Debunking the JFK Conspiracists: New Book

[Richard Smith]

When the time machine is invented, the contrarians will explain that merely because Oswald pointed his rifle at JFK at the moment of the assassination and it went "bang" doesn't mean Oswald was the assassin.  They will note that many people in history have fired a rifle.  Does that make them an assassin?  Of course not.  And maybe the rifle had blanks.  Many things go "bang" without killing anyone.  Children's balloons sometimes pop making a "bang."  Does that mean attendees at a children's birthday party are assassins?  And on and on down the contrarian rabbit hole. 

[John Iacoletti]

When the time machine is invented, the contrarians will explain that merely because Oswald pointed his rifle at JFK at the moment of the assassination and it went "bang" doesn't mean Oswald was the assassin.

More arguments by fabricated fantasy stories from “Richard” instead of facts and evidence. Who woulda thunk?

[Bill Chapman]

Foxhole Atheist: Atheist who 'gets it' on his death bed

[Steve M. Galbraith]

Foxhole Atheist: Atheist who 'gets it' on his death bed

When evidence is presented it's dismissed as corrupt - chain of custody, possibly manufactured. The WC was corrupt, the HSCA was corrupt, the news media investigations were corrupt.

So we have to somehow prove a negative. When we try to do something like that as in, "If Marina was coached then why didn't she say Oswald said he hated JFK?" Or "Why didn't she say she saw him carry a large package that day"? it's dismissed as dishonest questions.

All of this is challenged, dismissed, waved away. Where can we take this?

Meanwhile these goofy conspiracy theories such as the one by Mantik - the x-rays and photos were faked and JFK's wounds were caused by shrapnel - goes unchallenged. We have conspiracists here and at the insane Edu Forum promoting all sorts of conspiracies including ones that contradict their previous theories. They are never challenged.

[John Iacoletti]

When evidence is presented it's dismissed as corrupt - chain of custody, possibly manufactured. The WC was corrupt, the HSCA was corrupt, the news media investigations were corrupt.
So we have to somehow prove a negative.

This is a strawman, because even if it’s authentic, the available evidence does not prove who killed JFK beyond a reasonable doubt. The fact that the little evidence (real evidence — not crap like a ring in a cup) there is cannot be authenticated just adds to the doubt.

Meanwhile these goofy conspiracy theories such as the one by Mantik - the x-rays and photos were faked and JFK's wounds were caused by shrapnel - goes unchallenged.

Analyses such as Mantik’s expose real discrepancies in the evidence. They can’t be waved away simply by calling them “goofy”.

[Jon Banks]

- dozens of witnesses between Parkland and Bethesda saw an exit wound in the back of JFK’s skull.

- some witnesses, including Kennedy’s personal physician, placed his back entry wound too low to support the Single-bullet theory.

- Due to the chain of custody problems, it cannot be proven that CE399 wasn’t planted.

- there are discrepancies between the eye witness accounts, the autopsy photos, and the x-rays.

If you believe the above issues make it impossible to conclusively say that ‘only one shooter was involved with Kennedy’s assassination’, then you’re a “crazed conspiracy theorist” 🤓

[Michael T. Griffith]

Mantik's "optical density measurements". LOL Maybe Mantik used seer stones.

This answer is as silly as the answer that a Flat Earther would give when shown satellite photos of the round Earth. In one ignorant and incriminating swoop, you wave aside the established science of optical density measurement.

No, Dr. Mantik didn't use "seer stones"--he used an optical densitometer, which is used by scientists in many fields, especially medical fields that involve the use of x-rays, and particularly in radiology. And Dr. Mantik, who is both a physicist and a radiation oncologist, was not the only one to perform optical density measurements on the JFK autopsy skull x-rays: Dr. Michael Chesser, a neuroscientist, got permission to view the original autopsy x-rays at the National Archives and performed optical density measurements on the skull x-rays, and his results matched Dr. Mantik's. As Dr. Greg Henkelmann says in his endorsement of this book, "to reject alteration of the JFK skull x-rays is to reject basic physics and radiology."

Here are some non-assassination-related scientific links on the science of optical density measurement:

http://www.cet-science.com/products/testing-methods/biological-analysis/optical-density-measurement-od600/

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/338168550_Optical_Density_Measurement_for_Absorbed_Dose_Estimation_to_Enhance_Quality_Assurance_and_Quality_Control_in_Dental_Radiography_using_Dental_Radiographs

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16642363/

https://www.turito.com/blog/physics/optical-density

https://www.linshangtech.com/tech/optical-density-meter-tech1368.html

(Pat Speer doesn't think much of Mantik.)

As you well know, but didn't mention, Speer is the odd man out in the skeptic community when it comes to the OD evidence, and Dr. Mantik has answered Speer's criticisms in detail. As you also know, but also didn't mention, Speer rejects the single-bullet theory (SBT) as silly fiction.

Seems like all that was more-or-less in the 1963 Silbert-O'Neill Report, widely publicized in the paperback edition of "Inquest". The HSCA looked into it. Compare with David Lifton, who used the same FBI Report to come up with a bizarre body-alteration theory.

Eyewitness accounts don't always agree, especially by time the ARRB met (in fact, the Board cautioned against Loons attributing too much reliance on the Board hearings). The forensic evidence told the WC, the Clark Panel and HSCA that the bullet that inflicted the back wound transited the neck to cause the throat wound seen at Parkland before the tracheotomy was made through it.

So you are still lying about this evidence. I have personally documented and discussed this evidence in previous replies to you when you repeated your silly line that this evidence is just based on the Sibert and O'Neill report. The evidence consists of a lot more than that, and you know it, but you just keep getting on this board and lying about it.

Yes, the HSCA--actually, the HSCA's medical panel--did look into it, and they found all kinds of evidence that the back wound had no exit point, but then they suppressed this evidence by sealing it for 50 years. Fortunately for history, the ARRB released this crucial evidence in the mid-1990s.

Thanks to the ARRB, we now know that Sibert and O'Neill saw the same thing that many other autopsy witnesses saw, including Dr. Karnei, Dr. Canada, Dr. Lipsey, autopsy technician James Jenkins, autopsy radiologist Dr. John Ebersole, and Tom Robinson, the mortician who prepared JFK’s body for burial. The back wound was probed extensively, and pictures were taken of the probe in the back wound. After some initial probing, the autopsy doctors decided to remove the chest organs so they could have a clear view of the wound tract and could see where the probe led.

With the chest organs removed, the pathologists resumed probing the back wound, placing the body in multiple positions and angles to ensure the probing was conclusive and so they could see where the probe went. When Humes probed the wound again with his finger, people at the table could see the end of his finger pushing against the lining of the chest cavity--the wound had no exit. Then, the autopsy doctors probed the wound with a surgical probe, and once again they could see that the back wound did not penetrate the lining of the chest cavity because they could see the probe pushing against the lining of the chest cavity. At this point, Finck turned to Sibert and O'Neill and advised them that the back wound had no exit point. Interestingly, when pressed during his ARRB interview, Finck admitted that the probe did not go through the body! Dr. Karnei, Tom Robinson, Dr. Lipsey, Dr. Ebersole, and James Jenkins likewise confirmed that the probe did not go through the body and that the back wound had no exit point.

Incidentally, Lipsey also noted that the autopsy doctors were "absolutely, unequivocally convinced" that JFK "had been shot three times" and that they identified "three separate wounds" caused by "three separate bullets." And we also now know that Jenkins told the HSCA that the back-wound probing enabled Humes "to reach the end of the wound" and that the wound tract was "not into the chest cavity."

Another key fact that emerged from the ARRB disclosures is the fact that the first two drafts of the autopsy report said nothing about a bullet exiting the throat. That's why Humes illegally burned the first two drafts. We now know that the first two drafts said the back wound had no exit point, and that the second draft said the throat wound was caused by an exiting fragment from the head shot. We also now know that during a WC executive session, chief counsel Rankin disclosed that the autopsy doctors determined through probing that the back wound was shallow and that "it didn't go any further than that."

Yet another key fact that emerged from the ARRB materials is the fact that the throat wound was in fact probed during the autopsy. This, of course, belies the later tale that the autopsy doctors were unaware of the throat wound during the autopsy and only learned of it the next morning. This also confirms the account of one of Humes's close friends, Jim Snyder, who confidentially reported to CBS producer Robert Richter in 1967 that Humes told him that he was aware of the throat wound during the autopsy and that an x-ray was taken of a metal probe inserted into the back wound. Snyder also reported that Humes said the back wound's tract was erratic, that it went downward, then upward, and then downward again. Richter's memo on Snyder's disclosures to him surfaced in the 1990s.

Another key disclosure from the ARRB-released materials is that Dr. John Ebersole, the radiologist at the autopsy, told the HSCA that he noticed the throat wound early in the autopsy. Ebersole also told the HSCA that the probing of the back wound "revealed there was no point of exit."

And Dr. Karnei revealed to the ARRB that after Humes probed the back wound, Finck probed it as well, and that Finck probed it "with a succession of flexible metal probes." Karnei added that several photos were taken of the probes inserted into the back wound, and that by the end of the autopsy the pathologists had not "found an exit wound for the entry in the shoulder."

A crucial disclosure from the ARRB materials is that Agent O'Neill told the HSCA that the autopsy doctors "couldn't locate an outlet for the bullet that entered the back" and that "when the autopsy was complete there was no doubt in anyone's mind that the bullet in Dallas was the one that came out of JFK's body," i.e., that that bullet was the bullet that had entered the back and that it had fallen out of the shallow back wound.