I’m looking forward to A conversation With Oliver Stone, to be held at the Newseum here in Washington at 2 pm Friday, November 1.
To those who disdain his movie, I can only say, get over it. Oliver Stone has done more to give the American people the complete and accurate record of JFK’s assassination than all of his critics combined.
Without Stone’s movie, there would not be not JFK Records Collection in the National Archives. There would not be a Mary Ferrell Foundation Web site, where any citizen of the world can go and learn the story. No matter what you think about who killed JFK, you are in his debt. Give the man his due and get over it.
We are in debt to Oliver Stone, and others like him who are prepared to question the conclusions of the Warren Commission, which we now know was a flawed investigation.
You have to respect anyone who has the courage to pursuit the truth despite the personal criticisms and attacks this brings.
Thanks to that courage, we now know more about the JFK assassination than we ever would have done.
If you believe that Jim Garrison was anything but a charlatan and anti-gay bigot you are ignoring reality.
All of you Stone worshippers forget that Garrison’s original claim was that the JFK murder was ” a homosexual thrill crime, like Leopold and Loeb.”. The entire trial was a joke except for the innocent man whose life was destroyed by that evil phony.
Garrison is considered relevant because his investigation had the resources of the DA’s office – not because Shaw was guilty. I don’t know how you could read about the Garrison investigation without realizing that Ferrie was the main target.
I tend to agree that the trial was a waste of time. But, Garrison got Dr. Fink on trial and that’s when the Zapruder Film got copied, etc. If one man had to spend his life savings on successfully defending himself, fine by me. He was already retired, it’s not like he got fired when his homosexuality was revealed.
As to Garrison being a homophobe: what percentage of adult heterosexual men were not homophobes in 1967 New Orleans? It’s not productive to apply our contemporary standards to his era.
You should know that Jack Martin’s and Ferrie’s actions made Ferrie a reasonable target for an investigation.
Was the trial a waste of time Mitch? How many people would know David Ferrie even existed if not for the trial?
How would Jim Garrison know in advance the degree that Government agencies would roadblock and work against him?
Clay Shaw was used and protected by the CIA, even the CIA admits this. Clay Shaw was most definitely aquainted with David Ferrie….(see link)….and it may very well have been the CIA was using Shaw to monitor Ferrie’s activities as well as his associates. Clay Shaw’s full involvement is still an unknown.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1409162935984032&set=a.1381985698701756.1073741828.100006710165345&type=1&theater¬if_t=like
Dave Ferrie had nothing to do with the trial – he had been dead for some time. If Ferrie and Banister had lived, maybe things would’ve been different.
The trial against Shaw specifically is what I think was kind of a waste, because he was so likely innocent of the charge. His working with the CIA in what I think is a still not totally understood capacity does not make him guilty of conspiracy to murder JFK. The obstacles set up against Garrison would have more to do with discrediting his quest and shielding the Agency’s secrets. I mentioned just a couple reasons that I feel a trial such as Shaw’s was helpful.
That photo you linked is clearly not Ferrie. You can go to the ‘Education Forum’ if you want an ID of someone in a photo. A man there, James Richards, is quite the expert in that area. At any rate, we would all know by now if Ferrie had been identified in that famous photo.
It is past time to face the fact that after over 40 years of investigation and speculation the only evidence that Ferrie had any contact with Oswald is the CAP cookout picture from the mid 1950s. Notihing else except the claim of somebody who on the evening of Nov. 22 insulted Ferrie in a bar accusing him of killing JFK. As Ferrie understandably took offense he slugged him. So the perpetrator tried to get back at him and went to Garrison. Viola! The Great New Orleans Assassination Conspiracy was born.
Ferrie had absolutely nothing to do with Oswald after the CAP; even that relationship was transient, if at all .He had nothing to do with the assassination. He was unusual in appearance and was gay. So Garrison felt that he could go after him as easy prey. Unfortunately he died, so Garrison had to find another closet homosexual to persecute. Shaw fit the bill and to hell with Shaw’s civil liberties.
Clay Shaw was no innocent man.He was liar.He was part of CIA and
knew David Ferrie.It’s also become known the CIA and FBI Inflirted the garrison Investigation.Governor’s refused to extrade witnesses.If there was nothing to Garrison’s case why were some so worried about it?
Clay Shaw was indeed an innocent man. He and over 100,000 contemporary businessmen with overseas interests were asked by CIA representatives to comment on certain findings associated with those trips. In that Shaw was joined by “agents” who worked for IBM, Boeing,GE,Westinghouse, 3M and hundreds of other companies,large and small.
As an Army officer veteran of WWII he felt that was his patriotic duty, as many of the “Greatest Generation ” did.
Perhaps you should review Garrison’s habit of going after political enemies or flashy targets with little if anything to support his claims, often resulting in the collapse of his accusations when a little sunshine illuminated them.
If “Shaw” ended up in the Hot Seat, why don’t you blame the people who put him in that position? That would be the CIA….you know….the ones who were using him?
To blame the CIA for prosecutorial misconduct is ludicrous.
Your ability to accept the violation of an individual’s civil liberties simply to push a phony conspiracy is enlightening- the end justifies the means? I stated above what Shaw’s connection with the CIA was- the same as that of thousands of American businessmen with overseas interests. So if a General Mills employee pushed Wheaties in Finland and the CIA asked him about his observations he would be fair game to get indicted for murder? Are you serious?
The whole Garrison abortion started in response to a bar fight between David Ferrie and Garrison’s principle witness. It is a sad comment on the legal state of affairs in 1960s New Orleans when a man with the power of the D.A.’s Office indicts and prosecutes a man based not on evidence but to further an agenda and generate personal publicity.
First, if David Ferrie didn’t know Oswald, then why did he go to his residence looking for his library card? (reportedly to be in Oswalds possession when arrested, rightly or wrongly). For that matter, how did he know where Oswald’s residence was?
I find it very interesting how several of you have totally veered off of and away from the original subject….this isn’t about Shaw being innocent or guilty.
The simple reality is, without Stone’s movie “JFK”, the majority of records now available, wouldn’t be.
PS: I didn’t say Shaw was innocent or guilty, I said the CIA put him in the hot seat due to their manipulations.
“It is past time to face the fact that after over 40 years of investigation and speculation the only evidence that Ferrie had any contact with Oswald is the CAP cookout picture from the mid 1950s.”
The claim used to be that there was no credible evidence that LHO knew Ferrie.
Telling us the photo of them together isn’t recent enough is called ‘moving the goalpost’.
Two people who are not acquainted would be unlikely to be photographed at the same social event/organization.
The Pro Conspiracy camp is right on the Ferrie issue: he knew LHO, we was working with CIA affiliates (Arcacha Smith) on the Houma Raid (for example), working with Banister, working on the anti-Castro cause.
The issues is settled.
The only thing settled is that Oswald participated in the CAP long enough to have his picture taken with Ferrie- exactly as a Boy Scout could have his picture taken with a Scoutmaster. For all we know Oswald may never have attended another CAP function. There is no evidence Ferrie even knew who Oswald was ,aside from one of the kids in the unit.
How that goes to being an assassination plan is a real stretch. Now what actually was the “Houma Raid”? How about an exact description of what supposedly happened, including the exact date.
I agree with the above comments. I am dismayed when I see reputable researchers disparage Oliver Stone for his movie JFK. Why is it that people like Jim Garrison and Oliver Stone take the heat for hinting at the truth? Well, it’s obvious isn’t it.
Stone’s film is our “Guernica” –the haunting, truthful work of art – that Picasso created to capture the horror of the city’s bombing. Lincoln referred to the impact Harriet Beecher Stowe’s “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” had on the perception of people to the War. Stone, brilliantly, has captured swaths of American political culture in films like “Platoon” “Born on the Fourth of July” “Salvador” and “Nixon.” His “JFK” produced an Act of Congress which is more palpable than an artistic experience, and unique in American history.
Oliver Stone’s loyalty to the memory of Jim Garrison has been inspiring. His film, “JFK,” is not only a movie, but an act of history and Jeff is quite right to note that it has done more to offer the truth about the JFK assassination to the public than any other single work or set of ideas. So, bravo! For anyone in the New Jersey area, Oliver Stone will be speaking at a one day conference devoted to his work at Rider University on Saturday, November 2nd.
Exactly right Joan…..but as we know, there are still a great many people who make every attempt at blocking truth and factual evidence. If not for Stone and people like him….a great deal less would be known about JFK’s assassination.
Joan Mellen made this point well at the Wecht conference- that but for Oliver Stone’s movie “JFK” the JFK Records Act would not have been passed by Congress, and most of the books being published now could not have been written. The Vietnam issue is particularly acute, as vitually all major writers now admit that JFK would likely not have escalated in Vietnam, whereas before the Records Act the conventional wisdom was the contrary.