Peter Jennings Reporting: The Kennedy Assassination - Beyond Conspiracy
November. 22,2003Forty years after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, more than 80% of Americans still believe that Lee Harvey Oswald did not act alone. This documentary attempts to separate fact from conspiracy theories to get to the truth, employing stunning forensic technology that makes it possible for the first time to be an eyewitness to this crime of the century – to see precisely what happened that November day in Dallas.
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This should be viewed by all as an example of a disgusting, dishonest bulldozer through the truth. ABC and Peter Jennings make up our precious history and probably the most important events in that history out of pure fantasy. If you ever doubted America has its implausible propaganda (way beyond anything the Nazis or the Soviet Union could even dream about), then take a good look because here it is. I was especially furious to see Dale Myers with his idiotic computer-animated depiction of the Zapruder film, smugly making a truly bogus analysis of the event, claiming that he could see where the bullet rips through Gov. Connally's jacket, and that the "single bullet theory" is no longer a theory, but fact. He never mentions that the same bullet shattered Connally's wrist, even though Connally is holding on to his cowboy hat for several seconds. I notice that a poll was taken after this show aired and no one was convinced. Shame on Peter Jennings and ABC for trying to foist this on us! If this is what the American media is capable of, what other lies have they jammed down our throats?
The time spent on Oswald's childhood and his brother's "expert" opinion was nothing but a waste of time and proved nothing. The animated version of the Zapruder film was unnecessary and open to many inaccuracies, it's not like the cut and paste of computer saved files. It's the Flintstones or some Disney cartoon. Why do it when you have the Zapruder film!! The fellow shooting the gun in the allocated time only proved that the gun could be fired in the time frame, he wasn't aiming at anything!! It's operating the bolt and finding and re-aiming at the target that takes time!! The show does emphasize Zapruder frame 223 where Connaly appears to be hit based on the movement of this lapel. That was convincing however they fail to point out that Kennedy's arm is already showing reaction which would not be possible if it were the same bullet. They also fail to point out that Connaly by frame 232-233 was showing no reaction to the hit and only displays reaction at 236.The show only served to prove the conspiracy not to disprove anything. A better presentation would be to line up the debatable points and present both sides.
I like the scientific evidence and computer generated timelines that were created from the Zapruder film for this news special. They served to provide a different take on the shots fired and more concrete support that it was just Oswald acting and not a conspiracy.The whole focus of this show was to make as much evidence known as possible to make it impossible that there WAS a conspiracy. However, all of the evidence itself surrounded their argument that the only bullets that struck and killed Kennedy himself were fired by Oswald. That alone does not prove that Oswald acted alone in shooting Kennedy, it only proves that he fired the only bullets that HIT Kennedy.It is a fallacy in itself to assume that Oswald acted alone just because he was lucky enough to hit all 3 shots. He could have been paid off by any number of socialist/Communist organizations that he worked for, or by Castro himself. Heck, there could have been another shooter out there that day, that either fired shots and was not noticed or detected because of the actions of Oswald, or never fired shots because he realized that Oswald succeeded, and the the support help was not necessary.There are just so many theories that were not discussed in this program. Granted, there is no way you can touch on everything in a 90 min program. Heck, you couldn't do it in a 10 hour miniseries. However, spending 1/3 of the show debunking the film JFK was not time well spent in my opinion.
This film uses Stone's film as a punching bag, trying to fit a complex subject into an hour. It's a whitewash - not necessarily of the fact that a conspiracy existed, but that we don't know. Anyone who has examined the evidence knows that there are too many unanswered questions to land definitively on either side of the fence. But when a film shows one witness claiming that Kennedy's head wound was "clearly" suffered from the rear, it tells you all you need to know: look elsewhere for honest questions, honest answers. Stone's movie was flawed - most especially by its gratuitous addition of fictional elements which have never appeared in any of the serious challenges to the Warren Commission findings. (Donald Southerland's character, for instance) But Stone has always been the master of "bulldozer" cinema; that he would play with history for his own purposes does not diminish the very real likelihood that JFK was killed by a conspiracy.