Rachel Maddow appears to be a compulsive liar, at least where Lee Harvey Oswald is concerned. But this ought not be too surprising, given that non-serious, superficial researchers and talking heads (who may only deal with the assassination once or twice a year) are often bound to insert their feet into their foolish mouths. And so Rachel did it again last night, as she did back in March last year,
This was in conjunction with a segment last night on a gun reform law (S. 3714) that JFK had proposed: “to exclude from importation or re-importation into the United States arms or ammunition originally manufactured for military purposes.”
In this context she specifically mentioned the Italian made 6.5 mm Mannlicher-Carcano, and showed an ad for it in the "American Rifleman" magazine along with photostat copies of receipts proving Lee Oswald purchased it. She then added, emulating a Neoliberal know-nothing:
"Lee Harvey Oswald bought the gun in March, 1963. He killed President Kennedy with it that November."
No, Rachel, sorry to disabuse you, but he did not. In your piece, obviously intended to target the NRA, you instead have offended and outraged serious JFK assassination researchers while also disclosing yourself to be one more part of the "unspeakable" described by author James Douglass (JFK and the Unspeakable) . You'd have done better to keep your focus on the NRA defeating JFK's bill proposal rather than dragging in Oswald as the alleged killer of Kennedy!
But it was clearly way too much arduous work for Rachel and her staff to note the real killers, as well as the JFK assassination mastermind (LBJ, see previous blog) and the FACT that Oswald's rifle was basically useless. To briefly recap the facts:
A trained team of expert marksmen (assigned by the Warren Commission) was unable to replicate Oswald's alleged feat! Oswald was presumed to have fired from the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository, so effectively six stories up or 60’ in altitude. However, the experts were allowed to fire from a tower only half this altitude (30’). In addition, while Oswald had to have fired at a limousine moving at 11 mile per hour, the experts fired at stationary targets. (The Warren Commission Report, p. 137.)
The target area was also magnified for the experts, to the whole upper torso of the target prop’s body – while Oswald was limited to the head and neck. More to the point, the rifle was altered away from the one Oswald used. The rifle sight itself was rebuilt and “metal shims were fitted to provide a degree of accuracy previously absent’. When Ronald Simmons, the Chief of the Infantry Weapons Evaluation Branch of the Army’s Ballistics Research Division was asked about this he replied: “Well, they could not sight the weapon in using the telescope" (Op. cit. ,Vol. II, p. 250.)
He added that the aiming apparatus had to be rebuilt by a machinist with two shims added, one to adjust for the elevation, the other for the azimuth. In other words, had they actually used the rifle in the same condition Oswald was alleged to have had it, then they’d likely not have hit the side of a barn. (Maybe one reason the Italians dubbed their Norma Mannlicher-Carcano 6.5 mm bolt action rifle that Oswald was supposed to have used as "the rifle that never killed anyone").
At the end of the test trials, these Master Marksmen each fired two series of three shots each (18 rounds in all) at 3 stationary targets placed at distances of 175’, 240’ and 265’ (the last coming nearest to the distance from the Texas School Book Depository to the head shot). Even Chief Simmons admitted that the targets were not placed where they ought to have been to emulate conditions on November 22, 1963.
Just one of the three expert riflemen was able to get off three shots in under 5.6 seconds – the designated time interval for total shots declared by the Warren Commission. And most to the point: none of the total 18 shots fired struck the targets in the head or the neck. In other words, from a technical standpoint of duplicating Oswald’s alleged shots- this trio of experts failed. Another key aspect: for the duration of the 18 rounds, two of the master riflemen were unable to reload and fire at the stationary target as rapidly as Oswald purportedly did for the moving limo.
So why did Rachel make such a big deal out of this rifle? Perhaps she is just lazy or ignorant. More likely (I'm willing to give her a minor pass for ignorance) because she believed that by linking it, egregiously, to the Kennedy assassination and Oswald, she'd get more eyeballs and buzz for her show. But believe me, it backfired.
More interesting to me (and many others) is that in the immediate wake of the assassination, the actual rifle reported found at the Book Depository (i.e. by three Sheriff's deputies and deputy Constable Seymour Weitzmann as well as reported on NBC News, in real time tapes) was a MAUSER. Now, THAT is a weapon that could have been used in an assassination, as opposed to the ridiculous Mannlicher-Carcano (which National Archives personnel won't even let researchers touch for fear it will far apart - as per a letter to Patricia Dumais who asked them to check the serial no. - as pointed out by H. E. Livingstone in his 'Killing Kennedy'.)
Ok, as for the photo shots of Oswald holding said weapon, i.e. the photos that appeared in LIFE magazine, I have already exposed those as fakes, frauds --- likely put together by a team of CIA specialists using a splicing technique to superimpose Oswald’s head onto the body of another actually holding the weapon.The full blog on the techniques can be read here: http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2009/11/hany-farids-pixelated-illusions.html
In 1977, a Canadian Defense Dept. Photographic specialist: Maj. John Pickard, noted a 99% probability the LIFE cover photo was a fake and that each photo was taken from a slightly different angle. When superpositions of the images are performed, e.g. one photo laid atop another in succession, it is found that nothing matches exactly. As Pickard observed: "Yet, impossibly, while one body is bigger - the heads match perfectly."
Adding to the weight for this claim was the discovery of what has come to be known as "the Oswald ghost photo" (see image below). This had been recovered at Dallas PD headquarters some time after the assassination. As one can discern, the “ghost” is a cutout into which another image can be pasted-superposed. The cutout image, many of us conclude, was obtained using a Dallas cop stand –in, which photo was also found in Dallas Police files, along with the ghost image.
Photo specialist Robert Hester was called on 22 November, 1963 to help process assassination -related photos for the FBI and Dallas police. Hester reported (and his wife Patricia confirmed) that he saw an FBI agent with a color transparency of one of the backyard photos with NO figure in the picture. Hester has surmised and many researchers agree, that the blank photo was intended to deliberately set up Oswald. The mistake of the Dallas PD (which former Justice Dept. special agent Walt Brown ties into the plot as accessories, see his book, 'Treachery in Dallas' - Chapter 'Blue Death') was leaving incriminating evidence for their frame- up lying around. If they'd had any sense, they'd have burned it.
Obviously, the question remains of why Oswald would have purchased such a weapon, even if the photos etc. were fakes. We believe the rational answer inheres in the appearance of the letter ‘D’ – on the cover sheet of Oswald’s 201 file – indicating CIA Staff D, a SIGINT or signals intelligence operation run in concert with the National Security Agency or NSA. As pointed out by Peter Dale Scott (Deep Politics Quarterly, Jan. 1994): “In 1961, when William Harvey headed Staff D, he was assigned the task of developing the CIA Assassinations Project, ZR/Rifle.”
In other words, the purchase of the dummy rifle was part and parcel of a subplot in ZR/Rifle to simulate an assassination of Kennedy - at least this was the cover story fed to Oswald. He would then have exposed the real dangers facing the president when security wasn't at full strength (as it wasn't that day in Dallas, as the usual snipers that would have been there for protection were ordered to 'stand down' - likely also part of the subplot).
Most researchers who've delved into this in much more depth than superficial 'buffs' come away with the conviction Oswald was set up as part of ZR/Rifle. However, with the plot now turned against Kennedy. Oswald was likely used as the dupe or decoy so the actual perps (likely Cuban exiles, and trained assassins - from the Army's Ft. Benning Assassin school) could escape . Scott and others believe he was told he'd help to expose the plot but he needed to be at the Texas School Book Depository to do so. No surprise that Ruth Paine, another asset, steered him into the job at the TSBD. The rifle was likely already planted at the 6th floor window bearing the phony "sniper's nest" despite the fact only a half idiot or fool would've attempted a shot from there - given the view was partially blocked by branches from an oak tree at the time.
Much of this has been confirmed by a CIA accountant with top secret clearance named James Wilcott, who had been with Oswald at Atsugi and retired in 1966. (Farewell to Justice, p. 178). Wilcott expressed certainty that Oswald (who had drawn an advance on his salary) was "an employee of the agency and was an agent" and noted Oswald also "received a full time salary for operational work." Wilcott further concluded Ruby was paid by the CIA to eliminate Oswald, since the Agency wanted no loose strings after the deed was done, and only it's own framing setup to prevail in the media.
The original plan was to "kill Kennedy, link Oswald to Castro, and use this as a pretext to invade Cuba". (ibid. ) Note the parallels here to the October, 1962 Missile crisis- when the Joint Chiefs tried to get Kennedy to invade Cuba on the basis of the Soviet missiles there. JFK refused, and in so doing put another nail in his coffin, while his enemies looked for other ways to achieve their goal- ending up at assassination of Kennedy - by a Castro dupe. Or so the CIA hoped people would believe. Wilcott, however, noted the phony link to Castro could not be established firmly enough to hold and hence the need to brand Oswald as the lone assassin. (ibid.)
In other words, the CIA aimed for a 'trifecta' - blaming the USSR as an accomplice, invading Cuba and killing Kennedy, but they ended up with only one of the three - but to be sure a huge one - as it's distorted this nation's history ever since. (Along with shattering all confidence and trust in gov't - given the government still holds to the phony Warrenite story.)
See also:
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-pre-assassination-framing-of-lee.html
and
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-pre-assassination-framing-of-lee_1807.html
Maybe Rachel or her staff need to scan my blog posts on the JFK hit a bit first before she next shoots from the hip, and ends up boffing her set piece by deploying unnecessary and obvious canards that merely detract from the content and focus.
This was in conjunction with a segment last night on a gun reform law (S. 3714) that JFK had proposed: “to exclude from importation or re-importation into the United States arms or ammunition originally manufactured for military purposes.”
In this context she specifically mentioned the Italian made 6.5 mm Mannlicher-Carcano, and showed an ad for it in the "American Rifleman" magazine along with photostat copies of receipts proving Lee Oswald purchased it. She then added, emulating a Neoliberal know-nothing:
"Lee Harvey Oswald bought the gun in March, 1963. He killed President Kennedy with it that November."
No, Rachel, sorry to disabuse you, but he did not. In your piece, obviously intended to target the NRA, you instead have offended and outraged serious JFK assassination researchers while also disclosing yourself to be one more part of the "unspeakable" described by author James Douglass (JFK and the Unspeakable) . You'd have done better to keep your focus on the NRA defeating JFK's bill proposal rather than dragging in Oswald as the alleged killer of Kennedy!
But it was clearly way too much arduous work for Rachel and her staff to note the real killers, as well as the JFK assassination mastermind (LBJ, see previous blog) and the FACT that Oswald's rifle was basically useless. To briefly recap the facts:
A trained team of expert marksmen (assigned by the Warren Commission) was unable to replicate Oswald's alleged feat! Oswald was presumed to have fired from the 6th floor of the Texas School Book Depository, so effectively six stories up or 60’ in altitude. However, the experts were allowed to fire from a tower only half this altitude (30’). In addition, while Oswald had to have fired at a limousine moving at 11 mile per hour, the experts fired at stationary targets. (The Warren Commission Report, p. 137.)
The target area was also magnified for the experts, to the whole upper torso of the target prop’s body – while Oswald was limited to the head and neck. More to the point, the rifle was altered away from the one Oswald used. The rifle sight itself was rebuilt and “metal shims were fitted to provide a degree of accuracy previously absent’. When Ronald Simmons, the Chief of the Infantry Weapons Evaluation Branch of the Army’s Ballistics Research Division was asked about this he replied: “Well, they could not sight the weapon in using the telescope" (Op. cit. ,Vol. II, p. 250.)
He added that the aiming apparatus had to be rebuilt by a machinist with two shims added, one to adjust for the elevation, the other for the azimuth. In other words, had they actually used the rifle in the same condition Oswald was alleged to have had it, then they’d likely not have hit the side of a barn. (Maybe one reason the Italians dubbed their Norma Mannlicher-Carcano 6.5 mm bolt action rifle that Oswald was supposed to have used as "the rifle that never killed anyone").
At the end of the test trials, these Master Marksmen each fired two series of three shots each (18 rounds in all) at 3 stationary targets placed at distances of 175’, 240’ and 265’ (the last coming nearest to the distance from the Texas School Book Depository to the head shot). Even Chief Simmons admitted that the targets were not placed where they ought to have been to emulate conditions on November 22, 1963.
Just one of the three expert riflemen was able to get off three shots in under 5.6 seconds – the designated time interval for total shots declared by the Warren Commission. And most to the point: none of the total 18 shots fired struck the targets in the head or the neck. In other words, from a technical standpoint of duplicating Oswald’s alleged shots- this trio of experts failed. Another key aspect: for the duration of the 18 rounds, two of the master riflemen were unable to reload and fire at the stationary target as rapidly as Oswald purportedly did for the moving limo.
So why did Rachel make such a big deal out of this rifle? Perhaps she is just lazy or ignorant. More likely (I'm willing to give her a minor pass for ignorance) because she believed that by linking it, egregiously, to the Kennedy assassination and Oswald, she'd get more eyeballs and buzz for her show. But believe me, it backfired.
More interesting to me (and many others) is that in the immediate wake of the assassination, the actual rifle reported found at the Book Depository (i.e. by three Sheriff's deputies and deputy Constable Seymour Weitzmann as well as reported on NBC News, in real time tapes) was a MAUSER. Now, THAT is a weapon that could have been used in an assassination, as opposed to the ridiculous Mannlicher-Carcano (which National Archives personnel won't even let researchers touch for fear it will far apart - as per a letter to Patricia Dumais who asked them to check the serial no. - as pointed out by H. E. Livingstone in his 'Killing Kennedy'.)
Ok, as for the photo shots of Oswald holding said weapon, i.e. the photos that appeared in LIFE magazine, I have already exposed those as fakes, frauds --- likely put together by a team of CIA specialists using a splicing technique to superimpose Oswald’s head onto the body of another actually holding the weapon.The full blog on the techniques can be read here: http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2009/11/hany-farids-pixelated-illusions.html
In 1977, a Canadian Defense Dept. Photographic specialist: Maj. John Pickard, noted a 99% probability the LIFE cover photo was a fake and that each photo was taken from a slightly different angle. When superpositions of the images are performed, e.g. one photo laid atop another in succession, it is found that nothing matches exactly. As Pickard observed: "Yet, impossibly, while one body is bigger - the heads match perfectly."
Adding to the weight for this claim was the discovery of what has come to be known as "the Oswald ghost photo" (see image below). This had been recovered at Dallas PD headquarters some time after the assassination. As one can discern, the “ghost” is a cutout into which another image can be pasted-superposed. The cutout image, many of us conclude, was obtained using a Dallas cop stand –in, which photo was also found in Dallas Police files, along with the ghost image.
Photo specialist Robert Hester was called on 22 November, 1963 to help process assassination -related photos for the FBI and Dallas police. Hester reported (and his wife Patricia confirmed) that he saw an FBI agent with a color transparency of one of the backyard photos with NO figure in the picture. Hester has surmised and many researchers agree, that the blank photo was intended to deliberately set up Oswald. The mistake of the Dallas PD (which former Justice Dept. special agent Walt Brown ties into the plot as accessories, see his book, 'Treachery in Dallas' - Chapter 'Blue Death') was leaving incriminating evidence for their frame- up lying around. If they'd had any sense, they'd have burned it.
Obviously, the question remains of why Oswald would have purchased such a weapon, even if the photos etc. were fakes. We believe the rational answer inheres in the appearance of the letter ‘D’ – on the cover sheet of Oswald’s 201 file – indicating CIA Staff D, a SIGINT or signals intelligence operation run in concert with the National Security Agency or NSA. As pointed out by Peter Dale Scott (Deep Politics Quarterly, Jan. 1994): “In 1961, when William Harvey headed Staff D, he was assigned the task of developing the CIA Assassinations Project, ZR/Rifle.”
In other words, the purchase of the dummy rifle was part and parcel of a subplot in ZR/Rifle to simulate an assassination of Kennedy - at least this was the cover story fed to Oswald. He would then have exposed the real dangers facing the president when security wasn't at full strength (as it wasn't that day in Dallas, as the usual snipers that would have been there for protection were ordered to 'stand down' - likely also part of the subplot).
Most researchers who've delved into this in much more depth than superficial 'buffs' come away with the conviction Oswald was set up as part of ZR/Rifle. However, with the plot now turned against Kennedy. Oswald was likely used as the dupe or decoy so the actual perps (likely Cuban exiles, and trained assassins - from the Army's Ft. Benning Assassin school) could escape . Scott and others believe he was told he'd help to expose the plot but he needed to be at the Texas School Book Depository to do so. No surprise that Ruth Paine, another asset, steered him into the job at the TSBD. The rifle was likely already planted at the 6th floor window bearing the phony "sniper's nest" despite the fact only a half idiot or fool would've attempted a shot from there - given the view was partially blocked by branches from an oak tree at the time.
Much of this has been confirmed by a CIA accountant with top secret clearance named James Wilcott, who had been with Oswald at Atsugi and retired in 1966. (Farewell to Justice, p. 178). Wilcott expressed certainty that Oswald (who had drawn an advance on his salary) was "an employee of the agency and was an agent" and noted Oswald also "received a full time salary for operational work." Wilcott further concluded Ruby was paid by the CIA to eliminate Oswald, since the Agency wanted no loose strings after the deed was done, and only it's own framing setup to prevail in the media.
The original plan was to "kill Kennedy, link Oswald to Castro, and use this as a pretext to invade Cuba". (ibid. ) Note the parallels here to the October, 1962 Missile crisis- when the Joint Chiefs tried to get Kennedy to invade Cuba on the basis of the Soviet missiles there. JFK refused, and in so doing put another nail in his coffin, while his enemies looked for other ways to achieve their goal- ending up at assassination of Kennedy - by a Castro dupe. Or so the CIA hoped people would believe. Wilcott, however, noted the phony link to Castro could not be established firmly enough to hold and hence the need to brand Oswald as the lone assassin. (ibid.)
In other words, the CIA aimed for a 'trifecta' - blaming the USSR as an accomplice, invading Cuba and killing Kennedy, but they ended up with only one of the three - but to be sure a huge one - as it's distorted this nation's history ever since. (Along with shattering all confidence and trust in gov't - given the government still holds to the phony Warrenite story.)
See also:
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-pre-assassination-framing-of-lee.html
and
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-pre-assassination-framing-of-lee_1807.html
Maybe Rachel or her staff need to scan my blog posts on the JFK hit a bit first before she next shoots from the hip, and ends up boffing her set piece by deploying unnecessary and obvious canards that merely detract from the content and focus.
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