers (gamblers) he brings to the site (using coupons and other enticements), and he earns a cut of the action or some other form of payment. One day, Timberlake decides to gamble his $17,000 tuition money on the site and loses it all, even though he’s an excellent poker player and knows the precise mathematical odds for each move. He discovers that the site conned and cheated him, knowing his cards in advance.

Timberlake goes to Costa Rica to confront Affleck. Affleck apologizes, returns the money, and ultimately hires Timberlake. Then, he has Timberlake, a naive guy who thinks everything is aboveboard, do his dirty work. Timberlake pays off officials with bribes and soon finds friends missing. His life is threatened, as is his working class gambling father’s life, and he wants to get out, after finally realizing Affleck is a crook, a mobster, and a scammer. Believe me, I’m making it sound more simple than it actually is, as the movie is confusing, nonsensical, and ridiculous.

The movie is incredibly violent, and in one disturbing scene, Affleck and his henchmen pour chicken fat over public officials they’ve handcuffed. Then, they dump them in the water to be eaten by alligators. Or is it crocodiles? I didn’t care which, because I was so disgusted and already so bored and annoyed by sitting through this 1.5 hour pointless bore that seems like 5.5 hours.

Skip this.

TWO-AND-A-HALF MARXES
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Watch the trailer . . .

* “Inequality For All“: Should have been called, “Inequality For You Compared With Hypocrite Multi-Millionaire Fraud Robert Reich.” This is a “documentary” by and about Robert Reich, Bill Clinton’s Labor Secretary. The diminutive Reich explains why he is short (he has a disease, and his parents are normal-sized). And that is about the only explanation that is reasonable in this highly skip-able lecture of a movie. If you get orgasms over Occupy Wall Street, which is highly lauded in this movie, this is your flick. For those of us who are not Neo-Marxists, stay away.

Robert Reich tells us that the economy is bad and getting worse because of greedy shareholders who don’t work hard and just sit around and collect millions. He doesn’t tell us about his shares in the stock market and how greedy he is. Or about how he doesn’t work too hard giving once a week boring lectures as a highly-paid professor at UC Berkeley, although he does show us that he is a professor there.

Reich shows us some multi-millionaire original investor in Google (or Facebook, I can’t remember which and don’t care either). The guy tells us how his family is very wealthy from making pillows and investing. But, then, the guy whines that you only need six pairs of pants in life and that he has too much money because he’s made so much by investing. Well, then, give it to me, instead of hypocritically whining about it and imposing your left-wing, anti-free-market principles on the rest of us, while you continue to sit on your gazillions. Fraud.

The rest of the movie is Reich’s socialist clap-trap and fakery while he jets around America like the rich capitalist hypocrite limousine liberal that he is. He shows us some Hispanic people in California, whining about how hard life is for them because they live in a generously sized apartment (not a house–sad sad, too bad), and they might not be able to afford to continue to give their kids iPhones so their kids can call them in an emergency. Wow, that’s poverty?! Hilarious. Cry me a river. I don’t have an iPhone, but I don’t use that as an excuse for why the government should impose socialism and tell shareholders how much money they can make. Reich does.

There is only one good point in this movie, which is that when American workers make less or have less jobs, they don’t buy things, and, therefore, businesses die, and the economy sinks. We have turned into a purely service and consumer economy, not a manufacturing economy, and if we don’t manufacture things, we will die.

But he doesn’t point out a big reason a lot of people are losing their jobs and can’t afford to buy things and keep the economy humming: his precious ObamaCare. This is the biggest reason that people are either losing their jobs or being reduced to part-time and not making enough to survive. It’s glaring that this is never addressed in the movie. But, then, that’s what socialists do. They focus on the problems with capitalism, rather than the disasters they impose on our already weak economy.

If you want to get a survey of Marxist theology, better to read Das Kapital than to pay ten bucks to left-wing capitalist hypocrite Robert Reich.

FOUR MARXES PLUS FOUR OBAMAS
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Watch the trailer . . .




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45 Responses

Sorry Debbie, after seeing Clooney in that debacle, “Solaris,” I can’t bring myself to watch him, ever. And that doesn’t take into account his politics, which is reason enough to boycott him and any picture of his. After sitting thru “Solaris,” my friend turned to me and said, “What the Hell was that all about?” Fitting comment.

JeffT on October 5, 2013 at 10:35 am

DS, I am glad you mentioned Vincent Bugliosi. I have never been into Kennedy assassination theories as why go where all the crazies flourish BUT the one book I did read was his.

I should say I read half of it (and not because I got bored…) because it is the size of Russia and I was reading it at an unfortunate time where life’s stresses took over. I need to start it again and finish it.

It is extremely well written. I was so happy to see how easy it was to understand and read. I didn’t expect that because the subject matter is a labyrinth itself (for many, many years!) but I felt as if I started with the book one should start with.

I always like VB because of his work and book on Manson. I knew he had BDS but in the way where crazy Libtards have it where they are extremely short on facts. But I do recall the book being ginormous yet easily understood and VERY well written…which one does not see much these days. But I am not sure about the accuracy as it’s a subject I am not familiar with (but I do wanna keep away from the kook theories!) but I did feel I was reading a definitive tome on the subject…which could be correct or incorrect.

Skunky on October 5, 2013 at 11:52 am

That diminutive, pipsqueak from frickin’ munchkinland, Robert Reiiiiiiiiich, it should be remembered (a few years back) admitted that if HE were running for President he’d be honest and admit that a single-payer health care system WOULD have to ration and brutally base their providing of services on what the Gubmint could afford.

He admitted one can’t be that honest today but went on to say what HE would say IF one could be honest. And it detailed how the elderly would not be approved for services, people would have to die and that non-contributers to the Gubmint coffers would be last in line or non-priorities (elderly, very young & disabled).

He’s indeed a Satanic. little midget hypocrite. People need to know that about that beared Oompah-Loompah.

Skunky on October 5, 2013 at 12:05 pm

While I can’t stand Clooney, I took your advice and saw Gravity in 3D. It is an excellent flick. Well worth the extra $5. Thanks.

Bob on October 5, 2013 at 1:55 pm

To be fair, Sandra Bullock’s character Ryan Stone is NOT an astronaut. They don’t go into it in detail, but she’s some sort of researcher from a hospital in the Lake Zurich area of Illinois, and has developed something meant for a medical/hospital setting that works beautifully for NASA’s purposes. Essentially a reversal of how technology from NASA has found applications in other realms of scientific endeavor, particularly medical.

Ryan Stone (the only character referred to as Doctor) doesn’t have the experience of years of training in space and previous missions like Matt Kowalsky- she had six months of training so that she could go up and install this system she developed.

But yeah, sucks to be Kowalsky.

My issues with the movie are more about practicality.

1. Ryan may have designed the system to be installed, but there were seriously no astronauts capable of doing it? It makes no sense that it was easier to train a civilian to go into space than train an astronaut to install software/hardware.

2. In a real life situation where oxygen is dangerously, life-threateningly low, you DON’T encourage talking. It uses up more oxygen. Understandably they needed to dramatize the moment and calm the hyperventilating woman down, but that easily could have become Matt saying “Focus on my voice. Think of your sad life back on earth like you told us on the shuttle up here” and close ups of Ryan with a tear trickling down. After all, we don’t see that much of Kowalsky and it’d give him more to do.

It’s a tight, 90 minute movie that is a welcome change from the hugely embellished, Baroque productions of a dozen plot lines spinning out of control, but with at least one bizarre gaping hole they could have avoided, and another they could have better justified, it could have been a great movie instead of good.

Robert on October 5, 2013 at 2:51 pm

From Debbies’s last movie review, “…if we don’t manufacture things, we will die.” These eight words should be on billboards and bumper stickers.

Mike on October 5, 2013 at 5:35 pm

The original Soviet-Polish “Solaris” is the one to watch, if you enjoy philosophical movies.

Sandra Bullock debuted in “Speed” – which I still think is an underrated action film. Its riveting right down to the very last scene and there’s not a wasted moment in it.

Its good to see her back in top form in “Gravity.”

NormanF on October 5, 2013 at 6:08 pm

    Norman: Go back and take a look at “Demolition Man,” in which Ms. Bullock steals the movie right out from under both Wesley Snipes and Sly Stallone, not a mean accomplishment with both of these guys in their prime and chewing up all the scenery. She made quite an impact in a supporting role, then truly did come into her own in “Speed” (“Speed II” pretty much sucked), in which she had her first genuine starring role.

    jc15 on October 7, 2013 at 8:50 pm

That interview with June Oswald was fascinating. She’s seems a thoughtful person who doesn’t mince words. How bizarre it must be, and must have been her whole life, to be the daughter of L. H. Oswald. She seems, under the circumstances, to be preternaturally level-headed and poised.

…And speaking of preternatural, this interview was from 2009, so Marina, who looks like a trim 45 year-old in that brief clip, would have to be, what?–68? And June, who bears a spooky resemblance to her father (maybe it’s only spooky to me because I was watching TV in Wyandotte, Michigan one Sunday morning when I witnessed her father being murdered by Jack Ruby) she looks like a college sophomore but she’d be at least fifty, right?
Anyway, thanks DS for posting this intriguing interview. It dusted off some old memories sitting back in the far corners of my memory warehouse…

Joe Guiney on October 5, 2013 at 9:43 pm

That interview was during Clinton’s regime, must be in the 90’s !

davidc on October 5, 2013 at 10:29 pm

These all sound like duds. I hate Clooney and Bullock enough that I won’t even look at this on video. And why did they cast Clooney as the astronaut? Why not Will Smith or Denzel?

DS_ROCKS! on October 5, 2013 at 10:44 pm

The new movie “Parkland” sounds to me like another media attempt at distracting the public from the truth about the JFK assassination.

I am disappointed to read this review of “Parkland,” and right from the beginning it reveals a bias against the facts of the assassination. Like nearly every “news” article about the murder, this review refers to Oswald as “the assassin”—as though there were no doubts about that conclusion. Even though the members of a House Subcommittee looking into the assassination and the majority of Americans in poll after poll ever since 11/22/1963 believe that JFK was killed as a result of conspiracy, the media members still pretend that it’s a foregone conclusion that Oswald was the “lone assassin.”

The correct language to use here is to refer to Oswald as the “alleged assassin” and all journalists and lawyers should certainly know enough to use that phrase. That is especially true in this particular case.

Another inaccuracy in this review is that Zapruder wasn’t the only person filming the assassination. The other important 8mm film was shot by Orville Nix from the left side of JFK’s limo.

And finally, there is no evidence that Oswald’s mother, Marguerite Oswald, was “delusional.” On the contrary, the facts amply demonstrate that Oswald was no Communist and had top government clearance to travel to and from Russia with ease and a speed that no citizen at the time could have possibly accomplished without such clearance.

I have read scores of books on the murder, including the many volumes of the Warren Commission, studied other archived interviews and testimony, studied the Zapruder 8mm movie countless times, and so forth. My readings have included books from those who support the official version of the events as well as those who doubt it.

Based solely on the available facts and evidence, there is no question in my mind that there was a conspiracy to murder JFK, that more than one shooter was involved, and that the fatal head wound shot came from the front-right to JFK (indicating that that shot came from the area of the Grassy Knoll, and could not possibly have originated from the Texas School Book Depository).

Yes, there are junk theories and writings on the assassination as well as extremely well researched books—but those junk writings include those by Gerald Posner, and more recently, Vincent Bugliosi. Without getting into the many fallacies in Bugliosi’s book—a book which this new movie “Parkland” is based on—Bugliosi’s pro-Warren Commission book can be easily dismissed solely on the grounds that Bugliosi refuses to participate in any debates with any genuine JFK assassination experts. For example, Bugliosi wouldn’t dare to engage in a debate with the eminent assassination scholar Dr. Cyril Wecht, who is one of the nation’s leading forensic pathologists and who was once Pro-Warren Commission, but is now Anti-Warren Commission, having diligently studied the evidence.

I am certain that this movie “Parkland”—as a Bugliosi byproduct– doesn’t go anywhere near the actual testimony and opinions of the doctors who actually were there at Parkland Memorial Hospital working on JFK on 11/22/1963. The reason is simple: not a single doctor indicated that JFK was shot from behind, and that includes Drs. Malcolm Perry, Kemp Clark, Robert McClellan, and Charles Crenshaw.

Consider this press conference at Parkland on 11/22/1963 at 2:16 P.M. CST:

QUESTION-
Which way was the bullet coming on the neck wound? At him?

DR. MALCOM PERRY-
It appeared to be coming at him.

Now, Dr. Perry later did a little backtracking on his original statement, but Dr. Crenshaw—who worked with Dr. Perry—has publicly stated that all of the doctors involved at Parkland were told to keep quiet or their careers would be destroyed.

And later, Drs. McClellan and Crenshaw had given interviews indicating in no uncertain terms that JFK was fatally shot from the right-front and that his skull and brains were blown backward, consistent with that shot originating from the Grassy Knoll.

But if you want to believe that all these doctors, including current forensic pathology experts like Dr. Wecht are “conspiracy nuts,” you are entitled to believe that. But I also believe that you are entitled to believe in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny too.

Oh, and by the way, because JFK’s body was ultimately moved from Dallas to Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland for the autopsy, a truly professional autopsy was never performed on JFK. For example, Dr. James Humes, who was the principal physician conducting the autopsy had never before performed an autopsy involving gunshot wounds. Think about that for a moment. And all physicians involved in the autopsy were under military orders. Dr. Humes ended up burning his own notes.

One “easy” way for the pro-Warren Commission crowd to at least demonstrate that their lone gunman theory had merit would be to replicate the murder using dummies in a motor-contolled lomo using an actual marksman under very similar circumstances. Don’t you think that if someone with the necessary shooting skills existed, they would make a video demonstrating once and for all that the official version, with Oswald as the “lone assassin,” was at least a possibility?

They don’t because they can’t. I’m sure they’ve tried to replicate the circumstances, possibly out in some desert somewhere many, many times, but after failing, no matter how good the marksman, they’ve given up.

And even though the government has destroyed, or permitted to be destroyed, much critical evidence (a process that began immediately after the crime), there is still important evidence that the government has withheld from the public.

For example, George Joannides was the CIA case officer assigned to an anti-Castro group called the Student Revolutionary Directorate, which had an altercation in the streets of New Orleans with the Fair Play for Cuba Committee, a pro-Castro organization that counted Oswald as a member. After the fight, it was discovered that Oswald was passing out pamphlets that contained the Camp Street address of a known anti-Castro operation, leading many to believe that Oswald was part of a CIA effort to sabotage the pro-Castro group from the inside. (That address on Camp Street in New Orleans, is today—not ironically—the site of US Government buildings.)

Joannides also served as a CIA liaison to the U.S. House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations, which concluded in 1978 that JFK was “probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy.” According to committee counsel G. Robert Blakey, “He was put in a position to edit everything we were given before it was given to us.”

As the Associated Press noted, the classified CIA documents are currently held in a National Archives center in College Park, Md. The JFK Records Act, passed in 1992, states that the documents will be declassified in 2017, unless it is decided that releasing them would pose a threat to “military defense, intelligence operations, law enforcement, or conduct of foreign relations.”

However, I maintain that the US Government won’t release any important materials until all people associated with JFK’s murder are dead, and that may take several more years after 2017.

As for Jack Ruby and his motives? I’m surprised that “Parkland” hasn’t thrown in Ruby’s original cover story that he shot Oswald ”to save Mrs. Kennedy the heartache of going through a trial.”

My study of Ruby suggests that he was ordered to kill Oswald to silence him. Oswald was already on film in the Dallas Police Station stating that “I’m just a patsy”—so he clearly could not be permitted to remain alive very long, let alone be a defendant in a murder trial. The evidence plainly establishes that Ruby was a member of Mafia. He got started as a young man in Chicago working for Capone’s organization, but was later moved to Dallas. Most of the Dallas police knew all about Ruby because many of them were on his payroll and were given free meals, access to Ruby’s Carousel Club for free strip shows and his strippers, etc. The Carousel Club was also used for various Mob meetings held in Dallas.

In my view, the facts and circumstances of the JFK murder indicate that the Mob was responsible for many of the unusual deaths of individuals who had knowledge, or acquired knowledge, related to JFK’s murder. For example, Chicago crime boss Sam Giancana and crime associate Johnny Roselli were called to testify in the House Subcommitte on the JFK assasination-but by some bizarre, wild coincidence, each died suddenly one after the other before they could testify. Gianacana was shot in the back of his head and around his mouth at his suburban Chicago home, and Roselli was hacked to pieces and stuffed in an oil drum that was dumped in the Ocean near Florida.

As for why Jack Ruby really shot Oswald, the fact remains that Ruby pleaded with Federal authorities, including Earl Warren, the head of the Warren Commission, to take him to Washington, D.C. for protection, as he feared for his life. They refused. And so, Jack Ruby, who seldom drank alcoholic beverages and never smoked, on 12/9/1966—exactly one day after he had learned that his new trial was going to be held in February or March 1967 at Wichita Falls, about 140 miles from Dallas—was stricken with a mysterious disease first diagnosed as a common cold, then as pneumonia, and finally as generalized cancer.

As for some real insights into Jack Ruby’s real motives, why not at least listen to his own statements here? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yv3o9vx3VNM

Ralph Adamo on October 6, 2013 at 12:36 am

    Ralph:
    Nicely done. Extremely well-informed dissertation, although I’ll have to give you the benefit of the doubt regarding Ruby’s moderate drinking habits–he ran a strip joint, didn’t he?
    Whatever, his death was inconvenient for those who sought the truth, or at least some version or part of the truth.

    What a long strange trip it’s been…

    Joe Guiney on October 6, 2013 at 1:31 am

      Thanks for your comment, Joe. As for Jack Ruby’s moderate drinking, one source of information on that subject is J. Edgar Hoover, in a telephone call between him and Lyndon Johnson on November 29, 1963–shortly before the formation of the Warren Commission. Here’s a link to the call: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-1E7pivtss

      It’s a 20+ minute call, but you can hear Hoover’s description of Ruby at 6:00 – 8:00 minutes, using YouTube’s timeline, wherein Hoover says that Ruby didn’t drink. This section also discusses Ruby’s cozy relationship with the Dallas PD. Hoover can be believed here because he has no reason to lie about those subjects.

      (However, on other subjects, such as Oswald’s purported links to Communist organizations, the source/direction of the shots, and all shots coming from one gun in only a few seconds, Hoover’s comments have to be taken in the context that the FBI was already committed to concluding Oswald’s guilt as the “lone assassin.” And anything going against that was looked at as a problem–so the FBI’s objective wasn’t to find the truth behind the assassination.)

      The conversation at about 9:00 – 10:15 is also very interesting because, in my view, Johnson–without realizing it–signals that he knows that at least one shot came from the front-right. Johnson tells Hoover that if Texas Gov. John Connally had not been “in the way,” JFK would have been hit a third time. Hoover agrees with Johnson’s assessment. But the problem with that statement is that because Connally was sitting in the seat in front of JFK, Connally could only have been potentially “in the way” to someone shooting from the front–not from the direction of Texas School Book Depository, where Oswald was purported to have fired a rifle from the 6th floor.

      Ralph Adamo on October 6, 2013 at 5:12 am

    Ralph, Bugliosi’s book, even thou’ the size of a Buick, is explicit in it’s conclusion that Oswald acted alone. Right out of the gate.

    It uses the Warren Commission to bolster that and says, explicitly, that the WC was one of the finest investigative conclusions EVER.

    As I said, I don’t get into conspiracy theories but the book convinced me. It was easy to read and understand and really bolstered it’s conclusions with hard facts and convincing proof every step of the way.

    I refuse to go down the aisle of kookery when it comes to the Kennedy Assassination. That’s pretty hard to do so it’s no wonder I have zero interest in it at all. It’s been sullied beyond repair because of the kookery.

    Skunky on October 6, 2013 at 10:26 am

      Hmmmmmmm, kookery?!!!?? Skunky, are you trying to tell me that you deny the obvious? It’s a well known fact that Gracie Noll was a distant relative of former Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Chuck Noll.

      BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHHAHAHAHHHHHHHHH!!!

      Alfredo from Puerto Rico on October 6, 2013 at 11:43 am

      Skunky, Bugliosi is a very smart attorney and extraordinarily skilled prosecutor and he knows how to effectively and persuasively present a case. Don’t take this personally but you, no doubt, are falling for his masterful techniques. Of course Bugliosi writes clearly and simply. He wrote his book as though you, the reader, were a member of the jury, and juries don’t like complications. They prefer clear and simple arguments that appear to them to be supported.

      To give you a better idea of Bugliosi’s trial skills, in 1986, a mock trial of Lee Harvey Oswald was held in London. Bugliosi acted as prosecutor and famed attorney, Gerry Spence, acted as Oswald’s defense lawyer. The case was tried before a jury of Americans who were flown over for the event. The jury found Oswald guilty.

      Now, Gerry Spence is a great attorney, but he is no expert on the JFK assassination–in terms of knowledge of the evidence and details. Bugliosi, on the other hand, actually has done extensive research on the case. In short, Bugliosi was much better prepared than Spence was.

      But the fact that Bugliosi did his homework thoroughly does not mean that his case had strong merits. And based on his book, Bugliosi has heavily engaged in what is called “intellectual dishonesty” in the legal biz. He knew the evidence that he had to avoid because it would have undercut his arguments and he knew how to bolster weak evidence by giving you the illusion that his case was rock solid. He also deliberately made his book massive in length as another manipulative tool to persuade readers, as though to say that the weight of the evidence (literally) “proves” his case.

      You know, there’s a wonderful little scene in the movie “My Cousin Vinny” (script by Dale Launer) in which Vinny (Joe Pesci), as defense attorney, explains to Bill (Ralph Macchio) that the prosecution’s case only looks strong because of how its made to appear. Vinny demonstrates his point by doing a card trick. Here’s a clip of that scene, although, because of the way the frame is cropped, you can’t as easily see that Vinny changes one face card into an entirely different one.
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvSTjvDYUk4

      But the mock trial between Bugliosi and Spence was a sham because Spence, as good an attorney as he was, did not do the research that Bugliosi did. If Bugliosi faced off against attorney Mark Lane in 1986, who then would have been about 60 years old, I have no doubt that lane would have won his case over Bugliosi. Why? Because Mark Lane was not just a skilled attorney, but he was and is one of the most knowledgeable JFK assassination researchers ever. Lane, after all, had not only read and studied all the available evidence in great detail, but he was one of the pioneer researchers and personally interviewed witnesses that the Warren Commission ignored and witnesses in which the Commission changed what they said in their official report.

      Yes, as I’ve acknowledged, there are many kooks and disinformation specialists in the JFK assassination area. But that junk should not detract from the competent, diligent, and thorough work of those who have carefully examined the evidence and have reached the conclusion that JFK was killed as a result of a conspiracy.

      Do you consider the doctors who actually examined JFK at Parkland Memorial Hospital to be kooks? One of them, Dr. Charles Crenshaw, wrote a book about the assassination after he retired in which he described what happened at Parkland and what he saw and heard. Dr. Crenshaw explained that the fatal shot came from the right-front. You can see video interviews of Dr. Crenshaw on YouTube where you can judge for yourself whether Dr. Crenshaw was a kook.

      Are all the witnesses that said they heard shots that originated from the Grassy Knoll kooks? (And that includes police officers on the crime scene and scores of bystanders. Even Abe Zapruder said that the shots seemed to come from behind him!)

      Ralph Adamo on October 6, 2013 at 12:17 pm

        And if anyone is really interested in the JFK assassination, there actually is a first-rate movie on the subject based on attorney Mark Lane’s pioneering research. It’s called “Rush To Judgment” (1966). In it you will see Mark Lane’s interviews with actual eye/ear witnesses to the crime.

        If you watch the movie, note that Lane does not cut off those witnesses who say that they now believe the official government story. Lane does this because he also wanted to show the power of the government to manipulate people. The famous Stanley Milgram psychological “obedience to authority” experiment–as well as the replications of that experiment–establish that when the proper level of authoritative pressure is put on people, most will yield to the will of the authority. A similar principle is at work with the JFK assassination. Through repetition and media presentations presenting the official story, the “lone assassin” theorists hope to manipulate the public into accepting their position as true. “If the government says it, it must be true.” “If a major TV network says it, it must be true.” Etc. But the public still remains highly skeptical, as poll after poll proves. And with good reason.

        You can watch the full “Rush to Judgment” movie at this link.
        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHaMxA5w4_Y

        Ralph Adamo on October 6, 2013 at 12:40 pm

    For the record, I’d like to make one correction to my write-up on the JFK assasination. Bugliosi DID debate the eminent forensic pathologist, Dr. Cyril Wecht in a radio show. Although theirs was a friendly discussion of opposing views, Bugliosi did not remain too long to debate Dr. Wecht. When things started to heat-up Bugliosi had to excuse himself, purportedly for his book tour.

    Ralph Adamo on October 31, 2013 at 6:22 pm

I’ve mentioned before that I haven’t been to the movies for about 30 years, nor do I watch them in any other medium. Sometimes, when there’s nothing else to do, I’ll read one or two of Debbie’s movie reviews. I was happy that Debbie enjoyed a movie for once, until I got to the part where it says, . . .

George Clooney.

I despise George Clooney, and his politics have nothing to do with it, but y’all can throw that in there for good measure. I’m almost longing for the day when definitive evidence is provided of the young men he enjoys having sex with. I love my gay friends as much as my straight friends, but I abhor phonies. George Clooney is one of the most smug, self aggrandizing phonies on the scene today. If the rumors are in fact untrue, I still despise him, but I’m glad Debbie enjoyed the movie. She’s been subjected to enough of the ones she hates.

I used to sort of like Sandra Bullock, until 15 minutes after her breakup with Jesse James or whatever his name is, she appeared in public with a fat Ugandan baby, her new “son.” Did I mention how much I abhor phonies?

If anyone is interested in a fascinating movie with a character named Kowalski, I highly recommend 1971’s ‘Vanishing Point’ with Barry Newman.

Speaking of Ben Affleck, I despise him, too. Received accolades for his “epic” ‘Argo,’ despite having twisted that story to suit his Hollywood fancy, as Hollywood loves to do. Based on a true story means nothing anymore, or did it ever? I hear he left out a lot, including glossing over the most important character in that “true” story. Haven’t y’all twisted the culture enough?

Speaking of phoniness, anyone know how he got his famous chin? Okay, it wasn’t exactly carved out like John DeLorean’s, but he had some work done to get that “classic” look.

Hey Ben, nothing against licking your girl’s ass, but next time do it in private, PLEASE!!! Don’t make an ass out of yourself by doing it on the deck of a ship with a camera crew in a helicopter videographing the whole thing. Especially when she was just using you to stay relevant, and save her then totally flagging career. It worked, she’s The Queen of Everything That’s Nothing again. And that’s all it takes, just be a King or Queen of Nothing. Look at Miley Cyrus. She’s going to die in a high speed car accident with Justin Bieber at the wheel showing off, and they’ll both be lionized in the media.

Hollyweird.

Debbie, I know you’re a Certified Movie Critic, but I can’t help feeling sorry for the masochism you go through by maintaining that occupation. God bless you, you’re a better person than me, in myriad ways.

Alfredo from Puerto Rico on October 6, 2013 at 1:37 am

A few weeks before November 23, 2013, JFK, along with Bobby Kennedy had President Diem of South Vietnam overthrown and killed in a military coup.

Karma’s a bitch.

Jonathan E. Grant on October 6, 2013 at 11:53 am

    JEG, Karma obviously doesn’t work like that. If it did, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, and every president since would have met a similar fate to JFK’s.

    There’s a wonderful scene in “The Godfather” in which Kay (Diane Keaton) and Michael (Al Pacino) discuss whether top-level gangsters are all that different from presidents and senators. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAdUuGsi30g
    So, don’t be naïve.

    But that doesn’t justify a government sanctioned framing of Oswald, destruction of evidence, and a cover-up of one of the most important crimes in U.S. history.

    Ralph Adamo on October 6, 2013 at 2:39 pm

Unfortunately, this “karma” thing didn’t seem to hurt The Swimmer very much. Although he never fulfilled his dream to become president, he rose to a position of tremendous power, and did incredible harm to this “once great republic.” No outcry from the feminists, no checks and balances on him, he infiltrated the American political system, and influenced it in a very unhealthy way. We’re all suffering as a result.

Alfredo from Puerto Rico on October 6, 2013 at 12:13 pm

Bugliosi is a Left-wing Radical smear merchant and smart-mouthed little punk.

Daniel Middleman on October 6, 2013 at 4:11 pm

Since when is accuracy any goal of a film based on historical events? It never has been…not in the 1910s and ‘Birth of a Nation’, not in the 30s with ‘The Story of Louis Pasteur’ and not now. Nor is it the goal of novels or plays based on true stories. Shakespeare’s History plays are shameless Tudor propaganda. Tolstoy’s ‘War and Peace’ is blatantly biased against the French. If you want history read a history book.

Vivian on October 6, 2013 at 4:41 pm

Justin Timberlake as a college student? Does his youth never end? That guy has got to be in his 30s. Clooney and Bullock are not actors. They are movie stars. They play themselves in most movies.

I think of guys like William Macy and Phillip Hoffman more as “actors.”

If Kennedy was killed by a conspiracy, did the conspirators get the result they wanted?

Reich is proof of that old ironic axiom. Which is that you can be a total idiot, but as long as you can attract other idiots, you can have a wonderful life with a career, money, and respect.

the fog on October 6, 2013 at 4:43 pm

What left wing radicals like Reich and Obama never say when condemning stockholders is that stockholders used already heavily taxed paychecks to buy stocks and bonds.

Additionally, without stock and bond holders, businesses could not grow and expand and employ people.

Condemning property holders for owning property is communism, a system that never worked and has always had nothing but blood on its hands.

It is disgusting that so many Americans now mouth this bullcrap instead of saving and investing. Oh, right. Got to buy something for instant gratification instead of plotting to accumulate wealth. Dupes.

Jonathan E. Grant on October 6, 2013 at 7:00 pm

They failed to include the part where, right after the first or second bullet (I forgot which) hits Kennedy, Jackie turns to the President and says, “That’s for Marilyn.”

Jonathan E. Grant on October 6, 2013 at 7:11 pm

I am surprised that nobody yet had mentioned “Case Closed” by Gerald Posner, which I’ve read a decade ago and was thoroughly convinced by it that it was Oswald who did it, alone. Also, all the other theories, including the “grassy knoll” etc., don’t pass the Occam’s Razor test and thus smack of conspiracy/kookiness…similarly to the 9/11 conspiracies.

AIF on October 6, 2013 at 9:52 pm

Oswald acted alone. For every theory, idea, conspiracy theory, etc., not a single person has presented a thread of evidence to show a conspiracy.

Many so-called “experts” claim that Oswald could not have been skilled enough to shoot Kennedy from the Dallas Book Suppository; however, to anyone who shoots, this was an easy shot, and for a marine marksman, it was as easy as peeing.

And while there was not a second gunman, there was a second cameraman, as his films failed to show anything out of the ordinary from what the Warren Report stated.

But, if you believe in conspiracies, here a few:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myUDGvCLzi8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DguBcLpWBS0

On another note, Kennedy was a complete and total screw up.

He put 35,000 troops in Vietnam.
He destabilized South Vietnam by having President Diem killed.
He screwed up at the Bay of Pigs. He pissed his pants and failed to provide the necessary military support to overthrow Castro, thus eviscerating the Monroe Doctrine.
He came off like a weakling with Kruschev.
He could have knocked down the Berlin Wall when it was being
built…the wall was a test he failed.
He should have quickly moved in to stop a nuclear missile base from being built in Cuba…he was too busy getting drugs from his Doctor Feelgood and getting laid thereafter.

His economic policies led to the taxation of interest and dividends, which led to a much slower investment rate in America, slowing our GNP growth from 5-7% to 1-3%.

Both of his books were ghost written. In his ghost written book, he applauds then Senator Taft for opposing the War Crime trials of the Nazi murderers of Jews and others.

He was a big supporter of Joe McCarthy a drunk whose moronic anti-communist campaign discredited the anti-Communist movement.

He was a user of people. Here in DC, the Kennedys had a habit of always borrowing money from people for lunch, dinner, etc. and never paying them back. A small point but it shows what a chiseler and low life these people were and are.

He and his family were supporters of the Nazis up until December 7, 1941. This is well documented. He even had an affair with a Nazi Spy during WWII, until he was shipped out to the Pacific where he let a huge destroyer cut his far speedier, much more maneuverable PT boat in half.

And yet, the Kennedy Machine has convinced morons everywhere that he was a good president.

JEG: Right on (although I do not agree with you on Vietnam and McCarthy). I never ever believed in any of the conspiracy theories about the Kennedy shooting. The only thing that is half believable is that he was actually aiming for Connolly and missed. Other than that, I think the shooting is pretty straight forward. And conspiracy theorist BS movies, like “JFK,” which are NOT based on fact but instead based on lies, confuse and fool people. There is no evidence it was a conspiracy. DS

Jonathan E. Grant on October 6, 2013 at 10:21 pm

    The “not a credible shread of evidence of a conspiracy” line is used by those who have an agenda to support the Warren Commission or by the approximately 30% who believe the Warren Commission fairy tale. Notably, most of that 30% have NEVER looked at the enormous body of evidence convincingly proving that JFK was killed by the fatal shot fired from the right-front. In short, the accept the fairy tale lock-stock-and-barrel based soley on the ipse dixit of “authority” government and media sources–not evidence.

    Insofar as the attacks on JFK, none of them are true. But that is also a standard operating practice of the 30% believers in the fairy tale. In order to justify JFK’s murder, they denigrate him, summing him up as a liar, womanizer, drug user, commie sympathizer, coward, etc. Why do they chose to belive that too about JFK, in addition to the official fairy tale? Because the very same “authorities” in government and the mainstream media (that work closely together) have been busy feeding the public those lies. So the 30% who will swallow the Warren Commission lie wholesale will inevitably swallow other lies and distortions about JFK.

    Regarding JFK’s performance, the bottom line is that the Bay of Pigs faisco was a mess engineered by the Allen Dulles and the CIA, and JFK realized that he was being set-up for a failure in Cuba by the CIA. JFK’s response was to FIRE Dulles and Bissel. That sort of thing had NEVER done before by any US President. And JFK did not kill the Diem brothers.

    On top of that, JFK was taking steps to REDUCE the power of the CIA. That was a very dangerous policy for the President to take and obviously no president since has dared to go against the CIA and its war interests again.

    Ralph Adamo on October 31, 2013 at 7:12 pm

    For the record, JEG and Debbie, you haven’t really looked into the evidence nor history to draw any of the conclusions you’ve done. Physicians who examined JFK’s fatal head damage at Parkland said that the direction of the shot came from the right-front–ruling out Oswald or anyone else from the Book Depository. One of those physicians is still alive today, Dr. Robert McClelland. He recently spoke of the fatal head wound which he said that examined for at least 7 minutes, confirming again his statements through the decades about it. And, as I’ve pointed out, to duplicate even the timing of the three shots with any degree of accuracy by one shooter from the Book Depository was not only far from easy. It was impossible. If the Warren Commission apologists could replicate the shots, you can be 100% assured they would have ALREADY done that years ago and put it on video. They then would have played it over and over and over again to prove their point. But they can prove nothing because there is NO expert gunman on the face of the Earth capable of replicating the long gunman fairy tale.

    Your “knowledge” on history is equally deluded, as you are relying on the same “authorities” who are giving you the official fairy tale of the assasination itself. You use your own false history to paint JFK as a sex and dope fiend and commie tool–both to trivialize his murder and to excuse it. But your picture of JFK is bogus.

    To use your tar-brush technique to describe the career of Frank Sinatra (a friend of JFK’s and who played in instrumental role in his election), would be like saying that Sinatra was just a womanizer and an alcoholic (with Jack Daniel’s being his favorite means of getting drunk). Never mind his dozens of classic albums (CDs), tours, acting roles in some excellent movies, TV appearances, and his tremendous philanthropy. Let’s just sum up the man for what he was: a violent, womanizing drunk–and forget about all that other stuff. Fair assessment? Absurd, right? But that’s what you’ve done describing JFK.

    Moving on to your political misconceptions, the Bay of Pigs faisco was CIA’s own doing, and was a plan set in place even before JFK assumed office. The plan was doomed to fail from the start, as the Soviet Union and Cuba KNEW IN ADVANCE through their own intelligence souces of the plan.

    Subsequent to the fiasco, in November 1961, CIA inspector general Lyman B Kirkpatrick, authored a report ‘Survey of the Cuban Operation’, that remained classified until 1996.

    The conclusions were:

    1.The C.I.A exceeded its capabilities in developing the project from guerrilla support to overt armed action without any plausible deniability.

    2.Failure to realistically assess risks and to adequately communicate information and decisions internally and with other government principals.

    3.Insufficient involvement of leaders of the exiles.

    4.Failure to sufficiently organize internal resistance in Cuba.

    5.Failure to competently collect and analyze intelligence about Cuban forces.

    6.Poor internal management of communications and staff.

    7.Insufficient employment of high-quality staff.

    8.Insufficient Spanish-speakers, training facilities and material resources.

    9.Lack of stable policies and/or contingency plans.

    The CIA wanted to put the blame on JFK for not bailing them out for their failure of a “plan” by providing air support, thereby trying to directly draw JFK into the CIA’s failure.

    JFK was angered with CIA’s failure, and declared he wanted “to splinter the CIA in a thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds.” JFK told journalist Ben Bradlee, “The first advice I’m going to give my successor is to watch the generals and to avoid feeling that because they were military men their opinions on military matters were worth a damn.”

    As a direct result of CIA’s failure and botched plan from the start, Castro became even more solidified. JFK fired Director Allen Dulles, CIA Deputy Director Charles Cabell, and Deputy Director for Plans Richard Bissell (forcing them to resign) by early 1962. No president since the founding of CIA nor afterward has ever taken such unprecented action against the important agents of the military-industrial complex. But then again, no president before or since was executed in broad daylight either.

    Ralph Adamo on November 1, 2013 at 8:09 pm

I remember seeing Jerry Rivers (now known as Geraldo Rivera) present the Zapruder film or parts of it on TV. I was a teenager and became interested in the assassination (JFK was a hero to my Dad). The last book I read on this topic was Mark Fuhrman’s book (and I respect Mr. Fuhrman). However, unanswered are some facts:
1. Oswald knew as a Marine that his best shot is while the target is approaching. He could have shot at Kennedy as he approached but waited until his car was moving away. Why would he do that? To have a triangulation on Kennedy for a front shooter.

2. There was a definite back wound identified on Kennedy. There was also a wound to the front of the throat that was first identified as a entrance wound described as either an exit wound or one caused by a tracheotomy. When you watch the Zapruder film, when Kennedy shows his first reaction to being shot, he raises his arms at a 90 degree angle and grabs his throat. His reaction would be caused by both the pain in his throat, not back, and the damage caused to his spine which apparently causes that type of involuntary reaction. The back would was too low to cause an exit wound in his throat.
3. The head shot is all too clear – it’s a front shot. They’ve tried to explain this as caused by forces causing Kennedy’s head to lurch backwards. This is the equivalent of Flight 800 being destroyed in 1996 by a center tank explosion which has never occurred. Multiple witnesses claimed they saw a missile arc up and destroy the jet and those with military background who saw the explosion claimed it was an ordnance explosion, not one from jet fuel. But today, we’re suppose to believe that a center tank exploded,etc. In a pig’s eye.
4. The rather pristine appearance of the bullet from rifle allegedly used by Oswald that was found in the stretcher. This bullet allegedly struck Kennedy in the back, passed through him, struck Connolly in his wrist and then ribs, causing extensive damage to both areas of his body, and then entering Connolly’s leg. This has been called the Magic bullet.
5. Ever wonder why even Presidents such as Carter, Clinton and Obama have not normalized relations with Cuba? Maybe they’ve been presented evidence of the involvement of Castro who had the motive to have Kennedy shot. And if Oswald had been innocent, he would not have said he was a patsy (implying some inside knowledge of what occurred) but would have immediately said he was innocent. Oswald was involved and was one of the shooters. Someone else shot Kennedy from the front. And he was probably killed himself shortly thereafter.

Concerned Citizen on October 6, 2013 at 10:24 pm

Concerned Citizen, I wouldn’t know a “center tank” from a Sherman Tank, but I have never believed the explanation for Flight 800. I awoke on that day knowing something terrible had happened. My father, who was actually born on July 18th, always said his birthday was most likely actually July 17th. So, I called down here to check on him. He was fine. Then I heard about Flight 800.

The Great StainMaker was headed for an election, and couldn’t afford to have a bonafide terror attack on his watch. What a shameful bunch we have had running this country over most of the last century, especially the past quarter century. Throw in a complicit media, and we are doomed. As America goes, so goes the world, straight in to the toilet.

I sure hope everyone’s ready for the worst time the human race has ever experienced. I remember my youth, when everyone around me was so sure the human race would work it all out. Can’t work it out when you leave your Creator behind. The media, the government, and the people have been complicit in that, and we are going to pay the price.

As for the JFK assassination, I remember that day fairly well, all of seven years old I was, and living in Gulfport, MS at the time. It’s rather obvious that no matter what one believes, that something quite nefarious was going on, and Oswald could not possibly have been a lone “crazy” having his momentary delusion of grandeur.

That having been said, JFK was not nearly the president nor the man he was cracked up to be, just another page in the history of how the government and media have played the American people like a Stradivarius.

Alfredo from Puerto Rico on October 6, 2013 at 11:23 pm

Sometimes I just want to grab people and shout, “They are all liberal! All of them! If they are not rubbing their politics in your face during the movie, stop whining about it and just enjoy the show!” Sheesh. But I digress . . . “Gravity” is a fine, well executed movie. 90 tightly wound minutes to tell a simple story: “Speed in space” I’m telling people (and remember, the knowledgeable cop in “Speed,” Jeff Daniels, gets blowed up real good, leaving it to the reckless, inexperienced cop to save the day. I was half-expecting that Sandra was going to stand up and be greeted by her daughter, if you know what I mean.

gmartinz on October 7, 2013 at 12:12 am

Those last 14 words, Joe. Truer ones were never spoken.

Alfredo from Puerto Rico on October 7, 2013 at 8:38 pm

I also don’t think JEG’s prevarication about the Kennedy family being Nazis should go unchallenged. Was Joseph Kennedy, the father, a Nazi-sympathizer? Absolutely. Was he also a racist? Yes, absolutely. Did he also hate Jews? Yes absolutely. However, “like father” is not always “like son.” And in the case of JFK, none of the above applied in any shape or form. NONE. JFK, in fact, appointed Jews and Blacks to positions they had never before held in presidential administrations. For a little taste of what the Kennedys were like personally, see the memoir written by George Jacobs about his life as Frank Sinatra’s valet. Jacobs, who was part-Jew, part-Black, knew many of the key players of that era, including Joe Kennedy, his sons, and others in the Kennedy family. He tells, with disgust, how repulsive Joe Kennedy was, with this relentless attacks on Jews and Blacks and his oven “jokes.” Jacobs said (in so many words) that Joe Kennedy was so vile and disgusting that he made Sam Giancana, one of the most important and ruthless gangsters of the day, look like a genuine gentleman. Having known Joe for some time, when he finally did meet JFK, even before he was running for president, he surprised how good JFK turned out to be–with Joe as the example.

However, as Jacobs tells his life story, JFK did share a trait in common with his father–he was always on the lookout for sex. So just as Joe bedded Hollywood starlets, like Gloria Swanson, JFK had his affairs with Marilyn Monroe, Angie Dickenson, and others. Insofar as the woman that JFK had an affair with, Inga Arvad, who purportedly was a Nazi sympathizer, all the evidence points to an affair based solely on sex, at least from his point of view. Ironically, Joe the father, the real Nazi-sympathizer of the family made JFK cut the relationship off. So the affair was just about sex. That’s all there was to it.

Hopefully, I’ve set the record straight, for those who prefer history based on evidence, rather than hearing propaganda that supports their prejudicial, misguided notions.

Ralph Adamo on November 1, 2013 at 9:48 pm

And then, in addition to the crime itself, there is the second crime: the US Government cover-up of the original crime. Can there be any doubt about that, even among deaf-dumb-and-blind Warren Commission apologists? Could it be an accident that the US Government used force to remove JFK’s body so that the autopsy could be performed directly under military supervision, rather than by competent professional coroners in Dallas?

One of the key reasons that the JFK assassination remains a mystery is that the nature of his wounds remains a mystery. This was largely caused by problems with the president’s autopsy, which took place at Bethesda Naval Hospital Center, a military teaching institution near Washington.

The autopsy was carried out by three pathologists, all of them middle–ranking military officers whose only practical experience of forensic autopsies was a one–week course taken by one of the pathologists ten years earlier. Two of them, Humes and Boswell, had NEVER even examined the body of a person killed by gunshot wounds. Ever!

The room in which they worked was crowded with a variety of non–medical onlookers, several of whom were giving orders to the pathologists.

The written records from the autopsy are incomplete, and perhaps corrupt. The original autopsy report was deliberately destroyed by Humes, the senior pathologist, after Oswald’s murder. The rewritten autopsy report includes measurements and other data that do not exist in the pathologists’ surviving notes and diagrams.

The photographic record is incomplete. The pathologists and photographers recalled ordering and taking photographs which appear no longer to exist.

And for those who want to pretend that Oliver Stone’s movie on the assassination, JFK, was fiction, consider one of the most important and revealing scenes in the movie, presented during the trial near the end. One of the forensic pathologists is called to testify about the autopsy, and he explained what happened. The screenplay by Stone and Zachary Sklar hardly needed to get creative. All they did was simply capture the testimony nearly verbatim; testimony given by Dr. Pierre Finck, who was present at Bethesda. His testimony was powerful and dramatic enough, and it doesn’t take mach to read between the lines to get the real message. The US Government, led by the military, was only interested in preserving the offical lie, and did NOT want the truth to be revealed to the public.

Now, I know that many here don’t like Oliver Stone and hate his politics. But that should have nothing to do with whether or not his JFK movie is an accurate account of the real facts. And in this case, both screenwriters clearly did a LOT of research of the outstanding research performed by some of the real investigators of the assassination.

Here is some of the real-life testimony. Of course, I don’t expect the deaf-dumb-and-blind-authority-genuflectors to read this, but for those who are truly interested in the facts, this testimony from the Clay Shaw trial is a must-read.

Mr Oser: How many other military personnel were present at the autopsy in the autopsy room?

Col. Finck: The autopsy room was quite crowded. It is a small autopsy room, and when you are called in circumstances like that to look at the wound of the President of the United States who is dead, you don’t look around too much to ask people for their names and take notes on who they are and how many there are. I did not do so. The room was crowded with military and civilian personnel and federal agents, Secret Service agents, FBI agents, for part of the autopsy, but I cannot give you a precise breakdown as regards the attendance of the people in that autopsy room at Bethesda Naval Hospital.

Mr Oser: Colonel, did you feel that you had to take orders from the Army General that was there directing the autopsy?

Col. Finck: No, because there were others, there were Admirals.

Mr Oser: There were Admirals?

Col. Finck: Oh, yes, there were Admirals, and when you are a Lieutenant Colonel in the Army you just follow orders, and at the end of the autopsy we were specifically told — as I recall it, it was by Admiral Kenney, the Surgeon General of the Navy — this is subject to verification — we were told not to discuss the case.

Mr Oser: You were told not to discuss the case?

Col. Finck: — to discuss the case without coordination with the Attorney General.

(State of Louisiana vs. Clay L. Shaw, Criminal District Court, Parish of Orleans, State of Louisiana, 198–059 1426(30) section C, transcript, pp.51f)

Mr Oser: Doctor, speaking of the wound to the throat area of the President as you described it, after this bullet passed through the President’s throat in the manner in which you described it, would the President have been able to talk?

Col. Finck: I don’t know.

Mr Oser: Do you have an opinion?

Col. Finck: There are many factors influencing the ability to talk or not to talk after a shot.

Mr Oser: Did you have an occasion to dissect the track of that particular bullet in the victim as it lay on the autopsy table?

Col. Finck: I did not dissect the track in the neck.

Mr Oser: Why?

Col. Finck: This leads us into the disclosure of medical records.

Mr Oser: Your Honor, I would like an answer from the Colonel and I would ask The Court so to direct.

Judge: That is correct, you should answer, Doctor.

Col. Finck: We didn’t remove the organs of the neck.

Mr Oser: Why not, Doctor?

Col. Finck: For the reason that we were told to examine the head wounds and that the —

Mr Oser: Are you saying someone told you not to dissect the track?

Judge: Let him finish his answer.

Col. Finck: I was told that the family wanted an examination of the head, as I recall, the head and the chest, but the prosectors in this autopsy didn’t remove the organs of the neck, to my recollection.

Mr Oser: You have said that they did not. I want to know why didn’t you as an autopsy pathologist attempt to ascertain the track through the body which you had on the autopsy table in trying to ascertain the cause or causes of death? Why?

Col. Finck: I had the cause of death.

Mr Oser: Why did you not trace the track of the wound?

Col. Finck: As I recall I didn’t remove these organs from the neck.

Mr Oser: I didn’t hear you.

Col. Finck: I examined the wounds but I didn’t remove the organs of the neck.

Mr Oser: You said you didn’t do this; I am asking you why didn’t [you] do this as a pathologist?

Col. Finck: From what I recall I looked at the trachea, there was a tracheotomy wound the best I can remember, but I didn’t dissect or remove these organs.

Mr Oser: Your Honor, I would ask Your Honor to direct the witness to answer my question. I will ask you the question one more time: Why did you not dissect the track of the bullet wound that you have described today and you saw at the time of the autopsy at the time you examined the body? Why? I ask you to answer that question.

Col. Finck: As I recall I was told not to, but I don’t remember by whom.

Mr Oser: You were told not to but you don’t remember by whom?

Col. Finck: Right.

Mr Oser: Could it have been one of the Admirals or one of the Generals in the room?

Col. Finck: I don’t recall.

Mr Oser: Do you have any particular reason why you cannot recall at this time?

Col. Finck: Because we were told to examine the head and the chest cavity, and that doesn’t include the removal of the organs of the neck.

Mr Oser: You are one of the three autopsy specialists and pathologists at the time, and you saw what you described as an entrance wound in the neck area of the President of the United States who had just been assassinated, and you were only interested in the other wound but not interested in the track through his neck, is that what you are telling me?

Col. Finck: I was interested in the track and I had observed the conditions of bruising between the point of entry in the back of the neck and the point of exit at the front of the neck, which is entirely compatible with the bullet path.

Mr Oser: But you were told not to go into the area of the neck, is that your testimony?

Col. Finck: From what I recall, yes, but I don’t remember by whom.

(Ibid., pp.114–8)

Ralph Adamo on November 2, 2013 at 3:46 am

    And if there are still any people left who believe that they can be logical and believers in the Warren Commission fairy tale at the same time, consider one of the central figures in the assassination: Dr. George Burkley, Kennedy’s personal doctor. Burkley was the only medically qualified witness to possess first–hand knowledge of every aspect of JFK’s wounds and treatment.

    Dr. Burkley had been in the motorcade in Dallas; he had treated the JFK in the emergency room at Parkland Hospital; and he had attended the autopsy at Bethesda, Maryland. Dr. Burkley’s insight into the JFK assassination medical evidence was, however, overlooked by the official investigative agencies. He was not called to testify before the Warren Commission!

    Dr. Burkley made two contributions to the documentary record, both of which undermines the notion that Oswald alone killed Kennedy. On the death certificate that he signed, the back wound was located “at about the level of the third thoracic vertebra” (ARRB MD6, p.2).

    The autopsy descriptive sheet, the pathologists’ official diagram of the wounds to the body, placed the back wound in the same location. Dr. Burkley signed the sheet, “Verified” (ARRB MD1).

    The third thoracic vertebra is typically four to six inches, or 10 to 15 centimetres, below the point at which the shoulders meet the neck, and is consistent with the location of the bullet holes in the backs of President Kennedy’s shirt and jacket, both of which are almost six inches below the tops of the collars. A bullet that entered Kennedy’s back at a downward angle at this location could not have gone on to injure Governor Connally. If Dr. Burkley’s evidence is correct, the Warren Commission’s single–bullet theory must be false, and the assassination cannot have been the work of just one gunman.

    The mountain of evidence of a conspiracy is so overwhelming, that they only way that a official-fairy-tale-genuflector can continue to hold firm to the belief that Oswald was the lone assassin is by ignoring any of that mountain of evidence. And that is precisely what they do; and must do, to maintain their false alliance with authority. To question that authority by actually doing some real research and study of history is a painful and deeply disturbing thing for authority-genuflectors to do. But few ever transgress by even letting one footstep to touch the realm of reality. They instinctively avoid it, as they are programmed to believe that to question authority–or rather, those powers in the military-industrial complex that they perceive to be authorities–is unpatriotic.

    Ralph Adamo on November 2, 2013 at 4:13 am

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