Tag: Jim DiEugenio

Oliver Stone’s Coming JFK Documentary

Oliver Stone's JFK

Oliver Stone has done what, curiously enough, no major new organization or documentary filmmaker has done: try to make sense of the totality of information about the assassination of JFK made public since the 1990s. A huge amount of new material has come into the public record but no one has attempted to put the new information in the context of the old, a basic journalistic function taken up by Hollywood director.

Oliver interviewed me for this documentary, which I have not seen. It was an intense session with a knowledgable interrogator. I spoke in detail about what I learned about CIA operations around Lee Harvey Oswald, while writing my books, Our Man in Mexico, The Ghost, and Morley v. CIA

Using the records released since the 1990s, my books show Oswald as he appeared in the eyes of senior CIA officers like Mexico City Station chief Win Scott and Counterintelligence chief Jim Angleon. These files show how Oswald became a person of interest to CIA mole hunters in a secret office known as the Special Investigations group; how he was monitored in Dallas by the Agency’s Domestic Contacts Division, and how he was publicly linked to the Castro government by CIA agents in a psychological warfare program known as AMSPELL.

I’m looking forward to seeing how Oliver incorporates these revelations into his narrative. 

Comment of the week

sh – April 5

From the review: “Talbot’s work is not without flaws—which I will detail later. But it is so far ahead of its competitors, and it deals with such a wide variety of important subjects, that I strongly recommend reading it. Most books I review in this field I read once, and then walk outside and throw them in the dumpster. Talbot’s book is …

Comment of the week

Ronnie Wayne – February 11

…. I guess the other main theory of the thread is it means all of DiEugenio and Mellen’s work, as well as Garrison’s is junk?

‘Reclaiming Parkland’: the story behind the flop

Reclaiming ParklandDespite a big budget and a host of A-list actors, Tom Hanks’s JFK flick “Parkland” proved to be a dud,  As I wrote here last year, “The fact that the movie tanked at the box office and puzzled critics indicated its presentation of JFK’s murder as a fairly ordinary homicide in Texas had no resonance, even with elite media organizations imbued with a cultural affinity for the lone gunman theory.

But the story of the forces behind the making of the movie, explored in James DiEugenio’s book “Reclaiming Parkland,” is an in-depth tale of the collusive culture-making machinery of Hollywood and major news organizations.

From DiEugenio’s website, Citizens for Truth About the Kennedy Assassination:

Readers defend DiEugenio, shred Shenon

After I commented on Jim DiEugenio’s CTKA essay on The State of the JFK Case: 50 Years Out, I heard  from more than one reader who took exception to my defense of Phil Shenon’s JFK book,  “A Cruel and Shocking Act.”

One reader writes:

“Shenon’s book is another limited hang-out. After 50 years, that’s not progress. If the book had come out in the 1970s, it might be more significant. It contains a few juicy tidbits of ‘new’ information, but the overall substance of the book is misleading”

Another says: …

DiEugenio on the state of the JFK case

James DiEugenio, author

James DiEugenio, author and prolific contributor to the Citzens for Truth About the Kennedy Assassination Web site, has published “The State of the JFK case: 50 Years Out,” which makes some timely points on which I think everyone can agree.

I disagree with DiEugenio’s harsh assessment of Philip Shenon’s JFK book, “A Cruel and Shocking Act.” He calls the book a “disgraceful,” “travesty,” and an “apologia.” I wonder how he would describe a truly bad book. Such epithets scant the very interesting discoveries in Shenon’s reporting, including:

Why JFK was hated: his embrace of Third World nationalists

The story about the CIA role in the arrest of Nelson Mandela in 1962 highlights a bigger and often overlooked feature of President Kennedy’s time in office: his embrace of Third World nationalists.

As recounted by independent scholar Jim DiEugenio in Robert Parry’s Consortium News, JFK supported Third World independence movements that the Pentagon and the CIA usually sought to thwart or destroy.

Two examples stand out in DiEugenio’s detailed article:

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