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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsMissing Octafish today. That is all. nt
Last edited Wed Nov 25, 2015, 01:36 AM - Edit history (3)
I am so sorry for this thread. We were in Dealey Plaza on Sunday afternoon. For how Octafish has been attacked in this thread is nothing I ever could have imagined. All of you that have, shame.
And again to Octafish, we are so very sorry.
DU, stand up!
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azmom
(5,208 posts)
Hassin Bin Sober
(26,791 posts)
Electric Monk
(13,869 posts)Codeine
(25,586 posts)Look at the shadows from the gun -- and now at the shadows around his neck. That's clearly Sid Dithers' roflhead crudely pasted onto Octafish's body.
Follow the money.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)Not the one who made it. Take it up with them.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Feel free to laugh all you want.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)Not the one making the joke. You should respond to them.
And I laugh at the BS CT's you post all the time. Especially when you said Kennedy was for world peace. Remind me again who ramped up Eisenhower's policies in Vietnam? Strategic Hamlet? Initiating the CIA coup against Ngo Dinh Diem?
World peace, indeed.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)One example, missing from history and apparently your awareness, Dr Hobbitstein:
CIA head Allen Dulles and JCS chairman Lyman Lemnitzer counseled the United States launch an all-out "war of choice" on the USSR and China. The best time to attack was 'Fall 1963."
Did the U.S. Military Plan a Nuclear First Strike for 1963?
Recently declassified information shows that the military presented President Kennedy with a plan for a surprise nuclear attack on the Soviet Union in the early 1960s.
James K. Galbraith and Heather A. Purcell
The American Prospect | September 21, 1994
During the early 1960s the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) introduced the world to the possibility of instant total war. Thirty years later, no nation has yet fired any nuclear missile at a real target. Orthodox history holds that a succession of defensive nuclear doctrines and strategies -- from "massive retaliation" to "mutual assured destruction" -- worked, almost seamlessly, to deter Soviet aggression against the United States and to prevent the use of nuclear weapons.
The possibility of U.S. aggression in nuclear conflict is seldom considered. And why should it be? Virtually nothing in the public record suggests that high U.S. authorities ever contemplated a first strike against the Soviet Union, except in response to a Soviet invasion of Western Europe, or that they doubted the deterrent power of Soviet nuclear forces. The main documented exception was the Air Force Chief of Staff in the early 1960s, Curtis LeMay, a seemingly idiosyncratic case.
But beginning in 1957 the U.S. military did prepare plans for a preemptive nuclear strike against the U.S.S.R., based on our growing lead in land-based missiles. And top military and intelligence leaders presented an assessment of those plans to President John F. Kennedy in July of 1961. At that time, some high Air Force and CIA leaders apparently believed that a window of outright ballistic missile superiority, perhaps sufficient for a successful first strike, would be open in late 1963.
The document reproduced opposite is published here for the first time. It describes a meeting of the National Security Council on July 20, 1961. At that meeting, the document shows, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the director of the CIA, and others presented plans for a surprise attack. They answered some questions from Kennedy about timing and effects, and promised further information. The meeting recessed under a presidential injunction of secrecy that has not been broken until now.
CONTINUED...
http://prospect.org/article/did-us-military-plan-nuclear-first-strike-1963
So, laugh all you want. If you really bothered to learn, Dr Hobbitstein, you might actually understand why all the planted evidence leads straight to the communist-looking lone-nut patsy, Lee Harvey Oswald. Going by what you write, though, I doubt it.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)
Only one of us has actual facts on our side. Here's a hint, it's not you, my fishy friend.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)If we had an honest news media, they'd report how both obstructed justice in the investigation of President Kennedy's assassination.
Instead:
The Last Words of Lee Harvey Oswald: http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/LHO.html
Our media hasn't let us down since then, though, I'm sure you'll agree Dr Hobbitstein.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)Ratical, the site you just linked to, is full of 9/11 truther bullshit, soy conspiracies, and (one of my personal favorites) cell phone microwave conspiracies. So, if this site can't get the basic science behind soy and non-ionizing radio waves right, what makes you think they would be correct about anything else?
Keep your tinfoil hat on tight, my fishy friend.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)James Galbraith is a top academic, the son of the ambassador/economist.
Here's what the Boston Globe wrote about the assassination of President Kennedy, that so few other publications and no television news covered -- the president's brother, US Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, thought the assassination was the work of a right wing conspiracy:
Robert F. Kennedy saw conspiracy in JFK’s assassination
By Bryan Bender and Neil Swidey GLOBE STAFF NOVEMBER 24, 2013
EXCERPT...
No one had done more than he to create enemies for the Kennedy administration — the right kind of enemies, to the brothers’ way of thinking. In the mob, in corrupted labor, in Castro’s Cuba, in the rogue wing of the American intelligence system.
SNIP...
In the five years between his brother’s murder and his own assassination in 1968, Bobby Kennedy voiced public support for the findings of the Warren Commission, namely that a pathetic, attention-seeking gunman had alone been responsible for the murder of President Kennedy. Privately, though, Bobby was dismissive of the commission, seeing it, in the words of his former press secretary, as a public relations tool aimed at placating a rattled populace. When the chairman of the commission, Chief Justice Earl Warren, personally wrote to the attorney general, asking for any information to suggest that a “domestic or foreign conspiracy” was behind his brother’s assassination, Bobby scrawled a note to an aide, asking, “What do I do?” Then, after stalling for two months, he sent along a legalistic reply saying there was nothing in the Justice Department files to suggest a conspiracy. He made no mention of the hunches that appeared to be rattling around in his own mind.
There is no indication that Bobby ever found evidence to prove a wider conspiracy. But judging from his actions after hearing the news out of Dallas, it’s clear that he quickly focused his attention on three areas of suspicion: Cuba, the Mafia, and the CIA. Crucially, Bobby had become his brother’s point man in managing all three of those highly fraught portfolios. And by the time the president was gunned down, Bobby understood better than anyone how all three had become hopelessly interwoven, and how much all three bore his own imprint.
CONTINUED...
https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/11/24/his-brother-keeper-robert-kennedy-saw-conspiracy-jfk-assassination/TmZ0nfKsB34p69LWUBgsEJ/story.html
Most news media are too cowardly to print stuff opposing the CIA. So, keep smearking, Dr Hobbitstein. Not only does it show where you stand, it shows what kind of person you are.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)“I have seen all of the matters in the archives. If I became president of the United States, I would not reopen the Warren Commission Report. I stand by the Warren Commission Report.”
That's a direct quote by RFK.
RFK is smearing you, Octafish. Take it up with him.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)That's what his son and daughter, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Rory Kennedy, reported in an interview with Charlie Rose last weekend in Dallas.
It's also what author and Salon founder David Talbot reported, when he called Robert F. Kennedy the "first conspiracy theorist" in 2007.
Here's why the news from Robert and Rory is so important:
RFK called the Warren Commission report "shoddy workmanship."
Attorney General Kennedy knew about the Ruby-Mafia connections immediately, which is vital when considering the Mafia were hired by Allen Dulles and the CIA during Eisenhower's administration to murder Fidel Castro -- an operation which the CIA failed to inform the president and attorney general.
The interview with Charlie Rose marked the first time members of the immediate Kennedy family have voiced the attorney general's doubts about the Warren Commission and its lone gunman theory.
Those are the facts we learned Friday, Jan. 11, 2013. It's called history.
PS: That interview with Charlie Rose has yet to air, for some reason.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)The one who makes this claim, is an absolute loon. Crazy anti-vaxxer. I wouldn't believe anything that came out of his mouth.
notadmblnd
(23,720 posts)How do his posts here hurt you? Are you aware that you have an ignore button? Do you realize you are bordering on bullying this poster?
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)About Octafish's crazy CT theories. I made a comment about it, and Octafish came after me, not the poster making the joke. He's a big boy, he can fight his own battles.
notadmblnd
(23,720 posts)I agree. he can fight his own battles
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)Just refuting his claims and sources.
MrMickeysMom
(20,453 posts)Is that it, then? Everyone who's presented forensic evidence to support their being more than a lone nut is .... a loon?
The loon defense is not good enough. What may be better is for you to inform yourself. Students of history don't have to default to the "loon defense" and show pictures of themselves and their cats dressed up to support the "loon defense".
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)RFK Jr is a loon for his anti-vaxxer stance (as is ANY anti-vaxxer), which is exactly what I said.
MrMickeysMom
(20,453 posts)You probably don't read what you don't like to read, I'm betting. It gets in the way of pasting the tin foil picture to your posts that call people with scientific questions "loons" 
Here... take that foil off your head, give your cat a break and read what he really said. I find it sad that posters who love to create their own little world of "CT" posts have to be told again.
Link: http://www.robertfkennedyjr.com/vaccines.html
and pregnant women here and around the world.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)And he equates Thimerosal with autism, which is 100% unsubstantiated BULLSHIT. He's just like Jenny McCarthy on this one. Full of bullshit with NOTHING to back it up.
Furthermore it hasn't been in children's vaccines since 2001, yet he still rails about it.
Fuck RFK, Jr. He's an anti-science asshat.
Read, yourself.
http://www.cdc.gov/vaccinesafety/concerns/thimerosal/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/robert-kennedy-jrs-belief-in-autism-vaccine-connection-and-its-political-peril/2014/07/16/f21c01ee-f70b-11e3-a606-946fd632f9f1_story.html
http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/RFK-Jr-vaccine-CDC-cesspool/2015/06/01/id/648103/
MrMickeysMom
(20,453 posts)Your blind hate is noted and pitied, as it only should be. It must anger you that people question science. I guess they're loons when they do it during a time that provocation needs to be stirred up.
Of course, t's not nearly as provocative as the effects of posting pictures of foil on your cat's head?
There's one born every day.... 
- Everything is Loon!
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)I do have a problem REPEATEDLY questioning the exact same thing that has been proven time and again to not be a thing.
RFK, Jr. is a loon for repeatedly going after something that isn't true. And the "whistleblower from the CDC" that RFK Jr touts, is nothing more than a conspiracy theory made up by the anti-vax movement.
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2015/07/30/the-return-of-the-revenge-of-the-cdc-whistleblower/
MrMickeysMom
(20,453 posts)Who can question someone who is a megalomaniac and has "MD" behind them, right?
Meanwhile, your own hate keeps you from reading only what you want to support anything you decide to call, "LOON!"
You own it.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)Whatever you say.
PatrickforO
(15,126 posts)And Octafish cannot 'take it up' with him because like his brother he got killed, didn't he? He knew how the system worked because he'd been raised as a part of it. He'd been by his brother's side during his presidency. He was advocating ending the war in Vietnam and was a strong proponent of civil rights. I've always wondered if (or which) of those particular stances had anything to do with his killing. I never considered Sirhan a random shooter. You know, just a 'randomly gun down a front running presidential candidate for no reason' type of guy? I think not.
I had a professor in undergrad school who wrote an obscure book called Kennedy and La Cosa Nostra, which basically took the position that RFK was killed by the mob because when Attorney General he had cracked down on organized crime so hard. Was that a conspiracy theory? Was this guy unstable or imbalanced? Mentally deficient?
LOL, well I sat through some of his classes, and he was a nice enough guy. Smart. Ph.D. in History. Good at research. Knew his stuff.
But I'd hardly call him unstable, imbalanced or mentally deficient. See, that's pejorative - merely dismissing his theory as a 'conspiracy' without delving into his facts are systematically refuting them. And that is the exact issue I'm taking with your posts, with all due respect. Some things you can't just laugh off.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)And I know RFK is dead. Octafish likes to claim that anyone who argues against the bullshit he spouts is smearing him. RFK's only direct quote from that article opposes what Octafish claims, therefore--in fishy logic--RFK was smearing the good DUer (and my personal friend) Octafish.
I never called anyone unstable or imbalanced, however. Those were your words.
PatrickforO
(15,126 posts)having seen what happened to his brother. His intent upon election, however, was to further his brother's policies around curtailing the MIC by getting out of Vietnam, and poking the powers that be with civil rights advocacy. Like JFK, he had a pretty sharp vision of what this nation should be and was quite willing to vigorously attack how the nation is (was).
So, basically, I'm saying that one quote is a bit cloudy and that maybe we shouldn't just take it at face value.
I'm glad you and Octafish are friends, but I've got to still stand by what I said regarding so-called conspiracy theories. Seems to me that we often find ourselves being TOO dismissive when we should be digging deeper. Not like aliens and shit, you understand, but things like corporate collusion? You bet. I wouldn't put anything past some of those people because they are not really immoral - they have an absence of morality all together - they are amoral.
What this amorality looks like is akin to the people Himmler and Heydrich hired who could look at a concentration camp and see ways to make the death assembly line more efficient without seeing the horror of the camps themselves. Now, lest you say this is a spurious (or perhaps scurrilous) comparison, think about this:
Today's corporate 'c-class' are people who can be nice to their children and to animals while at the same time knowingly poisoning a water table with carcinogenic chemicals. And they can feel GOOD about earning $millions per year doing it, because they 'create value.' I mean, if people are willing to go that far, it doesn't seem that much of a stretch to 'remove' someone who is threatening profits, does it?
Guess I'm just not a capitalist, though I don't have any trouble at all with small business and entrepreneurship. It's just that these huge multi-nationals are another thing altogether.
PatrickforO
(15,126 posts)supports establishment propaganda by ridiculing anything that can make the establishment look bad.
Author Floyd Rudmin, the social psychologist writes:
“Conspiracy theory” is usually used as a pejorative label, meaning paranoid, nutty, marginal, and certainly untrue. The power of this pejorative is that it discounts a theory by attacking the motivations and mental competence of those who advocate the theory. By labeling an explanation of events “conspiracy theory,” evidence and argument are dismissed because they come from a mentally or morally deficient personality, not because they have been shown to be incorrect. Calling an explanation of events “conspiracy theory” means, in effect, “We don’t like you, and no one should listen to your explanation.”
In earlier eras other pejorative labels, such as “heresy,” “witchery,” and “communism” also worked like this. The charge of “conspiracy theory” is not so severe as these other labels, but in its way is many times worse. Heresy, witchcraft, and communism at least retain some sense of potency. They designate ideas to be feared. “Conspiracy theory” implies that the ideas and their advocates are simple-minded or insane.
All such labels implicitly define a community of orthodox believers and try to banish or shun people who challenge orthodox beliefs. Members of the community who are sympathetic to new thoughts might shy away from the new thoughts and join in the shunning due to fear of being tainted by the pejorative label.
What you are basically doing is ridiculing someone who thinks differently than you or looks at 'facts' differently than you. The fallacy in this is that you aren't refuting them based on facts of your own that you take the trouble to cite; instead you are simply attempting to silence with ridicule. Doesn't wash.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)This document caused quite a stir when it was discovered in 1977. Dated 4/1/67, and marked "DESTROY WHEN NO LONGER NEEDED", this document is a stunning testimony to how concerned the CIA was over investigations into the Kennedy assassination. Emphasis has been added to facilitate scanning.
CIA Document #1035-960, marked "PSYCH" for presumably Psychological Warfare Operations, in the division "CS", the Clandestine Services, sometimes known as the "dirty tricks" department.
RE: Concerning Criticism of the Warren Report
1. Our Concern. From the day of President Kennedy's assassination on, there has been speculation about the responsibility for his murder. Although this was stemmed for a time by the Warren Commission report, (which appeared at the end of September 1964), various writers have now had time to scan the Commission's published report and documents for new pretexts for questioning, and there has been a new wave of books and articles criticizing the Commission's findings. In most cases the critics have speculated as to the existence of some kind of conspiracy, and often they have implied that the Commission itself was involved. Presumably as a result of the increasing challenge to the Warren Commission's report, a public opinion poll recently indicated that 46% of the American public did not think that Oswald acted alone, while more than half of those polled thought that the Commission had left some questions unresolved. Doubtless polls abroad would show similar, or possibly more adverse results.
2. This trend of opinion is a matter of concern to the U.S. government, including our organization. The members of the Warren Commission were naturally chosen for their integrity, experience and prominence. They represented both major parties, and they and their staff were deliberately drawn from all sections of the country. Just because of the standing of the Commissioners, efforts to impugn their rectitude and wisdom tend to cast doubt on the whole leadership of American society. Moreover, there seems to be an increasing tendency to hint that President Johnson himself, as the one person who might be said to have benefited, was in some way responsible for the assassination. Innuendo of such seriousness affects not only the individual concerned, but also the whole reputation of the American government. Our organization itself is directly involved: among other facts, we contributed information to the investigation. Conspiracy theories have frequently thrown suspicion on our organization, for example by falsely alleging that Lee Harvey Oswald worked for us. The aim of this dispatch is to provide material countering and discrediting the claims of the conspiracy theorists, so as to inhibit the circulation of such claims in other countries. Background information is supplied in a classified section and in a number of unclassified attachments.
3. Action. We do not recommend that discussion of the assassination question be initiated where it is not already taking place. Where discussion is active addresses are requested:
b. To employ propaganda assets to and refute the attacks of the critics. Book reviews and feature articles are particularly appropriate for this purpose. The unclassified attachments to this guidance should provide useful background material for passing to assets. Our ploy should point out, as applicable, that the critics are (I) wedded to theories adopted before the evidence was in, (II) politically interested, (III) financially interested, (IV) hasty and inaccurate in their research, or (V) infatuated with their own theories. In the course of discussions of the whole phenomenon of criticism, a useful strategy may be to single out Epstein's theory for attack, using the attached Fletcher article and Spectator piece for background. (Although Mark Lane's book is much less convincing that Epstein's and comes off badly where confronted by knowledgeable critics, it is also much more difficult to answer as a whole, as one becomes lost in a morass of unrelated details.)
4. In private to media discussions not directed at any particular writer, or in attacking publications which may be yet forthcoming, the following arguments should be useful:
a. No significant new evidence has emerged which the Commission did not consider. The assassination is sometimes compared (e.g., by Joachim Joesten and Bertrand Russell) with the Dreyfus case; however, unlike that case, the attack on the Warren Commission have produced no new evidence, no new culprits have been convincingly identified, and there is no agreement among the critics. (A better parallel, though an imperfect one, might be with the Reichstag fire of 1933, which some competent historians (Fritz Tobias, AJ.P. Taylor, D.C. Watt) now believe was set by Vander Lubbe on his own initiative, without acting for either Nazis or Communists; the Nazis tried to pin the blame on the Communists, but the latter have been more successful in convincing the world that the Nazis were to blame.)
b. Critics usually overvalue particular items and ignore others. They tend to place more emphasis on the recollections of individual witnesses (which are less reliable and more divergent--and hence offer more hand-holds for criticism) and less on ballistics, autopsy, and photographic evidence. A close examination of the Commission's records will usually show that the conflicting eyewitness accounts are quoted out of context, or were discarded by the Commission for good and sufficient reason.
c. Conspiracy on the large scale often suggested would be impossible to conceal in the United States, esp. since informants could expect to receive large royalties, etc. Note that Robert Kennedy, Attorney General at the time and John F. Kennedy's brother, would be the last man to overlook or conceal any conspiracy. And as one reviewer pointed out, Congressman Gerald R. Ford would hardly have held his tongue for the sake of the Democratic administration, and Senator Russell would have had every political interest in exposing any misdeeds on the part of Chief Justice Warren. A conspirator moreover would hardly choose a location for a shooting where so much depended on conditions beyond his control: the route, the speed of the cars, the moving target, the risk that the assassin would be discovered. A group of wealthy conspirators could have arranged much more secure conditions.
d. Critics have often been enticed by a form of intellectual pride: they light on some theory and fall in love with it; they also scoff at the Commission because it did not always answer every question with a flat decision one way or the other. Actually, the make-up of the Commission and its staff was an excellent safeguard against over-commitment to any one theory, or against the illicit transformation of probabilities into certainties.
e. Oswald would not have been any sensible person's choice for a co-conspirator. He was a "loner," mixed up, of questionable reliability and an unknown quantity to any professional intelligence service.
f. As to charges that the Commission's report was a rush job, it emerged three months after the deadline originally set. But to the degree that the Commission tried to speed up its reporting, this was largely due to the pressure of irresponsible speculation already appearing, in some cases coming from the same critics who, refusing to admit their errors, are now putting out new criticisms.
g. Such vague accusations as that "more than ten people have died mysteriously" can always be explained in some natural way e.g.: the individuals concerned have for the most part died of natural causes; the Commission staff questioned 418 witnesses (the FBI interviewed far more people, conduction 25,000 interviews and re interviews), and in such a large group, a certain number of deaths are to be expected. (When Penn Jones, one of the originators of the "ten mysterious deaths" line, appeared on television, it emerged that two of the deaths on his list were from heart attacks, one from cancer, one was from a head-on collision on a bridge, and one occurred when a driver drifted into a bridge abutment.)
5. Where possible, counter speculation by encouraging reference to the Commission's Report itself. Open-minded foreign readers should still be impressed by the care, thoroughness, objectivity and speed with which the Commission worked. Reviewers of other books might be encouraged to add to their account the idea that, checking back with the report itself, they found it far superior to the work of its critics.
Source: http://www.jfklancer.com/CIA.html
Copy of actual memo: http://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=24678&search=concerning_criticism+of+the+warren+report#relPageId=1&tab=page
First brought it up on DU 12 years ago: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x765619
PatrickforO
(15,126 posts)Funny how the document is judiciously ignored, but when you come out with some other idea than the Warren Commission findings then look out!
librechik
(30,790 posts)calling what is in your brain facts is hyperbole to say the least.
ChisolmTrailDem
(9,463 posts)...Octafish post. Not just you stating unequivocally that he is wrong and a "loon".
You guys are always quick to criticize and poke fun, but you fail to produce anything but your derision.
PatrickforO
(15,126 posts)If they presented these plans to Kennedy in 1961 and he told them 'no' it doesn't necessarily mean this was a causal factor in his assassination, but it does make one wonder.
Zen Democrat
(5,901 posts)During this century, new documents and transcripts including voice tapes continue to be uncovered from the AARB and from the presidential libraries of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson. We know that Kennedy was pulling out of Southeast Asia completely, that the murders of Diem and his brother were engineered by CIA-tool Amb. Henry Cabot Lodge, to Kennedy's shock and horror, and that JFK saved the world from nuclear annihilation at the hands of the Joint Chiefs by making a backdoor deal with Kruschev to thwart JSOC efforts at delivering a first strike, which they regarded as critically necessary before the end of 1963. JSOC had no problem with 30 million killed, tops. We know that the Johnson Commission, titularly headed by Earl Warren, was in fact dominated by Allen Dulles, a fascist traitor to this country if ever there was one.
PatrickforO
(15,126 posts)'The Devil's Chessboard?'
I get frustrated sometimes because it seems to me the prohibition on this site and others around conspiracy theories acts to keep new information from arising, and casts new information into unnecessary doubt once it does arise.
I was five when Kennedy was shot, and can remember what my dad told me. He saw footage once, just once, he said, that to him as a combat vet clearly showed the bullets came from the front, not the back. In short, I have always felt the assassination an inside job - a coup-de-etat by the MIC. Now, it seems that new information has indeed arisen around this, and is in this book by Talbot showing Allen Dulles for the monster he was.
Talbot's a somewhat credible historian, and my question to those who moderate on this site is what if he's right?
Because, you see, if it came out in any credible way whatsoever that Kennedy was killed for the sake of potential MIC profits, it might change some things. Oh, I know that putting tin foil hats on people who (giggle) offer up 'conspiracy theories' (titter) is de-rigeur for the corporate-owned media, because the corporations that own the media use them to further their own propaganda and having the American people find out the truth, and that the truth was hidden from them, ridiculed as part of an establishment conspiracy is the last thing they want.
Why? Because they have conspired through neoliberal capitalism to freely move capital, money, and labor anywhere in the world through so-called 'free trade,' and are making their move to end nation states and replace them with corporate governance through TPP. Read it. It's obvious if you can bring yourself to wade through the obtuse language.
So, to end, I'm not saying yea or nay to the idea that Kennedy's assassination was in effect a coup-de-etat by the MIC. All I'm doing is asking how should we all react if that turns out to be true? Will it still be hidden? Ridiculed? Discouraged?
Just wondering.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)The hows and whys of the assassination are so clear that Stevie Wonder could describe the picture.
That book and James Douglass' "JFK and the Unspeakable" leave zero doubts as to why John Kennedy was killed and who had him killed. ZERO.
All of the evidence points in only one direction.
Charles deGaulle thought the CIA approved a hit on him. Yeah, that Charles deGaulle - French resistance leader and President of France for ten years.
deGaulle was certain that Kennedy was killed by the same people who nearly killed him in 1961.
So deGaulle is a woo merchant, too?
treestar
(82,383 posts)if they are OTT they can be disrespectful of the late President Kennedy.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)One example:
http://www.conservativeunderground.com/forum505/archive/index.php/t-51817.html
I'd ask if they're friends of yours, but, you know, I respect you as a DUer, MineralMan.
MineralMan
(147,990 posts)So, no, they're not friends of mine. Why would I go to a website with a name like that? For that matter, why did you?
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Now you're here, "serving" as Forum Host and what-not, helping decide what stays posted and what gets locked.
So, when I see your condescending posts about me, I think of the conservatives, like these:
http://conservativecave.com/index.php?topic=99014.0
MineralMan
(147,990 posts)But, yes, I'm here. I was banned from Free Republic in 2006 for "anti-Freeping" and haven't been back there since. You also mention another site in a link. They make fun of me there, too, along with a lot of active DUers. They might make fun of you, too, although I don't visit that site more than a couple of times a year, just to see who wins their little contest.
Just keep on posting. Don't pay any attention to what others say. That's my advice.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Otherwise, you're helping smear me.
MineralMan
(147,990 posts)weird theories based on questionable websites. Sorry. JFK CT stuff is part of all that. Good luck in all your endeavors.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)The Warren Commission's theory is that LHO acted alone.
Thanks to Allen Dulles and J Edgar Hoover, they didn't even bother investigating the possibility of co-conspirators. They also did not mention that the CIA had contracted the Mafia to murder Fidel Castro in 1960, when Eisenhower was president and Dulles headed CIA:
So, if the 1960 election had gone according to plan, Nixon would've been president during the Bay of Pigs. From all accounts, he likely would've sent in the Marines, along with the Army, Navy, Air Force and Coast Guard, making Allen Dulles and Meyer Lansky and all their rich and corrupt friends very, very happy again.
AUG 1960: Richard Bissell meets with Colonel Sheffield Edwards, director of the CIA's Office of Security, and discusses with him ways to eliminate or assassinate Fidel Castro. Edwards proposes that the job be done by assassins hand-picked by the American underworld, specifically syndicate interests who have been driven out of their Havana gambling casinos by the Castro regime. Bissell gives Edwards the go-ahead to proceed. Between August 1960, and April 1961, the CIA with the help of the Mafia pursues a series of plots to poison or shot Castro. The CIA’s own internal report on these efforts states that these plots "were viewed by at least some of the participants as being merely one aspect of the over-all active effort to overthrow the regime that culminated in the Bay of Pigs." (CIA, Inspector General's Report on Efforts to Assassinate Fidel Castro, p. 3, 14)
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/bayofpigs/chron.html
Details on the actual sit-down:
Ever wonder about the sanity of America's leaders? Take a close look at perhaps the most bizarre plot in U.S. intelligence history
By Bryan Smith
Chicago Magazine
November 2007
(page 4 of 6)
EXCERPT...
By September 1960, the project was proceeding apace. Roselli would report directly to Maheu. The first step was a meeting in New York. There, at the Plaza Hotel, Maheu introduced Roselli to O'Connell. The agent wanted to cover up the participation of the CIA, so he pretended to be a man named Jim Olds who represented a group of wealthy industrialists eager to get rid of Castro so they could get back in business.
"We may know some people," Roselli said. Several weeks later, they all met at the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami. For years, the luxurious facility had served as the unofficial headquarters for Mafioso leaders seeking a base close to their gambling interests in Cuba. Now, it would be the staging area for the assassination plots.
At a meeting in one of the suites, Roselli introduced Maheu to two men: Sam Gold and a man Roselli referred to as Joe, who could serve as a courier to Cuba. By this time, Roselli was on to O'Connell. "I'm not kidding," Roselli told the agent one day. "I know who you work for. But I'm not going to ask you to confirm it."
Roselli may have figured out that he was dealing with the CIA, but neither Maheu nor O'Connell realized the rank of mobsters with whom they were dealing. That changed when Maheu picked up a copy of the Sunday newspaper supplement Parade, which carried an article laying out the FBI's ten most wanted criminals. Leading the list was Sam Giancana, a.k.a. "Mooney," a.k.a. "Momo," a.k.a. "Sam the Cigar," a Chicago godfather who was one of the most feared dons in the country—and the man who called himself Sam Gold. "Joe" was also on the list. His real name, however, was Santos Trafficante—the outfit's Florida and Cuba chieftain.
Maheu alerted O'Connell. "My God, look what we're involved with," Maheu said. O'Connell told his superiors. Questioned later before the 1975 U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (later nicknamed the Church Committee after its chairman, Frank Church, the Democratic senator from Idaho), O'Connell was asked whether there had ever been any discussion about asking two men on the FBI's most wanted list to carry out a hit on a foreign leader.
"Not with me there wasn't," O'Connell answered.
"And obviously no one said stop—and you went ahead."
"Yes."
"Did it bother you at all?"
"No," O'Connell answered, "it didn't."
CONTINUED...
http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/November-2007/How-the-CIA-Enlisted-the-Chicago-Mob-to-Put-a-Hit-on-Castro/index.php?cparticle=4&siarticle=3
Yet, the Mighty Wurlitzer plays the false tune that Kennedy was the guy who wanted Castro dead.
Spies: Ex-CIA Agent In Raleigh Says Castro Knew About JFK Assassination Ahead Of Time
Former CIA agent and author Brian Latell in Raleigh
By The Raleigh Telegram
RALEIGH – A noted former Central Intelligence Agency officer, author, and scholar who is intimately knowledgeable about Cuba and Fidel Castro, says he believes there is evidence that Castro’s government knew about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963 ahead of time.
SNIP...
Robert Kennedy, as the Attorney General of the United States, was in charge of the operation, said Latell. Despite the United States’ best efforts, the operation was nonetheless penetrated by Cuban intelligence agents, said Latell.
Latell said there were two serious assassination attempts by the United States against Castro that even used members of the mafia to help, but both of them were obviously unsuccessful.
He also said that there was a plot by the United States to have Castro jabbed with a pen containing a syringe filled with a very effective poison. Latell said that he believes the experienced assassin who worked for Castro who originally agreed to the plan may have been a double agent. After meeting with a personal representative of Robert Kennedy in Paris, the man knew that the plan to assassinate Castro came from the highest levels of the government, including John F. and Robert Kennedy.
The plan was never carried out, as the man later defected to the United States, but with so many double agents working for Castro also pledging allegiance to the CIA, Latell said it was likely that the information got back to Havana that the Kennedy brothers endorsed that plot with the pen.
CONTINUED...
http://raleightelegram.com/201209123311
So, the CIA hired the Mafia to murder Fidel Castrol -- led at the time by the same Allen Dulles. That's no theory, that's fact.
Rex
(65,616 posts)Last edited Tue Nov 24, 2015, 01:18 PM - Edit history (1)
I see it now Octa, never really noticed before but H2Oman is on the money. Not a one of them will debate you on these issues. No wonder they cannot stand you posting here. I get it now.
Wow...to think all this time it was that petty and over jealousy. Hard to tell with supposed skeptics, because some really are the real thing.
Maybe one day you will get one of them to debate you...but I doubt it ever, they are way out of their field of expertise. Again...this is funny...seeing it now as it is. Jealousy over lack of critical thinking.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)The great DUer blm once invited Rush Limbaugh to debate with me about BCCI. Vulgar Pigboy never answered.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4831131
Among my treasured moments on DU, Rex, along with this one!
H2O Man
(75,779 posts)he is.
I do not "alert" on posts, even one that is as obviously in violation of the rules here as those found throughout this OP/thread. Indeed, in this case, I look at what is being posted as a badge of honor ....evidence that your contributions annoy certain types of people. And that's a good thing -- a person can be measured by their enemies.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Democracy.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)MineralMan
(147,990 posts)I simply brush off comments about out-of-context things I wrote 6 years ago and before.
They are almost always made by folks who can't really refute something I'm saying now, as if those references had any real meaning.
bravenak
(34,648 posts)lonestarnot
(77,097 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)"I don't do 'conspiracy theories.'"
What the hell have we been living since Nov. 22, 1963, then? Wars without end for black gold and corporate rulers, middle class and good jobs evaporating as banksters who looted the Treasury get billions in taxpayer-financed bonuses and TPP no-bid legislation, and the richest times in human history show almost ALL the money going into the pockets of the multi-millionaires and billionaires.
Oh, well. That's just the way things "are." No use in asking questions about it.
ChisolmTrailDem
(9,463 posts)...
CONSPIRACIES!!!
alcibiades_mystery
(36,437 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)
George Wallace and his third wife, the former Lisa Taylor, meet with Vice President George Bush and Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton at a lobster bake at Bush's residence at Kennebunkport, Maine, July 30, 1983. The third Mrs. Wallace, whom the governor married in 1981, was 30 years his junior and half of a country-western singing duo, Mona and Lisa, who had performed during his campaign in 1968.
CREDIT: AP/Birmingham Post
SOURCE: http://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/george-wallace/13/
George Wallace did all he could to oppose President Kennedy and his administration's policy to integrate public schools, including the University of Alabama.
Something else important to know: Wallace’s running mate in 1968 was Gen. Curtis LeMay, who exhibited insubordination to President Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
wendylaroux
(2,925 posts)i would rather jump off a bridge before I sat at a table with those people!Jesus Christ!!
Octafish
(55,745 posts)
http://www.pierogi2000.com/2011/03/mark-lombardi-at-pierogi/lombardibillclintonlippo5/
http://bombmagazine.org/article/2587/mark-lombardi
ChisolmTrailDem
(9,463 posts)wendylaroux
(2,925 posts)on this underground message board place.
So what the hell????? people voting against themselves?
what is going on??????????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:
MADem
(135,425 posts)People, that "damning picture" is a photograph of a GOVERNOR's GATHERING, attended by most if not all of the governors of the states of the USA, that was hosted by the Vice President of the USA, GHW Bush. To his right is GOVERNOR Bill Clinton, and to his left is GOVERNOR George Wallace.
Shit--trying to make it like Bill and Racist George went up to Kenny-bunk-port to conspire with GHW....
SMH.
For shame.
Loook....LOOOOOOOOK!!!! Here's JFK passing Bill Clinton the key to the secret room in the White House....once Bill got that key, he knew he had to do everything he could to become President and learn all of the Secret Society Secrets of the Grand Order of Horseshit Conspirators....Oooooooooh woooooooooooo!!!!
Octafish
(55,745 posts)As for the rest of your shaming, I remember you as the poster who put words in my mouth to shame me when I wrote about the State Department and the TPP all up and down this thread:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10027079972
LOL, It's MADem!
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Guide of Good Practices for Occupational Radiological Protection in Plutonium Facilities
EXCERPT...
4.2.3 Characteristics of Plutonium Contamination
There are few characteristics of plutonium contamination that are unique. Plutonium
contamination may be in many physical and chemical forms. (See Section 2.0 for the many
potential sources of plutonium contamination from combustion products of a plutonium fire
to radiolytic products from long-term storage.) [font color="green"]The one characteristic that many believe is
unique to plutonium is its ability to migrate with no apparent motive force. Whether from
alpha recoil or some other mechanism, plutonium contamination, if not contained or
removed, will spread relatively rapidly throughout an area. [/font color]
SOURCE (PDF file format): http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2013/07/f2/doe-std-1128-98_cn2.pdf
It's almost weird when I get mocked on DU by the Flock who swarm around those who dare mention the crimes of the national security state, whether they regard covering up nuclear contamination or the assassination of President Kennedy.
A Public Service Announcement about Plutonium
TEPCO - Plutonium is not dangerous. Where is the Boss?
Fukushima, Plutonium, CIA, and the BFEE: Deep Doo-Doo Four Ways to Doomsday
Before and After photo show significant tsunami damage...
On the Poet's Trail
Helicopter pictures show devastation inside Fukushima reactor towers
Governments Covering Up Nuclear Meltdowns for 50 Years to Protect the Nuclear Power Industry
Surviving Chernobyl Cleaner: 'Tell The People Of Japan To Run!'
What part of what he said wasn't true?
First thing I'd do if I were fighting this nuclear disaster is get the Team the best gear.
The Return of Nukespeak
TEPCO - Plutonium is not dangerous. Where's the Boss?
Toxic plutonium seeping from Japan's nuclear plant
Japan's Nuclear Rescuers: 'Inevitable Some of Them May Die Within Weeks'
Fukushima from Space
Absolutely. A real shame - man's hubris.
Japan Nuclear Power Plants
A more-recent satellite image of Fukushima Daiichi reactors 1-4...
The SCALE of the devastation is incredible.
Jimmy Carter, USN - Nuclear Hero
Utility Engineer Warned of Tsunami Threat at Japanese Nuclear Plant
Voyage to Fukushima Daiichi
TEPCO was warned and took the cheapskate's way out.
Fukushima owners failed to follow emergency manual - report
The people's ancestors left monuments to remind them of the dangers...
Fukushima tsunami plan a single page
Doubts deepen over TEPCO truthfulness after president's sightseeing trip uncovered
Atomic Samurai -IAEA Humbled By Worker Courage at Fukushima Daiichi
Fukushima Radiation Data Quarantined by Governments of Japan and the United States. Why?
Absolutely. And some, if not most, cancer deaths can be avoided with forewarning and knowledge.
''We never meant to conceal the information, but it never occurred to us to make it public.''
Fukushima Daiichi Mystery Man Steps Forward
The Fukushima Crisis Demonstrates how Lowly the Global Elites Hold the Common People
Plutonium detected 40km from Fukushima plant
Trivializing Fukushima
''We never meant to conceal the information, but it never occurred to us to make it public.''
In regards to Fukushima, the only thing TEPCO has successfully buried is the Truth.
TEPCO was warned and took the cheapskate's way out.
Trivializing Fukushima
Citizen Testing Finds 20 Radioactive Hot Spots Around Tokyo
Japan Fukushima plant dismantling needs over 30 yrs
Fukushima Typhoon raising radioactive water levels in contaminated buildings.
Fukushima owners failed to follow emergency manual - report
Fukushima and the Nuclear Establishment - The Big Lies Fly High
I've tried to make up for lack of news coverage, using DU as a news medium. Show me where I claim, even once, to be an expert. As I've stated elsewhere on this thread, please show where they're wrong, pintobean. I'll be happy to admit the mistake.
UTUSN
(72,705 posts)Please don't be ambiguous. Thanks.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Did you see this, UTUSN, from David Talbot?
http://www.salon.com/2015/11/22/inside_the_plot_to_kill_jfk_the_secret_story_of_the_cia_and_what_really_happened_in_dallas/
And we get to spread it, seeing how the nation's news media are AWOL, and the super rich keep getting richer and the middle class disappear into the mass of poor, while the planet is pillaged in wars without end on innocent nations. WTF.
cwydro
(51,308 posts)Everyday I tune into DU to see what the bug people are up to, and who is slinging poo at whom.
But I sure didn't expect to see a flame war based on a long dead president.
trumad
(41,692 posts)I'm retiring BS'ers and switching to Bug People!
Hilaraious. 
cwydro
(51,308 posts)Goes for the swatters as well.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Ideas like democracy, justice, equality, education, science, public works, commonwealth of man, culture, the arts...
7wo7rees, THIS is why it is worth it. President Kennedy represented what might be , like going to the moon and world peace, if only we try.
Waiting For Everyman
(9,385 posts)don't have as much worthwhile to say as 1 paragraph of an Octafish post.
Stupid. Trashing.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)'fish has forgotten ten times as much as those morans will ever know.
Zorra
(27,670 posts)and don't need to see the others.
Because...like you said.
smiley
(1,432 posts)😊
Go Vols
(5,902 posts)NCTraveler
(30,481 posts)
SidDithers
(44,273 posts)this thread is all kinds of awesome.
Sid
trumad
(41,692 posts)Indeed it is. 
Godhumor
(6,437 posts)So wonderful to behold.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Like the time you got angry because I wrote about Don Siegelman. You tried to smear me as all sorts of vile things.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022073759
Still waiting for you to show where I'm wrong or vile, SidDithers of DU.
SidDithers
(44,273 posts)for linking to, and therefore legitimizing and promoting, the work of racist, anti-Semitic, and homophobic bigots.
Every time you linked to an article authored by Paul Craig Roberts, you promoted and legitimized someone who holds odious white-nationalist views, and who should be toxic to anyone claiming to be progressive.
Every time you linked to an article authored by Wayne Madsen, you promoted and legitimized someone who holds odious homophobic views, and who should be toxic to anyone claiming to be progressive.
Every time you linked to an article authored by Christopher Bollyn, you promoted and legitimized someone who holds odious anti-Semitic views, and who should be toxic to anyone claiming to be progressive.
The reality is that you've continued to promote and legitimize these authors, even after being made aware of the odious views they hold.
For the millionth time, THAT is the issue that I have with the material you post at DU.
The question that YOU never answer is: if you know that Roberts is a racist piece of shit, and that Madsen is an homopohobic piece of shit, and that Bollyn is an anti-Semitic piece of shit, why do you insist on using them as source material? Do you not care about their odious opinions? Do you dispute that they hold those odious opinions? Do you agree with those odious opinions?
Sid
Octafish
(55,745 posts)
[font size="8"][font color="red"]So show, SidDithers of DU, any examples of where Octafish is a racist or homophobe: Please post. [/font color][/font size]
SidDithers
(44,273 posts)please, and try to understand the words that I typed.
They're very clear, and do not, in any way, say what you apparently think they do.
Sid
Octafish
(55,745 posts)That is the issue, SidDithers of Du.
treestar
(82,383 posts)Aren't there any sources not tainted with the racism, homophobia, or anti-Semitism?
Octafish
(55,745 posts)You can also find someone to say anything you want about someone else's sources. Ask Marquette professor, er, former professor John McAdams, great guy, a man of integrity, apart from what he's done as a professional JFK conspiracy theory debunker and noted right winger, a supporter of the likes of Scott Walker.
So, please: Show where I posted anything racist, homophobic or anti-Semitic.
Otherwise, it serves as smear.
7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)Honestly you just can't talk this way. Just not right, not acceptable. Period.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)I just tell the truth as I see it regarding secret government.
For those who don't think I'm worth reading -- great! No problem. No hurt feelings on my part, certainly.
All I ask is to show where I'm wrong.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)If you can't show where I'm wrong, all you got is your theory.
Seems you're wrong about my cult, too. That seems to me like a smear, Orrex.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)You aren't the arbiter of truth, and you have indeed been proven wrong many times over. The fact that you don't admit it is immaterial to me.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)All I said is "Show where I'm wrong."
Seems to me you and my real fan club -- those that have hounded me for years on DU -- want to shut me up.
Big difference.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)It is up to you to prove them, and you haven't done so. You've said that you've done so, but that's about it.
That's a classic tactic of the conspiracy theorist: "I must be right because you haven't proven me wrong." Sorry, but it doesn't work that way.
I certainly don't read all of your posts nor all of the responses to them, but I've never seen one that calls for you to shut up. Since I would never presume to suggest that you suffer from delusions of persecution, I'm sure you can provide links to some of the many examples of people trying to shut you up.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)For the record: Every post I make regarding the Kennedy and Dr. King assassinations uses sources and links to show where I got my information. If there was any theory, it would be easy to spot.
So. Show where I'm wrong:
First they came for ConsortiumNews, and I did not speak out—
Jimmy Hoffa disappeared 40 years ago today
James Randi: debunking the king of the debunkers
Always pushing the goal posts, changing the subject, diverting attention to sideshow, attacking the messenger... what's that called?
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Also, even if someone were to call you a liar, that's not the same as wanting you to shut up. For that matter, even if someone wanted you to shut up, that doesn't mean that you're telling the truth. It could simply mean that you're annoying; it's not up to me to guess at others' motivations.
Of course, I still wouldn't presume to suggest that you suffer from delusions of persecution.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Professional grade smear, that one.
BTW: You still can't show where I'm wrong, so you demand me to prove I'm right. Now that's crazy.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)In fact, I stated exactly the opposite:
In claiming that I accused you of mental illness, you accuse me falsely.
You can you possibly believe that this is not the responsibility of the claimant?
Octafish
(55,745 posts)But, you don't, Orrex. That means that what you look like really is what you are: A Time Waster.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Provide a direct quote in which I made that accusation. Otherwise you must either retract that accusation or else admit that you're lying.
You, however, did make an accusation of mental illness, as I demonstrated with a direct quote. But if you're lying in your claim that I've accused you of mental illness, then one wonders what other dishonesty might crop up in your posts.
Hmm...
Octafish
(55,745 posts)They're your words, Orrex.
So, show where I'm wrong.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)It's an explicit statement that I don't accuse you of being delusional.
How can you not see the difference?
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Get a grip.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)You seem very eager to paint yourself as the victim of a conspiracy. Why?
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Show where I'm wrong.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)It's not up to me to disprove your claims; it's up to you to prove them.
If you don't like it, then that's your problem. It's clearly no justification for you to lie about me.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)If you don't want to read what I write, what compels you to respond to it?
Orrex
(64,326 posts)You link to racists, anti-semites, homophobes and conspiracy theorists. Can you perhaps understand how these might be seen as inadequate or unreliable? You also claim that you write "the truth as (you) see it;" by linking to those sources, you're telling us that you see them as truth, with all of their hatred and bigotry.
If you don't like people taking issue with your sources, then pick better sources. If your claims are indeed the truth, rather than the fevered ramblings of racists and the like, then surely you can find objective sources to corroborate your claims.
And don't flatter yourself; I definitely don't read everything you post, because I allow only limited time for reading drivel. But occasionally the silliness reaches a boil and I am therefore inclined to respond to it. I certainly don't feel compelled to do it.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Drivel, you said.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Whatever else can be said about you, whether it's your explicit and demonstrable dishonesty, your need to respond to critics with accusations of mental illness, your mysterious fondness for anti-Semitic, racist, or homophobic source material, or your failure to understand how rhetoric works, perhaps your greatest weakness is that demonstrate no capacity for serious self-reflection.
That, in the end, may be your tragedy. You have knowledgeable people explicitly pointing out the flaws in your posts and your methodology, and rather than considering that maybe--just maybe--their criticisms have some merit, you immediately insult them while claiming to be the victim of a years-long plot to shut you up. Many of your acolytes follow suit, assuming that any rejection of your theory-du-jour is an anti-Octafish conspiracy.
Now that I think of it, I guess I understand exactly how you attract these fawning acolytes: a certain kind of pro-conspiracy mindset is very receptive to the notion that the consensus is deliberately aligned against them. To them, it's not possible that the consensus might be correct; the victim starts with the conclusion that he's the victim, and their perception is tailored to support that conclusion.
Of course, I certainly don't presume to diagnose mental illness, so you needn't waste time making that bullshit accusation again, but such behaviors are indeed consistent with a general expectation of the conspiracy theorist.
Rather than incessantly demanding that your critics "show you where you're wrong," perhaps you might try to consider objectively why they conclude that you're incorrect. Currently, you simply declare it by fiat and you pretend that you've proven some point.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)-- Aristotle, On Sophistry
http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/sophist_refut.3.3.html
Orrex
(64,326 posts)If not, then why did you post that link, except to demonstrate again that you are impervious to self-reflection?
Also, show me where I'm wrong.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)While the personal attacks are interesting, all they show is what kind of things go through your mind.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Of course, your posts lacked credibility already, so it's simply more of the same.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)You can't.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)I made a positive claim and you're demanding that I support it.
But when YOU make a positive claim, you demand that others refute it.
Why do you think you're entitled to special accommodation in this regard? You truly seem not to understand how to formulate an argument.
Also, you misquoted me, since I didn't claim that you promote them; I observed correctly that you endorse them (by linking to them). However, I'll conclude that you misquoted me due to your ineptitude and not because of your demonstrated dishonesty.
Show that you haven't linked to racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists.
ucrdem
(15,720 posts)Orrex
(64,326 posts)He makes numerous claims, and he demands that others refute them. Why do you find it acceptable when he does it?
Beyond that, in this thread alone I've repeatedly documented my claim that Octafish has lied about me, so I have no responsibility to document it again. Further, SidDithers has demonstrated in this very thread that Octafish links to (and thereby endorses) racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists for source material. Since this has also been documented, I have no responsibility to document it again.
The next fan club meeting should probably open with a review of basic rhetoric and the basic process of selecting legitimate source material.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Thankfully, I won't. It's that I can't stomach hypocrisy. Nor do I think that anybody is better than anybody else -- even after reading your posts, which is setting the bar pretty low.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)If a demonstration of your dishonesty is sufficient to make you consider switching parties, then I urge you to go, because you couldn't have been much of a Democrat in the first place. Given your demonstrated habit of endorsing racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists, I'm not surprised that you would feel kinship with the GOP.
And you accuse me of hypocrisy? That would be laughable if it weren't so pathetic. Your entire rhetorical style is based on hypocrisy, because you certainly hold a different standard for your critics than you hold for yourself.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)My only reply to the OP in this entire thread is Reply Number 8.
SO, when you write:
If a demonstration of your dishonesty is sufficient to make you consider switching parties, then I urge you to go, because you couldn't have been much of a Democrat in the first place. Given your demonstrated habit of endorsing racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists, I'm not surprised that you would feel kinship with the GOP.
And you accuse me of hypocrisy? That would be laughable if it weren't so pathetic. Your entire rhetorical style is based on hypocrisy, because you certainly hold a different standard for your critics than you hold for yourself.
It is a smear.
Otherwise, you'd show where I post any of that on Reply Number 8 or any other post I've made.
Almost forgot: How many hours do you figure you've spent harassing me on this thread? Interesting.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)How much time do you spend reading those racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists daily?
As for your accusation that I'm smearing you, well that's yet another lie. I have documented your dishonesty in this thread, and I have documented numerous instances in which you've held your critics to a higher standard than you hold yourself, so I've shown you to be a hyporcrite.
If you consider the truth to be a smear, then maybe you have a problem with truth. Given your demonstrated dishonesty, I'm not surprised.
ucrdem
(15,720 posts)Orrex
(64,326 posts)elias49
(4,259 posts)And you believe whatever the Mainstream Media tells you I guess. America would never do wrong!
And that's not a conspiracy theory. Though you may think it is.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Believe Octafish's zaniness (with his hyperlinks to anti-semitic, racist and homophobic conspiracy theorists, etc.) versus believing the mainstream media?
Thanks, but neither option appeals to me.
elias49
(4,259 posts)not spoon-fed from the bastions of good journalism. Whatever flavor you choose.
CT
CT
Try keeping an open mind.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)What did I ever do to you?
Orrex
(64,326 posts)You accuse me of of being "crazy" of and of being "obsessive."
For another, you've lied about me in this very thread, almost immediately after I'd stated outright that I don't find you dishonest. Shame on me for giving you the benefit of the doubt.
For yet another, you post links to demonstrated homophobes, anti-semites and racists. This is a disservice to your fawning acolytes and to DU as a whole.
And on a final note, you cheapen the ambient discourse by demanding that your critics "show you where you're wrong," and then pretending that they've failed to do so. This is also a failure of your rhetoric because you seem not to recognize that the burden of evidence is on the claimaint and not on the critic.
I have a suspicion that you will now demand that I show where you have done this, to which I reply that you've done it several times in this thread, and at this point your failure to see it can only be deliberate.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)So now you are angry. Too bad. So sad.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)You've accused me of being crazy, of being obsessive, and of being angry. Those are three explicit lies.
For the zillionth time, it's not my responsibility to prove that you're wrong; it's up to you to show that you're right.
Show me that you're right or else admit that you don't know how discourse works.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Show where.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)You accused me of being obsessive, and I am not obsessive. That was one of your lies.
You accused me of being crazy, and I am not crazy. That was another of your lies.
You accused me of being angry, and I am not angry. That was still another of your lies.
You've also claimed that I've accused you of mental illness, and I did not. That was yet another of your lies.
If you dispute any of these, show us that you did not make those accusations.
That's four lies, right in this very thread. How many lies do you get to post before it's fair to call you a liar?
Octafish
(55,745 posts)You never did answer why you feel so uh compelled to write about what I write. That's weird.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Do they not see through your shtick?
And what the hell is this about?
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Like GEICO, it's what you do.
And yet, you still have yet to show where I'm wrong, which you don't.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Instead, as has been pointed out repeatedly (and correctly), you've linked to racist homophobic, anti-Semitic source material. Since you declare yourself to post "the truth as (you) see it," we conclude that you find these wretched sources to be true. That speaks volumes about you, about your rhetoric and about your fawning acolytes.
Why do you imagine that criticism of your posts can only be motivated by mental illness? That's some serious hubris on your part, as well as being an implied ad hominem attack (i.e., "only a mentally ill person could disagree with me."
You demonstrate very limited vision, questionable taste in source material, and a severe disregard for effective discourse.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)That's why I source what I post. That's why I use links. That's why I ask you to show where what I post is wrong.
And you never do.
Is that crazy, or what?
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Unlike you, I don't presume to diagnose mental illness, so I can't say whether your choice of sources is crazy.
But it is indeed interesing, especially given your conspicuously eager offer to switch to the GOP.
SidDithers
(44,273 posts)I and I hope that you, like Wesley and Buttercup, can find a way to extricate yourself.
Sid
Orrex
(64,326 posts)
Iggo
(48,532 posts) Octafish
(55,745 posts)For years. As you don't show where I'm wrong, I have to assume you can't.
Act_of_Reparation
(9,116 posts)Show me where I'm wrong.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Stating something like that on a thread like this makes me think a poster like you only serves disinformationists.
Act_of_Reparation
(9,116 posts)Someone sounds bought.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)What's weird, to me, are those who do it for free.
treestar
(82,383 posts)anything shown to be a problem just becomes part of the conspiracy.
The person asserting the theory should be the one to prove it.
The most proof we have about JFK is that Oswald shot him. And no proof he planned with anyone else. Just assertions that he might have.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)The preponderance of evidence we have shows Oswald had extensive ties to US Ingelligence. Two pioneering works on the subject are "Spy Saga: Lee Harvey Oswald and US Intelligence" by Philip Melanson and "Oswald and the CIA" by John Newman. The CIA had been monitoring Oswald's actions in the weeks before the assassination. The story was covered up, but has been chronicled by Jefferson Morley in "Our Man in Mexico City: Winston Scott and the Hidden History of the CIA."
Oswald's story was used by people in government to tie the assassination to the communists, hoping to start that World War the commie haters so wanted. Why would anyone want to do that, besides to help start World War III?
For those interested in the details: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=1955&search=newman
LBJ's taped phone conversations show that the Warren Commission was established to put a lid on conspiracy talk that would lead to that conclusion. A transcript of a conservation with Sen. Richard Russell:
Telephone Conversation between the President and Senator Russell, 29 Nov 1963, 8:55PM
EXCERPT...
I told Warren...Warren told me he wouldn't do it under any circumstances
...didn't think the Supreme Court Justice ought to go..wouldn't have any-
thing to do with it..he said a man that criticized this fellow that went on the
Nuremberg trial...Jackson...he told me what he thought about Goldberg
...he thought that was terrible...and I said let me read you one report..and
there's 40 million Americans involved here...
Well you want me to tell you the truth? You know what happened?
Bobby and them went up to see him today and he turned them down cold and
said NO. Two hours later I called him and ordered him down here and he
didn't want to come. I insisted he come..came down here and told me No
twice and I just pulled out what Hoover told me about a little incident in
Mexico City and I say now, I don't want Mr. Kruschev to be told tomorrow
and be testifying before a camera that he killed this fellow
..and that Castro killed him and all I want you to do is look at the facts and
bring in any other facts you want in here and determined who killed the
President and I think you can put on your uniform of World War I..fat as you
are...and do anything you could to save one American life...and I'm
surprised that you the Chief justice (sic) of the U.S. would turn me down..
And he started crying and said, well I won't turn you down..I'll just do
whatever you say..but he turned the General down...
SOURCE: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.html?docId=912&relPageId=7
LBJ even made Earl Warren cry about it, forcing him to take the job.
The best book on the Warren Commission I've read is "Breach of Trust: How the Warren Commission Failed the Nation and Why" by Gerald D. McKnight.
treestar
(82,383 posts)of all kinds, but it doesn't prove he conspired with others in the CIA. Nobody else has been found in 50 years to have conspired with Oswald.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Ex-CIA director Allen Dulles, fired by JFK over the Bay of Pigs fiasco, somehow ended up on the Warren Commission. In his work, he explained to his fellow commissioners that a CIA agent could be expected to lie under oath to protect his status. Harold Weisberg documented the episode by using FOIA to access the WC secret session minutes.
So in the 1970s, when the House Select Committee on Assassinations were going through CIA assassination-related files, the agency stopped cooperating -- appointing one George Joannides to serve as liaison in place of an officer who had cooperated with the HSCA. They also failed to mention to the committee that Joannides, back in 1963, had served as their case officer monitoring the DRE, a violently anti-Castro Cuban terrorist organization that had a "confrontation" with "pro-Castro" Oswald in New Orleans.
It's worth knowing, in part, because the DRE's leaders were among those who reported to the press that Oswald, the assassin, was a defector to the USSR, linked to Castro and the communist cause.
Jefferson Morley, author and former Washington Post reporter, has followed the still-evolving story.
http://jfkfacts.org/assassination/cia-our-jfk-story-is-no-longer-operative/
ucrdem
(15,720 posts)Every Nov. 22 DU puts up great JFK tribute threads and Octa's are always at the top of the list and that's just one reason I'm happy to K'n'R.
So K'n'R!
Octafish
(55,745 posts)From someone much smarter and better educated than I can ever be, thanks to birth and probation:
The Warrant Report
Tim Madigan on the philosophers who investigated the Kennedy assassination.
EXCERPT...
It is a remarkable fact that three of the earliest and most influential critics of the Warren Report were professional philosophers – Bertrand Russell, Richard Popkin and Josiah Thompson. Russell, who was 91 years old at the time of the shooting, was one of the first prominent individuals to raise serious questions about the report, even before it was completed. In early 1964 he helped organize the ‘Who Killed Kennedy Committee’, and befriended attorney Mark Lane, author of the first major critique of the Warren Report, Rush to Judgment. Writing from his home in Wales and guided by Lane’s investigations, Russell issued his ‘Sixteen Questions on the Assassination’ a few weeks before the Report came out. Raising doubts about the impartiality, credibility and competency of the Commission, he pointed out that all of its members – who were appointed directly by President Lyndon Johnson – were deeply connected with the Washington establishment, especially its secretive investigative agencies, the CIA and the FBI. Some of the Commission could be suspected of having a vested interest in covering up uncomfortable facts about their own strained relations with the late president. For instance, Commission member Allen Dulles, former head of the CIA, had been fired by Kennedy after the Bay of Pigs fiasco in 1961. Not a single Commissioner, Russell asserted, would have been accepted as an impartial member of a jury if Oswald had been tried (a moot point after Oswald’s own murder by Jack Ruby a few days after the JFK shooting). Russell also raised questions about the fact that several people in Dealey Plaza at the time of the assassination had claimed to hear bullets being fired from in front of the President. Such claims were dismissed by the Commissioners, who seemed dedicated to proving that all bullets had been fired solely by Oswald, from behind the presidential motorcade. While accepting the well-known point that witness testimony is often unreliable, Russell nonetheless expressed his worries that the Commissioners were so eager to prove Oswald was the lone gunman that they ignored evidence contradicting this. Most of all, Russell asked why the Report’s conclusion was known well before the investigation was completed. This seemed to go against all the proper methods of truth-gathering and rules of logic, and looked more like an attempt to make the premises fit the conclusion rather than having the conclusion follow from the premises.
Shortly after the Warren Report was issued, Richard Popkin, then a Professor of Philosophy at the University of California at San Diego, wrote a highly influential article for the New York Review of Books entitled ‘The Second Oswald: The Case for a Conspiracy Theory’ (later expanded into a book). Popkin argued that if one used just the Warren Report as evidence, then one must necessarily conclude that there had to have been at least two Lee Harvey Oswalds for all the various details of the Report to make sense. The government’s own case for a lone gunman contradicted itself.
Popkin admitted that reading all 26 volumes of the report was a daunting task – especially as at the time there was no index for the work – but it was a labour he was up to. Popkin was noted for his encyclopedic memory, his ability to put together disparate facts (as witnessed by his investigative work in the history of ideas, which detailed previously unknown connections between various Sixteenth Century theologians and philosophers) and his dogged pursuit of problems. Popkin, a student of Skepticism, basically cast a skeptical eye on the purported solid evidence offered by the Warren Commission to prove that there was no conspiracy. If there was more than one ‘Lee Harvey Oswald’ who was at more than one place simultaneously, or more than one person purporting to be Oswald, then there had to be a conspiracy. Thus, the Warren Report proved the very opposite of its own conclusion.
SNIP...
Here lies the continuing epistemological nightmare of the Kennedy shooting. Will we ever know what actually happened that day? There have recently been Warren Report defenders such as Gerald Posner (Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK, 1994) and Vincent Bugliosi, the prosecutor of the Manson family, who just published Reclaiming History: the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy (2007), a 1,632 page book in which Bugliosi painstakingly attempts to answer every criticism of the Report. But there remains something deeply unsatisfactory about the Report. Whether because of the shoddy nature of the Commission’s investigations, the uncertainties and contradictions of the eyewitness interviews, the ulterior motives of the Commissioners and their aides, or other more controversial reasons, the very public murder of President Kennedy continues to nag at our collective consciousness. The trail grows colder, but questions remain – questions initially raised by three devoted professional truth seekers.
SOURCE: https://philosophynow.org/issues/66/The_Warrant_Report
Now, that's the logical -- the philosophical -- perspective. What the author doesn't bring up is the information that Allen Dulles withheld from the Warren Commission, specifically the Mafia-CIA plots to assassinate Castro. Going from what we've learned since 1963 and the Warren Report in 1964, Dulles and CIA actions have more than a potential bearing on the case. They also are proof of obstruction of justice.
ucrdem
(15,720 posts)Retired PhDs seem to be particularly well suited for truth telling when it comes to big lies. That was the case with some early 911 books too.
Robbins
(5,066 posts)putting more and more clinton supporters on ignore list causes me to not see most of replies here is that saying something
about how people see JFK among our 2 groups.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Unlike JFK, who worked for peace, Nuland was a John Bolton-Condoleezza Rice like holdover at State. For those ignorant of history, as well as for those who act that way, the neocons are the ones who pushed for the wars on Iraq, Libya, Syria, Iran, and recently Ukraine.
Neocons and Liberals Together, Again
The neoconservative Project for the New American Century (PNAC) has signaled its intention to continue shaping the government's national security...
Tom Barry, last updated: February 02, 2005
The neoconservative Project for the New American Century (PNAC) has signaled its intention to continue shaping the government's national security strategy with a new public letter stating that the "U.S. military is too small for the responsibilities we are asking it to assume." Rather than reining in the imperial scope of U.S. national security strategy as set forth by the first Bush administration, PNAC and the letter's signatories call for increasing the size of America's global fighting machine.
SNIP...
Liberal Hawks Fly with the Neocons
The recent PNAC letter to Congress was not the first time that PNAC or its associated front groups, such as the Coalition for the Liberation of Iraq, have included hawkish Democrats.
Two PNAC letters in March 2003 played to those Democrats who believed that the invasion was justified at least as much by humanitarian concerns as it was by the purported presence of weapons of mass destruction. PNAC and the neocon camp had managed to translate their military agenda of preemptive and preventive strikes into national security policy. With the invasion underway, they sought to preempt those hardliners and military officials who opted for a quick exit strategy in Iraq. In their March 19th letter, PNAC stated that Washington should plan to stay in Iraq for the long haul: "Everyone-those who have joined the coalition, those who have stood aside, those who opposed military action, and, most of all, the Iraqi people and their neighbors-must understand that we are committed to the rebuilding of Iraq and will provide the necessary resources and will remain for as long as it takes."
Along with such neocon stalwarts as Robert Kagan, Bruce Jackson, Joshua Muravchik, James Woolsey, and Eliot Cohen, a half-dozen Democrats were among the 23 individuals who signed PNAC's first letter on post-war Iraq. Among the Democrats were Ivo Daalder of the Brookings Institution and a member of Clinton's National Security Council staff; Martin Indyk, Clinton's ambassador to Israel; Will Marshall of the Progressive Policy Institute and Democratic Leadership Council; Dennis Ross, Clinton's top adviser on the Israel-Palestinian negotiations; and James Steinberg, Clinton's deputy national security adviser and head of foreign policy studies at Brookings. A second post-Iraq war letter by PNAC on March 28 called for broader international support for reconstruction, including the involvement of NATO, and brought together the same Democrats with the prominent addition of another Brookings' foreign policy scholar, Michael O'Hanlon.
CONTINUED...
http://rightweb.irc-online.org/articles/display/Neocons_and_Liberals_Together_Again
That's from Rightweb. They're full of facts, for those who take the time to read and learn. One name to pay attention to is Victoria Nuland, our woman in Ukraine, who is married to PNAC co-founder Robert Kagan.
Robert Kagan's brother is Frederick Kagan.
Frederick Kagan's spouse is Kimberly Kagan.
Brilliant people, big ideas, etc. The thing is, that's a lot of PNAC. And the PNAC approach to international relations means more wars without end for profits without cease, among other things detrimental to peace, justice and democracy.
Rex
(65,616 posts)It makes it funny to watch them act like unruly pupils. They remind me of freshmen and sophomores in high school.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)They remind me of people who flock around the rambling doomsday preacher in the subway station.
Rex
(65,616 posts)I love how just talking about Octa pisses so many people off they have to respond out of jealousy.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)What a precious and simple world you must live in, if that's the limit of your imagination.
Octafish posts garbage and is praised for it, by you and by fawning acolytes. There is nothing in his posts nor in his sycophants' adoration to inspire jealousy.
I'll give you some time to come up with a compelling point. Maybe check in with the rest of the fan club for some ideas, because the facile cry of "jealousy" sounds like you read it off of a MySpace meme.
7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)Garbage?????
Orrex
(64,326 posts)It's the tendency--demonstrated by Octafish and his fawning acolytes--to assume that disagreement equals insanity.
And, yes, I consider racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists to be garbage, as is anything that uses them for source material. What do you consider them?
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Otherwise, all you are doing is lying, Orrex.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Show me that I'm wrong. Show me that your cited sources aren't racists, homophobic and anti-Semitic.
And if you can't (or you refuse) to show me, then please explain why you endorse such thinking.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Both of these guys had ancestors and cronies in the slave trade.
Baron de Rothschild and Prescott Bush, share a moment and some information, back in the day.
The people who tried to overthrow FDR in 1933 had kids.
And their offspring* and connected cronies in crime are the ones* screwing America now.
What's different today, is we don't have Smedley Butler or FDR to stop them.
* Of course, it's not just a few rich families's offspring who screw the majority today. They've hired help and built up the giant noise machine to continue their work overthrowing the progress FDR and the New Deal brought America for 80 years.
Why would the nation and world's richest people do that? Progress costs money. And they don't want to pay for it, even when they've gained more wealth than all of history put together. Instead, whey continue to work -- legally, through government and lobbyists -- to amass even more, transferring the wealth of the many to themselves.
And instead of an armed mob led by a war hero on a white horse, as planned in 1933, their weapon since Pruneface made his first payment to the Ayatollah has been "Supply Side Economics." To most Americans, that means Trickle-Down.
Rothschild and Freshfields founders’ had links to slavery, papers reveal
By Carola Hoyos
Financial Times
Two of the biggest names in the City of London had previously undisclosed links to slavery in the British colonies, documents seen by the Financial Times have revealed.
Nathan Mayer Rothschild, the banking family’s 19th-century patriarch, and James William Freshfield, founder of Freshfields, the top City law firm, benefited financially from slavery, records from the National Archives show, even though both have often been portrayed as opponents of slavery.
Far from being a matter of distant history, slavery remains a highly contentious issue in the US, where Rothschild and Freshfields are both active.
Companies alleged to have links to past slave injustices have come under pressure to make restitution.
JPMorgan, the investment bank, set up a $5m scholarship fund for black students studying in Louisiana after apologising in 2005 for the company’s historic links to slavery.
CONTINUED (with registration, etc) ...
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7c0f5014-628c-11de-b1c9-00144feabdc0.html
Generation upon generation, knowing only service to power and property.
Kevin Phillips called them a ''multigenerational family of fibbers.''
The Barreling Bushes
Four generations of the dynasty have chased profits through cozy ties with Mideast leaders, spinning webs of conflicts of interest
by Kevin Phillips
Published on Sunday, January 11, 2004 by the Los Angeles Times
EXCERPT...
During these years, Bush's four sons - George W., Jeb, Neil and Marvin - were following in the family footsteps, lining up business deals with Saudi, Kuwaiti and Bahraini moneymen and cozying up to BCCI. The Middle East was becoming a convenient family money spigot.
Eldest son George W. Bush made his first Middle East connection in the late 1970s with James Bath, a Texas businessmen who served as the North American representative for two rich Saudis (and Osama bin Laden relatives) - billionaire Salem bin Laden and banker and BCCI insider Khalid bin Mahfouz. Bath put $50,000 into Bush's 1979 Arbusto oil partnership, probably using Bin Laden-Bin Mahfouz funds.
In the late 1980s, after several failed oil ventures, the future 43rd president let the ailing oil business in which he was a major stockholder and chairman be bought out by another foreign-influenced operation, Harken Energy. The Wall Street Journal commented in 1991, "The mosaic of BCCI connections surrounding Harken Energy may prove nothing more than how ubiquitous the rogue bank's ties were. But the number of BCCI-connected people who had dealings with Harken - all since George W. Bush came on board - likewise raises the question of whether they mask an effort to cozy up to a presidential son."
Other hints of cronyism came in 1990 when inexperienced Harken got a major contract to drill in the Persian Gulf for the government of Bahrain. Time magazine reporters Jonathan Beaty and S.C. Gwynne, in their book "The Outlaw Bank," concluded "that Mahfouz, or other BCCI players, must have had a hand in steering the oil-drilling contract to the president's son." The web entangling the Bush presidencies was already being spun.
CONTINUED...
http://faculty.plts.edu/gpence/html/kevin_phillips.htm
While some wonder how Saddam got WMDs, Wall Street gets ahead.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So show, Orrex, where any of that is wrong. Or racist. Or anti-Semitic. Or homophobic. Or anything you want to. That encapsulates why I bother to post on DU. It bears on Democracy.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)Stick to the point, please.
And you still haven't shown where I'm wrong.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Which is the point I made to you long ago.
Orrex
(64,326 posts)More specifically, it means that you lack the ability, the credibility or the documentation (or all of the above) to present a concise and cogent argument, so you try to distract your critics with a torrent of information, much of dubious or altogether irrelevant. Sorry, but it's not my job to digest bullshit for you, especially when you already have a troupe of fawning acolytes so eager to do it.
Further, since you have a demonstrated habit of linking to racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists, I certainly have no intention of clicking on links to such cesspits.
I expect that you will once again stomp your feet and complain that I haven't "shown where you're wrong," but that's simply because you don't know how to formulate an argument. For the record, every time you make that silly complaint, it's a loud and clear declaration that you know that you've failed to show where you're right.
Tommy_Carcetti
(43,607 posts)See here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=6305434
Do you have a non-sequitur card you keep in your back pocket?
Not to dispute the fact that the Bush family are a bunch of evil pricks, mind you (they most certainly are), but you can't just throw that into whatever random conversation you happen to be having and claim you're carrying on an actual conversation.
"It's a beautiful day outside, isn't it?"
"Let me tell you about the Bush family back in the days of FDR."
You remind me of Walter from The Big Lebowski, finding a way to weave in Vietnam to almost every single discussion he was having with The Dude.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Where's it say I have to re-write my own posts every time I post?
Tommy_Carcetti
(43,607 posts)That's all I'm saying.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)the poster I was corresponding with, Orrex, has claimed I post anti-Semitic, homophobic and racist rot.
I showed an example of where that idea may come from. So far, it has stood the test of time.
That's what I'm saying.
7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)Who are you? Fawning ACOLYTES, you are laughable.
What is a fawning acolyte?:?
Tommy_Carcetti
(43,607 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)You called my friend Robert Parry a liar:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026200201
He recently won the I.F. Stone Award.
Parry’s Speech at I.F. Stone Award
October 26, 2015
On Oct. 22, Consortiumnews Editor Robert Parry received the I.F. Stone Medal for Journalistic Independence from Harvard’s Nieman Foundation. Stone was an iconoclastic journalist who published I.F. Stone’s Weekly during the McCarthy era and the Vietnam War, setting a standard for independence that Parry has tried to follow.
By Robert Parry
I want to thank the Nieman Foundation for this honor, and especially Bill Kovach and Myra MacPherson for thinking I deserved it. It’s a special honor for me because I admired I.F. Stone’s independent journalism way back in college. I even lobbied the school library to subscribe to his newsletter. Reading it weekly shaped how I came to view journalism, as a profession that required endless skepticism.
And I had the privilege of meeting him once in the early 1980s. I was an investigative reporter for the Associated Press in Washington. I had gotten hold of some classified records about financial misconduct in El Salvador. He called and asked if he could read the documents. I said sure and he showed up at the AP office on K Street. Through his thick glasses, he spent a couple of hours poring through the papers.
Though I shared Stone’s view that journalists should be the consummate outsiders, I came to the profession as a mainstream journalist. But I never forgot his insistence on maintaining your independence, whatever the pressures. To me, the core responsibility of a journalist is to have an open-mind toward information, to have no agenda, to have no preferred outcome. In other words, I don’t care what the truth is; I just care what the truth is. That’s the deal you make with your readers, to follow the facts wherever they lead.
I also consider this award a recognition of what we’ve accomplished at Consortiumnews.com over the past two decades. This honor goes to the many talented reporters and analysts who have written for us. They have made Consortiumnews a place where you can find thoughtful, well-researched, well-reported information, stories well worth reading nearly every day of the year.
For those of you who don’t know much about Consortiumnews, here’s a brief history. The project began out of my frustration with the mainstream news media where I spent many years. I worked at the AP from 1974 to 1987. I was perhaps best known for breaking many of the stories that we now know as the Iran-Contra scandal. These included the first article about a little known Marine officer named Oliver North and – with my AP colleague Brian Barger – the first story about how some of the Nicaraguan Contras got themselves mixed up in the drug trade.
To say that these and other stories weren’t always popular would be an understatement. But they were well-reported and borne out when the Iran-Contra scandal exploded in late 1986. I then got a job offer from Newsweek and felt it was time to move on. Sadly, I had burned many bridges at AP in the fights to push our stories to the wire.
But what I found at Newsweek was even more troubling, an allegiance more to the powerful than to the public. At senior levels, there was a stubborn reluctance to pursue the Iran-Contra scandal to its roots — out of fear that it could destroy another Republican president. This may sound odd, but the attitude inside Newsweek and the Washington Post Company was that “we don’t want another Watergate.” Another constitutional crisis was not deemed good for the country.
So, I left Newsweek in 1990 and worked on some documentaries for PBS Frontline. But it was becoming increasingly clear to me that the space for serious investigative journalism was closing down. With the arrival of Bill Clinton, there was a market for silly, tawdry scandals. But there was even less interest in the unsolved mysteries of the 1980s — old, complicated stuff without much sex.
But a key moment occurred in late 1994 when I got access to the raw files of a congressional inquiry into an Iran-Contra spinoff scandal, the so-called October Surprise case, whether Ronald Reagan’s campaign in 1980 sought an electoral advantage by secretly undermining President Jimmy Carter’s negotiations to free 52 American hostages then held in Iran. After the 1994 elections when Republicans gained control of Congress – but before they actually took power – I saw an opportunity to get hold of the unpublished files.
I got approval from the House Foreign Affairs Committee and was directed to some offices that had been installed in the Rayburn House parking garage. When I got there, I was met by a young staffer who led me through the warren of cubicles to an abandoned ladies room. There, the boxes of files were piled up on the floor. He reminded me that I would be allowed to copy only 12 pages on an old copier machine around the corner in the office. He went back to his seat, calling a girlfriend about Christmas plans and I started ripping open the boxes.
To my surprise, some of the boxes contained secret and top secret documents. So, I volunteered to make the copies on the old machine which kept jamming. But I assured my watcher that I knew how to fix this kind of copier. Eventually, I had my dozen pages and got them out of the Capitol without anyone noticing. I returned a couple of more times to copy more documents. Next, I prepared a summary that I felt would change the history of the 1980s. But I couldn’t find anyone interested in publishing the material.
So, one day in 1995, I was grousing about this state of affairs when my oldest son Sam, who had just finished college, said that instead of complaining, why didn’t I publish my information on the Internet. He said there were things called Web sites. I really knew next to nothing about these matters, but I listened. Sam – though not a techie – figured out how to build a Web site. With the Internet in its infancy, there were no templates back then. We launched our no-frills Web site without fanfare in November 1995 as the first investigative magazine based on the Internet.
The original idea was to provide a home for neglected investigative journalists and their work. I thought I could raise significant amounts of money from a variety of sources, hence the clunky name Consortiumnews. But I soon learned that “independent journalism” – while popular in the abstract – is not something people really want to invest much in. They’d prefer to know how the stories are likely to come out. So we always struggled with money, but we did build a loyal readership who kept us going with small donations.
To my pleasant surprise, I also discovered that a number of ex-CIA analysts were also looking for a place to publish their work. They shared our concern that the United States was veering away from fact-based policies. They felt that this decoupling from reality was careening the country toward international catastrophes. And they were right.
I’d be happy to respond to any questions about specific issues that we have dealt with over the past two decades, from world affairs to domestic politics. But suffice it to say that what we mostly do is take on mindless “group thinks” of which there are many in Official Washington. We are relentlessly independent. That may not make us popular with some people, but I think I.F. Stone would approve.
Thank you.
You do know who I.F. Stone was, right, Tommy_Carcetti?
Tommy_Carcetti
(43,607 posts)And yes, when it comes to Robert Parry, he has lied on numerous occasions regarding the subject of Ukraine. It is documentable and I have documented such lies time over.
An award honoring Parry's more admirable and honest work 30 years ago does not change that fact.
ucrdem
(15,720 posts)You aren't doing Octa any favors by leaving this thing open.
7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)He is OK and knows that I meant no harm.
ucrdem
(15,720 posts)is not exactly a gift. If you're not going to be around to swat flies, just close the door. Copy the OP into a reply at the bottom, say "Thank you very much," and self-delete the OP. Presto, your tribute is preserved forever and Octa can enjoy his turkey with the rest of us.
Buzz Clik
(38,437 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)Used to be a newspaper reporter. When I saw that the crooks were getting ahead and those who reported that fact weren't, I got into another business.
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)You know the guy--he typically had 3 or 4 other friends around to laugh at whomever he was making fun of--the nerd, the handicapped person, the girl who didn't dress fashionably. You know that guy, and so do I. In my case, although I haven't thought about this at great length, I think some of my earlier liberal-political impulses came from these guys. I've always been for the powerless over the powerful, and I think the bullies I knew in high school may have had something to do with that.
After high school was over, I remember thinking about how refreshing it was to be in college, to be in a meritocracy where you were judged by what you could do, instead of how you looked or dressed or acted. I remember thinking it was nice to no longer be partially beholden to cretins at the bottom of the societal barrel. That was an idealized thought on my part, but it was more or less true in a lot of ways.
But these days, at DU, I can see an endless stream of high school douchebaggery right here in General Discussion. We have a small handful of "cool kids" who are actually nothing more than unreformed dickheads who never matured after leaving high school. They're generally libertarian-leaning (I don't care what they claim, I know the type), extremely selfish, and typically very binary in their thinking (ct=gmo=jfk=homeopathy=LIHOP=no plane at Pentagon=chemtrails). They like to gang up on the target du jour and make fun of that person, across posts, across forums, and over time. We're all adults here, and as such, we need to be able to back up the claims we make and the opinions we have, but this doesn't mean we should permit ourselves to be subjected to the whims of immature people whose only goal is to belittle others in order to make themselves look better. We were all warned about this sort of thing in about the 4th grade or so. Still, here we are.
Why do we continue to put up with these people that most of us wanted to leave behind in high school? Why do we let the taunts of flaming assholes stand? We have the collective power to say no, no more, asshole. No more picking on those whose voice isn't as amplified as yours is. No more smearing of a person's opinion by trying to equate that opinion to Alex Jones-level stuff. No more in-the-open-private jokes at the expense of the intended victim. No more tearing someone down for sport and for laughing with your asshole friends. No more half-truths strung together to create a new and damaging lie. Why are we here? What is it we stand for? What is it you personally stand for (rhetorical--you don't owe me an answer)? Does permitting this pack-of-jackals behavior comport with what it is that drew you here in the first place? Something to consider.
7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)JEB
(4,748 posts)It would be funny if they weren't so destructive.
Major Hogwash
(17,656 posts)I might use that later on because that seems so accurate.
DU's search for the truth started in 2001, yet so many people here don't want to learn the truth.
It's odd that they come here to read what is said, and sometimes even make posts disagreeing.
But, when they continually harass a poster like Octafish, it makes me wonder what they are really afraid of learning.
A group of men killed our President.
And yet no one went to jail for it.
I find it very odd that someone in Canada would continually bitch and moan about threads discussing JFK's assassination.
7wo7rees
(5,128 posts)Octafish
(55,745 posts)Democrats believe all people are equal. No one-up/one-down there.
Telling someone to shut up, doesn't do that. It makes those who command the conversation more valuable.
Major Hogwash
(17,656 posts)I put so many people on ignore this year that the threads at this forum are only about half as long as what they really are.
I can only see discussions taking place between the remaining participants, even among people who disagree.
Nevertheless, most, but not all, of the snarky smartass comments made by people here that are like "the boys who hung out in the hallway", the bullies at the high school that I graduated from, aren't there for me to read.
DU didn't start out to be an echo chamber, but it wasn't solely designed for people with no awareness of net etiquette to come here for bashing the same member all of the time, either.
NCTraveler
(30,481 posts)Apologizing to Octo never crossed my mind.
Mc Mike
(9,173 posts)NCTraveler
(30,481 posts)But this is awesome in so many ways.