WaPo: Scientists Cast Doubt on Kennedy Bullet Analysis

[mod mom]

Scientists Cast Doubt on Kennedy Bullet Analysis
Multiple Shooters Possible, Study Says


By John Solomon
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 17, 2007; Page A03

In a collision of 21st-century science and decades-old conspiracy theories, a research team that includes a former top FBI scientist is challenging the bullet analysis used by the government to conclude that Lee Harvey Oswald alone shot the two bullets that struck and killed President John F. Kennedy in 1963.

The "evidence used to rule out a second assassin is fundamentally flawed," concludes a new article in the Annals of Applied Statistics written by former FBI lab metallurgist William A. Tobin and Texas A&M University researchers Cliff Spiegelman and William D. James.
?
?Scientists originally saw no evidence of a second assassin based on analysis of the bullets that killed President John F. Kennedy. (Associated Press)

The researchers' re-analysis involved new statistical calculations and a modern chemical analysis of bullets from the same batch Oswald is purported to have used. They reached no conclusion about whether more than one gunman was involved, but urged that authorities conduct a new and complete forensic re-analysis of the five bullet fragments left from the assassination in Dallas.

-snip
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/16/AR2007051601967.html?hpid=moreheadlines


PAGING RESIDENT EXPERT OCTAFISH!

[deutsey]

1. Damn truth...Just like the blood on Lady MacBeth's hands, they can't seem to wash it away

[mod mom]

2. Wonder if corporate media will get a comment from Specter.

[Poiuyt]

4. Phil Spector?

[Beelzebud]

5. No. Senator Arlen "Magic Bullet" Specter.

The man most responsible for the perpetuation of the myth that one bullet caused all that damage.

[mod mom]

10. Coincidence-Specter speaks out re: Comey and this comes out?

-snip

There’s hope we’ll find out what was really going on. I’d highlight this portion of Specter’s remarks from the hearing: “Mr. Comey, it's my hope that we will have a closed session with you to pursue the substance of this matter further. Because your standing up to them is very important, but it's also very important what you found on the legal issue on this unnamed subject, which I infer was the terrorist surveillance program. And you're not going to comment about it. I think you could. I think you could even tell us what the legalisms were. Doesn't involve a matter of your advice or what the president told you, et cetera. But I'm going to discuss it with Senator Leahy later and see about pursuing that question to try to find out about it.”

And then Leahy, in response: “We will have a closed-door hearing on this. Senator Specter and I are about to have a briefing on aspects of this.” Can’t wait to hear what leaks out of that.

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/003242.php#comments

COULD THIS STORY (disputing his magic bullet theory) BE USED TO BUY HIS SILENCE? OR AM I REACHING TOO DEEP HERE?

[Norquist Nemesis]

15. Stop that!

The aluminum atop my head is already approach the 2,000 lb. limit.

[unpossibles]

3. awesome.

of course, the cynic in me says this story won't go very far. For one thing, most of the public doesn't seem interested in the idea that people in power sometimes abuse their power, especially those behind the scenes. For another, the people who orchestrated this are some of the same ones who seemed to have not only gotten away with a LOT of things (such as Watergate, Iran-Contra, BCCI, etc.) but who still hold positions of power.

Hell, it shocks and amazes me still that the public was not literally up in arms over the Iran Contra scandal. The CIA and related others traded arms to terrorists and smuggled hard drugs into America. I have a hard time with the idea that neither seemed to upset the American psyche beyond a few people.

Hell, that was the thing which woke me up politically, when Ollie North and GHWB suddenly got a bad case of the "I forgets."

I know it seems like I jumped topics, but it's a lot of the same crowd in power, and apparently has been for decades.

[acmavm]

6. We don't call them 'sheeple' for nothing.

[Peace Patriot]

11. "What do you mean 'we,' white man?"

I have never ever called the American people "sheeple." And I think that it is critically important, as to a strategy for recovering our democracy, that we analyze this situation accurately. Can the 56% of the American people who opposed the Iraq War FROM THE BEGINNING--Feb. '03--be described as "sheeple"? They were resisting relentless, 24/7 war mongering. 56%! That would be a landslide in a presidential election. And what has it grown to now? 75%! The American people are far better informed than anyone gives them credit for. Are they "sheeple"? No. What they are is disempowered and possibly demoralized, but, above all, disenfranchised!

This, to me, is the key. IF the chief problem is education (information, analysis, intelligent thinking), that's one thing. But if the chief problem is NOT education, if it is disempowerment and disenfranchisement, that is very different, as to solutions. Of course, education--in this era (beginning back in the Reagan years) of war profiteering corporate news monopolies--is always an issue, needing constant work by informed citizens and alternative news media. But when you look at the facts of the voting system, and the overwhelming trends that are revealed in ALL the opinion and issue polls, both corporate news media and not, over a long period of time, these facts almost scream "disenfranchisement." For instance, during the 2002 to 2004 period, an act by Congress in the same month as the Iraq War Resolution (Oct. '02)--the "Help America Vote Act"--resulted in the fast-tracking of electronic voting machines all over the country, run on "TRADE SECRET," PROPRIETARY programming code, owned and controlled by rightwing Bushite corporations, with virtually no audit/recount controls. Both the 2004 and 2006 elections are UNVERIFIABLE. As to the latter, that may explain why the Iraq War continues and has been ESCALATED, despite SEVENTY-FIVE PERCENT opposition among the American people.

Just something to think about, acmavm. Are they "sheeple" (stupid, uninformed people, who don't care)? Or are they a people who are well-informed enough to have opposed Bush's war from the beginning (56%), with opposition growing dramatically (to 75%), who just can't get their will enforced, because they have been systematically disenfranchised, in the most "black-holed" political scandal of all time--"trade secret" vote counting, and massive vote suppression of black and other progressive voters, in the U.S. of A.?

This I know for sure: IF all our votes had been counted, in '04 and '06, this country would be in a lot less shit than it is, and we would be well on our way in a program of serious reform. It is to prevent any such program of serious reform that vote "counting" by Bushites under a veil of corporate secrecy, and massive vote suppression, were allowed to occur with zero opposition by the war profiteering corporate news monopolies AND by the Democratic Party leadership. This is the hardest thing for people to get information on, and to absorb: that our democracy has been shredded, that no system of accountability--including the main one, elections--is in working order, and that, in order for the will of the people to operate, we must first restore vote counting that everyone can see and understand. The fundamental premise of our democracy--transparent vote counting--has been REMOVED.

I don't think we're "sheeple." I think we're just MYSTIFIED. That's where most people are at. WHY ISN'T IT WORKING? Why do we vote, and nothing happens, nothing changes? It's...uh...guess what?... very DEMORALIZING. And disempowering. Deliberately so. It's not that people DON'T KNOW that this government is criminal. It's that they can't get it changed, and they--many of them--don't know why. The biggest secret of all--the one that virtually everyone in the power structure has conspired on--is WHY.

[acmavm]

17. Where do you get these figures? 56% of the people opposed the

Iraq war from the beginning? No, I think not. And that invalidated everything else that came after in my book.

And don't you ever dare call me a 'white man' again. I may be of the caucasian persuasion but I sure as hell am no man. Learn to look at profiles before you spout off. And get me some reliable references to back up your magic numbers.

And another thing, it these figures were reliable, and if so many people adamantly opposed the war, there would have been more resistance to it. Not just small segments of the population showing their opposition.

Things have changed. But only in the last year or so, when it dawned on the sheeple that we had no way out and that it was an unwinnable situation. THEN THEY WORMS TURNED.

[seafan]

7. Remember Poppy's bizarre statements at Gerald Ford's eulogy?

Now that the Washington Post reports today that a team of investigators consisting of a former FBI metallurgist and researchers from Texas A & M University have announced findings that cast doubt on the official story of a lone gunman responsible for the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and

....urged that authorities conduct a new and complete forensic re-analysis of the five bullet fragments left from the assassination in Dallas.

"Given the significance and impact of the JFK assassination, it is scientifically desirable for the evidentiary fragments to be re-analyzed," the researchers said. .....

This warrants continued scrutiny on the very curious statements made by George H. W. Bush at President Gerald Ford's recent eulogy in January, 2007.

..... Long before he arrived in Washington, Gerald Ford’s word was good. During the three decades of public service that followed his arrival in our nation’s capital, time and again he would step forward and keep his promise even when the dark clouds of political crisis gathered over America.

After a deluded gunman assassinated President Kennedy, our nation turned to Gerald Ford and a select handful of others to make sense of that madness. And the conspiracy theorists can say what they will, but the Warren Commission report will always have the final definitive say on this tragic matter. Why? Because Jerry Ford put his name on it and Jerry Ford’s word was always good.

A decade later, when scandal forced a vice president from office, President Nixon turned to the minority leader in the House to stabilize his administration because of Jerry Ford’s sterling reputation for integrity within the Congress. To political ally and adversary alike, Jerry Ford’s word was always good.

And, of course, when the lie that was Watergate was finally laid bare, once again we entrusted our future and our hopes to this good man. The very sight of Chief Justice Berger administering the oath of office to our 38th president instantly restored the honor of the Oval Office and helped America begin to turn the page on one of our saddest chapters. .....


President George H.W. Bush's Eulogy for President Ford, January 2, 2007

(bold type added)



George H. W. Bush's fevered and deluded wish will haunt him forever that Americans will never uncover the true facts and identities of those involved in this country's forcible turn to darkness with the murder of John F. Kennedy.

And like a demented old man, he endlessly repeats the notions that serve as the fraying lifeline of self-concocted truths of the sanctity of his own innocence.

[mod mom]

8. Time to expose BFEE for just what it is: an elaborate CRIME FAMILY!

[Virginia Dare]

37. He definitely sent me on a search for a tinfoil hat that day...n/t

[DerBeppo]

9. Hmmm, a whole lot of nothing.

No evidence of a second gunmen and a bunch of what ifs based recently purchased samples of the "same lot" of bullets Oswald used 40 years ago. I need a whole lot more than that to convince me that decades of scientific proof of a single shooter is inaccurate.

[Peace Patriot]

12. On the contrary, I think it's quite interesting that these scientists would go to

all this trouble, on the JFK assassination, all these years later, at this particular time.

It was the wound that pierced us all. What followed--the wanton slaughter of upwards of 2 million people in Southeast Asia, including over 55,000 U.S. soldiers--combines with the initial wound to make us a people who are forever sick at heart. The wound that will not heal. And here it comes back round again, with yet another unjust, heinous war. Maybe it's time to "connect the dots"?

[seemslikeadream]

14. maybe it's time

:hug:

[mod mom]

33. Connect ALL the dots.

exactly!

[rasputin1952]

13. There was physical proof that was removed from Dealey Plaza...

a portion of curb that had been struck, a portion of a pillar from the overpass, film, cameras and numerous other items. I can go w/one or two "circumstantial" and "coincidental" things, but there are far too many in this case for me to just dismiss it all because of the Warren Report...x(

When one adds the "strange" deaths of so many connected to the assassination and witnesses....it is way out of bounds for me to believe that Oswald did anything, except be the fall guy.

[Lost4words]

16. Exactly, I knew it then and I was only 10 years old.

Oswald was a pawn.
8643

[rasputin1952]

18. Wan to see something that sealed it for me, immediately

following the assassination?

If you get the chance, watch Oswald's facial expression and his body language when asked at the news conference if he killed Kennedy. His look is one more in the line of "excuse me", until he is told by the reportter that he is indeede charged w/Kennedy's murder...the look on his face, and the way he tightens up, is a give away that he just realized he is a "dead man". He recovers quickly, but it is the initial response that shows it all. He was indeed, a "patsy"...:(

Which means, in my mind, that the killers got away, and killed again when people got to close to the truth.

[Lost4words]

20. we are of one mind on this one Ras!

And also the first ever perp walk televised

Do you remember the OJ Simpson trial, the look on the face of OJ's neighbor lawyer Kaverkian +/- when the not guilty verdicy was released?

Same look.

edit spelling

[rasputin1952]

23. Something else to mull over...The POTUS has been shot

at about noon on a clear day, they nation is in complete shock, no one knows who did it or why...the WORLD is weeping w/in a half hour.

One would think, that about the last thing the Dallas PD would be worried about is a guy who went into a movie w/o paying, yet in a couple of minutes, a DPD officer confronts Oswald in the theater, gun drawn, and a couple of minutes later, there are a fistful of DPD officers...alll this for a guy who didn't pay for a ticket!

Pretty damn ridiculous if you ask me, and this was just a short time after Tippet was murdered in the street. One more thing, Tippet was supposedly killed by Oswald, who had a revolver, yet cartridge casings were found at the Tippet murder scene, meaning that either an automatic was used, or Oswald stuck around to empty the cylinder...by ALL eyewitness testimony, Tippet was shot and the assailant ran immediately from the area...in over half of the eyewitness testimonies, two men were involved in the Tippet murder, and neither of them matched or even came close to the description given.

[Lost4words]

25. There was a well planned operation going on that day in Dallas

I dont think the plan included Tippet, he was doing his job and saw faces and had to die.

They came up with the names of the 9/11 hijackers quickly also.

The Warren comission = hogwash.

[Virginia Dare]

35. 9/11 Commission Report=HOGWASH

kind of makes you think it was the same forces behind both, doesn't it? :shrug:

[Virginia Dare]

30. Same sort of scenario on 9/11...

everybody in complete shock from watching the whole thing unfold. Nobody is thinking critically or rationally at the time. The perfect time to draw the shade over the truth.

[rasputin1952]

32. I can say one thing about 9-11, actually a few things....

First, I would have excused myself politely from that class...kids would understand, you know, "president stuff".

Second, I would have not gone to Nebraska, I would have gone to either NYC or DC...the hell w/the threat, it is time to be a leader.

Third, I would have put everything I had power over to find and catch bin-Laden, nothing this side of nukes would have stopped me. He was the key that was still alive, and he and his bunch had to be rounded up and brought to justice.

Fourth, I would have thanked the nations of this world for their thoughts and offers of help. It was a time when everyone felt violated, and there was no excuse to alienate other countries, it was a time for understanding and co-operation, I would not have squandered that.

[DerBeppo]

19. i'm sorry, but "strange" isn't proof.

Dozens of recreations, ballistics statistics and the lack of anything other than "isn't it strange that..." evidence to the contrary lead me to the simple, reasonable, rational notion that it was a single gunmen and Oswald was that man.

That doesn't eliminate the possibility that he was used or had some nefarious connections, but nothing has convinced me that there was some unknown, unseen mystery shooter in the middle of a small, crowded town plaza.

[Lost4words]

21. And nothing ever will, so lock in that thought.

[rasputin1952]

24. Fine...you can believe what you want, it is no skin off my back...

I find it all interesting, and is the only "Conspiracy Theory" I can see that holds water.

Proof...hard to come by when there were men who identified themselves aa SS and FBI on the plaza seizing cameras and film immediately. The SS had gone to the hospital w/Kennedy, the FBI has always maintained they had no one on the ground in Dealey Plaza. Whatever "proof" there is has been sealed or "lost" years ago. I might5 livelong enough for the evidence to be released after the 50 year seal, it will be interesting to see what comes of it, if it is intact to any degree.

As for the "magic bullet", I find it "proof enough" that it gained in weight after the fragments were weighed separately. That is kind of interesting from a physics POV.

[Lost4words]

27. You wont convince the LOCK-INs.

they believe the official report and thats that for them, dont waste your time, we lived it and we learned that terrible things do happen in the Good Ole USA.

Enjoyed your posts!

8643

[rasputin1952]

28. It is seared in my memory...they brought a B&W TV into class...

I watched as Cronkite lost it, taking off his glasses, a tear and the broken voice when he announced Kennedy was dead. I was in shock, as was everyone else that Nov day.

We were let out early, of course, and it is the ONLY time I ever heard NYC as quiet as a tomb...no sound, anywhere, it was eerie, to be sure.

When the funeral entourage went down Pennsylvania Ave, it was the one time I saw my father cry, and he was an R, as was my mother. both of them sitting there watching this on TV...he let out a sigh as John Jr, gave that salute...as did the rest of the nation...we all sighed that day...:(

We wanted answers, we wanted to see someone pay, we were angry and reason was tossed to the wayside. Almost immediately after the Warren Report was issued, the questions came. The questions were good ones and bad ones, but we came to distrusting the Gov't after that, we knew something wasn't right, too many questions, not many answers...this was not the Lincoln assassination...this was something different, it was not cut and dried, and we felt violated.

One cannot just look at a tome and call it truth. Some of the same people who denigrate the Bible, think
that the Warren Report is gospel. Interesting, one is false, but the other must be true, there are flaws in all investigations and in all conclusions, that is why we question what we read or hear. But if the WR is a cover-up, that goes beyond what we expect as a society...we want the truth, for it is the only way justice can be served.

On 22Nov63, a cloud came over the nation, and it has yet to dissipate. I am willing to accept that LHO was the sole assassin, if it can be proven to me that he was, perhaps we'll learn precisely that when the records are opened. But the secrecy that evolved, the odd way that some just say, it had too be LHO, no one else, w/o looking just a little further is an interesting anomaly. If someone killed a family member of mine, I would not rest until the truth was known and justice served, how can it not be so for the POTUS?

[Lost4words]

29. Yes, and thats all I can say. The ghosts are strong from that awful day.

86 43

[KatyMan]

26. I don't mean this as a slight

and it could be that I've read too much about the subject, but I can't imagine anyone defending the Warren report at all. Personally, I don't have an opinion on who was behind it or why, but the thought that Oswald even pulled a trigger on that day just doesn't compute with me.

for reference, I was born in '66, obviously not around at the time.

[rasputin1952]

31. I've looked and researched this situation for years, there are

some things in the WR that make sense and are eye-opening as to how investigations work and how they come to conclusions.

I have come to the conclusion that there are two absolutes that I know of in the Kennedy assassination, I didn't do it, and neither did Oswald. I remember that day, but I know I didn't shoot him; after looking a the evidence out there, and trying to get through the convolutions that have become the aftermath, I know Oswald didn't do it either.

After all of the people who handled that Carcano that day, and to find Oswald's "palm print" on it, clear as day, (after two FBI Agents were left alone w/the body in the morgue), when it could not be found of lifted before is an interesting curve in the story as well...They never did explain that one...x(

There are other things that have not been satisfactorily answered either...Take a look at the "backyard" photo of LHO...it is amazing that there are actually two suns that day, at least judging by the shadows one can see. I may be wrong on this one, but I think astronomers might have noticed that that day, I know I would have, but I'm not an astronomer, nor a physicist, so what do i know...:evilgrin:

The bottom line in this whole thing is, we want the truth, we could handle it back then, we can handle it today. We might not be happy w/what we get, but nothing trumps the truth.

[Virginia Dare]

36. If we learn the truth..

I'm convinced a whole chain of lies leading up to the present will become unraveled. Probably why we still don't know the truth.

[rasputin1952]

39. Truth is a funny thing...everybody demands it, most people run

away from it when they hear it, and few people speak it...:(

We can usually handle it, unless it is something devastating like someone is going to die soon, but the truth, although often bent, cannot be trumped...:D

[Lost4words]

22. You wont get a whole lot more than what is already out there.

so just Stay the course and you will be OK.

[BuyingThyme]

34. I'm guessing this has to do with the level of antimony in the lead.

I read about the "science" they applied to the JFK bullets some years ago and decided that it was junk science conducted by junk scientists.

It's about time that some real scientists got involved.

If you would like to read about antimony (both sides), see here:

http://www.jfk-info.com/snyder9.htm
http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=156892
http://karws.gso.uri.edu/jfk/scientific_topics/naa/Snyder_critique.html

I don't' remember where I originally read about antimony, but I'm pretty sure it was in a book.

[ComandanteChe]

38. Write this under the "no crap" column....

It only took these geniuses over 40 years to figure out what us "tinfoilers" have known for decades.

How long will it take tomorrow's "geniuses" to figure out 9/11 was an inside job??

I guess conspiracies don't exist, huh, non-tinfoilers, you of the enlightened minds??