Reply #184: ''Case Closed'' is one steaming load of a Big Lie...

[Octafish]

...made whole from a bunch of Small Lies.

First off the bat, an excellent interpretation of Posner's "work."

The following review appeared in the March/April 1994 issue of Federal Bar News & Journal, vol. 41, no. 3.

Kennedy Assassination: Case Still Open

Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK, by Gerald Posner, Random House, 1993. 607 pages, $25. The Last Investigation, by Gaeton Fonzi, Thunder's Mouth Press, 1993. 448 pages, $24.95.

Reviewed by George Costello*

EXCERPT...

Among the many books recently released to mark the 30th anniversary of President Kennedy's assassination, Gerald Posner's Case Closed has received by far the most attention, some deserved and some not. Posner's work is welcome because it puts together a seemingly plausible, coherent argument for what was becoming in the public mind the most outlandish theory of all -- the Warren Commission's conclusion that Lee Harvey Oswald, acting alone, killed President Kennedy and in turn was killed by Jack Ruby acting alone. Posner refocuses attention on the considerable evidence assembled by the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassinations that can support such a theory.

Lost by many in the rush to praise Posner, however, is the fact that Posner, like some of the conspiracy theorists he is quick to condemn, is highly selective in the evidence he presents, relying on evidence that supports his position and ignoring or minimizing evidence that tends to disprove it. Case Closed is a brief for the prosecution of Lee Harvey Oswald, not the objective and comprehensive reexamination of the assassination that it purports to be. Moreover, it presents an account of the shooting that is most likely erroneous.

Far less attention has been paid to Gaeton Fonzi's The Last Investigation. It is less ambitious, not addressing at all what took place during the actual shooting in Dealey Plaza, and addressing Oswald's background only tangentially. Nonetheless, in describing his frustrations as an investigator for the House Select Committee on Assassinations, and in describing the limited scope of investigation actually undertaken by the committee, Fonzi provides good reason why Posner's claim to have closed the case should be received skeptically.

Studying the Kennedy assassination is extremely frustrating, not so much due to the volume of material and the proliferation of theories about what happened (there are over 500 books to date), but mostly because the case was mishandled from the start and the authenticity of key evidence is in doubt. In the 30 years since President Kennedy's death, there has been no genuine murder investigation. The alleged assassin was murdered two days after the President's murder, and hence was never brought to trial. Federal agents obtained physical evidence from Texas authorities, who had jurisdiction over the case (in 1963 murder of the President was not a federal crime), yet the federal investigation was far from thorough, designed more to quell suspicions of conspiracy than to probe the possibility. Important leads were not followed, and witnesses whose memories conflicted with the lone-assassin theory were ignored or told they must be mistaken. Moreover, although the President's body should have been the "best evidence" of the shooting, federal agents removed the body from Parkland Hospital in Dallas, where by Texas law an autopsy should have been performed, and transported it to Bethesda Naval Hospital in Washington (whether the body travelled there directly is another story in and of itself), where an incomplete and inept autopsy was performed by persons not qualified in forensic pathology. A bullet fired from Oswald's rifle (later dubbed the "magic bullet" by critics) was found on a stretcher at Parkland Hospital, but the person who found it was relatively confident that it had not come from Governor Connolly's stretcher, even though, according to the official theory, the bullet first passed through Kennedy, then Connolly.) The chain of possession was not carefully documented on various bullet fragments later subjected to analysis for match with the magic bullet or Oswald's rifle.

Against this background of confusion, what Posner attempts and claims to do is ambitious, to say the least. Posner believes that much of the confusion has been created by irresponsible conspiracy theorists who have ignored, or at least selectively ignored, the considerable evidence that is available. Moreover, he asserts that recent computer-enhanced analysis removes the basis for much prior uncertainty. Drawing on the records developed by the Warren Commission and the House Select Committee on Assassinations, and adding a few new perspectives, Posner reconstructs the case that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. He not only analyzes the actual shooting in Dealey Plaza and provides a detailed biography and personality profile of Oswald, but also provides a personality sketch of Jack Ruby and tries to shoot down various conspiracy theories. If you believe everything Posner says, it all ties together quite nicely. You are more likely to believe what Posner says, however, if you limit your consideration to the evidence he selects and interprets.

CONTINUED...

http://www.assassinationscience.com/costello.html

And now for those photos missing from "Case Closed"...

For instance, there's the matter of the hole in President Kennedy's jacket. That would mean that the bullet didn't go through his neck and out and through Gov. Connally all those times, slowing in the process enough to emerge (relatively) unscathed on a hospital gurney later.



Then, Posner writes that Ferrie never crossed paths with Oswald in the Civil Air Patrol, yet, there they were.



Odd, how that selective memory works to really serve someone's interest, not We the People, though.