I Have A Few Questions
On this day of the long-scheduled release of thousand of documents related to JFK’s assassination, I am reposting my blog from last year.
UNANSWERED
I have mentioned before my mild obsession (Can an obsession be mild? Is that an oxymoron?) with unsolved mysteries. (Eureka, Sort Of)
I’ve always wanted to solve some great mystery or cold case.
In part, because I always like to show how smart I am. I was one of those obnoxious kids in grade school whose hand was always waving frantically in the air. (Well, OK, that was high school too. And college. And grad school.)
But mostly, because I am one of those types that just NEEDS to know. I hate a mystery with no answer.
Just TELL me.
Why, for example, when suspected murderers are dying, why don’t they just TELL us? I felt that way with Dr. Sam Shepard, who I thought was almost certainly innocent. Of course, it would have been even more convincing had their REAL murderer given us a death-bed confession.
Or Lizzie Borden, who on the other hand, I think was probably guilty. She’d been acquitted. She was already pretty much a social pariah in Fall River, so she had no reputation to lose. So why didn’t she just tell us?
It’s unfair.
I have a couple of minor, trivial, mysteries I will share in my next post, but I am in a serious mood today, and so I want to share a few important mysteries.
I am a Conspiracy Nut.
Yes, that’s what people call people like me.
I’m not one of those true overachieving nuts who believes EVERYTHING is a big conspiracy.
No.
I have just a few very specific conspiracy beliefs.
Perhaps it stems from the fact that some momentous world events happened when I was at my most impressionable. Those experiences that made me question authority for the first time. And understand, for the first time, that Authority is not always admirable or honest.
I don’t want to be too preachy or morbid. And I am no expert. So I won’t go off on a huge rant about the numerous unanswered questions or inconsistencies. I won’t beat the drum for thousands of pages or millions of words.
Let me just pose three questions. One question on each awful puzzle that has haunted me for decades. That may be demonstration enough. A few simple questions to represent the hundreds that continue to plague me.
1.
President Kennedy was assassinated in 1963. His murder was the most horrific thing most people had ever experienced. And I was only twelve. I watched events unfold, as I stood before our black-and-white TV, with my hands to my mouth. I saw Lee Harvey Oswald killed. I have only witnessed death once since… in 53 years. Two deaths. One a cousin, in her hospital room. One – an assassin on live TV.
There are many unanswered questions. I’ve read dozens of books, probably hundreds of articles. Most people who believe the lone gunman theory think that those of us who don’t are in denial. That we just cannot accept that one miserable unknown human being could have the power to change history.
But I am not naive. I am not an idealist. (Well, OK, perhaps somewhat of an idealist.) I do not think Oswald was a patsy in the true sense of the word. I believe he was involved. It’s the “lone” part of the “lone gunman” theory that worries me.
Here’s my one single JFK question. How does a young ex-marine who defects to the Soviet Union in the height of the Cold War– how is it that he was able to return so easily 2 1/2 years later? Why did the FBI or CIA appear to have no interest in him?
2.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was murdered in 1968. I was 17. He had changed the world significantly in just a few years, and he was not yet 40 years old. He was shot on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis. The convicted murdered was James Earl Ray, a petty criminal and avowed racist.He recanted his confession only a few days after pleading guilty.
Here’s my Dr. King question: Ray was captured in London, with a false passport. He had escaped through Canada to the UK and was attempting to travel to white-ruled Rhodesia. In 1968, air travel was still extremely expensive – out of the reach of most Americans. Where did a loser like Ray get the money for his escape?
3.
Only a few months after Dr. King was assassinated, Bobby Kennedy was shot as his entourage moved through the kitchen at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles after the California Democratic Primary. The assassin was Sirhan Sirhan, a young Palestinian (whose family was Christian, by the way) who may have been truly deranged. He fired his 22 even as he was wrestled into submission by members of Kennedy’s group. He emptied the gun.
Here’s my RFK question. Sirhan’s gun held 8 bullets. Kennedy was hit three times, but only 2 bullets were recovered, with one supposedly lost in the ceiling. Five were recovered from other injured people. That’s seven bullets recovered. So there is just one bullet unaccounted for (the ceiling bullet). So why were there extra holes in the ceiling and the walls? One door-frame was photographed with 2 holes circled by investigators. By some accounts, bullets had been recovered from these or other holes. Sirhan was firing wildly as he was subdued. But that is one hell of a lot of ricochet.
****
I know this is a crazy atypical post for me. I wasn’t sure whether to even publish it. But I’ve been thinking so much about the passage of time. In the not-too-distant future, all the folks who were witness to these events will be dead. And perhaps no one will care much about unanswered questions.
I hope the interest in Truth will still matter.
- Posted in: Aging ♦ Memories
- Tagged: conspiracy, conspiracy theories, JFK, Kennedy assassination, Martin Luther King, RFK
notquiteold 
I will limit myself to just one of your questions, JFK, because back then I worshipped him. I worked part-time (summers) for a defense sub-contractor, and they instituted severe security controls during the Cuban Missile Conflict. That made his relevance to my life even closer than any fellow kids my age. When his assasination was announced, during my high-school’s afternoon classes, I was stunned the entire way home (school was let out early). I had/have been familiar with firearms since forever, so I have NEVER accepted that a loser like Oswald could have achieved what he did with that piece-of-junk rifle which he used when the assasination occured. Your center of importance is different than mine about the assasination, but they both arrive at the same conclusion. Unfortunately, as your sis recently reminded me, the real truth has probably already been “disappeared”, and we may never know what really happened.
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I have lots of questions like this one – but decided to keep it to just one on each of these gut-wrenching murders. I agree that it is more than improbable that Oswald and that rifle could have performed as they are said to.
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And just now, the announcement that many docs won’t be released until others have their say. What a surprise.
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yup. not at all surprised.
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I only have one question: After all this heartbreak, why is this country still so enamored with guns to the point that just about anybody can buy one as easily as a loaf of bread?
Now, THAT’S a conspiracy.
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Truly a tragic question.
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So many questions! Life is full of these unanswered questions. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if somehow we could find all those answers. Some kind of instant release of information from the Netherworld or what ever, when ever someone who knows the truth passes on. Perhaps we can’t handle all the truths.
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I think we can handle more truth than we are given credit for.
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Sadly I am unable to answer any questions because it was before my time and I’ve only briefly learned about them. However, the one you asked about getting across the ocean, the idea that he knew someone who flew planes popped up. Or perhaps he didn’t travel by plane at all? How long after was he found there?
I too occasionally dabble into conspiracy theories. I think my generation questions the Illuminati and their play into the government and media. I’ve spent too many hours watching videos about it. I can’t figure out the truth.
Besides what would happen if I did? I read once somewhere ‘the government tells you what they want you to know.’ And it’s always left a major impression on me.
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From what is public, it appears that Ray stayed in Canada for a month before getting to London on a false passport. I believe he was arrested a month later, trying to travel somewhere else. I feel certain he had help.
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I can’t answer your questions, but conspiracy theories are very interesting to me too. I have wondered the answers to some of these myself. Conspiracy theories are interesting because they could be true, they aren’t so outrageous that no one could believe them.
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I don’t feel that I am a conspiracy “nut” by any means, but I was 12 at the time of JFK’s assassination. Something stunk – even to my childish brain.
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I don’t believe Oswald was a lone shooter. In 1983, there was a documentary on HBO about the Kennedy assassination. In it, they had a couple of pictures I have not seen since, they were photos of his head, taken in Dallas.
I firmly believe the shot that went into his head and killed him entered from the front. Entry wounds are small, exit wounds are larger, whether large caliber or small.
I have no theories as to who was responsible and I believe the people who knew the truth will forever be silent.
I DON’T think the newly released documents will shed any light on it.
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Yes, I have read a number of books and articles. I believe that the fatal shot came from the front.
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I’m not sure anyone will ever know the truth of JFK’s assassination. It could be that there were various factions aiding and abetting the killer, and that LHO was a patsy set up to take the blame. However, when you look back at events in history over many many years, often the simplest most unlikely explantion is in fact the true one.
In the UK there is an exxtraordinary unsolved mystery about a Peer of the Realm – Lord Lucan. An habitual gambler at some of the grandest private gaming houses in London, married with two young children, he was counted a close friend by many of the aristocracy. Then one night in 1974 his distraught wife ran into a pub near their London home, bleeding from her head, and asking for the police to be called as her husband had killed their children’s nanny and then attempted to kill her. The nanny – a young lass called Sandra Rivett – was indeed found bludgeoned to death in the basement kitchen of their house. But of Lucan there was no sign. From that day to this it has been a mystery as to what happened, and why, and where he went. His social circle clammed up. Did they shield him, spirit him away to a new life in a safe place? For all these years there have been rumours and counter rumours “he is living under an assumed name in Botswana/South America/ a Pacific island..” Lady Lucan lived on in isolation and died alone about a month ago. Till she died she stuck to her story, and said that she thought he would have taken a ferry to France and jumped overboard. Their son inherited the title and claims that his father was not a killer!
Get your teeth into that mystery!!!
And when you’ve solved it, there is the little matter of who was Jack the Ripper in 19th Century London.
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Wow. That is fascinating! I have read probably a half dozen books on the Ripper. I would love to KNOW!
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