Read Online Reclaiming History by Vincent Bugliosi - Free Book Online
Authors: Vincent Bugliosi
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them…The basis of my study has always been the contents of the volumes of testimony and exhibits, from which my assistants and I were able finally to assemble evidence disclosing the truth.” 72 The critics of the Warren Commission should ask themselves whether publishing evidence damaging to one’s own position is the mark of an honest and honorable person or group, or the opposite.
“It is the very thoroughness of the Warren Commission that has caused its problems,” the late Pierre Salinger noted. “It listened patiently to everyone, no matter how credible or incredible the testimony. It then appended all this testimony to its report, providing an opportunity to anyone with a typewriter and a lot of time on his hands to write a book on the subject.” 73
A tactic used by authors of virtually every single book I’ve ever read that propounds a conspiracy theory is to attack an agency as being part of a conspiracy in the Kennedy assassination, but when this same agency comes up with something favorable to the author’s position, the author will cite that same agency as credible support for his argument. This tactic is neither subtle nor logical, yet that is precisely what almost all the conspiracy theorists do, seeking to pick and choose and have it both ways. Just one example among hundreds: Referring to a threatening note that Oswald delivered to the FBI office in Dallas less than two weeks before the assassination, which was subsequently destroyed, Mark Lane, the granddaddy of all conspiracy theorists, writes in the introduction to his book Rush to Judgment , “An obvious and reasonable explanation as to why [the note] was destroyed is that it contained material prejudicial to the FBI…[It] was but one of the illegal police actions to silence [Oswald]. The ultimate action was to murder him.” 74
Pretty serious allegations against the FBI, right? But then Lane, without even blushing, turns to the FBI for support whenever an FBI finding is helpful to his position. In other words, the FBI, though per Lane apparently complicit in the assassination as well as the murder of Oswald, is suddenly imbued with honor and integrity and is out there working diligently to discover the truth in the assassination. He writes later in his book, “If it is accurate, the December 9 FBI report provides proof that the [Warren] Commission explanation of the throat wound is inaccurate…Hoover would not presume to summarize the ‘medical examination of the President’s body’…unless the autopsy report had been studied carefully.” And later, to support his position that Oswald was not Kennedy’s assassin, he writes, “After the FBI had examined the rifle, a letter from Hoover reported: ‘It is noted that at the time of firing these tests, the telescopic sight [on Oswald’s rifle] could not be properly aligned with the target since the sight reached the limit of its adjustment before reaching accurate alignment.’” 75
F inally, there is another need for this book. Amid the blizzard of defective and misleading anti–Warren Commission and pro-conspiracy books, there have only been two books of prominence on the other side in the last twenty years: first, Conspiracy of One by Jim Moore in 1991, and the much more well-known Case Closed by Gerald Posner in 1993. Both books (particularly Case Closed , which was well received by the mainstream press) have been valuable contributions to JFK assassination literature, and I agree with their two principal conclusions, namely, that Oswald killed Kennedy and acted alone. (I disagree 100 percent with Posner’s conclusion that organized crime may have intended to kill Kennedy, but Oswald “beat the Mafia to it.”) But what a disappointment it was to me when, after years and years of pro-conspiracy books, these two books finally came out on the other side and I saw the authors engaging in many of the same unfortunate tactics as the Warren Commission critics.
Just a very few
“It is the very thoroughness of the Warren Commission that has caused its problems,” the late Pierre Salinger noted. “It listened patiently to everyone, no matter how credible or incredible the testimony. It then appended all this testimony to its report, providing an opportunity to anyone with a typewriter and a lot of time on his hands to write a book on the subject.” 73
A tactic used by authors of virtually every single book I’ve ever read that propounds a conspiracy theory is to attack an agency as being part of a conspiracy in the Kennedy assassination, but when this same agency comes up with something favorable to the author’s position, the author will cite that same agency as credible support for his argument. This tactic is neither subtle nor logical, yet that is precisely what almost all the conspiracy theorists do, seeking to pick and choose and have it both ways. Just one example among hundreds: Referring to a threatening note that Oswald delivered to the FBI office in Dallas less than two weeks before the assassination, which was subsequently destroyed, Mark Lane, the granddaddy of all conspiracy theorists, writes in the introduction to his book Rush to Judgment , “An obvious and reasonable explanation as to why [the note] was destroyed is that it contained material prejudicial to the FBI…[It] was but one of the illegal police actions to silence [Oswald]. The ultimate action was to murder him.” 74
Pretty serious allegations against the FBI, right? But then Lane, without even blushing, turns to the FBI for support whenever an FBI finding is helpful to his position. In other words, the FBI, though per Lane apparently complicit in the assassination as well as the murder of Oswald, is suddenly imbued with honor and integrity and is out there working diligently to discover the truth in the assassination. He writes later in his book, “If it is accurate, the December 9 FBI report provides proof that the [Warren] Commission explanation of the throat wound is inaccurate…Hoover would not presume to summarize the ‘medical examination of the President’s body’…unless the autopsy report had been studied carefully.” And later, to support his position that Oswald was not Kennedy’s assassin, he writes, “After the FBI had examined the rifle, a letter from Hoover reported: ‘It is noted that at the time of firing these tests, the telescopic sight [on Oswald’s rifle] could not be properly aligned with the target since the sight reached the limit of its adjustment before reaching accurate alignment.’” 75
F inally, there is another need for this book. Amid the blizzard of defective and misleading anti–Warren Commission and pro-conspiracy books, there have only been two books of prominence on the other side in the last twenty years: first, Conspiracy of One by Jim Moore in 1991, and the much more well-known Case Closed by Gerald Posner in 1993. Both books (particularly Case Closed , which was well received by the mainstream press) have been valuable contributions to JFK assassination literature, and I agree with their two principal conclusions, namely, that Oswald killed Kennedy and acted alone. (I disagree 100 percent with Posner’s conclusion that organized crime may have intended to kill Kennedy, but Oswald “beat the Mafia to it.”) But what a disappointment it was to me when, after years and years of pro-conspiracy books, these two books finally came out on the other side and I saw the authors engaging in many of the same unfortunate tactics as the Warren Commission critics.
Just a very few
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