03-01-2011, 05:03 PM
Apparently you do not even know the difference between a question and an assertion. If I asked you, "Do you weight more than 150 pounds soaking wet?", I am not thereby asserting that you weight more than 150 pounds soaking wet. I am asking a question, the answer to which, "Yes" or "No", makes an assertion--if "Yes", then you assert that you DO weight more than 150 pounds soaking wet; if "No", you assert that you do not.
When I asked, "Has Josiah Thompson turned you into a brainless buffoon?", therefore, I have not said that you ARE a brainless buffoon. I am asking you to think seriously--far more seriously than you have--because you are falling to a pattern of cheap, petty and thoughtless attacks issuing from you, which remind me of those I received from Tink over decades. I don't think you are a buffoon, but you are starting to act like one.
I can't believe that you are continuing on with this drivel about Lyndon not controlling EVERY ASPECT of the handling of Oswald, for example. I asked then whether I needed to explain to you the nature of multi-layered covert intelligence operations. Each of the key players, including CIA, was doing its thing, where other patsies were in place in other locations like Chicago, as Abraham Bolden has explained, if the agency needed them.
This illustrates your shoddy practice of exaggerating my position to make it easier to attack. You have done it on the EF and you are doing it here. If I think Barr McClellan's book has something to contribute, then you imply that I must therefore endorse ALL OF IT. I think that particular book has some serious flaws, but it also makes a contribution on a vary narrow but nevertheless significant point, namely, the involvement of Ed Clark.
So I don't think you are entitled to berate me, especially in relation to "RFK: Outing the CIA at the Ambassador". That you appear to be hypersensitive to the rather obvious points I have made in taking apart your reasoning or valuing the contribution I have made in explaining where you and Morley and Talbot went wrong is an example of one of the most important kinds of original research that we can undertake: figuring out who got it right!
You don't know anything about photographs or films. You need a tutorial from Jack about how easily they can be altered. That photo was not from the Ambassador, in case you haven't noticed. This is another example of your incapacity to reason on the basis of the totality of the evidence. The photograph is interesting, but the arguments I have presented outweigh it. If they were Bulova officials, they were certainly not acting like Bulova officials!
In fact, in case you haven't noticed, this entire thread is devoted to whether or not Madeleine Duncan Brown, Billy Sol Estes, Barr McClellan, E. Howard Hunt, Noel Twyman, Phil Nelson, Nigel Turner, and Evelyn Lincoln, among others, got it right in fingering LBJ as the pivotal player in the assassination. I think they are right and that Jack Ruby spoke the truth when he observed that, if LBJ had not been Vice President, President Kennedy would not have been hit.
When I asked, "Has Josiah Thompson turned you into a brainless buffoon?", therefore, I have not said that you ARE a brainless buffoon. I am asking you to think seriously--far more seriously than you have--because you are falling to a pattern of cheap, petty and thoughtless attacks issuing from you, which remind me of those I received from Tink over decades. I don't think you are a buffoon, but you are starting to act like one.
I can't believe that you are continuing on with this drivel about Lyndon not controlling EVERY ASPECT of the handling of Oswald, for example. I asked then whether I needed to explain to you the nature of multi-layered covert intelligence operations. Each of the key players, including CIA, was doing its thing, where other patsies were in place in other locations like Chicago, as Abraham Bolden has explained, if the agency needed them.
This illustrates your shoddy practice of exaggerating my position to make it easier to attack. You have done it on the EF and you are doing it here. If I think Barr McClellan's book has something to contribute, then you imply that I must therefore endorse ALL OF IT. I think that particular book has some serious flaws, but it also makes a contribution on a vary narrow but nevertheless significant point, namely, the involvement of Ed Clark.
So I don't think you are entitled to berate me, especially in relation to "RFK: Outing the CIA at the Ambassador". That you appear to be hypersensitive to the rather obvious points I have made in taking apart your reasoning or valuing the contribution I have made in explaining where you and Morley and Talbot went wrong is an example of one of the most important kinds of original research that we can undertake: figuring out who got it right!
You don't know anything about photographs or films. You need a tutorial from Jack about how easily they can be altered. That photo was not from the Ambassador, in case you haven't noticed. This is another example of your incapacity to reason on the basis of the totality of the evidence. The photograph is interesting, but the arguments I have presented outweigh it. If they were Bulova officials, they were certainly not acting like Bulova officials!
In fact, in case you haven't noticed, this entire thread is devoted to whether or not Madeleine Duncan Brown, Billy Sol Estes, Barr McClellan, E. Howard Hunt, Noel Twyman, Phil Nelson, Nigel Turner, and Evelyn Lincoln, among others, got it right in fingering LBJ as the pivotal player in the assassination. I think they are right and that Jack Ruby spoke the truth when he observed that, if LBJ had not been Vice President, President Kennedy would not have been hit.
Jim DiEugenio Wrote:Jim:
I don't if you realize the hole you are digging for yourself. Just like with Baker, there are people reading this thread as lurkers. They see that you are using cheap invective towards me, like calling me a buffoon. And for some off the wall reason comparing me with Tink Thompson. What that means, I do not know.
Bottom line on your work on the Ambassador: You did not do any original work on that. All you did was recycle the work of others, and then you put your spin on it. You did not even include any photos. I mean the photo in Shane's book of Johannides is simply devastating to your argument. Since no on can look at that and say the guy in the films is him. Therefore, its Owens. And if its Owens, then its Roman. And that is it for your argument.
Concerning LBJ and the conspiracy, you did not answer any of my points that I listed. Repeat: the plot to manipulate Oswald before the murder did not need LBJ. The cover up afterward did not fully rely upon him. The actual mechanics of the cover up were done by Hoover and the Troika on the WC i.e. Ford, McCloy and Dulles. We have that very clear now. I mean Hoover was at the race track on Saturday. He took calls there on their phone. According to Tony Summers, the case was essentially closed in 24 hours by the FBI. ANd Hoover needed no urging to go along with the cover up. We know that through the phone calls he made to RFK informing him of his brother's death. Which took place before LBJ ever got back to Washington.
Nelson's book was terribly misconcieved. In addition to that he used some very bad sources like McClellan and Hersh.
You made a mistake Jim. Just like you did with Baker.