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“Political language…is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”
— George Orwell, 1946
EVERYTHING MR. EMORY HAS BEEN SAYING ABOUT THE UKRAINE WAR IS ENCAPSULATED IN THIS VIDEO FROM UKRAINE 24
ANOTHER REVEALING VIDEO FROM UKRAINE 24
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FTR#1269 This program was recorded in one, 60-minute segment.
Introduction: In this broadcast, we continue our discussion with the heroic Jim DiEugenio, selected by Oliver Stone to write the screenplay for his documentary JFK Revisited. Jim also wrote the book containing transcripts of both the two-hour and four-hour versions of the documentary and supplemental interviews.
No discovery by the ARRB was more important than its uncovering of the Operation Northwoods contingency plan to set up a provocation to justify a U.S. invasion of Cuba.
The lawsuit filed by the Mary Ferrell Foundation aims at compelling further disclosure about Northwoods.
At loggerheads with then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Lyman Lemnitzer, JFK replaced him with Maxwell Taylor, unaware that Taylor and Lemnitzer were close.
The ARRB faced serious resistance from the Secret Service in its attempts to shed further light on the JFK assassination. Although prohibited by law from doing so, the Secret Service destroyed documents.
Particularly noteworthy are documents from the agency about two attempts on JFK’s life in 1963 that may very well have been part of the constellation of events leading up to Dallas on 11/22.
That agency was particularly reluctant to share records about the two attempts on JFK’s life.
ARRB member Douglas Horne uncovered some fascinating information about pay records of both Oswald during his last months in the Marines and TSBD manager Roy Truly, Oswald’s supervisor at the building.
1. No discovery by the ARRB was more important than its uncovering of the Operation Northwoods contingency plan to set up a provocation to justify a U.S. invasion of Cuba.
The lawsuit filed by the Mary Ferrell Foundation aims at compelling further disclosure about Northwoods.
At loggerheads with then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Lyman Lemnitzer, JFK replaced him with Maxwell Taylor, unaware that Taylor and Lemnitzer were close.
The ARRB faced recalcitrance when it attempted to gain access to the Zapruder film. They had to pay an enormous sum of money to gain access to the film, which, ultimately was given to the Sixth Floor Museum, which retains tight control over its use. The Sixth Floor Museum maintains a doctrinaire adherence to the untenable Warren Commission.
2. The ARRB faced serious resistance from the Secret Service in its attempts to shed further light on the JFK assassination. Although prohibited by law from doing so, the Secret Service destroyed documents.
Particularly noteworthy are documents from the agency about two attempts on JFK’s life in 1963 that may very well have been part of the constellation of events leading up to Dallas on 11/22.
That agency was particularly reluctant to share records about the two attempts on JFK’s life.
Key Points of Discussion and Analysis Include: The trumped-up charges against African-American Secret Service agent Abraham Bolden, who refused to go along with the cover-up of the Chicago plot; Similarities between Thomas Vallee—the apparent patsy in the Chicago plot and Oswald (both former Marines who had worked on the U‑2); Four apparent snipers with rifles and the motorcade route, none of whom was detained for any length of time by the Secret Service; The Tampa plot, featuring an apparent patsy who was affiliated with the Fair Play for Cuba Committee; The fact that both the Chicago and Tampa plots involved the motorcade going past a high-rise building; JFK’s expression of gratitude to the agents who blocked the Tampa plot; Secret Service agent Elmer Moore’s confession to Jim Goschenauer that he was ordered to pressure on the Parkland M.D. who performed the tracheotomy on JFK and said the throat wound was entrance wound; Moore’s evident satisfaction over the neutralization of Abraham Bolden.
3.—The ARRB faced recalcitrance when it attempted to gain access to the Zapruder film. They had to pay an enormous sum of money to gain access to the film, which, ultimately was given to the Sixth Floor Museum, which retains tight control over its use. The Sixth Floor Museum maintains a doctrinaire adherence to the untenable Warren Commission.
4.—ARRB member Douglas Horne uncovered some fascinating information about pay records of both Oswald during his last months in the Marines and TSBD manager Roy Truly, Oswald’s supervisor at the building:
. . . . You’re ready for this. This is all new stuff. Oswald’s last quarter of earnings in the United States before he defected to the Soviet Union should have been paid by the Marine Corps. And they weren’t. Because we asked to see his Marine Corps records that the Marine Corps deposited with the Social Security Administration. They did not pay him any money. That has serious implications to me because of all the speculation that he was a fake defector. So if he was in training for that, somebody else was paying his salary . . . .
. . . . The other information that that the public should know about is that there is another record that’s sequestered in the JFK collection. Just like Oswald’s earning records. The other information is about employees at the Book Depository who were paid and the name Roy Truly, Oswald’s supervisor, is not on the list of people who were paid. And I don’t understand that. . . .
It’s that time again. The 59th Anniversary of the JFK assassination. Or rather, the 59th Anniversary of the JFK assassination and subsequent official coverup. 59 year of ‘the more things change, the more they stay the same’. No matter how much new damning evidence gets released, there’s always been this giant trove of still-classified files that government agencies have repeatedly refused to release. That was all supposed to change in 2017 when a supposedly concrete deadline for the release of all classified information related to the JFK assassination was supposed to be released. Instead, then-President Trump decided to side with the CIA and FBI and agreed to waive the deadline, which brings us back to where we are.
A new deadline for the release of materials was set for December 15 next month by President Biden. But as we’re going to see, the wording of that deadline appears to still allow for the same kinds of bureaucratic refusal to turn over the documents that’s been used in the past. So we’re going to see what ultimately gets released in a few weeks of the more than 14,000 JFK-related documents still classified. But in the meantime, it turns out we got a new batch of released files. Files showing the correspondences between the National Archives and the various government agencies that are still refusing to release these files. It turns out the correspondences were obtained via a FOIA request by Larry Schnapf, a lawyer who is representing the Mary Ferrell Foundation in a lawsuit filed against the President Biden and the National Archives, demanding release of all the still-classified assassination documents. Interestingly, while Schnapf filed the lawsuit against the National Archives, he actually praises them for their efforts. It’s the other agencies that are refusing to release the documents. That’s the story that unfolds in these released correspondences. The National Archives kept informing agencies like the FBI and CIA that they are not abiding by the law. For years.
It’s also notable that the National Archives has been telling the public not to expect any major bombshells when the documents are being released. So if the still-classified files aren’t filled with assassination bombshells, why are so many government agencies unwilling to allow their release? It’s part of the ongoing mystery. Maybe the Archives is just unaware of the full damning nature of some of these documents. Or maybe they’re damning, but in relation to other things like the CIA’s relationship with organized crime and not necessarily damning in relation to the assassination. Or perhaps each individual file isn’t really damning on its own, but the collection of them together paints a damning picture. We don’t really know what’s still hiding in those 14,000 still-classified documents. But it’s pretty damn clear the agencies that ran that coverup want that to be the case for as long as possible. And 59 years isn’t long enough:
“Newly released internal correspondence from the National Archives and Records Administration reveals that, behind the scenes, there has been a fierce bureaucratic war over the documents in recent years, pitting the Archives against the CIA, FBI and other agencies that want to keep them secret.”
A fierce bureaucratic war, with the National Archives on one side and agencies like the CIA, FBI, and State Department on the other side. That’s the picture depicted in the newly released internal correspondences obtained by Larry Schnafp, a lawyer whose clients include the Mary Ferrell Foundation. As Schnafp notes, while he ended up suing the Archives, he’s actually been impressed with the agency’s aggressiveness in trying to get documents released. That aggressiveness is part of what was revealed with these internal correspondences. Aggressiveness in the form of reminding agencies like the FBI and CIA that they are not abiding by the 1992 law that mandates these disclosures.
At the same time, as the article notes, the Archives have for years warned the public not to expect any bombshells. At least not easily detected bombshells. It’s part of the mystery here: the Archives are declaring that still-withheld classified documents aren’t going to be revelatory and yet its still running into steep resistance from the FBI and CIA despite those agencies recognizing that they are fueling the perception of a cover up. It’s the kind of situation that suggests the Archives isn’t fully aware of all of the different investigative threads that could be pulled should those still-classified documents get released:
As the article also points out, while the 1992 law requiring the release of the documents has yet to demonstrate conclusive proof of a conspiracy to kill Kennedy, the documents that have been released did reveal just how much evidence had been withheld from the Warren Commission. Like evidence related to Oswald’s alleged ‘trip to Mexico City’. A trip that the CIA initially claimed had no evidence about. And now we’re learning that some of the still-withheld documents are drawn from the CIA station at the US embassy in Mexico:
Then there’s the extensive classification of figures with organized crime ties, with the FBI and DEA and fighting particularly hard to keep the identities of any informants classified for as long as possible. This is a good time to recall the photo taken just before the assassination that appears to show a smiling 24-year old Barry Seal “seated at a nightclub table in Mexico City with [Watergate burglar] Frank Sturgis, [Iran-Contra operative] Felix Rodriguez, and William Seymour, all members of the CIA’s assassination squad, Operation 40.” Any sort of Barry Seal ties to the CIA assassination would obviously be some of the most damning and highly sensitive classified info the DEA could possibly possess. It’s a reminder that the reasons for the extreme sensitivity around these documents isn’t just going to be related to direct fears of having the assassination plot exposed. There’s all the other tangentially plots — like decades of CIA-sponsored major drug-trafficking — that could be revealed too:
Finally, there’s the latest promise to finally get all these remaining documents declassified. December 15 is the next due date. But it sounds like the exact same excuses that prevented the release of these documents could still apply:
So are they waiting for everyone involved to have passed? Or waiting for democracy and any form of public accountability to have passed? Either way, we’ll see how many documents are indeed released next month. And how many new excuses get deployed but why it is once again a major disappointment. A very guilty-looking major disappointment.
Time flies when you’re having fun. Less so when covering up. And yet there’s no denying the grim reality: it’s been a wildly successful cover up. 60 years and counting. Who knows how much longer it will go, but it does indeed appear that there will be no honest public accounting of the John F. Kennedy assassination while any of the figures involved are still alive. EVERYONE is going to be LONG dead before the truth is allowed to come out. Assuming that ever happens.
Recall how Congress passed a law in 1992 mandating a release of government documents on the assassination by 2017, a deadline that has been pushed back on by both the Trump and Biden administrations, resulting in thousands of documents still held back by the government.
So with the blatant cover up of this seminal event on track to continue indefinitely, here’s a piece in The Independent that contains a fun fact that the US public really should be more and more aware of as the years tick by and the cover up continues: a recent Gallup poll found hat 65 per cent of US adults think Oswald worked with others to eliminate Kennedy, while 29 per cent believe he was solely responsible. And that’s just this year’s poll. Gallup has been conducting that poll since 1963, and if you look at that history of polling there has NEVER been a point where a majority of US adults didn’t suspect a broader conspiracy. It’s another part of this overall story that could only emerge slowly over time, but here it is: the JFK assassination cover up has effectively been carried out in the face of a skeptical public the entire time.
But then there’s the other side of this story: it’s not like the US public has really prioritized this issue. Simply answering a pollster’s question the same as actually caring or doing something about it. It’s been 60 years of public suspicions, but extraordinarily passive public suspicions. The kind of extremely vague suspicions a largely disengaged public can’t really articulate or act upon.
With the 60th Anniversary of that dark day upon us with the in-your-face government cover up still very blatantly intact, it’s hard to think about what more there is to say about this story. It happened, it was blatantly covered up, that cover up is still in place, and while suspicions remain to this day no one actually cares. That’s the JFK assassination story in 2023: the extraordinary passivity of the US public in the face of 6 decades of blatant cover up. Two generations now of Americans suspecting some sort of big conspiracy surrounding the assassination of JFK, but not actually caring enough to do really anything about it:
“One reason why conspiracy theories in the case have remained consistent could be that the government has never released all its files. It was supposed to have been completed by 2017 but that date has been pushed back during both the Trump and Biden administrations.”
A consistent refusal to release the documents the law mandates be released. Gee, might that have something to do with persistence of all the ‘conspiracy theories’ around this event? Both Trump and Biden refused to release them all. Of course, this refusal to release all the documents is a relatively new reason for suspicions since that release deadline was only 6 years ago in 2017, 54 years after the assassination. But it’s been six years now of delays and pushbacks. It’s the kind of situation that would beg the question “What is the government hiding?”, if we already weren’t inundated with decades of evidence pointing towards a massive cover up. Evidence that now includes Secret Service agent Paul Landis’s recounting of events that further undercuts the absurd ‘magic bullet’ narrative that remains the official narrative to this day. Recall how Landis’s account is backed up by the recollections nurse Phyllis Hall publicly shared in 2013. The more time passes, the more evidence and insights gained, the more a picture has emerged of a gross cover up that remains in place to this day:
So with the 60 years now having past, and the official cover up still very much intact, it’s worth keeping in mind that it isn’t simply the case that 65 percent of US adults suspect there was a broader conspiracy. Take a look at Gallup polling going back to 1963 and you’ll find that a majority of US adults has NEVER believed the official story. it’s a part of this that only grows more and more prominent as the decades tick by: the cover up was executed in the face of overwhelming public suspicion. For 60 years now. And with no apparent end in sight. The end was supposed to be the 2017 deadline for the release of all those documents but that obviously isn’t happening
Of course, while the US public may have harbored suspicions about the nature of the assassination plot this whole time, you can’t really argue the public did much about it. Outside of a few figures on the fringes, there’s almost no real interest of concern about the long-term implications of a successful conspiracy to kill a president and then cover up it.
So while the world in 2023 may seem like it’s coming apart at the seems, it’s worth keeping in mind that the world in 2023 has very much been shaped by the powerful forces who executed that assassination and managed to maintain such a deep grip on power that we still can’t talk about them 60 years later. It’s their world and we’re just passively living in it.
He did it. The executive order promised by President Trump just a day before his inauguration to order the release of the remaining classified government files in assassination archives of JFK, RFK, and MLK was indeed fulfilled.
Sort of. The executive order was issued. And based on the language of the order it would appear to be a directive to release all the remaining documents and redactions, without exception. “I previously accepted proposed redactions from executive departments and agencies (agencies) in 2017 and 2018, but ordered the continued re-evaluation of those remaining redactions...I have now determined that the continued redaction and withholding of information from records pertaining to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy is not consistent with the public interest and the release of these records is long overdue,” the executive order states. It sure sounds like he’s calling for a declassification of everything, without redaction. Huge, if true.
But the devil is the details when it comes to this kind of story, and there do appear to be details that could serve as a pretext for withholding some of the archives materials. Specifically, the executive order requires the director of national intelligence and attorney general to work with White House officials on a plan to release the records on JFK’s assassination and present it to Trump within 15 days. The reports on plans for the RFK and MLK assassinations similarly need to be delivered to Trump within 45 days. Which means the real test of this order will be whether or not those plans end up being filled with all sorts of exceptions and, in turn, whether or not Trump approves it.
The countdown begins. It’s hard to know what exactly to expect from this. But it’s a remarkable turn of events if Donald Trump, the president who arguably poses the great threat to US democracy in history, is the one who apparently has finally issued these orders. Remarkable, in part, because he was tasked, by law, with doing this back during his first term. And then went on to staged an insurrection. That’s the guy who ultimately made this historic call. Which is a reminder that every other president in the last six decades, including Joe Biden, utterly failed in their public duties on these matters. Trump was just handed back access to an orchard filled with all this historic low-hanging fruit and he finally picked the fruit. After skipping the opportunity the first time around. It’s a historic turn of events. Bad, but historic.
But as we’re also going to see, we did get a hint back in 2023 regarding what’s still sitting in those archives. Unfortunately, it’s a hint coming from one of the least trustworthy sources available: Roger Stone. According to a July 3, 2023, interview with Alt Right figure Jack Posobiec, Stone claimed that he asked then-Trump about the JFK records early on during Trump’s first year in office. “He said, ‘I can’t tell you, it’s so horrible you wouldn’t believe it. Someday you’ll find out.’ That was the sum total of it and he didn’t want to talk further about it. He kicked the can down the road to President Joe Biden.” That was Stone’s public claim roughly a year and a half ago. And while Stone might be a disreputable character prone to deceit, there’s no denying Roger is one of Trump’s oldest pals (who isn’t named Jeffrey).
It’s also worth noting a very interesting finding in the JFK case made by researcher Jefferson Morley back in December of 2022 in response to files obtained by the Mary Farrell Foundation following an October 2022 lawsuit. According to Morley, the documents obtained by the foundation related to a still-classified covert operation approved by CIA officials three months before Kennedy’s death. A covert operation that the documents suggested involved the use of Lee Harvey Oswald for intelligence purposes several weeks prior to the assassination. Which is the kind of document that, if their interpretation is correct, not only contradicts a core tenet of the CIA’s story but also suggests there really might be some explosive revelations still sitting in that archive. Because one of the big questions long looming over the assassination archives is the question of whether or not truly incriminating documents were going to be left in there at all. They could be destroyed, after all. But if there really are documents in there that could show Oswald was being used as an intelligence asset for the CIA just several weeks before the assassination, who knows what else is sitting in there? We’ll find out. Specifically, we’ll find out whether or not we’ll ever be allowed to find out. Soon. Maybe:
“The order requires the director of national intelligence and attorney general to work with White House officials on a plan to release the John F. Kennedy records and present it to Trump within 15 days. A plan for releasing the other records must be presented to Trump within 45 days.”
Ok, the promised executive order was indeed issued. Sort of. The order wasn’t for an immediate declassification of the remaining files. It’s an order for a set of plans to be presented to President Trump. Fortunately, those plans have to be presented relatively soon, in just 15 days for the JFK records. But that might just mean we’re going to find out in 15 days how the plan will somehow disappoint in the end. And yet, looking at the language of the executive order, it appears to be pretty explicit. Trump is calling for a release of all remaining files, including the previously redacted information. It’s an order that, if taken literally, would seem to leave the government little wiggle room in terms of keeping documents secret:
Now, assuming we really do see a massive release of the remaining files and redactions, what should we actually expect? Will there be devastating revelations? Or just a bunch of details but no meaningful revelations? Keep in mind that, even if there are devastating revelations sitting in those unreleased files, there’s nothing preventing the destruction of documents as long as the world doesn’t yet know about their existence. At the same time, previously released but redacted files will be a lot harder to keep hidden if the redacted sections are ordered released.
And that brings us to the following story for July of 2023 from a most untrustworthy source, but a source that has the status of being one of Donald Trump’s long-term close associates: Roger Stone. According to Stone, Trump confided during his first term in office that the then-still classified JFK files are ‘so horrible you wouldn’t believe it.’ As Stone put it, “He said, ‘I can’t tell you, it’s so horrible you wouldn’t believe it. Someday you’ll find out.’ That was the sum total of it and he didn’t want to talk further about it. He kicked the can down the road to President Joe Biden.” So Trump kicks the can down the road to Biden, Biden kicks it back to Trump, and here we are:
“He said, ‘I can’t tell you, it’s so horrible you wouldn’t believe it. Someday you’ll find out.’ That was the sum total of it and he didn’t want to talk further about it. He kicked the can down the road to President Joe Biden.”
Trump was spooked by what he knew. That’s more or less Roger Stone’s recounting of the conversation he had with Trump back during the early stages of his first term. And note this anecdote: Trump apparently asked “Why hasn’t anyone brought this to my attention?” just weeks before the October 2017 release date that was mandated by law. A date that Trump obviously didn’t meet in his first time. That’s also part of the context of this story: by law, all of these files were technically already supposed to be released back in 2017. But ‘reasons’ kept coming up to justify their continued withholding:
And as an example of the kinds of revelations that are probably sitting in these documents, it was Documents released in December of 2022 that apparently show Oswald being involved with a CIA operation just months before the assassination. A revelation that would utterly destroy the CIA’s decades old stance on Oswald:
And as we’re going to see in the following piece about those possible revelations, the documents showing this evidence of a CIA operation involving Oswald were obtained by the Mary Ferrell Foundation thanks to a lawsuit. Which makes these documents, obtained in December of 2022, examples of the kinds of documents Trump was convinced to keep classified back in 2017. And also suggests that if there aren’t eventually documents released describing a still-classified CIA operation that involved Oswald in the months before the assassination, there’s still some documents being withheld...or destroyed:
“In a Tuesday press conference at the National Press Club, Jefferson Morley—a veteran of the D.C. press corps and a preeminent expert on JFK’s assassination with the Mary Ferrell Foundation—told reporters that he and attorneys with the foundation obtained documentation relating to a still-classified covert operation approved by senior CIA officials three months before Kennedy’s death that suggested the agency used Oswald for intelligence purposes several weeks prior to shooting.”
Evidence of Oswald’s involvement just weeks before the assassination in a still-classified covert operation approved three months prior. Approved by senior CIA officials. That’s quite a finding. The kind of finding that utterly undermines narratives the CIA has been hiding behind for decades now. But also a revelation that was made public back in December of 2022, over two years ago, which raises the question: What kind of preparation have been since then in anticipation of the eventual release of files describing that still-classified CIA operation?
Is the public really about to see all the ‘smoking-guns’ left sitting in the JFK assassination archives? The language of this executive order would seem to promise just that. But, again, the devil is in the details. There’s still time for obfuscation.
Still, based on all the available circumstantial evidence, we have reason to suspect some damning evidence of the successful coup waged against the US democracy over six decades ago could end up getting exposed. Which will make the eventual release, or lack of release, of the RFK and MLK files all the more interesting.