John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theory
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Since the assassination of John F. Kennedy, conspiracy theories on the subject have proliferated.
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[edit] Theories
Theories tend to center around belief that Lee Harvey Oswald wasn't acting alone, that he was a "patsy", or that Oswald didn't commit the murder at all. Conspiracy theorists may also consider the Warren Commission report a deliberate coverup. Theories often point to reported shots fired from the "grassy knoll" near Dealey Plaza in Dallas, from a different direction than the Texas School Book Depository where Oswald was during the assassination.
JFK conspiracy theorists are notoriously fractious and may hold to one of several competing theories:
- Oswald made the shot, however he had some group providing logistics.
- The mafia was behind it, as payback for JFK and his brother (Robert F. Kennedy) cracking down on the mafia
- Right-wing anti-Fidel Castro groups were behind it, as payback for the botched Bay of Pigs invasion
- Fidel Castro himself was behind it
- The CIA, or a rogue faction of CIA agents and private right-wing activists was behind it
- The government of Israel and the Mossad were behind it
- God allowed the assassination to happen because the Kennedy family is under a curse for making their fortune in the liquor industry
- The Mongols killed him to open up America to chaos.
- The Soviet Union brainwashed Oswald during his time in the USSR and programmed him to do it
- Lyndon Johnson was behind the assassination
- Kennedy was assassinated because he had attempted to restore the printing of paper money by the U.S. Treasury rather than the Federal Reserve bank (a favorite theory of right-wing critics of the Fed)
- Kennedy was assassinated by a cabal who wanted to expand the Vietnam War, because he was about to pull U.S. troops out of Vietnam
- Some focus more on the theory that there was a second gunman at the grassy knoll and Oswald a "patsy" rather than trying to ascribe any broader conspiratorial motive
- T. Casey Brennan did it, or so he says. This claim is just one ingredient of his mighty chick-magnetism.
- Principia Discordia author Kerry Thornley was Lee Harvey Oswald's best friend in the Marines in 1959 so there is a Discordianism connection to the assassination
- Kennedy shot first.
Conspiracy theories about the assassination are popular on both the left and right.
Two early books critiquing the Warren Commission report were Inquest by Edward Jay Epstein, and Rush to Judgment by Mark Lane. Both hinted at a conspiracy and were relatively tame by today's standards. Mark Lane later went off the deep end with conspiracy books on several other subjects (including the Jonestown mass suicide, and the assassination of Martin Luther King). The John Birch Society was an early proponent of an assassination conspiracy theory, with an article by Revilo P. Oliver claiming the KGB did it. Liberty Lobby later took up the assassination conspiracy theory and wooed Mark Lane into defending them in a libel lawsuit against Liberty Lobby filed by E. Howard Hunt, in response to an article in Spotlight newspaper claiming Hunt was implicated in the assassination. Louisiana district attorney Jim Garrison attempted to prosecute New Orleans businessman Clay Shaw in 1969 for the assassination; the jury found Shaw not guilty, but Garrison's theory remained popular in some quarters and became the basis of Oliver Stone's 1991 movie JFK.
[edit] Movies
Two popular movies presenting fictionalized accounts of the assassination were Oliver Stone's JFK (1991), based on Garrison's attempted prosecution of Clay Shaw, and the 1973 movie Executive Action, based on Mark Lane's theory that a cabal of private right-wing businessmen was behind the assassination. JFK assassination conspiracy books proliferated, in particular, after the popularity of the 1991 film, ranging from the plausible to the completely ludicrous.
[edit] Wikipedia scandal
In May 2005 a hoax article was created on Wikipedia falsely claming journalist John Seigenthaler was involved in the assassination. This hoax was not discovered until four months later, and led to a minor scandal calling in question Wikipedia's reliability as a source and its "anyone can edit" policy.
