For those who think LBJ may have played a role in JFK Assassination

[Octafish]

There’s a photograph that casts suspicion on Lyndon Baines Johnson. Taken seconds after being sworn in as the new President aboard Air Force One, LBJ turned to US Rep Albert Thomas (D-TX) and receives a “conspiratorial wink” and a smirk, if not subtle smile. Considering the circumstances this is most troubling behavior on the part of elected officials of the US government. Whether it signifies a role in President Kennedy’s murder is another matter, open to interpretation and hopefully investigation. At the very least, the wink does signify that someone standing within a few feet of President Kennedy’s widow found something sufficiently interesting to comment on with the almost-silent body language of approval.



The Wink*

*From Steamshovel Press #12: An example of the weird mix of brilliant technical detail and lousy assassination history comes early in the book when Trask interviews White House photographer Cecil Stroughton about the swearing-in of LBJ. Trask virtually pinpoints the exact frame in which Stroughton switches from his Alpha to his Hasselblad camera. The images are beautifully reproduced from the contact prints, save one that Trask explains as being reproduced from a copy negative. This is the "wink" photograph, a shot of LBJ receiving a wink from Congressman Albert Thomas after the swearing-in, with all the onerous implications it has in David Lifton's Best Evidence, where the photo appeared in 1980. Trask supplies no reason why this particular negative original is missing, no indication that he asked Stoughton about it, no suggestion that he is even aware of its controversy, despite references to Lifton in the same chapter.

http://www.umsl.edu/~skthoma/lbj.htm

There’s more information on this topic in a thread started in LBN regarding a new book on LBJ and the JFK Assassination, written by the father of the new White House spokesman:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=116060&mesg_id=116060

[DemocratSinceBirth]

1. That Wink Is In Such Incredibly Bad Taste

The look on Jackie's face says it all...

I don't believe LBJ was involved in the assasination but every time crap like this comes up I have to reflect upon my decision to give LBJ the benefit of the doubt and count him as one of the "good guys".

Same things with Bobby... Yeah his feuds with RFK are legendary but the best he could come up up with in the aftermath of RFK's assasination was to muse to his intern at the time, Doris Kerns Goodwin that he weould have loved to see RFK unsuccessfully struggle with the problems of his day should he have become president....

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

4. I'd take LBJ over JFK any day

If JFK hadn't been killed, he would have been remembered as a mediocre president at best. Not to mention JFK was a shameless warmonger, and ordered all sorts of terrorist attacks against Cuba. Sure he looked good on TV, but we really don't want anymore like him.

[deutsey]

9. I think JFK certainly has been raised to the level of martyr

perhaps without real justification.

However, mediocre? His poll numbers were pretty high before his murder, and had been consistently so throughout his term. I don't know that he would be remembered with the same revered awe that he is now by some, but I don't think he would be seen as being among the lackluster presidents, either.

[THUNDER HANDS]

22. actually

Kennedy's poll numbers dropped every year he was in office until the moment he was killed.

He and Reagan were the two most overinflated presidencies America has had in the past 50 years. Kennedy never got more than 60% approval and Reagan never got over 55% approval.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

24. Gee, maybe 'cause JFK was a liberal who believed in taxes

and set the graduated rates to spread the burden to the upper classes for which the GOP hated him so much.
JFK had vision, he inspired millions around the world, and he was a good president. People miss him for good reasons.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

30. JFK started the destruction of the progressive income tax

He used the same arguments Reagan did, and started us down the road to the fake progressive tax we have now. That's what happens when you put trust funders in office. Thanks a lot, JFK!

[NewYorkerfromMass]

33. excuse me if this sounds a little revisionist but

it's not fair to say JFK used the same arguements Reagan did when JFK predates Reagan by 20 years. JFK has his reasons for doing what he did, but they can't be said to be the "same" reasons as Reagan.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

38. I guess it was Reagan that used the same arguments that JFK did

In either case, they told us that we should cut taxes on rich people in order to grow the economy. JFK destroyed the very successful progressive income tax, and Reagan finished the job.

I have no idea why people love JFK so much - he was our first actor president, and it's no surprise that he's the favorite of Democrats and Reagan is the favorite of Republicans. Style over substance. The last thing the Democratic party needs is more Kennedys.

[PROGRESSIVE1]

48. I would have cut taxes too in 1961!!!!

The highest tax rate was 90% at that time! We needed taxes to be this high to pay off the war debt (WWII and Korea)! By 1960 the debts had been paid and the government did not need the money (remember this is before the big social spending programs came into effect, which I fully support them!) so Kennedy gave it back to the people! The circumstances were different back then!

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

53. if we had kept the progressive tax

we wouldn't be arguing about how much of the safety net to cut. JFK ruined it for all of us, and he was the first to start dismantling the new Deal.

JFK was the first neo-liberal. I consider him to be one of the worst Democrats in modern times.

[jos]

27. Untrue

He was polling in the 70s for much of his time in office. It was only after he pushed civil rights that his approval ratings dropped below 60%

[Octafish]

15. Gee. You must never have heard about the Cuban Missile Crisis.

That's when the Soviet Union installed nuclear-armed MRBMs in Cuba? The country came within minutes of all-out nuclear war with the Soviets over it? And all the Generals and Admirals in the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the senior Congressional leadership, and almost everyone in the Cabinet were yelling at Kennedy to go to war? And Kennedy said, "Wait. There's got to be another way?"

You are so wrong, WhoCountsTheVotes. We need more like JFK. The guy was smart enough to know when EVERYBODY else was WRONG.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

19. Yes I remember

well, I wasn't alive but I have read about it. So JFK didn't get us into WWIII with the Soviets - that's good. If he was running today, I wouldn't vote for him.

[JohnyCanuck]

21. TV program said JFK tried to normalize relations with Cuba

I just saw a few minutes of a cable TV program on Castro this morning. In the few minutes I was watching they claimed that part of the deal JFK cut with Krushcev to get the Russian missiles withdrawn from Cuba was a promise by JFK to the Russians that the US from that point on would never invade Cuba. Castro was not aware of these negotiations and was reputedly very pissed off when he found out that the deal had been cut.

This could possibly explain the often remarked on fact that Castro's regime has survived a very long time (all the while openly thumbing their noses at the US)when compared to other latin American regimes which managed to get under Uncle Sam's skin. Is the Castro regime's survival for 50 years more a result of this under the table deal the US cut with Russia rather than Castro's skill as a leader?

The program also mentioned that about 5 days prior to the assasination JFK was meeting with a French journalist just prior to the journalist making a visit to Cuba to see Castro. Reputedly (as per this program) JFK asked the journalist to pass on an informal message to Castro the the US wanted to resolve their differences with Cuba and wanted talks with Castro to establish normal diplomatic relations and to end the trade embargo. The journalist was in a meeting with Castro when they got the word that JFK had been shot.

I am not saying all the above is necessarily true. It's just what they reported on the show I was watching.

[Octafish]

26. „Es una mala noticia." — Castro upon hearing the news.

Anthony Summers in "Conspiracy" detailed how the Cubans had made overtures to Washington for improved relations and JFK had agreed. US Ambassador William Attwood met, secretly, with Ambassador Seydou Diallo, Guinean envoy to Cuba.

"There is no doubt in my mind. If there had been no assassination we probably would have moved into negotiaqtions leading to a normalization of relations with Cuba." — Ambassador William Attwood.

French journalist Jean Daniel was with Castro when he received the news on November 22, 1963. She said Castro was shocked and repeated three times: „Es una mala noticia." ("This is bad news.)

According to Daniel, the first news reports were that JFK was wounded. Castro was hopeful that the President would recover. From Summers:

When the death was confirmed Castro remarked, "Everything changed. Everything is going to change.... The Cold War, relations with Russia, Latin America, Cuba, the Negro question....all will have to be rethought. I'll tell you one thing: at least Kennedy was an enemy to whom we had become accustomed. This is a serious matter, an extremely serious matter." Later, as the American radio station announced that the assassin was a member of Fair Play for Cuba and an admirer of Fidel Castro, the Cuban leader declared, "If they had had proof, they would have said he was an agent, an accomplice, a hired killer. In saying simply that he was admirer, this is just to try and make an association in people's minds between the name of Castro and the emotion awakened by the assassination. This is a publicity method, a propaganda device. This is terrible..." Then, as the radio began calling Oswald a "pro-Castro Marsist," Castro called off his engagements. The Cuban government was in fear of a swift revenge strike by the armed forces of the United States..."

SOURCE: Conspiracy, by Anthony Summers. First Paragon House paperback edition, 1989. Page 409.

[liberalhistorian]

7. I've always believed that Johnson was secretly glad

when JFK was assassinated, and even more so when it happened to Bobby. Does that translate into having something to do with one or both assassinations? Probably not but, like you said, things like this always make me doubt Johnson even more. It does seem strange that JFK's murder took place in Texas, Johnson's stronghold of power, doesn't it?

On the other hand, it may mean nothing. That's what really drives me crazy about things like this, there will never really be any way to know for sure.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

12. When I Said

that I have trouble counting LBJ as one of the "good guys" my intention wasn't to imply that he was involved in the assasination of LBJ and RFK just that he wasn't a "good guy"...

[MattNC]

14. certainly a possibility

Johnson hated the Vice Presidency.

[jos]

2. So what?

He was probably just a recognition wink. If that's all there is, give me a break! This is an incredibly serious charge to level. There must be substantial proof.

[Ergotron]

6. The truth is out there...

X-files conspiracy theory anyone?

[Octafish]

17. It IS a serious charge.

But nowhere near as serious as finding the truth about what happened almost 40 years ago. No court or government body had LBJ take the witness stand, nor Albert Thomas (nor J Edgar Hoover or Richard Nixon or George Herbert Walker Bush, for that matter) regarding the photo and what was meant. With or without the picture, an honest prosecutor can make a darn good case against each of them — for the People.

[molly]

3. I've always thought he was involved

[mrbill]

8. lbj did have some major brown & root connections.

that's the company now known as halliburton.

[madrchsod]

5. well that

pretty much sums up how really dumb some people are. in fact i`ve never heard this before..johnson put the hit on kennedy wow!! dam i guess i am pretty stupid for not believing this..oh ya, it`s from the father of the new butt boy for the whitehouse..dam how could i be so dumb. well, all the whores will be coming in their pants over this one..

[agincourt]

56. Well don't you know?

Hillary was also seen with a lollipop, a pink purse, and a sniper rifle on the day Kennedy was shot. Let's keep up the good reporting from the sperm donor for Ari's replacement.

[Minstrel Boy]

10. The thing is, if the wink is conspiratorial,

then it implicates Albert Thomas more than LBJ.

I do believe Johnson could have had foreknowledge of the assassination. He was, at the very least, involved in a cover up. But I think the wink is open to interpretation. A wink isn't necessarily a sign of a shared secret. It could have been Thomas's way of bucking up Johnson after the performance of a difficult duty. In other photos of LBJ from the ceremony he appears haggard. All Thomas might have intended was a simple "It's over. Well done."

[Octafish]

32. Excellent point, Minstrel Boy. We don't KNOW.

My point, not as well stated as yours, is we need to know. The United States of America is a different place today because of what happened in Dallas almost 40 years ago. A brief rundown (please pardon the ommissions:)

Vietnam
Watergate
Iranian Hostage Crisis
October Surprise
Savings & Loan fiasco
BNL (Banco Nazionale del Lavoro / US loans to arm Saddam's Iraq)
CIA-Afghani Mujahedin Blowback
BCCI (Bank of Credit and Commerce International / terrorists, money launderers, drug dealers, KGB, CIA, Abu Nidhal, Iran-Contra figures, Ollie North — all banked there).
Iran-Contra
Selection 2000
ENRON Energy Policy
9-11.

All are tied, directly to what happened in Dallas — and not through some forgotten historical figure. The oily common thread is one "reputable Houston businessman, Mr. George Bush."

[Minstrel Boy]

37. I'm with you, Octafish

And to your excellent list I'd add Inslaw and CIA complicity in the drug trade.

The more I study 9/11, and how it's been shamelessly Warren Commission'd by the Administration, the less I think of Pearl Harbor 1941, and the more I'm reminded of Dallas 1963.

[nolabels]

41. Some of the reasons to bare this shield

[Octafish]

51. Yes, Sir! or Ma'am!

I'll vote for any Democratic Party nominee over Bush, the appointed front-man for the Bush Organized Crime Family, apparent retainers of the world's secret fascistic and satanic elite.

Here's why I support John Kerry — Kerry will BUST the BFEE. To Kerry, as it is to many DUers and myself, it's PERSONAL. That's why, I believe, Kerry has worked so darn hard to do things "by the book" in order to be in a position to run for the Presidency. It may be why so many are so quick to destroy his candidacy, as well.



Kerry, left, sails with President John F. Kennedy
aboard the 62-foot Coast Guard yawl Manitou
in Narragansett Bay on Aug. 26, 1962.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

11. Evidence of planning in Dallas: 2 things:

1. Why was the motorcade route made to take the slow, more than 90 degree turn onto to the freeway ramp? This was a violation of Secret Service motorcade guidelines.

2. The behavior of the Dallas police in investigating, collecting evidence, and their general conduct was appalling unprofessional. And never mind how Jack Ruby was allowed to walk in to snuff Oswald.

Re: LBJ- Perhaps he was too beholden to military industrial/complex interests? He had the means and the opportunity to get JFK in his home state- did he have the motive?

[liberalhistorian]

13. He hated being VP, wanted to be President,

and said that he "swallowed his pride" to be VP for the chance someday of being President. He couldn't stand JFK or any of the Kennedys, either, especially Bobby. Whether or not that means he would actually do something like that will probably never be known.

[Solomon]

16. Octafish! You da man!

Love your posts. Watch out for yourself. You know too much.

[sangh0]

18. Read "Master of the Senate" by Robert Caro

It's an execellent book on LBJ and the Senate.

[Octafish]

43. Didn't Caro write the multi-volume bio on LBJ?

Thanks for the heads-up, sangh0! I know Caro is recognized as THE authority on President Johnson. What does Caro say regarding November 22, 1963?

BTW: In an interview late in his life, LBJ said he thought there WAS a conspiracy. "We were operating a damned Murder Inc. in the Caribbean!" he said, apparently in reference to the anti-Castro assassination plots or, perhaps, American skulduggery throughout Central America.

http://www.prouty.org/johnson.html

[sangh0]

47. It's still in process

Caro is writing an exhausting series of books on LBJ. The first one was released earlier. It was about LBJ before he got to the Senate. This book, Master of the Senate, is the 2nd in the series and covers his Senate career. The next book is supposed to be about his career after leaving the Senate.

I've only read the 2nd, and it is an EXCELLENT book. Not only is it thourough when it comes to LBJ, it also gives a lot of detail concerning how the Senate works, or doesn't.

[Democrats unite]

20. Yawn

eom

[Octafish]

35. Thanks for adding.

That is nothing.

You don't think the country is a different place, compared to what it was before November 22, 1963? Consider we haven't had too many, if any, Presidents since JFK who knew enough to "Think Big." Those were the days of "The New Frontier," where peaceful space exploration was to replace bloody terrestrial conflict as mankind's playground.

[birdman]

23. Seconds later Johnson and Thomas were caught high-fiving

But, of course, that picture was suppressed and destroyed
by the Warren Commission. It was only through famed investigator
Michael Ruppert that we know of its existence.


Those strawberries are at the LBJ Ranch.

[Octafish]

40. Where'd you find my bio photo?

That is, from my former life?

BTW: JFK, reportedly, liked Rod Serling's script for "Seven Days in May."



I'm slow, but I'm beginning to understand you, birdman.

Here's a nice Red Scare movie list. Just substitute "Rabid Right" for Red and it may give you more interesting ideas:

http://www.lib.washington.edu/exhibits/AllPowers/film.html

[Brian Sweat]

25. You don't even know that that is a wink.

To conclusively determine that that is a wink, you need video.

[Octafish]

29. Good point. However, there's a clearer photo available.

Robert J. Groden, who served as a photographic analyst for the House Select Committee on Assassinations in the mid-70s, published a clearer print in his book, "The Killing of a President." Unfortunately, I have not been able to find that picture on the web, but photos taken immediately after the "wink" show Thomas with both eyes wide open. Here's a link to the LBJ archives, which has a couple of high-res shots of the famous swearing-in pic. Thomas does look mighty serious in them, to be fair:

http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/AV.hom/images/ladybird/1A-1-WH63/1A-1-WH63.shtm

Unfortunately, as in the original post above, the photographer did not use his Hasselblad for the wink shot, and, as you noted, BS, movie or video would demonstrate the wink conclusively.

BTW: How's this for a charming expression? Here's one of JFK and Albert Thomas from better days:

[Silversocal]

28. No big deal here.

/

[loudsue]

31. George Bush Sr. was working intelligence in Texas at the time....

And there are a LOT more fingers that point toward him and his goons. That said, Johnson had to hate the Kennedys for their exceptional class and style, which Johnson was so totally lacking in, it's pathetic. Johnson held interviews with journalists while sitting on the comode taking an x-lax break....journalists were appalled. One actually took a photo through the door of Johnson's bare legs with his pants around his feet on the floor, his smiling face peering around the door to the bathroom.

Once while in the Senate, Johnson was busted in the back seat of a car in downtown Austin, Texas, naked with a similarly undressed hooker. Both were drunk. Many of us who grew up in Texas remember these things only too well.

I don't put too much past Johnson. And I don't doubt for a minute that he and the bush family had mutual friends (i.e., John Conally) connected to the oil business and military/industrial complex. The bush slime family has been involved in just about every slimy, classless situation this country has ever been guilty of.

:kick:

[Octafish]

34. When will a US Attorney General investigate the assassination?

You're exactly right, loudsue: GHW Bush is key to discovering what happened and who was responsible.

Remember George De Mohrenschildt, the only man known to be on a first-name basis with both George Herbert Walker Bush and Lee Harvey Oswald? The Bush business buddy and Bush/Oswald family friend was found the victim of what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound on the day he was to be interviewed by House assassinations investigators (“The Last Investigation” by Gaeton Fonzi; “Conspiracy” by Anthony Summers).

We the People need an AG who will subpoena Poppy Bush and get him to testify about his wherabouts, contacts, etc. Here's a great site for background:

George Bush, Skull & Bones and the JFK Assassination

Rodney Stich's book "Defrauding America" tells of a "deep-cover CIA officer" assigned to a counter-intelligence unit, code-named Pegasus. This unit "had tape-recordings of plans to assassinate Kennedy" from a tap on the phone of J. Edgar Hoover. The people on the tapes were " Rockefeller, Allen Dulles, Johnson of Texas, George Bush and J. Edgar Hoover."

Could George Bush be involved in the JFK assassination?

In 1963, Bush was living in Houston, busily carrying out his duties as president of the Zapata Offshore oil company. He denied the existence of a note sent by the FBI's J. Edgar Hoover to "Mr. George Bush of the CIA." When news of the note surfaced, the CIA first said they never commented on employment questions, but later relented said yes, a "George Bush" was mentioned in the note, but that it was "another" George Bush, not the man who took office in the White House in 1988.

Some intrepid reporters tracked down the "other" George Bush and discovered that he was just a lowly clerk who had shuffled papers for the CIA for about six months. He never received any interagency messages from anybody at the FBI, let alone the Queen Mary.

It is also worth noting that a CIA code word for Bay of Pigs was Operation Zapata, and that two of the support vessels were named Barbara and Houston.

CONTINUED...

http://www.meta-religion.com/Secret_societies/Order_of_Skull/part_7.htm

More on the subject here, too:

http://liberty.hypermart.net/editorials/Kennedy.htm

[Andy_Stephenson]

39. Look a here

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/POLITICS/JFK/postphotos.html

[Octafish]

42. Thanks, Gbnc!

That photo of Oswald or his lookalike has troubled me for years, no matter how many preserved and pressed shirts they stick on Oswald's lookalike co-workers from the TSBD the "authorities" trot out. Besides, it doesn't change the fact the police officer testified he found Oswald calmly sipping a coke in the second-floor lunchroom about a minute after the assassination.

Here's something else that's troubling:

There are ZERO Secret Service officers protecting JFK's limo:



OTOH: There were plenty of SS around LBJ's car.



Here're some more details:

http://www.jfklancer.com/LNE/limo.html

[Minstrel Boy]

45. I just finished reading

the JFK section in The Assassinations: Probe Magazine on JFK, MLK, RFK and Malcolm X. Marvelous depth and head-spinning revelations that were new to me. Highly recommended.

[Andy_Stephenson]

36. My Mother Bless her has said all my life

That she thought Johnson had something to do with JFK's death. She always called him a "Snake in the grass". She never trusted him.

[Forkboy]

44. Whew

I thought you were going to blame it on Kerry.

[TrogL]

46. A wink - you're kidding, right?

Please tell me you're kidding.

*groans*

You're not kidding, are you.

*sighs*

Some people are 'winkers'. They wink at people for no apparent reason - I have no idea why. A few will wink at children in an attempt to gain their trust - they're called pedophiles.

People close one eye for other reasons, usually related to pain:

• something in the eye
  
• eyestrain
  
• migraine
  
• dry eyes
  
• allergies
  

This is simply "reading into" on a grand scale. :tinfoilhat:

[Octafish]

50. You're right. There are many reasons for winking ;^)

Most are totally unrelated to the assassination of a President of the United States.

Yes, it is, sigh, disappointing to think, groan, someone may actually consider a wink at such a solemn moment anything other than what it was — a wink. I don't need a tinfoil hat to grok that.

Really, though? I don't KNOW what it signifies. It just happened at a strange time.

PersonallY? I'm a winker. I seem to do it unconsciously when mirth or merriment abound. It does bug some people.

[Unknown Known]

49. Brown & Root financed Johnson's political career - it's the oil, people!!

It's always been Texas oil money and it still is that has been corrupting this country for years.

From Molly Ivins -

Most of the government work was done by Halliburton subsidiary Brown & Root, the construction firm, thus reinstating a fine old Texas tradition. Brown & Root was Lyndon Johnson’s major money source: It was to LBJ what Enron was to George W.

http://www.texasobserver.org/showArticle.asp?ArticleID=805

It's not so preposterous to believe that Johnson had something to do with Kennedy's assasination because of Johnson strong ties to Texas oil and defense contractors.

From the Pentagon Papers -

National Security Action No. 263 (Oct. 11, 1963) - referring to the possible withdrawal of US troops from Vietnam.http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/pentagon2/doc146.htm

4 days after the assassination, Nov. 26, 1963, Johnson signed NSAM NO. 273 which committed the U.S. to the Vietnam War.

Paragraphs 5 and 6 totally contradict paragraph 2.

5. We should concentrate our own efforts, and insofar as possible we should persuade the Government of South Vietnam to concentrate its efforts, on the critical situation in the Mekong Delta. This concentration should include not only military but political, economic, social, educational and informational effort. We should seek to turn the tide not only of battle but of belief, and we should seek to increase not only our control of land but the productivity of this area wherever the proceeds can be held for the advantage of anti-Communist forces.

(Action: The whole country team under the direct supervision of the Ambassador.)

6. Programs of military and economic assistance should be maintained at such levels that their magnitude and effectiveness in the eyes of the Vietnamese Government do not fall below the levels sustained by the United States in the time of the Diem Government. This does not exclude arrangements for economy on the MAP account with respect to accounting for ammunition, or any other readjustments which are possible as between MAP and other U. S. defense resources. Special attention should be given to the expansion of the import distribution and effective use of fertilizer for the Delta.

http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nsam-lbj/nsam-273.htm

Less than 9 months later, Johnson signed The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.

[Octafish]

55. Petroleum is considered a "Strategic Resource."

The Bush Organized Crime Family, like the 1920s-era Chicago gangsters upon which they patterned their business model, go where the money is. In today's world that means petroleum. After finishing up at Yale, Poppy pulled up the tent in Connecticut and moved to West Texas where he could make a living pumping crude and playing spy throughout the Caribbean and Central and South America. It wasn't all that difficult, his Ol' Prescott served on the board of Dresser Industries.

http://www.famoustexans.com/georgebush.htm

http://www.sumeria.net/politics/cia-bush.html

Not only is black gold useful for our nation's economic engine, plastics, pharmaceuticals, fertilizers, home heating, and personal transportation — the stuff is REQUIREd by the Pentagon to keep the aircraft flying and the humvees humming. The Defense Department is the world's largest single user of the stuff.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/sep2002/oil1-s20.shtml

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/090803_meecher.html

BTW: Thanks for a great post, Unknown Known. It makes me think Democracy has a chance when people are aware of NSAM 263 and 273, no matter what Reichsmarshall Rumsfeld does.

[Old and In the Way]

52. Strange, but not convinced of Johnson's complicity.

No doubt that there was a cultural chasm between the Kennedy's and Johnson, but I think their political differences were relatively small...

But I totally agree that problems we are living with today find their roots in that terrible day in November. I can only imagine what kind of society and world we have if the assassinations of the 60's/70's nevered occurred.

Interesting to note that we haven't had any assissinations by bullet since the 60's, too. Does that mean assassinations haven't occurred?

[Octafish]

54. Reason? No Nixon.

Some seemed to like the gun in those days, Not So Old. Today "They" seem to prefer airplanes, fast cancers and drowning, to name a few.

You are correct, though. Almost the entire Liberal Leadership fell to the assassin's bullets in the 1960s. JFK, RFK and MLK were working to build a better America for ALL the people. Must've sounded communistic to somebody interested in protecting their real property and we know the rest.



BTW: Remember Arthur Bremer, the guy with the shit-eating grin in all the photos? That guy shot George Wallace a few times in the back at a shopping plaza in an assassination attempt in 1972 that left the Dixiecrat paralyzed?

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/wallace/sfeature/assasin.html

Of course, PBS leaves out the most important part of the story. Shortly after the shooting, Tricky Dick Nixon ordered E Howard Hunt to break into Bremer's apartment to plant pro-McGovern literature in an attempt to smear Nixon's opponent. What a guy. And to think Clinton wept at the funeral.

http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/ToA/ToAchp8.html