Talk:Assassination of John F. Kennedy/Archive 2

message: In this study, to be found at,   The basis for scientifically proving through acoustic analysis that bullets were fired from 2 separate locations is proven, or rather rated probablistically at about 96%.
The method of investigation was to analyze the echo profile of
each shot recorded that day from the police microphones.  Echo
delays on some shots proved to be coming from the Book Depository
shown by the echo delays from the nearby surface of large buildings. One shot was different, and correlated with a 96% chance that it orginated at the so-called grassy knoll.
This is evidence that one would hardly imagine that a conspirator
would be thinking about in the 1960's, yet today is relatively
easy and exact. There has been so much drama and misinformation, as well as so much valid information, and emotion around this issue that most people have tuned it out long ago, yet I heard this man speak on CSPAN and the evidence change my mind after almost 40 years.
I am new to Wikipedia and am finding it so wonderful and up to
date in some things, yet I see no mention of this.  How would I
find this or add something about if it is not listed?
Thank you, Bruce
:See Dictabelt evidence relating to the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Gamaliel 02:18, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  I see no discussion of the DB Thomas study from Jun of 2000. 

message: Wasn't the committee's finding that there were two gunmen later debunked by someone who got a copy of the recording and discovered it was a radio problem? I remember a Nova (I think) episode about it. RPGLand2000 21:48, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  ''The House Select Committee on Assassinations'' Problem 

message: I removed the following mess from the ToP Dab of Charles Bronson at the time of creating Charles Bronson (disambiguation):
*''

*''
IMO it should be preserved, and this talk page is a place where that can happen. Further deponent saith not.--Jerzy•t 16:52, 2 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Charles Bronson (amateur photog) 

message: Chapter 8 footnote 168 and 168 WCR
RPJ 11:35, 6 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Security Precautions 

message: :The following rant moved from the head of the article to its chronological position. --Jerzy•t 20:48, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Eastland etc. 

message: Some information has been placed in the article about tests by Dr. Eugene Shoemaker. Is this the rather famous Dr. Shoemaker who was prominent in the space program?  I have not seen anything written that he was involved in ballistic experiments.  
Is there a study by him or someone else that supports the contention when one shoots at an object with a rifle the bullet hitting the object will bring it closer to the shooter?  I once saw  someone demonstrate that shooting a rifle at a round object near the bottom will give it backward spin causing it to roll slightly back towards the shooter. This is similar to playing pool and hitting the cue ball near the bottom with the cue stick that gives it back spin and it will roll somewhat back toward the the player after striking another ball. 
But lets face it, the president's head wasn't a loose ball on a flat surface that rolled backward because of spin. It was attached to his body and when he got struck by the bullet the president went backward and to the left as if struck by a bullet from the front. That is why I am interested in the study that has been placed in the article.
RPJ 05:20, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Shoemaker tests 

message: There is a new entry that should have some form of support. This entry states the following: 
"The effect of echos from rifle shots within Dealey Plaza, and the sound produced by the bullet impacts themselves have not been as thoroughly investigated as other aspects of the shooting. Such sounds can often cause inexperienced listeners to misinterpret all the sounds they hear as rifle shots."
The first sentence comparing (1)the thoroughness of the investigation done between the sound of the rifle blast with the sound of the impact of the bullet with (2)the thoroughness of the investigation on other  "other aspects of the shooting" does not appear in any published material that I have seen.
One problem with such a comparison is this: How does one compare thoroughness of investigations into different suject matters? By the number of hours spent investigating the alleged phenomena, or the quality of the investigation or both? Moreover, what if one "aspect of the shooting" is both easy to investigate and easy to come to a scientific conclusion, and "another aspect of the shooting" is difficult to investigate and takes long hours. Can one say that the one investigation that is easy, quick and certain to investigate, is not to be as trusted as much as the investigation that is difficult, lengthy but also  certain?
Therefore, the sentence really doesn't add anything to the article. This is true even if the "other aspects" to which the author refers are identified, and the amount of investigation quantified in some manner. 
The author needs more support and back up for the sentence. Moreover, besides the change in the typo (its "Dealey Plaza" not "Daly Plaza") the sentence needs editing. I changed the typo so it doesn't detract too much from the article.
The second sentence also needs support. On what basis does the author conclude that "Such sounds" (apparently sounds of bullets impacting) often cause inexperienced listeners" to "misinterpret all the sounds they hear as rifle shots."  This doesn't make any logical sense on its face: An "inexperienced listener" hears a bullet impact, and starts "misinterpreting all the sounds they hear?"  How long does this hearing condition last? 
The author is apparently trying conclude that a person who does not hear rifle shots very often (the "inexperienced listener") will "often" mistake the impact of a bullet for the muzzle blast.
The second sentence can be edited to clarify this point but there should be some empirical evidence offered to support such a contention, because it is not self evident, and if this contention is correct it is an important point since the Warren Commission and others reviewed these eyewitness accounts to help determine where the shooter or shooters were located.   
The author's contention is possibly quite valuable, the author should put in some supporting reasons for the two sentences. Otherwise it shouldn’t be in a reference work because reflects badly on the body of the work as a whole.
(RPJ 05:47, 17 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Shot Sequencing 

message: There is a possible contradiction in this article. The main article states:  "Dallas police had prepared the most stringent security precautions in the city's history."  
Then, in Kennedy Assassination Theories, the article states:
"The two official government investigations have confirmed that the security around Kennedy's motorcade had been considerably reduced from its customary levels." 
Is there any evidence that either, or both  are true?  This reference work should not have two apparently contradictory statements. They could both be correct if the level of security was raised by the Dallas Police (but to an inadequate level) but security reduced by the U.S. agencies who were assigned to protect the president. 
In any event it looks bad; and they both should be supported by evidence. RPJ 19:57, 20 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Were Security Precautions Reduced by  U.S. but Increased by DPD? 

message: In this article, there is a link to Dr. Shoemaker (a well known scientist)that may or may not be a joke. On November 15, 2005, someone inserted some information about Dr, Shoemaker in the article about him conducting ballistics tests in the mid 1960's on human skulls filled with simulated brain tissue by shooting rifle bullets at the skulls. The purpose of this macabre test was apparently to determine whether a skull "recoils" towards the person shooting when hit by the bullet. Then the link was put in place to Dr. Shoemaker's biography:
The passage reads as follows:
Dr. Shoemaker did not restrict his interests to colliding astronomical objects, and he believed in experimentation to prove his beliefs. During a special CBS News investigative report in the mid-1960s about the assassination of President Kennedy hosted by Walter Cronkite, Eugene demonstrated what he had discovered during tests with his own rifle and human skulls. A bullet fired into the back of the skull with simulated brain material inside would cause it to recoil rearward, towards the shooter. This supported the Warren Commission’s findings, and refuted the ideas of conspiracy theorists, who believed that such recoil can only occur due to a shot from the front.
While the author, of the biographical insert writes in a style of great familiarity with Dr. Shoemaker ("Eugene demonstrated ...."), the information was posted anonymously. Also,it was posted at the same time someone posted Dr. Shoemaker's name as the expert who proved the "skull-recoil" theory on Wikipedia's Kennedy Assassination site. Then the Kennedy site was linked to the site so the reader could see that the information is purportedly true.
This counter-intuitive result (skulls recoiling towards the shooter) may be true, or not, and Dr. Shoemaker may or not have conducted such experiments. However, the Kennedy site has many true believers who are committed to certain theories. In this situation, it may be a highly committed person supporting the "lone gunman" theory (where Lee Harvey Oswald is the alleged lone gunman) and wants to rationalize why President Kennedy went quickly backwards (towards Oswald) after being fatally wounded to the head. The "answer" is that Dr. Shoemaker experimented and proved a human skull recoils towards the shooter when the bullet hits the skull.
Pending external reference, I have deleted the paragraph from this page. We can restore if someone supports the result. -- hike395 16:22, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Did Dr. Shoemaker experiment on human skulls? 

message: The section about the actual assassination is probably the most visited part of the article. Even it weren't, a point that could use clarification is in the following passage:
During the attack Agent Greer had turned very quickly to look behind him and towards the screaming governor and/or President, then turned forward again. 
Does the author mean to say that either the governor and/or the president were screaming?  Or does the author mean only the governor was screaming and Agent Greer looked towards the  governor who was screaming and/or the president? 
Irrespective of what the author of that passage meant to say does anyone else have source of information regarding this?  Thank you.
RPJ 04:47, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Assassination Itself: Can there be a clarification? 

message: Besides some minor word editing,  this part was changed by moving the mention of the record album recording that was simply a recreation of the assassination to the end of the article so as not to break the flow of information of what actually was caught live by film, photograph and recording. RPJ 05:32, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Edited the filming of the assassination 

message: Alfred G. Olivier, DVM to Rockefeller Commission, April 18, 1975. Transcript of testimony taken beginning at page 21.  See  
This particular area of the Kennedy assaassination is so laced with with theory and grounded on so little fact, that it probably should be removed or at least the reader warned that while the president's body did move backward the reason ofr it remains unclear.  RPJ 19:14, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Jet Effects"   recoiling melons , recoiling  skulls, spasms, compressions  and other theories 

message: The Assassination Records Review Board obtained a great deal of new evidence and is still making many parts of it public. Much of what the Board subpoened is still to be disclosed. 
One of the key pieces of evidence for solving this 42 year old murder is the direction of the bullet that killed the president.
There is no doubt that a bullet caused severe damage to his brain. Mrs. Kennedy cried to her bodyguard "My God, they have shot his head off."  His massive brain damage was examined minutes later by the  treating physicians at Parkland who found the president with over a third of his brains missing from inside his skull. He was near death; in technical terms: "moribund." 
Then he died. The massive damage to the brain not only ended the president's life but also discloses the direction of the bullet that killed the president.
But, now the president's brain is missing.
The Article needs to be more informative. The Article now states:
The President’s brain apparently was put in his coffin before burial, and a different human brain may appear in the photographs contained in government files recently subpoenaed by the official Assassination Records Review Board. [4] This panel was recently formed under federal law to gather and preserve the documents relating to the assassination.
(emphasis added)
The article can supply more facts. These facts from the Washington Post story in the link
are very helpful: 
The central contention of the report is that brain photographs in the Kennedy records are not of Kennedy's brain and show much less damage than Kennedy sustained when he was shot in Dallas and brought to Parkland Hospital there on Nov. 22, 1963. The doctors at Parkland told reporters then that they thought Kennedy was shot from the front and not from behind as the Warren Commission later concluded. 
"I am 90 to 95 percent certain that the photographs in the Archives are not of President Kennedy's brain," Horne, a former naval officer, said in an interview.        “Horne contends that the damage to the second brain reflected a shot from behind. He says the first brain was Kennedy's and reflected a shot from the front. 
The report points to, for instance, the testimonies of former FBI agent Francis X. O'Neill Jr., who was present at the Nov. 22, 1963, autopsy at Bethesda Naval Hospital, and of former Navy photographer John T. Stringer, who said he took photos at a supplementary brain examination two or three days later, probably on the morning of Nov. 25. 
O'Neill told the board in a 1997 deposition that at the Nov. 22 autopsy "there was not too much of the brain left" when it was taken out of Kennedy's skull and "put in a white jar." He said "more than half of the brain was missing." 
RPJ 11:27, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Who switched the pictures of the president's brain; and where is the president's brain? 

message: Hill's bravery has not received the full public recognition that it deserves. Because the Warren Commission operated in secrecy much of the events have only come to light since the Assassination Records Review Board in the early 1990's was empowered to subpoena and declassify documents relating to the assassination.
The highly intense debate over who was responsible for the shooting has for a long time eclipsed the act of murder itself. RPJ 10:58, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hill's actions  

message: Recently, two researchers collected the statements by Kenneth O'Donnel and Dave Powers regarding the pressure put on them to change their testimony "for the good of the country" because what they saw allegedly "could lead to an international incident."  Ultimate Sacrifice, Lamar Waldron with Thomas Hatmann, Carroll & Graf (2005) Pages 15, 901-902. The authors interviewed Powers on June 1, 1991 at the JFK Presidential Library. Former House Speaker Tip O'Neill also mentions the same account from Pwers and O'Donnel in his autobiography as mentioned and cited by Waldron.
:I don't think we should be singling out the vague testimony of 2 out of 216 witnesses, especially when we aren't mentioning more important witnesses like Howard Brennan, who actually saw Oswald at the window with the rifle. If anyone is curious, here's the excerpt from O'Neill's book. Gamaliel 18:47, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Witnesses pressured to Change Testimony 

message: "Gamaliel" has removed information about two eyewitnesses to the Kennedy assassination who later stated they were pressured to change their testimony to conform with what the Warren Commission investigators wanted to hear. 
“Gamaliel” defended his action on this discussion page, and the reasoning doesn't appear to stand scrutiny. But, before putting the information back in, "Gamaliel" should have another opportunity to provide more substantial reasons than he gave on this discussion page.
Defending the suppression of information on witness tampering by government investigators, "Gamaliel" argued as follows: 
1) The witness tampering testimony is "vague testimony:" 
Response: 
Here is the testimony by Kenneth O'Donnell. He was a presidential aide who was an eyewitness who was riding in the car immediately behind Kennedy when the president was shot.
He told the Speaker of the House, Tip O'Neil, several years after the assassination:
"I told the FBI what I had heard [regarding the shots] but they said it couldn’t have happened that way and that I must have been imagining things. So I testified the way they wanted me to. I just didn’t want to stir up any more pain and trouble for the family."
This doesn't seem vague at all. Kenneth O'Donnell was told by the FBI "It couldn't have happened that way."  Why is the FBI arguing with witnesses and telling them it couldn't have happened that way? How many other witnesses did the FBI argue with?
Then "O'Donnell admitted "I testified the way they wanted me to."  There is nothing vague about the  testimony that the FBI had changed from investigators of the crime to advocates of a theory of the crime and wanted a witness to change his testimony--and he did change his testimony. 
How many other witnesses did the FBI pressure into changing their testimony?
David Powers experienced the same type of pressure to change his story. He was also a presidential aide and also was an eyewitness who was riding in the car behind Kennedy when the president was shot. Powers then became a director of the JFK Presidential Library, and he told the Speaker of the House the same thing about witness tampering.  in 1991, Powers gave a taped interview to a researcher about the efforts to change his testimony.
Powers vividly told  the researcher seeing the shot from the grassy knoll, and felt they were "driving into an ambush." Powers further said that when he tried to tell his story to the Warren Commission investigators they kept interrupting him because it didn't conform with what they wanted. 
Finally, the Warren Commission never even called Powers as a witness to testify, but instead took an affidavit from him that said shot came from behind (as the Commission wanted to hear) and "I also had a fleeting impression that the noise appeared to come from in front in the area of the triple overpass." See Ultimate Sacrifice, Lamar Waldron, p 15, 901 and 902 (Carroll & Graf 2005).
Again. Why was the Commission involved in pressuring witnesses into a preconceived theory?
Isn't conduct such as this one of the reasons the public rejects the Warren Commission's conclusions? and shouldn't the reader be told this?
2) There are "more important witnesses" who aren't mentioned.
Response:
This second argument by “Gamaliel” on why the reader should not be alerted to the fact that evidence of witness tampering exists, veers away from the issue of witness tampering. “Gamaliel” refers the reader to a witness that testified that he saw Oswald at the window with a rifle. 
That is not the point of the discussion. Lets assume that someone testified he saw Oswald at the window with the rifle, that doesn't address the point that others saw and heard another shooter in front of the president and then the FBI and others pressured the witnesses into changing their story. Obviously, “Gamaliel” feels very strongly about the issue of witness tampering and he should. It is a felony to get witnesses to provide false testimony. The basis of our legal system is to obtain truthful testimony, and if the investigators themselves are pressuring witnesses to change their story, the entire proceeding lacks any credibility. 
In fact, the witness that so impressed "Gamaliel" by stating he saw Oswald with the rifle at the window may have been pressured into his testimony. Its important to know that on the date of the assassination "Gamaliel's" "important" witness  declined to positively identify Oswald as the person he saw with the rifle. See affidavit of Howard Leslie Brennan on May 7, 1964. 
Only later, after discussions with the investigators did the Brennan's testimony change to the story that the Warren Commission and FBI wanted to hear. 
How many other witnesses beside Brennan, Powers, O'Donnel and Mrs. Hill changed their testimony under pressure by others?
RPJ 11:23, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I oppose singling out 2 out of 216 witnesses, especially 2 witnesses whose testimony is largely insignificant and your motive appears to be to suggest something sinister is afoot. If you want to write something substantial about all the witnesses, or just the significant witnesses, fine, but don't waste our time trying to sneak in innuendo. Gamaliel 18:40, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Debate over Warren Commission Pressure on Witnesses to Change their Testimony  

message: This section appears to have been vandalized; and has been overlooked. - RoyBoy 800 20:23, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I copied and pasted from this version. - RoyBoy 800 20:26, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unreleased documents 

message: There is a lead-in statement to the number of shots fired stating that there was a clear consensus among witnesses that three or fewer shots were fired by a margin 90%. Does anyone know where this statistic came from? Is this statistic correct?
:It comes from the witness statements in the Warren Commission, House Select Committee, and statements made by witness to various news agencies.  Here's a summary of this research with a  chart. Ramsquire 23:40, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  What documents the 90% figure for consenus of three shots? 

message: A contributor has placed a "stop sign" on this article disputing the facts and neutrality of this article.
"Totally disputed" is all that is said. 
Not too much to work with there. JMLK17 has disputed other articles in such a fashion but such an effort seems a waste of time to do so without investing work into explaining why and improving what is there.
RPJ 17:12, 21 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Stop Sign"  by JMLK17 : need your reasoning 

message: === Key witness coerced out of testifying by Warren Commission investigators ===
Contributor "Gamaliel" wants to move the testimony of David Powers out of the Warren Commission section because Powers is only one witness. But Powers is a strong witness and a representative eyewitness to the witness tampering by the Commission’s investigators. Ken O'Donnell had exactly the same experience of witness tampering by the commission's investigators, as described in the discussion section above relating to Tip O’Neil’s book.
The events witnessed by David Powers devastate the credibility of the Warren Commission as an impartial fact finder. Powers remembers the President's car driving into an ambush with a shooter in front, which is supported some years later by the House Select Committee on Assassination which contends there was a second shooter out front.  More importantly, Powers rebuts the contention of the Warren Commission that there was only one shooter.
What does the Warren commission do to this eyewitness?: 1) The Commission investigators try to get Powers to conform to the Commission's one shooter theory and won't listen to anything else; and  2) When this doesn't fully succeed, the Commission doesn't call Powers as a witness; but has him sign a very brief, watered down version of his testimony.
The Commission concludes there is no "persuasive" evidence of more than person involved in the shooting but then doesn't call an eyewitness that can supply persuasive testimony. It looks very bad for the Warren Commission.
Is Powers a credible witness? Yes. He was a presidential aide riding in the car directly behind President Kennedy. Powers was right behind Kennedy when every bullet struck..  Has Powers been misquoted about the witness tampering by the Commission investigators. No. His witness tampering charge is from two different sources given at two different times. The former Speaker of the House, Tip O'Neil had a conversation with both Powers and O'Donnell about the witness tampering and writes about it in his autobiography.
This led to the taped interview with powers by a researcher on the subject and is good powerful evidence of the Warren Commission trying to reach a preplanned result that Oswald did it, and he did it alone. 
If "Gamaliel" can't give good reasons to the contrary, this is going to have to be put back in. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by RPJ (talk • contribs) .
"The story is an absolute lie...whoever gave that story is lying. It's an absolute, outright lie." - Kenneth O'Donnell, qtd. in Chicago Tribune, June 15, 1975
I found a citation to this via google, and then looked up a pdf of the original article in ProQuest.  All told, it took me about three minutes. Please do research before you insert claims into Wikipedia articles. Wikipedia's reputation depends upon the accuracy of its articles. Gamaliel 08:51, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Dave Powers

message: Contributor "Gamaliel" wants to move the testimony of David Powers out of the Warren Commission section because Powers is only one witness. But Powers is a strong witness and a representative eyewitness to the witness tampering by the Commission’s investigators. Ken O'Donnell had exactly the same experience of witness tampering by the commission's investigators, as described in the discussion section above relating to Tip O’Neil’s book.
The events witnessed by David Powers devastate the credibility of the Warren Commission as an impartial fact finder. Powers remembers the President's car driving into an ambush with a shooter in front, which is supported some years later by the House Select Committee on Assassination which contends there was a second shooter out front.  More importantly, Powers rebuts the contention of the Warren Commission that there was only one shooter.
What does the Warren commission do to this eyewitness?: 1) The Commission investigators try to get Powers to conform to the Commission's one shooter theory and won't listen to anything else; and  2) When this doesn't fully succeed, the Commission doesn't call Powers as a witness; but has him sign a very brief, watered down version of his testimony.
The Commission concludes there is no "persuasive" evidence of more than person involved in the shooting but then doesn't call an eyewitness that can supply persuasive testimony. It looks very bad for the Warren Commission.
Is Powers a credible witness? Yes. He was a presidential aide riding in the car directly behind President Kennedy. Powers was right behind Kennedy when every bullet struck..  Has Powers been misquoted about the witness tampering by the Commission investigators. No. His witness tampering charge is from two different sources given at two different times. The former Speaker of the House, Tip O'Neil had a conversation with both Powers and O'Donnell about the witness tampering and writes about it in his autobiography.
This led to the taped interview with powers by a researcher on the subject and is good powerful evidence of the Warren Commission trying to reach a preplanned result that Oswald did it, and he did it alone. 
If "Gamaliel" can't give good reasons to the contrary, this is going to have to be put back in. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by RPJ (talk • contribs) .
"The story is an absolute lie...whoever gave that story is lying. It's an absolute, outright lie." - Kenneth O'Donnell, qtd. in Chicago Tribune, June 15, 1975
I found a citation to this via google, and then looked up a pdf of the original article in ProQuest.  All told, it took me about three minutes. Please do research before you insert claims into Wikipedia articles. Wikipedia's reputation depends upon the accuracy of its articles. Gamaliel 08:51, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Key witness coerced out of testifying by Warren Commission investigators 

message: Contributor "Gamaliel" claims the statements of Powers regarding witness tampering by the Warren Commission should not be put in the article relating to the Warren Commission, even though it is supported by two sources and Powers is a very credible eyewitness.
"Gamaliel" will not relent in the opposition to this evidence by Powers of witness tampering being put in the article despite the witness being credible, i.e., former presidential aide to President Kennedy, Director of the JFK Library and who was one of the closest eyewitness witnesses to the assassination and had direct dealings with the Warren Commission. And despite the fact that Powers provided this information at different times to different sources, and despite he has not retracted it nor has it ever been denied.  
Lets face it: Here is an solid eye witness that sees a shooter in front, and the witness isn't even called to give live testimony. 
Why is "Gamaliel" so adamant in his opposition to the Powers' testimony? The reason is surprising.
The reason for "Gamaliel's position is that Ken O'Donnell, told the United States Speaker of the House of Representatives, Tip O'Neil  that he had the very same experience of being pressured to change his story by the Warren Commission and he caved-in to the pressure, and later, O'Donnell then denied that told this to Speaker O'Neil. O’Donnell was probably pressured again.
In any event, "Gamaliel's" reason is not a good reason to keep the Powers' testimony out, and doesn't appear, on its face, a very logical reason. 
RPJ 09:47, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Powers eyewitness account of witness tampering by the Warren Commission  remains very solid evidence 

message: The Powers' eyewitness account of the Kennedy assassination with a shooter in front and riding into an ambush still looks exceptionally strong and seriously undercuts the credibility of the Warren Commission for manipulating the evidence against establishing two shooters (one in front and one in back). 
Dave Powers was a high government official at the time (being a personal aide to Kennedy) and was riding right behind the president when he was murdered by gunfire.
Two indepedent sources support the Powers' account of the Warren Commission investigators trying to interfere with him simply recounting what he saw and heard because Powers' account didn't reflect what the Warren Commission wanted to hear. One source of the Powers' account was Tip O'Neil and the other Waldron in the new book called Ultimate Sacrifice where a taped interview of Powers was taken by a researcher in 1991. 
Contributer "Gamaliel" doesn't want anyone to be aware of this effort by the Warren Commission to suppress evidence contrary to what the Commission wanted to hear.
Gamaliel's latest argument is this:
The story is hearsay from a ghostwritten book and is contradicted by the men themselves, their sworn testimony, and is not mentioned in the book they wrote about Kennedy
Very weak:
1) Its "hearsay."  A desperate lawyer-type dodge. "Gamaliel," everything one reads in a book whether first-person style or not is "hearsay" because the writer is not subject to cross-examination. Thus, very weak comment, without redemption.
2) Its a "ghostwritten" book by Tip O'Neil. Assuming this is true, so what? Tip O'Neil either had the dinner with Powers and heard his story or he didn't. 
4) Powers' account of witness tampering and evidence suppression is "Contradicted by the men themselves."  Not true. Gamaliel has been repeatedly asked to produce a retraction by Powers  of what he said happened and "Gamaliel" has continually been unable to do so. "Gamaliel" wants to change the subject from Powers to someone else, and make unsupported claims of retractions by Powers. 
3)  The information is not in the book "they" wrote.
Who is the "they" to whom "Gamaliel" is referring? David Powers? Someone else? What is the name of the book? 
No amount of this avoidance of the devastating evidence against the Warren  Commission is going to help keep Powers' testimony out of the article. It is too fundamentally important. Powers'testimony, helps establish the Warren Commission's conclusion was pre-ordained to a lone gunman--other evidence was ignored, or tampered with.
If this is all "Gamaliel" has in rebuttal then it clearly isn't enough.
RPJ 22:41, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Powers' Testimony still looks very solid 

message: Lets review the evidence again. one needs to keep out extraneous facts about other witnesses. Deal with one witness at a time--that stops confusion.:
Dave Powers has told two seperate commentators that: 
1) shots came from right and overhead and from the front which is body blow to One Shooter theory of Commission;
2) he thought the president was riding into an ambush;
3) The Warren Commission investigators tried to keep interrupting him to change his testimony to what they wanted (one shooter from the rear) but when they couldn't get Powers to abandon completely what he knew happened Therefore, they didn't call Powers as a witness to elaborate on what he saw.
This is pretty strong evidence of witness tampering and bias by the Commission investigators who were trying to gather evidence of only one shooter.
Contributor "Gamaliel" again strays from discussing Powers, the witness at issue, and, again, starts talking about another witness . 
Gamaliel  claims Powers contradicts his sworn testimony--but again no evidence by "Gamaliel"  Here is what Powers' sworn statement describes:
 My first impression was that the shots came from the right and overhead, but I also had a fleeting impression that the noise appeared to come from the front in the area of the triple overpass. This may have resulted from my feeling, when I looked forward toward the overpass, that we might have ridden into an ambush. 
Gamaliel--has run out of time to come up with an argument against the Powers testimony.
Here are Gamaliel's arguments against the use of the Powers' statements relating to  witness tampering and failure to call Powers  as a witness at the Warrren Commission:
1) Gamaliel says: Don't believe Tip O'Neil's autobiography because it was allegedly written by a ghostwriter. There is no mention by Gamaliel that Powers gave a taped interview to another researcher to the same effect;
2) Gamaliel says:  Powers is contradicting a prior sworn statement. But, again, no proof by Gamaliel. Gamaliel is just repeating this charge a second time with no source. This doesn't help. Where is this prior inconsistent statement?; and
3)Gamaliel says: Powers doesn't address the subject in a book about Kennedy. 
Apparantly that is it.
RPJ 09:25, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Powers testimony is very strong 

message: The article could be cleaned up and tightened up a bit. Clean up is used in the sense of word editing.  
Presently the article emphasizes the act of murder itself. This approach departs from the intense debate over who committed the crime that dominates much of what is written. Therefore the article focuses on the act of murder from the view point of the victim and the immediate eyewitnesses on the president being struck and killed by at least by  one bullet in his upper body  and another bullet wound to the head.: 
"My God, I'm hit."   “I saw his head opened up and the blood and everything came out” “They have shot his head off”. “The right rear portion of his head was missing measuring about five inches in diameter.” “His brain was exposed”” You could actually look down into the skull cavity itself” “Probably a third or so, at least, of the brain tissue  . . . had been blasted out."
This is a description of a murder. 
The heated political discussions, the alleged blundering and finger pointing all come later.
Some information needs to be better documented; but not too much. The trivia questions and coincidences could be moved to a sub article for reasons of taste.RPJ 21:31, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Tag on Clean Up 

message: Some contributors  have the tendency to revert things with cryptic comments. It would be a better practice to put something in the discussion page about what is being done so that contributors don't have to guess what the person who reverts has in mind.
RPJ 03:37, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Some Contributors need to do more writing and less reverting. 

message: The following section is speculation as to why certain people heard shots from a certain location.  I say it should be deleted:
Considering there is no question that both Kennedy and Connally were both hit from behind during the assassination, it is of note that so few people heard shots in two directions, as a Grassy Knoll shooter could not have inflicted the wounds in Connally and Kennedy, save for the fatal shot Kennedy received. However, reason that could explain why people fall into one group or the other is that the eyewitnesses may have just heard the shots that were fired nearest to them. If the shots originated from the Book Depository the witnesses closest to the Book Depository would have heard those shots rather than those further away. Likewise, those closest to the Grassy Knoll may have simply heard the shots from that location that was near to them.
Ramsquire 00:07, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm defining speculation in this sense of a user here trying to harmonize the different conclusions of the researcher using supposition and information that were not considered by the original researchers.Ramsquire 00:15, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Should the Article Contain Speculation. 

message: Calling people eye-witnesses is misleading. Only a few claimed to see the origin of the shots. They were eyewitnesses to the assassination, but almost all were ear-witnesses regarding the source. Since the issue being discussed is about the source & not about whether or not JFK was shot, calling them eye-witnesses in that section is misleading the reader & needs to be clarified in article. --JimWae 18:35, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Eyewitnesses or ear-witnesses? 

message: Another point made by contributor Ramsquire is this: 
For the above paragraph, since the doctors were not at the scene of the crime, any suggestion of their's is likewise speculation. I believe a more accurate and NPOV way of stating the conclusion of some of the doctors is to state "some of the doctors believed the neck wound to be an entry wound."
This point appears well taken to some extent. The article is reporting someone else's beliefs. And, this approach would be equally applicable to any doctor's belief that Kenndey received a bullet wound to his back from a shot from the rear. This holds true  for a conclusion by a group or even several groups of political appointees that hold the belief that Kennedy received a bullet wound to his back from a shot from the back.
Ramsquire's implicit suggestion that any of the beliefs held by the doctors or politicl appointees is "speculation" may  not be well taken in the evidentiary sense. Beliefs by non-eyewitnesses are routinely relied upon by juries to establish proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Forensic science is built around such examination of physical evidence and conclusions are reached that are clearly not viewed as "speculation" by the courts since such evidence is allowed to be considered in reaching a judgment.
The Kennedy murder needs to be evaluated by a uniform application of evidentiary rules. Attaching the label of "speculation" to whatever displeases the reader is not a helpful way of discussing the suject.
RPJ 01:25, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Your point is well taken and I don't think we disagree on the proper use of speculation.  The article is supposed to be NPOV and shouldn't be coming to a conclusion. In a court of law, yes, the statement is fine as is, but here, disputed information should be stated in a way that makes it clear to the reader that there are differing views on the issue (or simply left out).Ramsquire 00:30, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  More on evidence , speculation and logic 

message: One contributer inserted into the article the following: "[I]t is of note that so few people heard shots in two directions, as a Grassy Knoll shooter could not have inflicted the wounds in Connally and Kennedy, save for the fatal shot Kennedy received" 
It isn't self-evident what is meant by this. A shooter from the front could have inflicted the wound to the throat and the wound to the head. A shooter from the rear could have inflicted the wound to the back of Kennedy and to the back of Connally as one combination of possibilities. 
Does the person who contributed the insert or anyone else agree or disagee?  RPJ 07:14, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think this is what the user is implying: if there was a conspiracy, based on the wounds of the victim the gunshots would have to be heard from two different areas. Yet most people only heard gunshots from one area (implying there was one shooter).  It's POV, and the kind of speculations that shouldn't be in the article.Ramsquire 00:38, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  What is the significance of two groups who perceived shots from different  directions? 

message: "But, this could mean that up to six shots were fired with one group of eyewitnesses hearing three from one direction that was near where they were located and the other group hearing three shot from the area where they were located. Also, multiple assassins could have arranged to shoot simultaneously. Agent Kellerman's testimony of almost a simultaneous flurry of shots would support such a contention."
I don't know if the person who wrote this has ever been to Dealey Plaza, but as someone who has, if there were two shots from different directions, they would have been heard by everyone in the Plaza, it's a very small area.  Probably less than half a block in size.  
More importantly, however, it violate's Wiki's rule against "original" content which prohibits the situation where an argument (made without citing a reputable source for that argument) purports to refute or support another idea, theory, argument, or position.  Here the user is arguing the results of the research with no verifiable sources to back up his opinion.  Ramsquire 18:29, 20 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Original Content Not Allowed 

message: Several edits were made, some seem good but some raise questions.  First. Dropped out was the word "large" to describe the two opposing groups of witnesses that heard shot from different directions. Its not as if a couple of people heard shots from the front and hundreds heard them from the back. 
:My reason for deleting "large" was mostly cosmetic.  "Large" is largely a subjective thing, and I figured a more neutral way of presenting the statement is to say there are two opposing groups without resorting to subjective criteria as the size of each group. I felt this way especially since both groups were described as large.  Ramsquire 01:03, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I made that argument in the TALK PAGE!  Such observations and opinion is proper in the talk page not in the article. Please read and understand the five pillars of Wiki.  I have no rules here, it is Wiki's rule.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:OR. Notice I left in the officer's opinion of shots being bunch together, it was because that was from a verifiable source unlike your theories.Ramsquire 01:03, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I left this is because I thought it was attributed to the officer mentioned in the article, if it is not, it should be taken out as well.Ramsquire 01:03, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

text: As an aside, in my non wiki life, I am a lawyer, and although there is a kernel of truth to what you say in that competing evidence doesn't necessarily make either irrelevant, you really should know the dictabelt thing has been objectively debunked.  1) the officer whose vehicle the recording came from testified that he wasn't in the Plaza at the time of the shooting, 2) the dictabelt only measured spikes in sound, not gunshots, and the spikes were not audible to human ears, and 3) ABCNews did their own technical research using the dictabelt, all of the home movies taken, and computer simulations, and placed the officer in the exact location he said he was in at the time of the assassination, i.e. not in Dealey Plaza.  That would be pretty conclusive in any courthouse throughout the country that the dictabelt is not reliable evidence.  Doesn't prove there was no conspiracy, but it does show that the dictabelt probably is not evidence of one. Ramsquire 01:27, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

text: RPJ, you obviously believe that there was some conspiracy to kill the JFK, and that is fine.  You are entitled to your opinion, and you could do a blog or website and fill it with all your arguments and theories.  However, if you are contributing to Wiki, you should follow its rules and know what Wiki is and what Wiki is not.  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:What_Wikipedia_is_not Ramsquire 01:04, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

text: There are reasons why you can't put in the dictabelt evidence, without describing why it as having been "debunked" or mention Jeanne Hill without mentioning why many view her as an attention seeking crackpot, or mention one researcher's conclusion without mentioning another.  My intent is not to be disrespectful to you in any way, and if I am, I apologize.  But you really need to understand how Wiki works.  Please read through the above link.  We can go back and forth on the talk pages with our theories, and explanation and argue, but not in the articles. Ramsquire 01:11, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Some edits well taken; some raise other questions

message: Some of those who believe there was only one gun man, who shot from the rear, don't believe the word "large" should be used to describe the group of 40 witnesses to a murder who gave official statements that some of the shots did not come from the building behind the president where Oswald worked,but instead came from somewhere else.
A group of witnesses of this size to a murder certainly couldn't be described as a "small" group of witnesses to a murder. Or could it?  Discussion is welcome. 
Remember, these are a good group of witnesses. They are attentive witnesses.  All the witnesses gathered at that spot of the murder specifically to either see the murder victim or to protect the murder victim. Kennedy was the focus of every witnesses' attention. And, over 40 of these acutely attentive witnesses identified shots coming from the direction of a second shooter. 
These official statements by so many witnesses undoubtedly contribute to the rejection of the lone gunman theory by most Americans by a very large majority. One simply has to look at the reputable polls to establish that fact. 
RPJ 08:51, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Large as opposed to what?  I would just say "over 40 witnesses".  "Over 40 witnesses" is more accurate and is NPOV, so put it in. Ramsquire 04:49, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Over 40 witnesses to a murder is a large number of witnesses