Episode 81: JFK - Oliver Stone's Film

If JFK's murder is the granddaddy of all conspiracy theories, Oliver Stone's 1991 film JFK could be a granddaddy of the granddaddy. It's been bashed by a number of people - it's a total fiction, it's full of koo-koo ConSpiRacY tHeORieS, it's propaganda from the C!A, all of Gen X saw the film and raised hell over it, etc. So what's the case?

Links:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102138/

https://www.buzzsprout.com/1125110/12975283

Need more? You can visit the website at: https://consaracytheories.com/ or my own site at: https://saracausey.com/. Don't forget to check out the blog at: https://consaracytheories.com/blog. 

****

My award-winning biography of Dag is available on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Decoding-Unicorn-New-Look-Hammarskj%C3%B6ld-ebook/dp/B0DSCS5PZT

My forthcoming project, Simply Dag, will be available next summer. 

Transcript

Transcription by Otter.ai.  Please forgive any typos!

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

JFK, Oliver Stone, conspiracy theory, generational conflict, Gen X, media narrative, Warren Commission, Clay Shaw, David Ferrie, Lee Harvey Oswald, military industrial complex, Cuban Missile Crisis, Bay of Pigs, assassination, Vietnam War.

Welcome to con-sara-cy theories. Are you ready to ask questions you shouldn't and find information you're not supposed to know? Well, you're in the right place. Here is your host, Sara Causey.

Hello, hello, and thanks for tuning in. In tonight's episode, I will finally, after lo these many months, be talking about Oliver Stone's film. JFK. It has not escaped my attention that I have neglected the granddaddy of the granddaddy, and I finally wanted to sit down and remedy that situation. If we think of murder of JFK as being a conspiracy theory granddaddy, then arguably Oliver Stone's 1991 film, JFK is a granddaddy of a Granddaddy. And it seems like so many people have opinions about this film. One of the reasons why I wanted to talk about it here is because as a Gen Xer, our entire generation, although we're very often forgotten when it comes to generational click bait and bullshit, generational warfare happening between the baby boomers and the millennials and the Gen Z ers. It's as though Gen X is a completely forgotten generation. Anybody from 1965 to 1980 apparently doesn't exist. And by and large, that's fine by me, because I'm not really interested in getting into bull crap generational conflicts with other people. I think it's ridiculous. And I think in so many ways, those of us who are part of Gen X as being that latchkey kid generation, we're accustomed to pretty much being self sufficient and having our own ways of doing things, having our own ways of thinking. And so it's kind of nice sometimes to be left out of that. Nevertheless, as Gen Xers, we get accused of en masse. We all went in 1991 to the theater to see JFK, and we absolutely lost our shit. We weren't intelligent enough to know that we were seeing a Hollywood film. We thought that we were seeing like cinema, verite, actual history in the making, a documentary in real time like Kevin Costner was Jim Garrison, even though they look nothing alike, all of Gen X thought that Oliver Stone's film was actual, literal history, and so we lost our shit. We went crazy. We demanded something needs to be done. And I'm like, Well, I can't speak for the entirety of my generation. However, as a member of it, I can say I never went to see the movie. I didn't get up in arms about any of it. And in fact, in thinking back to my immediate circle of friends and family, I can't remember anybody that I knew living in the Midwest that went to go see it. I don't remember a single person that I knew personally saying you need to get your ass to the theater to go see this movie. It's fucking incredible. It will change your frame of mind. I don't remember anything like that. In fact, what I remember was the opposite. I think a lot of us bought into the mainstream media narrative that this is a movie for crackpots, Kooks and weirdos, tin foil hat types. And I also remember people asking the question of like, what is Oliver Stone up to with this? It's been years. Why is he trying to stir up mess about this now? He's trying to get people upset. He's trying to foment conflict. I don't remember anybody in my immediate vicinity anyway, regardless of generation being like, No, you need to go see this. It's incredible. It's gonna piss you off. I don't remember any such a thing. I feel like, in some respects, the media hyped it up by coming out ahead of it and being so vitriolic, is that part of a plan? It's always possible. You know, I said on this podcast, we would look for information we were not supposed to know. We would ask questions that we were not supposed to ask. So maybe it's all one big psyop. Maybe the whole media resist resistance to the film and writing one hit piece after another after another. And then you have Noam Chomsky coming out with rethinking Camelot, and you have Sy Hersh doing the dark side of Camelot. Maybe this was all done to drive people to watch the film, to go see it in the theater, to buy the VHS tape when it was released, and then the DVD, and now to stream it. Who knows stranger things than that have happened? But in particular for me, because my generation gets accused of going to the theater to see it on mass, and then getting our panties in a twist and not knowing how to handle real reality. It meant. Something to me to get on the airwaves and talk about this film as I see it. My first remembered exposure to this film was right around Memorial Day weekend of 2023 It was a long weekend. It was actually right around JFK birthday, which I didn't even know at the time. So you have to understand JFK was nothing to me. I hate politicians. I've said that many times, and I stand by it. If a politician's lips are moving, they're lying to me, I feel like if somebody starts out honest in that line of work, they don't stay honest. I just have a very sour skin crawl. Kind of opinion of politicians I just, I don't even think it's a matter of absolute power corrupts absolutely. I think people get in and they just turn and it happens so fast. I don't trust any of these jackals, and it doesn't matter to me, donkey, elephant, whatever the fuck they're just all a bunch of scumbags. In my opinion. So I had no interest in his life. I had no interest in his murder. I didn't know anything, or care anything about his legacy. I watched it on a lark. I had a long weekend, and I was like, you know, I like conspiracy theories. I'm interested. There's that Faustian edge to my personality. I like to look for the things that you're not supposed to know, the esoteric knowledge, the don't talk about that. Don't go there, don't look over there. And I'm like, I don't think I've ever seen this film. I don't remember ever actually watching this. I've heard people talk about it, and I know it's supposed to be like this big piece of conspiracy theory history, but I don't, I don't reckon I've ever even seen it. So I watched it in a couple of different installments, because it is a lengthy film. And was just like, holy shit. Now I didn't as a Gen Xer, okay? I didn't sit there and think I was watching actual, literal history. I didn't assume that I was watching a documentary, my feeling was, if even a scintilla of this is true, if even a fraction of a fraction of the things that Oliver Stone asserts in the film are accurate, then we should all, as Americans, be asking a hell of a lot more questions, what actually did happen, and why did it happen, and who perpetrated it? But I never thought this is actual, literal history. I just left the film thinking, there's way more to this story. There has to be. So I didn't just take the movie's word for anything. I you know, decided to think critically, decided to do my own research and decided to read books. I mean, it's to me, this is not a complicated situation, you know, if there's a topic that I feel I want to know more about, I figure it's a pretty good starting point to read some books, which is what I did, and I fell down the rabbit hole. Man, for me, it was like I never cared about this guy. Never thought anything of him, positive, negative, indifferent, except really just the overall stereotype, the bias that I have that all politicians are pieces of shit. I just figured he probably was too at the end of the day, and all the womanizing, you know, I think a lot of us have been bombarded with that he was knocking boots with Marilyn Monroe. And then she gets up like a, I'm trying to think of the right way to say it. She gets up on stage like a bovine and estrus moaning for the bull to come service her. And it's like, oh, God, how embarrassing. Like, who does that? He may have been in with the mafia. I mean, you know, the Kennedy family and the Kennedy curse, and then Teddy got into the mess with Chappaquiddick. You know, this family is not exactly a family of saints with halos over their heads. I I really never thought much about it. So for me, it was just like a weird moment. I didn't care about any of this, until one day I did, and then I cared a whole hell of lot. And now here we are, all this time later on a podcast, a successful podcast, where I just sit here and opine about

conspiracy theories. What a world.

So the movie starts out with this opening quote, to sin by silence when we should protest makes cowards out of men. By Ella Wheeler Wilcox, January, 1961 Eisenhower warns of the military industrial complex in his farewell address, which is rather rich when you think about all of his contributions to it. November, 1960 JFK wins the election over Nixon. JFK is seen as a symbol of change in the 1960s especially for freedom, JFK inherits a war against Castro, largely run by the Charlie India alpha and Cuban exiles. Castro is fighting the American business interests in Latin America. It culminates in the Bay of Pigs invasion. JFK. A takes public responsibility, but is privately upset and feels that he has been manipulated. In October 1962 we have the Cuban Missile Crisis. Rumors swirl that JFK makes a deal with Khrushchev not to invade Cuba, so that the Soviets will remove the missiles. JFK is then painted as some by some, as being soft on Communism. Kennedy also finds himself embroiled in Laos and Vietnam. There's a clip of JFK talking to Walter Cronkite, and where he says, In the final analysis, it's their war. They have to win it or lose it, which, that's not some digitally altered news clip that was made for the film. That's literal history. You can pull it up and watch it yourself. JFK gives the peace speech at American University. The movie itself really begins with Rose cheremy being thrown from a car and trying to warn the hospital staff that Kennedy would be killed. I think there's been a book or two written specifically about her. I have not read those yet, but I intend to, I mean she very much could be and should be her own podcast episode. We see footage of the motorcade along with the seizure that happened before the murder. We also see the wanted for treason. Handbill in New Orleans. Jim Garrison learns that JFK has been shot. He and some co workers leave to go to a bar and a restaurant with a television. Cronkite announces the death. Some in the restaurant are sad. One man applauds the death. Vincent D'Onofrio is on TV as Bill Newman, one of the witnesses in Dealey Plaza, Ed Asner plays guy banister, and Jack Lemmon plays Jack Martin banister calls Kennedy a no count son of a bitch, and can't believe that people are crying over his death. He also calls him a bullshit president, and brings up the Bay of Pigs. He also says this is what happens when you let the inwards vote, of course. He says the racial epithet, they get together with the Jews and the Catholics and elect an Irish bleeding heart. Banister says, Here's to the new frontier. Camelot and smithereens. Garrison is watching TV as Oswald is arrested. Banister gets very drunk. He starts talking about Oswald. He also lashes out at Jack Martin and beats him up after he thinks Jack has gone through his files. Gary Oldman plays Lee Harvey Oswald very well. I thought that he was well cast in that. It's sort of funny to think about Gary Oldman going from like Lee Harvey Oswald to Bram Stoker's Dracula. That just shows the versatility. And then he's also Mason verger in that Hannibal movie is absolutely unrecognizable. Nothing beats the rules. Jack Ruby is in the press pool offering a correction that Lee Harvey Oswald was involved in the Fair Play for Cuba committee. Garrison notes that Oswald seems pretty cool for a man under that kind of pressure, Oswald is portrayed in the media as a communist and an ultra left winger. Garrison wants to investigate Oswald's New Orleans connections ASAP. They uncover the name David Ferrie. David ferry is supposedly going to be Oswald's getaway pilot, according to an unnamed source, they watch as Oswald get shot by Ruby on national television, no more trial of Oswald. David ferry comes in, played by Joe Pesci.

I actually recorded a

podcast episode about this over on my daytime podcast called you're not going to beat the system. Because that was another thought that I came away from this film with, is it's like, if a sitting president is not gonna beat the system, you're not gonna fucking do it. And I don't care what some controlled oppo out there wants to tell you about. John and Jane Q Public are really waking up. They're the globalists are shaking in their boots, whatever that even means. It's like, Listen, man, if a sitting president, somebody with millions of dollars, a sitting president, the highest office in the land, supposedly, a multi millionaire dude can't beat the system. You're not gonna fucking do it, no way. But in that, in that episode, I also talked about how the physical appearances of Joe Pesci and Tommy Lee Jones were just like, holy shit. Particularly Joe Pesci is David ferry. Because I'm like, nobody would look like that. So I googled the real David ferry, and I was like, I'll be damned. I will just be damned. Wow. Ferry denies knowing Oswald. Ferry admits he drove to Houston to go ice skating, then they go to Galveston, and he claims that they went goose hunting, but they couldn't get any geese, and he's chain smoking the whole time, and clearly nervous. Garrison says he wants to detain fairy for Foxtrot Bravo India questioning. However, they release ferry, and they say there was no evidence that ferry knew Oswald or had any connection to JFK murder. This makes Gary. Garrison and his staff suspicious, but they decide to move on. So the movie now flashes forward by three years. Garrison has a conversation on a plane with Senator long played by Walter Matthau. Long questions the veracity of the Warren Commission Report. Long says he'd round up 100 of the world's best riflemen. Sorry, I try not to say boom stick words too much, because you can get flagged for doing that. But there are only so many synonyms that if it were up to him, he'd round up 100 of the world's best riflemen and find out which were in Dallas that day. He calls Oswald a decoy garrison. Throws himself into studying the Warren Commission report and starts finding its many plot holes. Garrison goes down the wormhole. That's what I've written in my notes. I'm like, man, it happens to the best of us. All of a sudden, boom, you're down the wormhole. We hear the story of the three tramps. We also hear about cars in the railroad area that didn't seem to belong. We hear that there was a flash of light or smoke on the grassy knoll. Garrison becomes obsessed. He points out to his staff the proximity of guy Bannister's office, fair play for Cuba slash Oswald, Office of Naval Intelligence, Foxtrot, Bravo India, Charlie India, alpha the shush service in New Orleans, all in the same general area. Oswald has what seems to be a staged fist fight with anti Castro Cubans, and he goes on TV as a Marxist Garrison wants to reopen his case. He asks Jack Martin about the time when guy banister beat him up. Jack implies that maybe banister didn't die of a random heart attack. Martin describes banisters place as a mad house of people coming and going, Cubans and David ferry. He mentions operation mongoose. Cubans would be trained to overthrow Castro. Martin claims they were all Charlie India alpha and everybody knew everybody. There was a training ground by Lake Pontchartrain. Supposedly Nazis and mercenary types were there too. You know, look, I'm going to butt in right here and say, I don't find that unbelievable at all. I mean, I was going to suspend my comments until the very end of this, but when the minute that you say Nazis and mercenaries were there too, I'm likely to believe you. Think back to the episodes that I recorded about the BBC Docu series on Operation Gladio. That whole thing was full of Nazis and Italian fascists that should have faced prosecution for war crimes but didn't. Instead, they wind up as part of a stay behind network to save Europe from communism. I'm also thinking about the mysteries around the death of Dag Hammarskjold, and how in Africa, at the time, the continent was just loaded with these white supremacist mercenary types, whether it was I'm trying to think of the right way to put it, like mercenaries for hire, mercenaries that were aligned to a particular company, that were aligned to a particular nation, or they were just soldiers of fortune that didn't give a shit who was paying them, as long as the money was green. So I'm inclined to believe this idea of Nazis and mercenaries being involved. JFK tells the Foxtrot Bravo India to shut down the camp, but Martin thinks they only went through the motions of shutting it down. Like, yeah, it's shut down. Wink Oswald was around Bannister's office. He also describes a man who was tall with white hair and looked like a society guy banister would kiss his ass. Martin shuts down at the mention of clay Bertrand, Martin warns Garrison that he's too naive. We see John Candy as Dean Andrews. He's asking Dean about clay Bertrand and the call to be Oswald's lawyer. We see cutaways of Dean actually meeting with both Oswald and Clay Shaw. Dean brings up the question, if there was a conspiracy, why didn't RFK prosecute all of them, and how could so many people keep a secret it was all Oswald. Garrison threatens Dean with perjury. Dean tells him, if he reveals the identity of clay Bertrand, he'll be killed. He warns Garrison to stop what he's doing. As Dean points out JFK is dead, but the government keeps rolling on, and the portrayal of Dean Andrews is pretty flamboyant and crazy in the film. This was another instance their very first time I watched it, where I was like, nobody would behave that way. Well, then I saw films of the real Dean Andrews. And I was like, I'll be damned. I'll just be damned. Talking about the real you got the wrong ta, ta, but the wrong ho, ho. And I'm like, Oh my God,

John Candy was spot on in that role.

Garrison goes to see a prisoner, Willie O'Keefe, who's played by Kevin Bacon. It's my understanding. That Willie O'Keefe is supposed to be a composite of four or five different people, but there, if you're wondering, was there a literal Willie O'Keefe? No, there was not. O'Keeffe. Talks about clay Bertrand. He says fairy took him to meet clay for sexual favors. He talks about a party with Bertrand and fairy ferry had mice in cages because he was working on a cure for cancer. Oswald was also there. O'Keeffe claims that ferry was popping his mouth off about JFK and how they wanted to kill Castro. One of the Cubans says that JFK is licking Khrushchev's ass. Ferry says that he'd kill JFK, and it could be blamed on Cuba slash. Castro get three pop poppers in three locations, a triangulation of crossfire. One man has to be sacrificed. Clay gets angry at Ferry for making such remarks, especially in front of a mixed group of folk. O'keeff says Fascism is coming back. He says JFK wrecked the country and stole the election from Nixon. He uses racial epithets and says Fascism is coming back. And JFK was a communist Garrison staff is concerned that O'Keeffe's testimony would never hold up in court. So let's think for a second about what this composite character is saying Fascism is coming back. You know, I'm also inclined to believe that as well. I don't think it ever really left. We see Garrison as a popular figure in New Orleans, well known, well liked. They review the photos of the three tramps. Lee Bowers dies in a single car accident. Rose Jeremy is dead. Oswald's tax records are considered classified. Oswald's military history at atzuki, he defects, under odd circumstances to the USSR. He meets Marina and her uncle is in Soviet intelligence, Francis Gary Powers u2 plane goes down six months after Oswald defects Susie, who is one of the staff members of garrison. Wonders out loud if the peace summit between Eisenhower and Khrushchev was derailed on purpose. Oswald has no issue running to the returning to the US. Why was he not prosecuted as a traitor? Why was he allowed to return, and why was he allowed to bring Marina back? At the same time, we see someone creating the infamous backyard photos of Oswald. Oswald goes to Dallas and gets a job at Jagger's child Stovall to do photography work of some kind of analysis. Oswald gets chummy with the white Russians in Dallas, who are rabid anti communists. You know, I have warned you about this before that sometimes when a person says White Russian, sometimes when they say Billy rushy chelovic, what they really mean

is N A z, I, nobody else is

going to tell you that. I fucking will.

He buddies up with George demoronshield, who's quite a bit older. Seemingly, they don't really have anything in common. It's like, if Oswald is really this ultra leftist commie sympathizer, why is he hanging out with white Russians? And why is he buddy up to George demoren shield, who's so much older than he is, it's weird. Demoren Shield is a member of the petroleum club, speaks five languages and was Vichy intelligence during the war. It's rumored, according to the movie, it's rumored that demoren shield was a Nazi sympathizer during the war. By the way, demoren shield is played in the film by Willem Altman's who had a strange connection himself with the more and shield the oltmans demore and shield connection slash friendship slash interviews. Could be its own separate podcast episode, but remember, I'm telling you, sometimes when a person says White Russian, it's a code, it's a dog whistle, not always, but sometimes demoren shield paints the picture of Oswald as being well read, smart and adoring of JFK. There's a vignette in the movie of demoren shield seeing that Oswald has a boom stick, which he claims is for hunting. Garrison says they should refer to demoren shield as Oswald's handler and circle him as possible. Charlie India, alpha, the demoreshields Introduce Oswald and Marina to Janet and Bill Williams. This is a little bit of Hollywood magic here. In reality, this would be Ruth and Michael Payne, and it's via Janet Williams wink that Oswald gets his job at the Texas School Book Depository, Lee and Marina fight often. Oswald rents a room in Dallas under the alias of O H Lee. The williamses also have classified tax records, and Bill Williams has links to the Charlie India Alpha three. His family and he does classified work for Bell Helicopter. I'm sure that's just a coincidence. Bill and Janet's separation makes room for Marina to conveniently move in with Janet, and the two become BFFs when Lee is arrested, she buries Lee with the public, portraying him as sick and psychopathic. Was Marina manipulated or threatened? That's what the movie asks us. Garrison concludes that Oswald was not a real defector. He was an intelligence agent and remained one until his death. One of his staff asks if Oswald pulled the trigger, does that mean the intelligence agencies murdered their own commander in chief? Garrison replies that maybe Oswald didn't pull the trigger, no nitrates on his cheek. The boom stick wasn't tested to see if it had been fired. It comes back a week later and suddenly has Oswald's palm print on it. What if that palm print was taken at the morgue? Why buy a traceable weapon through the mail anyway? As Garrison's character in the film says, We're through the looking glass, Garrison begins interviewing Dealey Plaza witnesses, some folks, some of the same folks who talked to Mark lane and rushed to judgment. Julia Ann Mercer talks about seeing Jack Ruby at Dealey Plaza before the murder of JFK. We see vignettes of witnesses being intimidated by the authorities. Beverly Oliver tells the story of Jada and the carousel club. Cops were always around Jack's clubs. She says Jack introduced her to Lee Oswald and another man believed to be David ferry. She recognized him on TV as Jack's friend. Beverly says she doesn't want to testify. I mean, if they could kill the president Jack Ruby asked to go to DC and leave Dallas, Jim Garrison himself appears as Earl Warren in a small part. The Zapruder film establishes three shots in 5.6 seconds. Garrison's team tries to duplicate Oswald's alleged shots, and cannot do it. They also point out the tree and its foliage being in the way they agree to subpoena Time Life for the Zapruder film. Why would anyone wait until the motorcade was on Elm to put him in a triangulation of crossfire a turkey shoot. Original parade route was to go down. May the motorcade uses elm to slow the car down significantly. They point out the link between the Cabell brothers. When Charles Cabell comes to New Orleans to address the foreign policy Association, he was introduced by Clay Shaw as Garrison says this is like the fox investigating the chicken coop. Oswald is spotted all over Dallas doing memorable, flamboyant things. He shows up at Sylvia. Sylvia Odeo his apartment with Cubans, and is introduced as Leon Oswald at the same time. However, Oswald is in Mexico trying to get into Cuba. The photo they show is the same photo that Hugh McDonald accuses of being Saul. If you caught that episode that I recorded about Hugh McDonald and his wack a doodle story of this guy, Saul, it's the same photo. If Oswald had gotten into Cuba and then killed JFK, Americans would support a Cuban invasion. Oswald denies being in the backyard photos and Garrison's team is skeptical of those photos. When Oswald is in Russia, someone uses the name Oswald to buy trucks for friends of democratic Cuba. This organization is involved with Guy banister Hoover creates a memo in June 1960 that someone might be using Oswald's identity. They discover that clay Bertrand is Clay Shaw. We see the tension building in Garrison's home life. He schedules Clay Shaw to come in on Easter Sunday for an informal conversation. We're told of a party with David ferry Clay Shaw and two others Sex, drugs and rock and roll. Clay Shaw denies everything. Garrison asks him. Shaw calls JFK a man of true panache and Jackie a woman of impeccable style. Garrison asks about Shaw's involvement with the Centro mondial commercial and asks about its connections with the Charlie India alpha, the CMC was also linked to Schlumberger and, by extension, to David ferry in the Cuban exiles Garrison asks if he's ever worked for the Charlie Indy Alpha Shaw says, if so, would I really be here talking to you? Garrison is convinced of Shaw's guilt. Garrison is mobbed by the press and is accused of spending $8,000 on the InVEST investigation into JFK death. David ferry calls one of garrisons men, and has a temper fit on the phone. Ferry says he's scared of everyone. He names an eliado del Valle and says he was Ferry's pay master. He's clearly paranoid and flipping out. He says Clay Shaw has compromising photos of him. He says Oswald was in the civil. Air Patrol with him, and he brings up his cancer mice. So there's a lot going on, even right here compromising photos. So it sounds like there's some kind of honey trap, allegedly, according to the information in the film, some kind of honey trap situation going on where these men are having sex parties. And there's photographs of them doing the things that they do, as ferry tells Garrison you don't leave the agency. He says Clay Shaw is untouchable, and asserts that Shaw Oswald and the Cubans are all agency. He says Jack Ruby was a pimp, a bag man for the Dallas mafia. He ran boom sticks to Castro when he was on our side. He describes a scenario of the Charlie India alpha and the mafia working together to kill Castro out of mutual interest. He mentions operation mongoose. He tells Garrison that the issue of who killed JFK is too big for him. Ferry warns that he will wind up dead. He also says that the pop poppers don't even know who was ultimately behind the murder. He warns Garrison that he too will be destroyed, as he says in the movie, they're untouchable man.

Garrison is again mobbed by the press. They debate whether or not to call David ferry as a witness. Due to his emotionally fragile state, Garrison and his staff discover that their offices are bugged. David ferry is found dead. Garrison suspects foul play. Two typed suicide notes are located just pretty weird. Eladio del Valle is also dead in a brutal murder. The Foxtrot Bravo India approaches one of Garrison staff and claims that Castro was responsible for the murder and war will break out. Garrison goes to Washington to meet Mr. X. Mr. X tells him he's closer than he thinks, and describes himself as a pentagon man, someone in Black Ops who provides hardware for pop, Pops, coups, rigging elections, psyops, etc. He says he was in Eastern Europe in World War Two, and helped evacuate part of Nazi intelligence at the end of the war, Italy, 48 stole the election. France. 49 broke strikes a series of coups, including the Philippines, Arbenz in Guatemala, mosta day in Iran, Vietnam in 54 Indonesia, 58 Tibet, 59 things were good till Cuba. The invasion was supposed to happen in October of 62 Khrushchev sends missiles to resist the invasion. JFK doesn't invade, and the military is left with its dicks in the wind a lot of pissed off people. 1963 Mr. X claims he spent time working as JFK. Is working on JFK plan to get us personnel out of Vietnam by the end of 65 in Sam 263, first 1000 troops home by Christmas in November, one week after the murder of Diem. Mr. X is sent to the South Pole by General y to be a military escort for a group of international VIPs on his way back. X is in New Zealand when the news breaks, Oswald was charged at 7pm Dallas time with Tippett's murder. That's 2pm the next day in New Zealand. But already their newspapers had an entire story of the unknown, 24 year old Oswald, a studio picture, detailed biography, Russian information, and we're pretty sure he killed the president alone, although it took them four more hours to charge him with that crime in Dallas, it felt to Mr. X that a cover story was being put out like the government would do in a black op. X gets back to the US and asks himself, why, as the chief of Special Ops, why was he selected to go to the South Pole for a job any number of others could have done. He wondered if it was because of his routine, routine duties. His routine duties would have been to arrange additional security in Texas. So he decides to check it out. He discovers that someone has told the 112th Military Intelligence Group at Fort Sam Houston to stand down that day over the protests of Colonel Reich, its standard operating procedure, especially in known hostile city like Dallas, to supplement the Secret Service. Even if the bubble top was not used, there would have been 100 to 200 agents on the sidewalk, without question. Only one month before Adlai Stevenson was spit on and hit. There had been attempts to kill de Gaulle in France. We would have armed. We would have, well, wait a minute, I'm trying to read my notes here. My handwriting is abysmal. We would have arrived days ahead, studied the route, checked all buildings and never allowed open windows overlooking Dealey Plaza. Our own snipers would have covered the area. If a window had gone up, they'd have been on a radio. We'd have watched the crowd for packages rolled up, newspapers, coats. Never would have let a man open an umbrella. Never would have let the car slow down to 10 miles per hour. Or take that curve onto Elm Street, you'd have felt an army presence in the streets. That day. He believes the lack of protection and normal security protocols is the best indication of a massive plot in Dallas. Who could have best done it Black Ops. Someone could have called Colonel Reich and said, Stand down. We have another unit coming. He says that day there were army intelligence people in Dallas. Mr. X says he'll still try to figure out who and why. He claims army intelligence had a Harvey Lee Oswald on file, but those files were destroyed. Many strange things happened, but Oswald had nothing to do with them. The entire cabinet was on a trip to the Far East. 1/3 of the combat division was returning from Germany in the air above the US at the time of the murder, at 12:34pm the Washington telephone system went out for an hour on the plane back to Washington. Word was radioed from the White House Situation Room that there was only one pop popper. Does all of this sound like coincidence? The cabinet was gone to get them and their perceptions out of the way. Troops were in the air for possible riot control. Phones didn't work to keep wrong stories from spreading. Nothing was left to chance. He could not be allowed to escape alive. I never thought things were the same after that, Vietnam started for real. There was an air of make believe in the Pentagon and the Charlie India Alpha. Those who'd been in secret ops knew the Warren Commission was fiction, but there was the same thing, deeper and uglier. Mr. X says he knew Allen Dulles well, but he didn't understand why Dulles was appointed to investigate JFK death, considering JFK had fired him. He also says that Dulles was General wise benefactor. Mr. X says he got out in 64 garrison. Says he never realized that Kennedy was so dangerous to the establishment. Mr. X says the real question is why, the how and the who is just scenery for the public. Oswald, Ruby, Cuba, the mafia keeps them guessing like a game. It prevents the most important question, why? Why was JFK killed? Who benefited? Who has the power to cover it up in 1961 right after the Bay of Pigs, Mr. X says he participated in drawing up in SAM memos, 5556 and 57 in them. JFK told lemnitzer that from here on, the joint chiefs would be wholly responsible for all covert paramilitary action in peacetime. This would take power away from the Charlie India alpha, as JFK said, Splinter it into 1000 pieces. Now he was asking the military to help him do it. This was unprecedented. Mr. X says there were shock waves along the halls of power that the firing of Dulles, Bissell and Cabell Kennedy's initiatives were never truly implemented because of bureaucratic resistance. But one result was that the Cuban operation was turned over to Mr. X's department as Operation mongoose. Mongoose was pure black ops. It was secretly based at Miami University, which has the largest domestic Charlie India, Alpha Station, budgeted for hundreds of millions of dollars annually. 300 agents, 7000 select Cubans, 50 fake business fronts for money laundering. They waged a non stop war against Castro, industrial sabotage, crop burning, etc, and it was all under the control of general y. He took the rules of covert war he'd used abroad and brought them back to the US. He talks about the budget cuts JFK called for in March of 63 nearly 52 military installations in 25 states and 21 overseas bases. He says nearly 3000 helicopters have been lost so far in Vietnam. Who makes them? Bell Helicopter? Who owns Bell? Bell was nearly bankrupt when the First National Bank of Boston asked the Charlie India Alpha about using the helicopter in Indochina. How about the f1 11 fighter, General Dynamics of Fort Worth? Who owns that find out the defense budget since the war started. 75 going on, 100 billion, nearly 200 billion will be spent before it's over. In 1949 it was 10 billion. No war equals no money. The authority of the state over its people resides in its war powers. JFK wanted to end the Cold War in his second term. He wanted to call off the moon race and cooperate with the Soviets. He signed the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. He refused to invade Cuba in 1962 he set out to withdraw from Vietnam as early as 1961 they knew Kennedy was not going to have war in Southeast Asia. We see someone in the military brass yelling, he fucked us in Laos, and now he will fuck us in Vietnam. Someone else said, JFK tried to rub limit SIRs nose and shit. If we didn't go into Cuba, which is so close, why would we go into Vietnam, which is so far away? JFK gives TF X fighter contract only those countries. Sara that will matter in 64 the people in the loop fight back in their own way. We have to control the intelligence from Saigon. Just don't let McNamara stick his nose in this he comes back and scares the shit out of JFK. I want Maxwell Taylor on him night and day. If you control McNamara, you control Kennedy. Mr. X believes it starts just as a conversation, defense contractors, oil bankers, just talking. But then a call is made to someone like general y. Mr. X says no one comes out and says he must die. We see a subtle sign on general Y's desk that suggests he is Lansdale. There's no vote. Nothing's on paper. No one is to blame. He compares it to a military firing squad, five bullets and one blank. No one's guilty. Everyone in the power structure has plausible deniability. There are no compromising connections, except at the most secret point. The main thing is that it must succeed, no matter the cost. The perpetrators must be on the winning side and never subject to prosecution by anyone for anything that is a coup d'etat.

JFK announces a Texas trip in September. At that moment, oz second Oswald pop up all over Dallas, where they have the mayor and the cops in their back pocket. General why flies in the pop poppers, maybe for the special camp, or from, I should say, maybe from the special camp near Athens, Greece. Maybe locals, maybe Cubans, maybe mafia guys, Tuesday, the 26th of November, the day after JFK was buried. LBJ signs in Sam 273, to essentially reverse JFK withdrawal policy and green light covert action against North Vietnam the Gulf of Tonkin incident is provoked. From there we see a shadowy LBJ saying, just get me elected, and I'll give you the damn war Garrison naively says, I can't believe they killed him because he wanted to change things. Mr. X laughs and says, kings are killed. Politics is power, nothing more. Garrison asks Mr. X to testify, and he, of course, declines. He says he'd be arrested and gagged, maybe sent to an institution, maybe worse, Garrison too. He encourages Garrison to keep digging. Garrison expresses his frustration that he no longer has much of a case. Mr. X reminds him that he's become a threat to national security. He says Garrison's credibility will be destroyed because it would be too obvious to murder him. Maybe you can start a chain reaction of people coming forward. Clay Shaw is arrested during the booking. We see him admit to the use of clay Bertrand as an alias, we see garrison and his wife watching the NBC hit piece on TV. He jokes about the 20 to 30 million people watching in the movie. The hit piece brings up Garrison as being tied to the mafia himself. Garrison watches a television about the news of Martin Luther King's murder. The household starts to receive creepy, threatening telephone calls. His wife is angry and feels that garrison is neglecting his family, and she accuses him of attacking Clay Shaw for being a homosexual. He says it's about their kids growing up in a shit hole of lies, and he's angry about it. The US Attorney declines to serve any subpoenas on the Charlie India alpha or the Foxtrot Bravo, India, surprise, surprise, the office is hamstrung by various obstacles. IRS audits and garrison is asked to resign from the National Guard. Oswald and Clay Shaw were seen together in Clinton, Louisiana during a civil rights voting drive. If enough witnesses connect Shaw and Oswald and ferry, then maybe they have a case. Oswald goes to see the Foxtrot Bravo, India, two weeks before JFK death, and asks for hosty. Hosty had made multiple visits to Janet Williams house. He left a note for Marina, and Oswald got mad about it. Whatever correspondence occurred between hosty and Oswald was torn up and flushed down the toilet. Garrison asks, What if it pertained to the murder of JFK? If it was a threat from Oswald to hosty, he would have kept it to further prove that Oswald was a crazy weirdo, he points out agent Quigley destroyed his notes with Oswald back when he was arrested in New Orleans. Did Oswald write the November 17 telex to warn of JFK death in Dallas on November 22 the Telex went out to warn that militant groups might try to kill JFK in Dallas. But nothing was done later. It was removed from all the files. Garrison speculates that Oswald was sending Intel through hosty. Perhaps Oswald infiltrated a group of Cubans andor right wing extremists. Oswald is told to be at the Texas School Book Depository that day, either to take part or to try to prevent it. We don't know which one member of his office is skeptical. Why would the Foxtrot Bravo India cover it up? Why would there be a telex that can. Conveniently disappears from every office in the US. Orders complicity. He addresses a common complaint, you can't keep a secret in a room with 12 people, how the hell would some conspiracy and cover up go on between the mob, the foxtrot, Bravo India, the Charlie India, alpha army, intelligence and whoever else for all this time,

what do we really have going into this trial?

Oswald ferry and banister are dead. Maybe Shaw's agent. He's wide open for blackmail because he's gay. He gives the alternative theory to Garrison that the mob did it. Ruby was all mob and set Oswald up, Hoffa trafficante Marcello were maybe the pop poppers that killed JFK, or arranged for the pop poppers that killed hire some. That's what it is. In my notes, Hoffa trafficante and Marcello hire some pop poppers to kill JFK. The government doesn't want to open up a big can of worms about it, because they use the mob to try to kill Castro Garris encounters back that they were probably involved at a lower level. But could the mob change the parade route or eliminate the protection for the President? Could the mob send Oswald to Russia and get him back, get to the Foxtrot Bravo India, the Charlie India alpha, the Dallas Police to mess up the investigation? Could the mob organize the Warren Commission to cover it up? Could the mob wreck the autopsy? Could the mob convince the national news media to go to sleep? Since when has the mob used anything but 38 for hits up close? Garrison believes it was a military style ambush, a coup d'etat with LBJ waiting in the wings. LBJ got a billion dollars for brown and root to dredge Cameron Bay in Vietnam. If I'm so far from the truth, why is the Foxtrot Bravo India bugging our offices? Why the witnesses getting bought off or murdered? Why are federal agencies blocking our extraditions and subpoenas? Maybe there's some rogue element in the government. Garrison responds with a full blown conspiracy to cover it up. You ever read Shakespeare? He points out the senators who murdered Caesar, a few people on the inside the Pentagon, the Charlie India alpha, one of his employees, Bill quits. Apparently he was trying to make a connection between Jack Ruby and hunt oil. We see Garrison making a TV appearance the Jerry Johnson Show. At this point, he makes the same argument he does in heritage of stone about the analogy of what if the same story had happened in Russia to the Soviet Premier, we would know it was bogus. He shows photos of the three tramps he's told he cannot show them on TV and is cut off. Garrison is worried that he'll be killed. Shaw has brought in mobsters from Canada to do the job. Garrison says to stop spreading paranoid rumors. However, at an airport bathroom, he's cornered by weird characters and accosted by the police. This story is also told in his book on the trail. Garrison learns that one of his office staff has turned on him and taken documents with him. They see RFK on TV, and Garrison predicts they'll kill him before they let him be president. The staff encourages Garrison to call off the trial of Clay Shaw. He talks about a war with two fronts, one, the trial of Clay Shaw, and to the court of public opinion, we see Garrison making a sandwich with the news on television. He sees footage of RFK murder and looks like a disheveled, shattered man. This helps to convince garrisons wife that he isn't totally crazy. CLAY Shaw's trial begins at last, and this is a line I've written in my notes. The whole thing about the right ta, ta, but the wrong Ho, Ho is a direct quote. Lol, it is, yeah, the craziness there of Dean being played by John Candy, and then when you see the real Dean, you're like, Wow, just wow. Garrison's witnesses generally get skewered on the stand. CLAY Shaw's admission that he was clay Bertrand during his booking is ruled as inadmissible. It's clear that garrison is losing. He shows his subpoena copy of the Zapruder film. This was actually the first time I saw it without the infamous Kill Shot edited out. So when I watched this movie back in 2023 and I saw the unedited Zapruder film. Well, I mean, it's edited. We know that it's been tampered with, but unedited in the sense that the kill shot is visible, I just sat frozen. I was like, Holy shit, that's what they did to him. Because in the TV versions that get shown, it's all of a sudden, he just slumps over in Jackie's direction, like somebody that's had a heart attack. You don't actually see the the blood and brain matter going everywhere. So once you see that, you're like, Oh God, this sends one hell of a message, doesn't it? There's an audible gasp in the courtroom, which reminds me of, good night, America. When Dick Gregory and Robert Grodin take the Zapruder film to Geraldo on Good night America in the 70s, the audience sees it for the first time, and there's a collective gasp, and Geraldo talks about how it's the most horrifying thing he's ever seen on a film, indeed. So he goes through the timeline of shots, as well as James tags getting grazed by a stray bullet. He points out Arlen Specter's magic bullet theory, and it's impossible nature in the film, Jack Ruby is the one who deposits the pristine bullet on a stretcher at Parkland. Now that's Oliver Stone's telling of things. The theory that maybe Jack Ruby is the one who deposited it, deposited it last year. I think it was maybe the year before it all bleeds together. On the 60th anniversary, one of the service agents came forward to say that he did it. And I'm like, after all this time, really seems a little sketch to me. I could be wrong. Garrison also uses the analogy of an elephant hanging off a cliff with his tail tied to a daisy like, yeah, it's possible that an elephant can hang off the edge of a cliff with his tail tied to a daisy, but probably fucking not. He details what the doctor saw at Parkland and how the body was moved from Texas to Bethesda. The Bethesda autopsy is botched. We see Colonel Fink's rather uncomfortable testimony about the clown car autopsy. That's what I'm calling it, because it looked like everybody and their brother was packed into that autopsy room. Humes burns his autopsy notes. Connolly suit gets sent to the cleaners. The presidential limo is cleaned and rebuilt. The president's brain goes missing, the epileptic seizure at 1215 on November 22 is a distraction. The person vanishes and never checks into the hospital. The A Team gets into the Texas School Book Depository. The B team gets into the dal Tex building. The C team goes to the grassy knoll. The umbrella man is there. They create a triangulation of crossfire. The first shot sounds like a backfire and misses completely. The second hits JFK in the throat from the front. The next hits JFK in the back, pulling him down and forward. Shot four misses JFK and hits Connelly in the back. Another shot misses completely and hits James tag by the triple underpass, the car breaks. The sixth and fatal shot hits JFK in the head from the front, he goes back and to the left. The shooters disassemble their weapons and leave, except for the boom stick of Oswald. Fake Secret Service were on the grassy knoll. A police officer smelled smoke on the grassy knoll. The three tramps were photographed, yet there's no record of their arrest. Oswald was in the break room drinking a coke. More than one witness saw multiple men on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository. Oswald walks out the front door of the Depository. He goes to his rooming house and grabs his 38 two horn honks occur from police officers. Oswald jogs a mile to murder Tippett allegedly, and then runs to the Texas theater. Other witnesses say the pop poppers were not Oswald is the Texas theater, a pre arranged meeting point. Oswald doesn't buy a ticket, and the cops are called garrison. Compares it to the Reichstag fire. He also compares it to Kafka's book, the trial, which I still this is a good reminder for me, I still need to do an episode devoted to Kafka's story, the trial. The whole country assumes that Oswald is guilty. Ruby gains entry by one of his contacts in the police department. Quote to spare Jackie from a trial. Murder becomes a meaningless act by a crazed loner. He talks about the excuse always being national security, but it's really fascism. November 22 1963 was a coup d'etat, and it resulted in the Vietnam War. He considers LBJ and J Edgar as accomplices. After the fact, the president becomes a business agent. He speaks of peace, but fuels warfare at every turn, I've written in my personal notes out to the side, bingo. Why can we not see the documents? Why seal them for 75 years? Someone, somewhere may find out the truth. If Garrison really is a paranoid Kook, then release all the documents and let's see Ruby Oswald, the Charlie India alpha. Let the public see it all. The government treats you like children. You might get too disturbed. We tend to think Justice comes into being automatically, but it doesn't. Garrison receives money from average Joes who want him to pursue the truth.

Authority forgets a dying king.

The jury finds Clay Shaw not guilty. It's clear that garrison was trying the murder of JFK more than he was trying the case against Shaw. One of the jurors, I think, says to the media, we believe that there was a conspiracy, but whether Clay Shaw was a part of it, is a different kettle of fish. The media says the verdict is a full vindication of the one. Report, of course, Garrison says it proves that no one can run an investigation questioning the intelligence operation of the US government. A note flashes on screen in 1979 Richard Helms, Director of covert operations in 1963 admitted under oath that Clay Shaw had worked for the Charlie India Alpha. Clay Shaw died in 1974 of lung cancer. No autopsy was allowed. In 1978 Jim Garrison was elected Judge of the Louisiana Court of Appeals in New Orleans. He was re elected in 88 to this date, he is he has brought the only public prosecution in the Kennedy killing Southeast Asia, 2 million Asian lives lost. 58,000 American lives lost $220 billion spent. 10 million Americans airlifted there by commercial aircraft. More than 5000 helicopters lost 6.5 million tons of bombs dropped. The Congressional investigation from 76 to 79 found a probable conspiracy in the paw pop of John F Kennedy and recommended the Justice Department investigate further. As of 1991 the Justice Department has done nothing. The files of the House Select Committee on pop pops are locked away until the year 2029 what is past is Prolog dedicated to the young, in whose spirit the search for truth marches on. As a result of this film, Congress in 1992 passed legislation to appoint a panel to review all files and determine which ones would be made available to the public. And with that, my JFK Director's Cut DVD ends. So you have people that say the whole film is a fiction. It's just a total fiction. I disagree. I don't think that you can reasonably say that the entire film is a total fiction. In my mind, when you say that something is a total fiction, it means the whole thing is false. Like there was no JFK, there was no Oswald, there was no Clay Shaw, there was no Jim Garrison. Mean, these people really existed, and the murder of JFK really happened. Now I will talk in a future episode. There are the conspiracy theorists, as I did with Jay Weidner film JFK X he claims that JFK faked his own death and went off to Greece with his quote, favorite mistress and lived happily ever after whatever. The hell who knows there are people in the conspiracy theory world, not just about JFK, but in general, they think everything's a fake. Every single thing that has ever happened that's been negative has been fake. There was no World War One, there was no World War Two, there was no Vietnam. War 911, never happened. JFK, never died. RFK, never died. On and on and on it goes. They think every single thing negative is false, and I guess that makes for a pretty convenient worldview. I lump it in with people who blame everything on the devil. The devil made me do it if they get up out of bed in the morning and stub their pinky toe on the side of the bed. That was the devil. The devil was working against them. It's like, I guess the Prince of Darkness must have had a pretty slow morning that morning if he decided to target Billy Bob and make him stub his toe on the side of the bed frame in the morning. I don't believe that every single negative thing that's ever been reported is false. To me, that's just it's too convenient. You're going to have to engage in some critical thinking to figure out what events have been real and what events have been false. I'm not saying that every event that gets reported to us is true. It's not possible to have a false flag. Of course, it's possible. All I'm saying is that not everything that happens that's negative is fake. But you have these people that believe JFK faked his own death. I personally don't believe that to be true. I think he actually did die in Dallas that day. For me, the idea that the whole movie is fake, the whole thing is just some weird nightmare of Oliver Stone. I think that that's being too harsh. Is everything automatically correct on the other side of the spectrum? No, it isn't. I think this is why people want the neat, tidy world views. The devil made me do it. Everything good is God, everything bad is the devil. Everything bad that's ever been reported in the media must be fake. They want the neat, tidy answers because they don't want to have to do the research. They don't want to have to dig through the evidence. They don't want to have to think about If This Then That. They don't want to sit and really think about it. They just want to make up these neat, tidy answers. That was the devil. That was Satan. That was God. JFK, faked his own death. He didn't really die. We don't need to feel sad, we don't need to probe. We don't need to investigate, because he just faked his own death and went off and lived somewhere else. And that was that. Now I don't think the movie is a total fiction, and I actually don't think it deserves the heaps of criticism that get thrown on it. I. Yeah, I've seen movies that were way, way farther afield, in my opinion, than Oliver Stone's JFK, a perfect film. No, absolutely not. I mean, that's like I've said before, I'm not convinced that Beverly Oliver was the Babushka Lady. We still don't know the full story about the umbrella man. What was he actually doing there? We really don't know, for that matter, the convenience of the Zapruder film, like conveniently Zapruder is there, and films the kill shot. How does that happen? And then also, the Zapruder film has been edited. Certain frames have been spliced out. Well, what are we not allowed to see in the frames that were spliced out? There are a lot of unanswered questions around this thing. So I'm not going to sit here and say, Oh, Oliver. Stone's film is the Bible. It is paramount. It should be taken as literal history. Of course not. For me, the truth is somewhere in the middle, I think it gets a lot of things right, and I think there are other things that are pure speculation, and we're not going to know read a book like I always come back to this idea, read multiple books. If you really want to learn more about JFK, his legacy, as well as different theories around the murder, read books and don't get in an echo chamber. Look for books from a variety of authors, because if you focus just on mainstream historians, the good old fashioned white guy, wasp historians that are allowed to tell you what to do and what to think. They're all going to tell you the same basic thing, some variation of the same basic thing. Some will say that Kennedy was a Reagan neocon. Some will say that he was way left of center. They're all going to tell you that he was a womanizer. He was a vapid him bow. He didn't have any real deep ideology. Paid more attention to public opinion polls than he did to anything else. He was vain. Cared more about his appearance. He was off screwing Marilyn Monroe and probably any other blonde starlet that he could get his hands on and blah, blah, blah. That's all you're gonna learn. I would encourage you to pick from a larger spectrum than that. Yes, read things that are critical, read things that are not critical. Make a hodgepodge for yourself so that you get out of the echo chamber. Don't just watch Oliver Stone's film and say, I know the whole story. I know it all. That's ridiculous. But to call the film a total fiction, or to say that it's purely a waste of time, I think, is being way, way too critical. So what do you think? How many places does stone get it right? And how many places does he not? Stay a little crazy, and I will see you in the next episode.

Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to this podcast and share it with others.