The Ed Forum is having a total Meltdown and chicken bones!

[Colin Crow]

You can understand how wildly implausible it is to suggest that the assassin/conspirators simply let Williams leave the floor and trusted that he would not raise an alarm beforehand and remain silent forever afterward?  Fear of being implicated as the assassin is not persuasive.  Williams has an airtight alibi in the presence of two other people.  There is a photo that exonerates him.  Even if he wasn't aware of the photo at the time, he certainly became aware of it.  He has no realistic reason for him to be concerned that he would ever be deemed a suspect.  It just doesn't add up as plausible excuse for his silence.  Nor would the conspirators have relied on that given the stakes and their obvious willingness to commit murder.  A more plausible narrative in that context is that Williams would have been detained on the floor until after the assassination, at which time he would have been killed with Oswald's rifle.  The story would be that Williams had lunch on the floor and was killed by Oswald during his escape.  A win-win for the fantasy conspirators as it further implicates Oswald and eliminates a witness.  The very last thing they would have done is allow a witness to exit the floor and risk exposing or thwarting the plot.

Which is why I am not suggesting anything like that happened Richard. In fact I would agree with you that what you suggest did not happen. You know that Frazier claims that Fritz was pushing him to confess that night. I am sure Frazier had an alibi too. The reality is that for some time after the assassination Williams was reluctant to tell of his 6th floor lunch trip. His alibi pals lied on a number of occasions and told authorities he went up with them on the lift to the 5th floor. Surely you have to ask yourself, in a case of this importance, would you lie about someone who had been at the crime scene just before the shooting? Big risk if you are caught.

[John Iacoletti]

Pat Speer admitted last week that he has done it "dozens if not hundreds" of times....

He said "references to online discussions", not copying entire posts to his own website.  I searched for your name on patspeer.com and found a single reference to your name but not so much as a quote of anything you had written.

[John Iacoletti]

But the theory I'm hearing in this discussion means you guys need to have Bonnie Ray Williams [BRW] lying his head off, plus various police officers lying, and the Warren Commission too. It's just plain silly (not to mention totally unnecessary on ANYONE'S behalf)....and surely you know it's silly. But you insist on making mountains out of nothingness anyway. It's in a CTer's blood. You can't help it, I guess.

I can see why you're such a fan of Bugliosi.  Instead of making an evidence-based argument you try to ridicule the opposition instead.  just like he does.

The entirety of the evidence suggests that the lunch bag was not at the two-wheeler when the SN was first discovered, but that it was moved there afterwards and that BRW just ran with the story.  Why would a black man in 1963 Dallas (or even today) want to admit being next to the window the cops said that shots were fired from?  Not only do you have to deny the word of several witnesses to the lunch bag and the bones, but you have to deny Arnold Rowland's observation of a negro in the SE window at the same time BRW was on the 6th floor, all so you can cherry-pick one account over that of several others.

And a piece of chicken that inexplicably goes from one part of the sixth floor to another (and I cannot explain it; I have no idea why there is the conflicting testimony regarding the chicken bones) is not going to suddenly ERASE the physical evidence of Oswald's guilt.

What physical evidence of Oswald's guilt?

Nor will that piece of chicken (or its bones) erase the known incriminating ACTIONS of one Lee Harvey Oswald on 11/22/63.

Anything he would have done would be considered "incriminating" by you in true Monday morning quarterback fashion.

[John Iacoletti]

Since Bonnie Williams had chicken, Fritos, and a Dr. Pepper for lunch at that exact place, that should have been the end of it. Lieutenant J. C. Day dusted the Dr. Pepper bottle for fingerprints, and no prints of Oswald’s were found. When Day later found out the food and drink had belonged to Williams, he decided the lunch bag and Dr. Pepper bottle had no value to the case and threw the sack and bottle away. (CD 1245, p.83)

Talk about trying to make the evidence fit the suspect...

[John Iacoletti]

I didn’t buy his book. When I saw the superficial treatment of the evidence available (like the dismissal of Mooney in the quote) I figured I didn’t miss much. Maybe he or his ghostwriters hadn’t bothered to analyse all the available information about the chicken lunch by 2007.

Bugliosi is just Posner with a whole lot of repetition, lawyer rhetoric, and appeals to ridicule heaped on top of it.  Bugliosi was in desperate need of an editor.

[John Iacoletti]

Nor would the conspirators have relied on that given the stakes and their obvious willingness to commit murder.

What conspirators?  Did Colin say anything about conspirators?

  A more plausible narrative in that context is that Williams would have been detained on the floor until after the assassination, at which time he would have been killed with Oswald's rifle.

With what?  The assassin only brought 3 or 4 bullets, right?  He's going to waste one on BRW?  And miss his chance to shoot at the motorcade when people hear the gunshot?

  The story would be that Williams had lunch on the floor and was killed by Oswald during his escape.  A win-win for the fantasy conspirators as it further implicates Oswald and eliminates a witness.  The very last thing they would have done is allow a witness to exit the floor and risk exposing or thwarting the plot.

Yawn.  Yet another "I don't believe the conspirators I just made up would do X, therefore Oswald killed JFK" argument.

[Richard Smith]

Which is why I am not suggesting anything like that happened Richard. In fact I would agree with you that what you suggest did not happen. You know that Frazier claims that Fritz was pushing him to confess that night. I am sure Frazier had an alibi too. The reality is that for some time after the assassination Williams was reluctant to tell of his 6th floor lunch trip. His alibi pals lied on a number of occasions and told authorities he went up with them on the lift to the 5th floor. Surely you have to ask yourself, in a case of this importance, would you lie about someone who had been at the crime scene just before the shooting? Big risk if you are caught.

My understanding is that you suggested Williams had his lunch in the SN and hastily left.  Presumably in response to a demand from the someone involved in the assassination (Oswald or whomever since that would be on the only person on the floor at the relevant time).  I doubt he would have done that unless he was fearful for some reason.  In which case he would have encountered the shooter just a few minutes before the assassination.  Presumably under circumstances that would have made him suspicious if he abandons his lunch (as opposed to just not completely finishing it).  His silence is then explained as a product of his being a potential suspect although he is never treated as such by anyone.  Why would he believe he was a suspect when he was on another floor and had an iron clad alibi?  Even if he unreasonably came to this conclusion for some reason, surely he would have known at some point that he was not under suspicion.  It is hard to reconcile his leaving the 6th floor hastily, perhaps encountering someone on that floor who was the assassin, but then never saying a word.  And recollections about the location of his lunch on a floor full of boxes and windows doesn't rebut his own words on the matter.   On a practical note, I don't see anyone squeezing between the SN boxes to have lunch in that secluded spot.  Particularly if he expected others to join him on that floor.  More likely that his own description is accurate.

[John Mytton]

I can see why you're such a fan of Bugliosi.  Instead of making an evidence-based argument you try to ridicule the opposition instead.  just like he does.

The entirety of the evidence suggests that the lunch bag was not at the two-wheeler when the SN was first discovered, but that it was moved there afterwards and that BRW just ran with the story.  Why would a black man in 1963 Dallas (or even today) want to admit being next to the window the cops said that shots were fired from?  Not only do you have to deny the word of several witnesses to the lunch bag and the bones, but you have to deny Arnold Rowland's observation of a negro in the SE window at the same time BRW was on the 6th floor, all so you can cherry-pick one account over that of several others.

What physical evidence of Oswald's guilt?

Anything he would have done would be considered "incriminating" by you in true Monday morning quarterback fashion.

The entirety of the evidence...

The entirety of the evidence is from the Dallas Police, how can you tell when the Dallas Police were telling the truth and when were they lying?

but you have to deny Arnold Rowland's observation....

I saw what I thought was a man standing back about 15 feet from the windows and was holding in his arms what appeared to be a hi [sic] powered rifle because it looked like it had a scope on it. He appeared to be holding this at a parade rest sort of position. I mentioned this to my wife and merely made the remark that it must be the secret service [sic] men. This man appeared to be a white man and appeared to have a light colored shirt on, open at the neck. He appeared to be of slender build and appeared to have dark hair.
http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/russ/testimony/arowland.htm

JohnM