BOOK REVIEW -- "RECLAIMING HISTORY: THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY" (1 Viewer)

[Paul McElligott]

Crikey, the book is almost shorter than the review...

 

[David Von Pein]

Not even close, Paul. The book has 1,535,791 words.

(Crikey.)

 

[David Von Pein]

Paul McElligott,

A "BTW" -- Nice website of your reviews you've got there. Very eye-appealing.

We have similar tastes in many reviewed films, including Psycho and The Birds.

 

[Paul McElligott]

Thanks, David.

I checked Audible.com to see if they had this book, but it was only the abridged version. (Probably only 750,000 words ) Of course, I don't think most people live long enough to listen to an unabridged version.

I can't believe this book is out and I didn't notice. I'm been impatiently waiting for this ever since Bugliosi announced he was writing it back when JFK was a new movie(!). I'd like to see how it stacks up against Posner's Cased Closed.

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

I still have to find the time to take my Carcano down to the range and see how fast I can get off three aimed rounds.

I still think LBJ did it so he could become president. He sent a whole case of Carcanos down to Cuba in a Mafia cargo plane. Frank Sinatra was on board as a cover story. We'll never know the truth now that Lady Bird has died.

 

[KevinGress]

I apologize if this is covered in the lengthy posts, but does it talk about the 'kill shot' apparent on the Zapruder film?

I used to believe in all forms of conspiracy theories and while I'm to a point now where I could believe Oswald was the only shooter, the only problem I have is that it appears to me that the shot comes from the front, not the rear. Now, while I admit that I'm not a gun expert and that the versions of the film I've seen either came from the movie, JFK, or the internet, it still appears to come from the front. If someone could show, through a demostration, that the shot did, indeed, come from the rear, then I would be fully satisfied.

 

[Jeff Gatie]

It has been proven by high speed photography time and time again that the typical "movie shot" that shows the head/body flying backwards in the direction of the shot is BS. More often than not (depending on the bullet/velocity combination), the body will move opposite the direction of the bullet due to blowback from the exit wound or simply because of muscle trauma. I've personally seen sandbags fall forward off a post after being shot straight through from the front, every time. Never trust you own eyes when it comes to this stuff. Simple scientific experiments debunk most of this BS.

 

[RobertR]

The Zapruder film shows this. When you do a frame by frame analysis, you can clearly see that before the much-ballyhooed "backwards movement", Kennedy's head moves forward from the impact of the fatal bullet. Read David's posts. It's shown there.

 

[Jeff Gatie]

Exactly. People see the dramatic backward movement and immediately equate it with the fictional shootings they see in the movies; where the person is blown backwards through the air when the bullet strikes. Fact is, although a bullet carries tremendous energy, that energy is concentrated in a very small area of contact with a very small mass, so instead of moving the object like a sledgehammer or a car would, it's energy is transfered to the object as a destructive rather than an inertial force. So very little of the mass is moved in the direction of the velocity, but very much of the mass is destroyed. Kennedy's dramatic reverse in direction was probably more muscle spasms due to the massive head shot than any movie magic like "sledghammer" blow from a bullet.

 

[David Von Pein]

Yeah, she was probably "rubbed out" by the "Mystery Death Squad" (a la Jim Marrs' theory) too. After all, she was only 94...and the assassination was a mere 44 years ago. The plotters couldn't take any chances....because Lady Bird might start singing like a bird any minute!



(I think Dennis' post above re. LBJ and Sinatra was probably of the tongue-in-cheek variety. Sure sounds like it anyway, what with its built-in silly factor. But when discussing the JFK case and its mountain of associated conspiracy-flavored nonsense, many times it's hard to tell when somebody's merely pulling your leg.)

 

[David Von Pein]

As Robert mentioned earlier, the Zapruder Film positively shows the forward movement of JFK's head at the crucial INSTANT of the bullet's impact.

The following Internet Z-Film clip is by far the best clip I've ever come across to prove that JFK was shot in the head from behind, not from the front. And also take note of where all of the blood and blood spray is located...it's all to the front of JFK's head (i.e., at the exit point for the bullet).

There's not a speck of blood (or even any redness) located at the rear of the head. How in the world would that be possible if a "Grassy Knoll" gunman had just blown the BACK of the President's head wide open?

(Graphic images below....)

THE ZAPRUDER FILM -- PROOF OF A SHOT FROM THE REAR

 

[David Von Pein]

FROM THE 1986 TELEVISED DOCU-TRIAL "ON TRIAL: LEE HARVEY OSWALD" :


VINCENT BUGLIOSI -- "What was the conclusion your panel came to as to how many bullets struck the President, their point of entry, and the path they took through the President's body?"

DR. CHARLES PETTY (one of 9 forensic pathologists who served on the autopsy panel {aka the "FPP"} for the HSCA) -- "My conclusion, and the conclusion of the panel, was that the President was struck by two bullets -- one entering the right-upper back and exiting in the front of the neck; the other entering the right back of the head, and exiting what we call the right-frontal area, that is the front and side of the head."

MR. BUGLIOSI -- "Is there any doubt in your mind, Doctor, whatsoever that both bullets that struck the President came from the rear and no bullets struck him from the front?"

DR. PETTY -- "None whatsoever."

MR. BUGLIOSI -- "Let me ask you this, Dr. Petty .... assuming the President HAD been struck by a bullet from the front -- make that assumption -- could the transference of momentum from that bullet have thrown the President backward as is shown in frames 315 to 320 of the Zapruder Film?"

DR. PETTY -- "No sir, not in my opinion."

MR. BUGLIOSI -- "And why is that?"

DR. PETTY -- "Because the head is too heavy. There's too much muscular resistance to movement."

MR. BUGLIOSI -- "So the killings that people see on television and in the movies, which is the only type of killings most people ever see, where the person struck by the bullet very frequently, visibly, and dramatically is propelled backward by the force of the bullet -- that's not what actually happens in life when a bullet hits a human being?"

DR. PETTY -- "No, of course not."

 

[Jeff Gatie]

Mythbusters did a great test of the "blown backwards" BS. They hung a pig carcass from a chain on a rig. The rig had a horizontal bar that held the chain on by only a fraction of an inch. The slightest push on the chain would cause the pig to fall. They shot it with everything, pistols, shotguns, high-powered rifles and the pig never moved. The only thing that caused it to fall was a shot from a .50 caliber sniper rifle, one of the most powerfull shoulder mounted weapons in existence; but even that only moved the pig a fraction of an inch.

 

[Joseph DeMartino]

Sir Isaac Newton did a pretty good pre-emptive refutation of the Hollywood "guy lifted off his feet and hurled 10 feet backwards by a shotgun blast" cliche when he formulated his first law of motion: "For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction." If it were true that the kinetic energy of a bullet or a bunch of shotgun pellets could throw the target 10 feet then it would also have to throw the shooter a similar distance, assuming the shooter wasn't specially braced and was of roughly comparable mass. This is an idea that can be demolished with five minutes of quiet reflection and a good grounding in basic science, no elaborate experiments required. (Although one should always accept any excuse to fire a 50 caliber rifle at a pig carcass. )

Regards,

Joe

 

[Michael:M]

David, I just wanted to thank you for the incredible write up of Bugliosi's book. While I would like to dive into it, I'll have to wait some years until my free time is a bit more consistent.

I was a casual CTer for many years...until I read Posner's book. That convinced me that it was Oswald alone. While obviously not as detailed as VB's book, I found that an intelligent, grounded reader could take the solid case Posner built and refute just about every looney theory out there.

 

[David Von Pein]

I agree completely. It's a very good book, IMO. I think, in fact, that Mr. Bugliosi is a tad too hard on Mr. Posner in "Reclaiming History" at times. (But at other times the criticism does seem to be warranted.)

 

[David Von Pein]

...

 

[Dave Hahn]

David VP

Your initial post is the single most impressive post I've ever seen on Home Theater Forum! Thanks so much for taking the time and effort to lay this out for us.

Oh, by the way; them boys on the grassy knoll, they were dead within three hours, I still have the shovel!

 

[David Von Pein]

Yeah, that sounds typical of the kind of conspirators many theorists believe were involved in the "Big Plot"....i.e., just leave incriminating evidence lying all over the place to implicate the "plot", such as easily-destroyable documents that many theorists think were filed away for all time, instead of the assassins and cover-uppers merely getting rid of such evidence.

Your shovel should have ended up in the Trinity River. But, instead, it's still in your garage. Go figure.

(I'm just kidding, of course. I know darn well you don't have the shovel....because I happen to know that the Babushka Lady has it stashed in her attic, along with her undeveloped film of the shooting and the 54 bullets that magically disappeared immediately after JFK was shot by Badge Man.)

 

[Dave Hahn]

Glad you got the joke!

You know, whenever I'm talking with someone who starts in on one of these conspiracy theories, i.e. the JFK assignation, the "fake" moon landings, Area 51, etc, I just say, "I'm going on a cruise this summer, I hope I don't fall off the edge of the flat earth . . ."

I think conspiracy theory in our present time is the equivalent of superstition in the middle ages. Things unknown or not easily explained used to be assigned supernatural explanations. Now elaborate conspiracy theories are constructed, gathering steam and new "facts" with each retelling. I find it amazing that now that two-thirds of the population have cell phones capable of taking pictures, there hasn't been a single credible shot of Bigfoot, Nessie, or little green men. :rolleyes

All my family and friends know I'm a Master Mason, and after The Da Vinci Code and National Treasure came out, (not to mention the "documentaries" on The History Channel), I had several ask, quite seriously, if the Masons were indeed hiding the Holy Grail, the True Cross, the Ark of the Covenant, the Blood Line of Jesus, or the Great Treasure of the Knights Templar; and if it was true that the Masons are conspiring to take over the world.

I tell them, "I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you."