I am remiss in not posting this sooner.
Assassination
Unsung JFK Hero: Abe Bolden
RIP Vincent Salandria, Leading Warren Commission Critic
From the Truth and Reconciliation Committee
The writings of Vincent J Salandria on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy are historic, foundational, and essential to any serious scholar interested in understanding the real dynamics of the Kennedy murder and its place as a terrible and pivotal moment of the American Century. In his 1967 book Six Seconds in Dallas, Josiah Thompson notes that what he terms the “second generation” of assassination researchers—including Mark Lane, Edward J. Epstein, Harold Weisberg, Raymond Marcus, Léo Sauvage, Richard Popkin—owe “a deep debt to Salandria’s pioneering and largely unsung research.” Thompson is accurate, since Salandria is in the front rank of Warren Commission critics, and the prescience of his analysis is an instruction to all interested people.
NHK Prime on Oswald and the CIA, Part II
Several readers noted that the link to Part II of NHK Prime’s documentary on Oswald and the CIA didn’t work. Sorry about that. Here it is. Part II .
And a note for readers who like to comment on JFK Facts.
Read moreJapan’s NHK TV: Oswald in the Eyes of the CIA
Along with Rolf Mowatt-Larsen, John Newman and Dick Russell, I was interviewed extensively for this two-part show on NHK Prime, a prime-time magazine show on Japan’s public television network.
Here’s how NHK presents its latest JFK story.
Read moreThe New York Times Evades Bob Dylan’s JFK Challenge
“Bob Dylan Has a Lot on His Mind,” the New York Times reported on June 12. That’s for sure. In late March, as the COVID-19 pandemic shut down America, the 79 year old singer-songwriter released “Murder Most Foul,” an epic, 17-minute song-poem about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
Since “Who killed JFK?” is one of the central questions of American history, you might think that the Times interviewer, historian Douglas Brinkley would ask the Nobel laureate about how he came to compose his dark and brooding take on November 22, 1963. You might think Brinkley, a CNN commentator, would ask Dylan why he decided to release the song as the country and the world reeled from a plague.
You might think wrong.
Read moreWhat were JFK’s two greatest speeches?
President Kennedy gave two speeches, on June 10 and June 11, 1963 that changed the course of American history, says historian Andrew Cohen, author of “Two Days in June.” Cohen explained what JFK wrought in a recent interview with CBC TV host Peter Mansbridge.
June 10, 1963: A profile in courage with lethal consequences
President Kennedy’s speech to the graduating class of American University in Washington DC on June 10, 1963, represented the beginning of his “strategy for peace” to wind down the Cold War. His bold proposal for a joint U.S.-Soviet moon flight was part of this strategy.
Kennedy’s vigorous style and clear mind never had a more important goal — or more powerful enemies.
JFK, Dylan, and the Death of the American Dream
In these terrible days, I got to thinking about Tim Shorrock’s essay/review on Bob Dylan’s JFK opus:
Read moreAt its most essential level, “Murder Most Foul” marks the collapse of the American dream, dating from that terrible day in Dallas, when a certain evil in our midst was revealed in ways not seen for a hundred years—a day that, for Dylan, myself, and others of our generation is forever seared into our collective memory.
Murder on the Towpath: Soledad O’Brien’s Podcast on Mary Meyer
I’ll be tuning into this re-examination of the Mary Meyer case, not for the conspiracy theories (which I don’t find convincing) but for the details of the case that emerged at the trial of her alleged (and acquitted) assailant.
Read moreJFK on Memorial Day: a Memoir
These memories of Memorial Day come from reader, Louis Jarvis.
Read moreDigitizing the JFK Bullet Evidence
A fascinating explanation of how the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) created digital imagery of the bullet evidence in the assassination of JFK.
Read moreComing: ‘Last Second in Dallas,’ by Josiah Thompson
Josiah Thompson was headed for a dull career as a college philosophy professor when he took an interest in the assassination of JFK.
Read moreUnderstanding the Forensic Evidence and Witness Testimony
At Medium, Jimmy Falls (also of WhoWhatWhy) breaks down the forensic and eyewitness testimony to JFK’s assassination with a focus on the testimony of three people-John and Nellie Connally and James Tague–who experienced the hail of gunfire that killed the president.
The presentation is careful, the conclusions inescapable.
Read more‘Bob Dylan, the JFK Assassination, and My Frantic Quest to Connect the Two’
“With the stunning recent midnight release of Murder Most Foul, Bob Dylan unequivocally declared his deep distress at the unsolved mysteries surrounding the assassination of President Kennedy. I wish I’d known about that sooner. It would have saved me a lot of anguish and embarrassment.
So writes the ingratiating Bob Katz in Bob Dylan, the JFK Assassination, and My Frantic Quest to Connect the Two
It was November, 1975. “Oswald’s November,” as the poet Anne Sexton once branded that gloomy time of year when daylight shrinks, weather turns dank, and hearts feel the chill. Dylan, recently emerged from an extended hibernation, had just launched the now legendary Rolling Thunder Review tour. Nov. 20 at the Harvard Square Theater in Cambridge was among the first dates on the tour. Next was Nov. 21 at the Music Hall in Boston. On Nov. 22, a mass rally calling for a re-opening of the investigation of President Kennedy’s assassination.
Read on Bob Dylan, the JFK Assassination, and My Frantic Quest to Connect the Two
Five Takes on Bob Dylan’s JFK Song
Maybe its his Nobel Prize but Dylan seems immune to the normally outspoken camp of JFK anti-conspiracy theorists. Rather his 17-minute rumination of the assassination of President Kennedy has attracted 2.6 million views while impressing critics and scholars of the case.
A sampling:
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