Tag: MEDIA

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See Additional Reviews of Inside the Target Car

• By Pamela McElwain-Brown
• By Dr. David Mantik
• Part One of James DiEugenio
• Part Three of James DiEugenio

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After his (planned?) false statement about Jackie Kennedy being in the line of fire, Gary Mack makes another observation. This one is more superficially credible—until one thinks about it. He observes that the bullet path from this particular position on the Grassy Knoll leaves an exit on the left side of Kennedy’s head. He then says that this was not evident at autopsy. He then uses this to discount a shot from that position. (He will later unwarrantedly aggrandize this into discrediting any shot from the right front at all!)

He’s correct about the autopsy not showing this kind of exit. But he is wrong in the deductive logic of this eliminating any shot from that particular point. Let me explain in detail what I mean. Since the program’s Curtailed Alternative doctrine predictably ignores it.

Clearly, something was happening behind the stockade fence. All you have to do is review the record. Let’s begin with the startling testimony of Lee Bowers, a worker in the rail yard adjacent to it and behind. From his vantage point in a 14-foot tower, he talked about the three cars he saw driving behind the fence about 25 minutes before the assassination. (Jim Marrs, Crossfire, p. 75) The first car looked like it was searching for a way out or checking the area. (ibid, p. 76) A second car came in about ten minutes later. The driver looked like he was speaking into a phone or a mike since he held something up to his mouth. This car probed a little deeper into the area than the first car. Then a third car came in: it was muddy up to the windows. It was occupied by what appeared to be a white male. This car spent a little more time in the area and then cruised back toward the Texas School Book Depository. At the time of the shooting Bowers saw two men standing between his vantage point and the mouth of the triple underpass. This would seem to approximate the spot, which I described in part one as being the best shooting venue. We all know what Bowers described next: “At the time of the shooting, in the vicinity of where the two men I have described were, there was a flash of light or … something I could not identify … some unusual occurrence—a flash of light or smoke or something which caused me to feel that something out of the ordinary had occurred there.” (ibid p. 77)

It is interesting—compelling actually—to couple this testimony with that of Sam Holland. In a 1966 interview that will live as long as people study this case, Josiah Thompson talked to Holland in Irving, Texas. He was reluctant to talk to Thompson. Why? Because as I mentioned in part one of this review—and what Gary Mack leaves out—many witnesses complained about what the FBI or Warren Commission did with their testimony. Holland is one of them. He told Thompson that the Commission “had not transcribed his testimony as he had given it.” (Thompson, p. 83) So now, three years later, he told Thompson his whole story. While standing in Dealey Plaza, he acted out what he did on 11/22/63. And those photos are memorialized in Six Seconds in Dallas. To anyone looking at them, they become almost seared into one’s sub-conscious. Holland told Thompson that he was originally standing on the overpass as he watched the motorcade come toward him. He then heard four shots, with the last two very close together. (ibid) Holland said the third shot sounded like it was from a different class of weapon than the others. Holland also said he saw a puff of smoke beneath some trees on the knoll area. (ibid, p. 121) Thompson then notes seven other witnesses who saw a puff of smoke in that area. (ibid) Three of these—Holland, James Simmons, and Richard Dodd—were so sure the shots came from over there that they ran off the overpass to an area behind the fence. When Holland got there, he could see scores of footprints in the soft ground behind a car. Looking at their pattern, it didn’t make sense to him. Why? Because they were all concentrated in a very narrow area, like a lion pacing in a cage. (ibid, p. 122) To cap this fascinating story, Thompson noted another witness named J. C. Price. Price saw someone running from this area with something in his hand, which he said could have been a headpiece. (ibid p. 123) This reminds us of the driver of the car Bowers saw, holding what he thought was a phone or a mike.

Need more? A woman told Dallas Patrolman Joe Smith that the shots came from the bushes up on the knoll. Smith ran behind the fence and smelled gunpowder. While he was there he had his gun pulled. As he was replacing it a man in the area showed him Secret Service credentials. Yet, as Thompson notes, every Secret Service agent had gone to Parkland Hospital with the motorcade. (ibid, p. 125) So who was this guy?

Finally, as more than one author has noted e.g. Richard Mahoney, John Davis, and Lamar Waldron, there exists an FBI report which states that two police officers saw some men standing behind the wooden fence on the knoll on November 20th. The men were engaged in what appeared to be mock target practice. They were aiming what looked like a rifle over the fence. When the patrolmen made their way up the knoll, the men disappeared in a nearby parked car. The policemen thought little of this episode until after the assassination. They then reported it to the FBI. The Bureau made a report on this that is dated November 26th. Yet this report was never made part of the official FBI record of the assassination. And it was not declassified until 1978. (For a depiction of the episode, see Ultimate Sacrifice, p. 704).

Of course, this program notes the Warren Commission evidence for there being a sniper’s perch on the sixth floor of the Depository e. g. the boxes and shells near the window. And, at first, the show implies it was Oswald at this post. Then later—when all semblance of objectivity has disappeared—it calls the shot from this position “Oswald’s shot”. Yet, further indicating its agenda, when it comes to the stockade fence on top of the knoll, the program mentions none of the above. Not Bowers, not Holland, not Smith, not Price, not the policemen. Not one word about any of it.

Because Gary Mack and the narrator are strangely mute about all the above, let us give voice to it. One obvious way to interpret it all is like this:

1. Two days before the assassination, a hit team was testing out a firing point behind the fence.
2. On the morning of the assassination, the team was transported behind the fence via a staggered three car caravan, leaving two men in place who were being communicated with by radio.
3. This ended up being one of the firing points in Dealey Plaza as evidenced by gunshot sounds, a flash of light, and a puff of smoke.
4. The hit team was furnished with fake official ID to protect themselves after the fact, because they knew their shot would attract witnesses to the area.

I believe there is a good reason the show leaves all of this crucial information about planning in advance out. Because if they included it, the audience would realize how illogical—actually absurd—one of the show’s main underlying assumptions is. Namely that the conspirators would use the same weapon and ammo as the alleged assassin was supposed to. Because in light of all the above, if they did do that, they must have been mentally retarded. Why? Because a shot from that site with that weapon and ammunition would clearly prove there was a conspiracy and Oswald did not kill President Kennedy! For, from his vantage point, how could Oswald fire a shot that exited the left side of Kennedy’s head? He could not. So the autopsy would prove Oswald an innocent man. So, to a lesser extent, would the Zapruder film. Are we really to believe that Gary Mack 1.) Forgot about all of the evidence above, and 2.) Never once thought of this stupid paradox in the weeks, maybe months, he worked on this program? I don’t buy it. And if you do, I have a bridge in Arizona to sell you.

As I have said, I personally do not believe a shot came from that particular site. If I had to bet on it, I would say it came from further down the fence toward the overpass. Yet a shot from that second point would not have produced the left side exit the producers clearly wanted. Which is probably one reason the producers did not fire from there. But, from a study of the Zapruder film, testimony like the above, and the medical evidence, I have for a long time believed that the shot from the front was a frangible bullet: one that exploded on contact with the skull. And before anybody says that the House Select Committee on Assassinations reported that this was not the case, I will reply that the HSCA was talking through its hat on this—as it did on many matters. I have communicated with CIA associated people on this issue. Believe me when I say the following: What these guys can put in rifles is literally beyond imagining. They can create very dense and heavy projectiles that, upon impact, all but disappear. Therefore, in any normal crime scene inquiry, you would overlook the traces. And this is obvious if you think about it. If you had an almost unlimited black budget to tinker with, and wizards of weaponry like George Nonte and Mitch Werbell were on your payroll, you should be able to come up with things that would be beyond the horizon. That is what you pay men like that for in the first place: To disguise a black operation. Not the Three Stooges stuff inherent in Gary Mack’s goofy fable which amounts to this: After previously scoping out a firing point, you then make sure you incriminate yourself. And in the process you exculpate the guy who is the designated patsy. Based on this, let us give the show a new title: Discovery Channel’s Idiot Conspirators.

II

Yardley: What are we basing this bullet hole on historically Gary?

Mack: We’re basing it on something that the Warren Commission did not have in 1964; the actual autopsy photographs and x-rays … which were examined officially in the late 1970’s. We know that there is a bullet entry hole up in this area …

The above statement is so studiously deceptive that it reminds me of a trick by Uri Geller. But it is imperative that Gary Mack makes it. If not, his “experiment” will have serious problems in this segment. Let me explain why in detail.

This exchange took place before the simulation of a shot from the sixth floor of the Depository. As previously noted, the show now drops all pretenses of neutrality, and labels this as “Oswald’s shot”. Yardley asks Gary Mack about the precise placement of the rear skull shot into Kennedy. Mack replies with the above deceptive quote. He then points to the upper part of the modeled skull, a bit to the right of the midline.

It is hard to believe that Mack does not understand how wrong he is here. Let us begin on the evening of November 22, 1963. That night at the autopsy in Bethesda, and contrary to what Mack says, the doctors looked at the x-rays! And at least two members of the Warren Commission had the photos: Arlen Specter and Earl Warren. (There is a strong hint that J. Lee Rankin saw a photo of the back wound, since he talks about it being clearly lower than the throat wound.) So for Mack to tell the public that the Commission did not have these exhibits is simply not accurate

But it’s worse than that. In the time period of late 1966 and early 1967, there is evidence that the autopsy doctors were brought back in to look at the photos and x-rays. The 1966 visit was called a military review and the pretext was to sort out and classify these exhibits. In 1967, the visit was provoked by the strong reaction to the criticism of the Warren Report then peaking in the press. As former CBS employee Roger Feinman has reported, this visit was done with the help of John McCloy in order to help CBS defend the Commission. This controversy eventually resulted in former Warren Commission assistant counsel David Slawson writing a memorandum to Attorney General Ramsey Clark. Slawson requested that the Justice Department begin an official medical review to stave off the threat of a more wide-ranging and wholesale inquiry. The Slawson memo resulted in 1.) What appears to be the autopsy doctors looking at the exhibits again, and 2.) A new panel of forensic pathologists “officially examining” the photos and x-rays for a review of the medical evidence. This new panel, formed in 1968, was headed by pathologist Russell Fisher and is called the Clark Panel.

Question: In light of the above two paragraphs, how can Mack misinform the public that these photos and x-rays were not officially reviewed until the late seventies? But an even better question is this: Why is he saying it when he knows better?

Because the Discovery Channel wanted to go with the new and revised entry point in the rear of Kennedy’s skull. The one Gary Mack deceptively says “we know” about. The Warren Commission entry point, as confirmed by the original autopsy team, was at the bottom of the skull, at a point called the external occipital protuberance—the EOP. But this trajectory created problems with the Warren Commission exit point, which was on the right side of the head, above and to the right of the ear. As Josiah Thompson pointed out in his book Six Seconds in Dallas (p. 111), at Z frame 312, Kennedy’s head is not anteflexed enough to make this work. And the Warren Commission understood this because in the false drawings prepared for Arlen Specter, Kennedy’s head is anteflexed much too far—looking down into his lap—in order to cure this problem. (See ibid. At that page, you can see the dramatic comparison in forward lean for yourself.)

Consequently, and contrary to what Mack says, Russell Fisher and the Clark Panel—working from the photos and x-rays—first revised this entry point upward by four inches in 1968. The House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA), in 1978, then agreed with the Clark Panel revision. Unlike what Mack wants the public to believe, this official “review” did not happen 15 years later. Another key point Mack leaves out: The original autopsy doctors—James Humes, Thornton Boswell, and Pierre Finck—did not agree with this new and raised entry point.

It is this disturbing landmark in the medical evidence that the program needs to tiptoe by. So it falsely states that 1.) The Commission never saw the photos and x-rays, and 2.) There was no official review of them until the late seventies. The clear and deceptive implication is that the autopsists missed the raised entry in the cowlick area because they did not have either the x-rays or photos. The supposition being that if they did, they also would have placed the entry wound up high. Again, this is inaccurate. Because when the pathologists saw these exhibits during the HSCA they mightily resisted the cowlick placement of the entry wound in the skull.

The following was Discovery Channel’s problem. If the show admitted that the rear entry wound moved up in the space of about four years it would have trouble explaining how it happened. Because in real life this is almost unheard of. And further, contrary to what Mack’s certitude about an entry wound in the cowlick, the evidence strongly suggests that this later raised entry was manufactured after the fact. A point that the show also avoids by using this sleight of hand. (See Section Five of Part Four of my review of Reclaiming History for the troubling details.)

But it’s even worse than that. As Gary Aguilar has pointed out, the Commission actually performed shooting experiments with Dr. A. Olivier on this specific issue. When firing at the EOP, the shot exited at the supraorbital process—the bony ridge above the eye. (WC Vol. 5 p. 89) The resulting damage was something resembling a blow-out wound to the right upper face. (See the skull photos and a discussion of this issue in Gary Aguilar’s essay in Murder in Dealey Plaza, p. 184) The problem with it was that 1.) This exit is not noted in the official autopsy report, and 2.) It is not evident in the photos. One has to wonder if all these evidentiary problems with the EOP entry caused Fisher to rework the original autopsy by raising this wound.

Please note: all of this utterly fascinating material would have made a much more interesting, honest, and educational program than JFK: Inside the Target Car. Yet Gary Mack disposes of it all in the space of about two fraudulent sentences. He has to of course because he does not want Yardley firing at the Warren Commission’s EOP location. Because as noted by Aguilar, that could risk a shot exiting through Kennedy’s face. And that would create a real fracas for the official story wouldn’t it? Mack’s cheap trick with the medical evidence prevented it. Discovery Channel was determined from the outset to uphold the Commission—even if it meant revising the Commission’s own conclusions! Because remember, the Commission went with the lower EOP entry point.

The above is a perfect illustration of what I said at the beginning of Part One about the risk in oversimplifying a complex and changing phenomenon: that one will end up inherently falsifying it. And this is what the show does in dealing with all the above in the space of about two sentences. All of this ducking and weaving in order to avoid fully informing the audience.

III

Bypassing all of the above, Yardley takes his “Oswald” shot at the revised and raised cowlick area. He hits it. But as I wrote in Part One, this creates still another problem for the show. As he wrote in his online discussion afterwards, Gary Mack says that the bullet did not fragment. He immediately tried to dispose of this problem. I understand why he wants to dispose of it ASAP. But it won’t go away. If his demonstration is to have scientific validity, this important point can’t be ignored. For in the second federally sanctioned JFK investigation, the one by the HSCA—the one the show is abiding by with the raised skull entry wound—the bullet did fragment. But it was a rather bizarre fragmentation. The head and tail of the bullet ended up in the front of the car. And the middle of the bullet somehow got stuck at the outer table of the skull high in the back of the head. This is probably one reason why Mack wants to dispose of this matter as quickly as possible. He doesn’t want to have to explain that rather weird phenomenon. Even though he (falsely) says the HSCA discovered the raised entry placement, he doesn’t want to explain the fragmentation that goes along with this raised entry. Why? Because it’s not explainable. In fact, experts have called it unbelievable.

But that is not all. In the Clark Panel x-rays there is also a particle trail traveling horizontally across the top of the skull. This presumably represents the progress of this bullet across the top of Kennedy’s head. The problem is the trail does not match up with either the in shoot or out shoot point. Again, the show mentions none of this.

Now, as Milicent Cranor has pointed out, it was not mandatory that the Discovery Channel experiment precisely duplicate this key issue about the bullet breaking apart in the middle. But it should have accomplished something that was at least similar. In other words, the bullet should have broken someplace. The fact that it did not break at all would suggest two logical deductions. Neither of which the show wishes to entertain.

1. Either the projectiles striking Kennedy’s head were not Mannlicher Carcano bullets, or

2. The snake oil cooking I described in part one was boiling over. That is, the Adelaide T ∓ E “exact replicas” of the human head were no such thing.

Because the official autopsy in this case was so curtailed and incomplete—which is another area of the medical evidence this show does not want to get into—we cannot answer this question with real certainty. But I actually think number one could be true, and number two almost has to be true. Concerning the first, as I mentioned before, the shot from the front may well have been a frangible type of bullet that broke into bits upon impact, thereby leaving this weird particle trail in the skull.

But there can be little doubt about number two. I recorded my surprised reaction in part one of this review about the skull breaking into smithereens when struck by a hunting bullet. Well, that was reinforced when this happened. Clearly, the manufactured skull did not create enough resistance to the bullet. And considering the background of Adelaide T ∓ E, the past history of Discovery Channel and their JFK specials, plus what the Sixth Floor represents, one has to wonder if it was by design. That is, they knew they could not duplicate what the HSCA said happened to this bullet. So they went ahead and created easily breakable skulls to give the viewer what they wanted to show: an unobstructed and visually discernible path through the top of the skull.

And by doing this, they do not have to explain another mystery about this revised entry point. Which is this: both the Clark Panel and HSCA largely based this raised entry point on a circular 6.5 fragment at the back of the skull table. The dimensions, of course, exactly duplicate the shells allegedly used by Oswald (which no one in Dallas recalls selling to him). But further, no one at Bethesda saw this circular object on the x-rays the night of the autopsy! Yet how could they have missed it? In light of this fact, I understand why Mack does not want to talk about this issue. Not only does the non-fragmentation seriously impact the validity of his “exact replicas”, it also affects the credibility of his “knowing” there was a raised entry wound at the rear of the skull. Why? Because his “simulation” does not leave the 6.5 mm fragment—or anything approximating it—in the skull. Which, as previously stated, was one of the major reasons for raising the skull wound in the first place. But even though its not there, Mack raised the wound anyway.

So much for Gary Mack’s oh-so-certain knowledge of this cowlick entry wound in the skull. It’s a “certainty” that his own experiment belies.

I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried. And I’m not trying. But I’m still not done.

IV

Let us now discuss Yardley’s so-called “Oswald shot”. Because something odd happened with it. When Yardley hit his shot, the whole right side of the “replica’s” head flew off. Including what appears to be the right front top of the forehead. Yet this is not the kind of impact that is shown on the Zapruder film, written about in the autopsy report, or shown in the autopsy photos. In those photos, the forehead is intact.

And this directly relates to another important point. Toward the end of the show, Mack brings on two alleged experts in blood spatter analysis. For this segment, they pose what looks like a white plaster bust in Kennedy’s position in the car. They then place what looks like a target mark on it for the exit point. The mark was located in the upper forehead on the right side. My BS antennae sprung up about a foot in the air. Because if you read the autopsy report, this is not where the doctors located the exit wound. They located it on the right side of the head in the parietal area. Which is back from the forehead. (Most authors give the location as above and to the right of the ear on the right parietal.) Besides being utterly surprised and puzzled, I didn’t know how to explain it. Are we really to believe that Gary Mack, and the producers, and the director never read the autopsy report? As I said, this was very puzzling.

A couple of minutes later I wasn’t puzzled anymore. At that point, I understood why they placed it wrong. And I should have known. Inevitably, in this age of computer graphics, the producers wanted to superimpose a line on the screen that traced back from a hole in the dashboard that the Yardley shot created, through this exit, and to the sixth floor window. And so with this Yardley exit, you can do that. But with the exit described by the autopsy doctors you cannot. So in addition to the dubious entrance wound, this show gives us an exit wound that does not correspond to the autopsy report. All in order to keep Oswald as the lone assassin.

After this long and excruciating dog and pony show, the two witnesses are shown photos of the alleged “blood spatter pattern” in the car as adduced by this ersatz experiment. Now let me ask a logical question in light of the above: If the manufactured skulls were not close to being what real skulls are like, and if the entrance point on the skull was wrong, and if the exit point on the skull was wrong how could the end result be the same? But let me add one more point here. The stuff that is ejected from these skulls upon bullet impact seems about as exact a substitute for blood as the manufactured heads are for real skulls. The stuff looks like something out of a “B” horror movie, maybe The Green Slime. But let us discount the color, what bothers me is the texture. The texture may possibly approximate brain matter, but it does not appear to be close to blood. In any real experiment there should have been at least two things ejected from the skull, brain matter and blood. I didn’t see that here. Further, the actual photos taken of the car after it got to Washington only appear to show blood on the back seat. There was little if any of the spatter that was projected forward. So there was no control for this final part of the demonstration. With all these specious variables, with no control factor, and the proven untrustworthiness of the producers, the reliability of these witnesses who confirm the green slime at the end is worth very little.

But that is not really the end. The end is afterwards with Gary Mack looking out the so-called sniper’s perch onto Dealey Plaza. Get it? That is where the shot that killed JFK came from. And with that posed and pre-planned shot, we understand what this program has been all about. From the selection of Adelaide T ∓ E, to all the cheating on the marksmanship, to the selection of that particular front shot, to the lie about Jackie Kennedy being in the line of fire, to the mentally impaired hit team which wanted to exculpate the patsy, to the oh-too-frangible skulls, to the wrong exits and entrances etc. etc. etc. all the way down the line. It was all done so the show could leave us with that final frame staring out the Sixth Floor window. Which is probably why The Sixth Floor Museum and Mack agreed to go along with the charade.

But for one informed viewer, that shot did not suggest what the producers wanted—that is Oswald as the lone assassin. For me it was Discovery Channel, Gary Mack and the Sixth Floor as assassins of the truth.

I will try and explain how it happened in Part Three.

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See Additional Reviews of Inside the Target Car

• By Dr. David W. Mantik
• Part One of James DiEugenio
• Part Two of James DiEugenio
• Part Three of James DiEugenio

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The JFK Assassination Aftermath and TV Shows

One would think that once the Warren Report (WR) hit the stands in 1964 the government would have said, “there you have it”, and moved on to something else. However, there were so many flaws within that it invited a fair amount of criticism. Although the critics were quickly pointed out to be un-American, they continued to grow in number and volume. Their voice threatened to drown out that of the Warren Commission. Something had to be done.

Some on the Commission, like Allen Dulles, actually believed the American public would not bother to read the WR. Apparently, they believed that their appeal to authority, dictated by those supposedly the most revered in our government, would be sufficient. They thought that the American public was merely ‘sheeple’, and would do as they were told. They were wrong.

In order to quickly cover their tracks, a special posse was formed behind the scenes devoted to stomping out the growing Critical Community (sometimes called Conspiracy Theorists, or CT’s). New books were quickly written to re-emphasize the ‘conclusions’ of the WR, while some new CT books were written in order to confuse the CT community. And someone in the posse (which we will refer to as the Ongoing Cover-up, or OC) had an ‘aha’ moment when it came to pushing the WR agendas on that new media called TV.

So into the fray jumped the networks, anxious to please; most of them probably co-opted by the OC even prior to the JFK assassination. The sheeple believe our newscasters. So, of course, they would believe what these people had to say about the assassination. This spewing of TV jargon would be more persuasive to the sheeple than any doubts they might have had. Quickly, a TV show on the WR was developed. Others followed. The Jim Garrison investigation was decimated by the NBC White Paper propaganda show against him. The OC had hit the big-time, and television had become the new means of controlling the public.

Which brings us to the present. Fairly recently, the Discovery Channel decided to fund shows on the JFK assassination. Their ultimate conclusion, after allegedly looking ‘objectively’ at all the facts, was—you guessed it—a recrowning of the Warren Commission. On the other hand, in 2004 the SPEED Channel did a one-hour documentary on the Presidential Limousine,. This was called Behind the Headlights: JFK Presidential Limousine (currently available on You Tube.) This program, for which I helped develop the script and was interviewed for, was conspiracy-based and contained new information about what happened to the limo after the assassination. It clearly demonstrated that the limo was the primary crime scene and that there had been a cover-up. How could this be allowed to stand? So somebody at Discovery Channel had a bright idea to do a program focusing on the limo as the crime scene. And that brings us to “JFK: Inside the Target Car”, and my participation in it.

The Invitation

A few years earlier, a production company called Creative Differences called me. A producer named Robert Erickson interviewed me by phone for possible involvement in a show they were doing for the Discovery Channel. It came to be called Beyond the Magic Bullet (BTMB). This was broadcast in 2004. The show ultimately progressed in a different direction, and I was not included. I had been involved with a few other TV programs around that time. Most notably the Fox News 2-hour JFK assassination special entitled Case Not Closed in 2003, and a pilot for the show Tech Effect which ended up being too expensive to complete. Interacting with the producers of those shows had left me calm and empowered. Interacting with Erickson left me vaguely uncomfortable.

As a rule, I do not spend much time watching Warren Commission apologist shows. I did watch the single bullet test in BTMB, but was put off by the shows’ easily-apparent hypocrisy. They had not even bothered to specify which exact single bullet scenario they were attempting to follow. Another heads-up I should have taken more seriously.

So when Robert Erickson e-mailed me last spring about the new show his company Creative Differences was doing on the limo for the DC, I did not exactly leap right into it. But I did decide to keep an open mind.

Initially, I did not have any suspicions about the show being scripted to coincide with a Warren Commission apologist agenda–even though common sense told me that could probably be a factor. The script looked interesting. Though much of it was a rehash of my 2004 SPEED Channel documentary. Which was puzzling. Plus, it included an objective which has been one of my major priorities for over 10 years: to view the limo windshield held at the National Archives (NARA). I was to go to Washington DC with the producers and they would hire a glass forensic expert. The windshield would be examined and photographed in High Definition. How much more exciting could an investigation get?

I enlisted the aid of Congressman Jim Ramsted, who wrote a dynamite letter endorsing the request to NARA to view the windshield. I thought: What could possibly go wrong? Little did I know.

Erickson had spoken with Bob Casey, the curator for Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, where the rebuilt limo is on display. Casey mentioned that Lincoln Motors had begun etching numbers into the windshields of its cars during the sixties. Was it possible that the NARA windshield contained such a number? If so, it might be possible to track it down to determine if it was the one in the limo when it was delivered to the White House garage in June of 1961. More importantly, it might be possible to determine if it was the one in the car during the assassination.

The DC letter and the Ramsted letter were sent to NARA at the end of April. We waited anxiously. In a few weeks, we heard back. Apparently, they had sent someone scurrying down to the windshield to check for a number etched on the edge, and when they didn’t find one, heaved a sigh of relief and refused our request. The door to viewing the windshield had been shut. However, a new one was about to open.

Trip to Dearborn

In June we continued with the next section of the program. Bob Casey and I were to be interviewed next to the rebuilt limousine at Henry Ford Museum. Robert Erickson was waiting for me at the Detroit airport. He was very pleasant, yet cool and somehow calculating. I began to have the sensation that perhaps I was being set up. We had dinner at a Chili’s and discussed the questions he would ask in the interview the next morning. Apparently, I was being relegated to fill-in material, as none of the questions were very interesting or exciting. I tried to figure out an angle where I could contribute something new to the show, but seemed to be blocked. What do you want me to say? I asked. I then added: “You’ve given all my best lines away.” It was a very frustrating evening. Here I was being told that I was needed because I was ‘the limo expert’, but I was obviously being sidelined for some unknown reason. Erickson also asked me about some of the more far-out theories connected to the limo and what I thought about them. He asked me about getting in touch with a few other fringe CT researchers. I gave him what information I had, and then had an insight: “He’s trolling for kooks,” I thought. Little did I know I was one of them.

Erickson also talked about the previous program, Beyond the Magic Bullet. He said the feedback on the show had been pretty negative, and didn’t understand why. Without explaining that I had not watched the entire show, I talked to him about my idea of different SB scenarios. I referenced an article I had written on them, called “The Pretty Pig’s Saturday Night.” I told him, “By not specifying which scenario you were following, you were setting yourself up for trouble.” He didn’t seem to understand.

The Henry Ford interviews were to be done before the doors opened, which meant that the set-up began at around 5:30 a.m. The Museum was dark and quiet—an extraordinary event in itself. There was a small group of girls who scarfed us up coffee and bottles of juice and water. A woman from the research staff was also present. The cameraman worked quickly and at 6:15 Erickson said, “Shall we get started”? I had been looking over my notes for valuable information to add to the bland questions, and quickly switched gears.

The interview was boring and rote, and I was unable to contribute much more than the bare bones that had been previewed the night before. I got to sit at the rear of the limo; an hour later Bob Casey sat at the front. I had a chance afterward to walk around the Museum in the quiet, looking at the other presidential limousines, the autos, planes, trains and vacuum cleaners from years gone by. That in itself was a dream come true.

The Museum opened, light streamed in the windows, and the Kennedy limousine was again the center of attention. The crowds were kept back as the ‘beauty shots’ of the limo were filmed; some from the camera mounted on a dolly, moving silently back and forth. It was a beautiful sight. Afterwards, a staffer did some measurements of the limo rear seat and we were allowed to take photos of her holding the measuring tape. We were not allowed inside the limo. A low blow.

After the cameraman had packed up his gear, we all went to lunch and discussed plans for the rest of the day. We thought about going to the Gerald Ford Library, as there were some interesting documents there. Erickson also mentioned possibly seeing a replica limo that they planned to borrow for a day. Before I knew it, we were looking at the only other limo built from the Hess ∓ Eisenhardt blueprints (not available to the public) by Kevin MacDonald, a protege of Hess. The car had been built back in the 80’s, and used for the movie JFK, as well as for other movies and TV shows. The top was off, a bottle of water lay on a jump seat and a container of tennis balls had been tossed carelessly in the back seat. It was hardly stately, but my heart was in my throat. This was the car as it had looked on November 22, 1963.

The car was in some ways exquisite, and in others grotesque. The jump seats were the wrong shape and covered in plastic rather than leather; the metal handholds were not correctly shaped. The tires were modern. The plexi-glass top sections were opaque and could only be used with the canvas cover. The rear seat was not built up; as of course, it did not contain the mechanisms to move it up and down as had the original. Otherwise, the car was a gem. We took measurements and photos of it, and reluctantly left. “I don’t know what to do,” said Erickson, “now that the NARA segment has been scrubbed.” “Go to the car, I said.”

And so began the process that culminated in the replica limo being shipped to Dallas, and the possibility of having a true reenactment of the fatal shot of the assassination.

In our last discussion later that day, Erickson and I went over all the limo photos and documents I had brought with me. We talked about the black ∓ white FBI photos, taken during the forensic exam early Saturday morning. We talked about the color SS photos, CE 352 and CE 353. Erickson kept insisting they had been taken during the FBI exam. No, I patiently explained, they were not taken until late Saturday afternoon. Which was well over 24 hours after the assassination. And after the Secret Service had scoured the car for hours, and later, the FBI had done the same thing, including removing the rear seat. I tried to explain: There was no way that these photos could resemble what the car had looked like at Parkland Hospital. However, it felt as though I were talking to a brick wall. Later I came to realize that the actual timing of the photos was irrelevant; the timing had to be juggled to give Erickson and Dealey Plaza consultant Gary Mack what they wanted.

Replica Limo in Dallas and a Test

About two weeks later the replica limo had arrived in Dallas, and was available for shooting for a week. Although I was on the outside from this point on, it was exciting to think that there would be a chance to do an accurate re-enactment of the fatal headshot (and disprove the Warren Commission in the process). Also, they would be able to copy the measurements of the rear section of the replica limo for their firing test simulator, which would just be a crude copy in plywood. E-mails went back and forth between Erickson and me. I suggested that they use Zapruder film frame 312 ( Z-312) head position as the focus point for their reenactment. I hoped that if they followed through on this, they would discover that both the Commission and House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) positions were wrong. Obviously, I expected to hear some follow-up questions about it.

Surely there would be some discussion as to the difference between the Warren Commission, HSCA and Z-312 angles for JFK’s head? Yet, this did not happen. They did have other experts on hand. What were they being told? Did they just choose a position that they felt their test would fare better with? If Abraham Zapruder could see the back of JFK’s head in Z-312, how could it be totally accessible from the sniper’s nest, which was many feet up the street? Wouldn’t Kennedy’s head have to be tilted on both a horizontal and vertical plane? And when one looks at other films, this appears to be the case.

“Where would a shot from the grassy knoll have come from?” Erickson asked. Not being there, I could not be specific, so I suggested: “Use a representative spot.” At one point, Erickson seemed concerned that there was no clear shot with the correct trajectory from the grassy knoll unless someone was standing on something, such as a car. That was puzzling to me. But again, at a distance, there was nothing much to say. Of course, by this time, the Sixth Floor Museum’s Gary Mack was literally at the center of everything.

Firing Tests in LA

Next came the actual tests. The replica skulls were designed by the Australian company Adelaide T ∓ E and were expensive. They were supposed to react exactly as a human head would. Nobody bothered to mention to me that they were mounted on a rigid neck. While I had been asked for feedback, I tried to walk a tightrope between answering their questions and not doing their homework for them. In addition, I wanted to remain outside and objective and not unintentionally put anything into the mix that might invalidate the test. Such was my naivetÈ. Had I known they were going to use nothing like a real neck or torso, I would have asked them how they thought their test could even attempt to duplicate the fatal headshot? Because they would be unable to duplicate the ‘back-and-to-the-left’ head movement. No use. As it turned out, Gary Mack later in the show tries to sidestep the problem while trying to claim the test was still valid. I disagree. Apples and oranges. Then word came back that something extraordinary had happened with one of the grassy knoll tests. But what? Quickly, the show’s script was rewritten to focus on the tests. It was probably at about this time that the press release was solidified. But there is little doubt that the basics were in place before this show even went into production.

I had been posting about the program on Spartacus Education Forum. One post in early September, initiated by another forum member, touched on the test. Within a few days, I received this email from Erickson:

I’ve been alerted to some commentaries on the web about the program. I enjoyed your article about [ … ] and the State fair… But I would like to have you refrain from any further discussions about the program and its contents until its aired. Thanks.

Gary Mack regularly lurks at the Education Forum, though he does not condescend to post. I had little doubt who ‘alerted’ Erickson. A gauntlet had been thrown; a line drawn in the sand. While nothing had been said about the fact that I was being monitored, nor had I signed any confidentiality statement, it became evident that the stakes for this show were pretty high. It was at about this point that it seemed everything began to solidify into the show that became JFK: Inside the Target Car. I finally got the picture. I was on the outside; Gary Mack was on the inside. I had little doubt that with the verbal chastising would also come the excising of snippets of my interview from the final show. I began to wonder what else would happen.

The Grandiose Claims of the Discovery Channel Communications Press Release

“JFK: INSIDE THE TARGET CAR is the latest example of using break-through technology to authenticate scientific theories,” said John Ford, president and general manager, Discovery Channel. “This special encompasses an intensive forensic investigation that proves the origin of the fatal bullet. It’s momentous for the network to help support the science behind this definitive evidence.”[…]

The results of these precision ballistics tests provide some clear answers to the events that unfolded in Dealey Plaza. Comparing the splatter patterns from these test angles, with the historical evidence gleaned from eyewitness testimony and Secret Service reports, as well as an exact digitized overlay of the Zapruder film, the forensic team draws the definitive conclusion that the fatal shot could have only come from the sixth floor window of the Book Depository and not anywhere else, just as the Warren Commission determined in 1964.”

Reading this press release provided one of the bigger gut-punches I had felt since reading the Warren Report for the first time. Suddenly, everything came into focus. The press release had probably been written even prior to the tests. It defined this show, along with the other Discovery Channel offerings, as yet another means to use the fallacy of appealing to authority in order to redo the Warren Report. I was outraged. Nothing that I had experienced during the development of the show had prepared me for a press release containing claims of this magnitude. For one thing, from all I had heard, they had done absolutely nothing worthy of saying they had done more than an ‘ad hoc’ test. By their own admission they had no idea where a shot from the grassy knoll would have originated, nor what kind of gun or ammo would have been used. It seemed they had failed to do their homework, and had not even jumped through the modest hoops that I had offered to them. What was going on? What had I gotten myself into? I was about to find out.

First Airing of ITTC

It was with a mixed sense of curiosity and foreboding that I sat down to watch the show. Much of the early part of the show was neatly packaged, but somewhat ho-hum; including the interview with Nellie Connally, much of which had already been shown on the networks.

The scenes of the replica however, interspersed between shots of the actual limo, culminating in the re-enactment session in Dallas, were breathtaking. If nothing else had been accomplished, this remarkable car, its flaws not visible because they were in the interior, created for us a fresh sensation of being there with the Kennedys on that fatal ride.

The development of the dummy heads at Adelaide T ∓ E was fascinating. It was discomfiting, however, that there were no features on the faces. That made it very difficult to verify the alignment of the head. Was that intentional? And, of course, the heads were built on rigid necks. While Gary Mack tried to explain away the significance of that fact, I was horrified. Without a moving neck there would be no way to verify the ‘back-and-to-the left’ movement of the Z313 fatal headshot. There was no way any test with a rigid neck would provide anything but suggestive conclusions. Hadn’t Discovery Channel realized that when they had made the high-falautin’ claims in their press release? I guess not. They were on a roll.

Test One at the Grassy Knoll (GK)

Test One of the grassy knoll shot blew the entire head off of the rigid neck. This was the test, I think, that created such excitement in the emails I had received from Erickson. It didn’t seem to bother them that the result was achieved with a rigid neck. Nor did it seem to bother them that the Winchester and ammo they were using might not have been that used on 11.22.63.

However, at this point, they certainly could have regrouped and analyzed their results objectively. Had they stopped jumping up and down long enough to do so, it might have occurred to them to at least change the ammunition used in the second grassy knoll shot to a frangible bullet; something postulated by numerous researchers throughout the years–me included.

Test Two at the GK

This test, however, did provide interesting input. They could have retained the blood spatter and spray frames and later compared them with the shot from the sixth floor “sniper’s perch” to see if they could say anything exclusively about one spot or the other. They did not.

They did achieve an analogous amount of damage to the head, though the shot had gone through to the left side of the head. No surprise, however, as the ammo was not a frangible bullet. Rather than addressing the limitations of their test, Gary Mack then backs away by saying that if the fatal shot had come from that position on the grassy knoll fence, Jackie would have been killed. This was an error by Mack which he had to retract in his later online discussion.

So there were a number of missed opportunities in the grassy knoll tests of this show. They could have been upfront and acknowledged them, and at least qualified their claims about the results they thought they had achieved. But, oh no, they were too busy jumping in the streets! They had just destroyed the keystone of the conspiracy theorists, or so they thought. At long last, the precious Warren Report was being vindicated. Such joy, in my opinion, seems to have blinded their common sense.

Test Three at the Sniper’s Nest (SN) of the Texas School Book Depository (TSBD)

Same situation—rigid neck, no passengers in the car, head at an angle where they can see the white target on the right side—definitely not Z-312. They take the shot, then rejoice in a manner that has become predictable, at an outcome that should have caused them to run for cover. The shot blew off the top of the dummy head. Skull pieces went everywhere. Nobody tracked the huge pieces that went forward—only the one that went backward. Why? The shot from the SN of the TSBD did produce a lot of spray—but then, so did the others. Because they only chose to focus on the spray of that shot, there is no definition given as to how, if at all, it differed from that of the other test shots. Without passengers in the vehicle, to be later removed, there is no possibility that whatever debris that was in the plywood model bore any resemblance to what was actually in the limo when it arrived at Parkland Hospital. Nevertheless, they merrily moved forward per their script to later make such a declaration. And, of course, there was no ‘back-and-to-the-left’ motion; without which, of course, they had only an ad hoc test. Of course, they did not even attempt to do that, as they had remained in blissful ignorance that the WR fatal headshot scenario was quite different than what they attempted to do.

So, what, if anything, did this test actually prove? It demonstrated that the Mannlicher Carcano ammo, from the cartridges conveniently found on the floor of the SN, probably did not cause the Z-313 head wound. The x-rays and photographs show a nearly-intact skull, not one with huge chunks of skull missing. Now, in typical Warren Report fashion, the show attempts to tie up all its loose ends with more fascinating and meaningless ‘tests’ and images, clumsily trying to dodge the fact that if they accomplished anything, it was to disprove the Commission, not to re-prove it. And of course, that was what I believed was the case almost right from the start. Fortunately, their hubris caused them to overlook all the clues they left in the show as to what everything really represents. But then, perhaps that is what happens when you try to get a mouthpiece for the Ongoing Cover-up to do the job of a limo researcher?

The “Corrected” Show

After numerous complaints to Discovery Channel, by me and many others, reporting the numerous inaccuracies of the show, in December another version was aired. It corrected the error that the color Secret Service photos were taken ‘the next day’ (as opposed to well over 24-hours after the assassination and after numerous exams) and did revise the reenactment footage to show what they believed a closer reenactment of Z-313.

Warren Report Redux and the State of the Ongoing Cover-up

So here we have yet another TV show using some of the same tactics the Commission did to try to claim they had ‘reproven’ the Warren Report. Although numerous flaws and loose ends were left visible, and the narrative of the show did not correspond with the so-called ‘evidence’ that they had found, not to mention the fact that they didn’t bother to follow up on information obtained in their early test in terms of revising the later ones, they are comfortable touting the claim that they have dropped a bomb on the critical community by ‘proving’ the fatal headshot could not have come from the grassy knoll. And, in a perfectly illogical turn, then claiming that it could ‘only’ have come from the “sniper’s nest”. And in true Warren Report apologist form, anyone who mounts a criticism to the glaring inadequacies of the show is ridiculed, and the articles are termed ‘ranting’. So too were the earliest dissenters from the Warren Commission attacked, even to the extent that they were labeled ‘Communists’ for refusing to follow the party line.

So here we have another excellent example, unfortunately, of just how far the OC will go to attempt to push the myth of the Warren Report. As we head toward the next big anniversary of the assassination—the 50th—we can be sure that the players are in place and the agendas at work to attempt to continue to attack and ridicule the critical community and leave no ‘valid answers’ to the assassination except the Warren Report. Various Kennedy assassination online forums have already been infiltrated with false Conspiracy Theorists who will, one by one, as did Gary Mack in this show, ‘come to see the light’ of the ‘truth’ of the Warren Commission. The Commission advocates are already present in the forums as well, to bring ‘common sense’ into the convoluted circus that the research community has become.

The OC has money and it has power. Even more so, it has persistence and tenacity. It will, I believe, continue until all the documents at the National Archives have been gutted and then released. Then they will be able to proclaim that there is ‘nothing more to learn’. There is also a highly restrictive process in place at the Archives, where you practically have to be vetted by the JFK Research staff in order to see certain groups of papers which are supposed to be ‘available’. And, of course, even a reasonable request to view the windshield and finally give it a proper forensic examination is subject to denial. The stakes are extremely high; for our individual freedoms were permanently compromised not only when JFK was killed but when Lee Harvey Oswald was murdered before our eyes after being denied legal representation and then denied a presumption of innocence after his death.

If anything good can be accomplished by this show and its accompanying press release, let it be that it encourages us to engage once more in a battle to learn the whole truth of what happened, banding together and mentoring each other. Using an historical research process, weighing and evaluating information, rather than making appeals to authority by claiming ‘conclusively’, ‘exclusively’ or using any absolute conclusion. Nothing is absolute about the assassination except that President Kennedy, J. D. Tippit and Lee Oswald are dead, and Connally was injured. We know who killed Oswald. But we can and should move forward to a complete release of all of the remaining documents. We may then try to have the conclusions of the Commission declared null and void because they were based on denying a citizen the presumption of innocence. We have not been defeated in the past, and we do not need to be defeated in the future. Let the real research, differentiated from the type done for this program, continue.

All Contents Copyright © In Broad Daylight Research July 2009