MY SPACE LOG OF TIME
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EXPOSED........YALE'S SECRET SOCIETY OF BONESMEN AND WOMENAugust 7, 2008Skull & Bones Societyby Alexandra Robbins ON High Street, in the middle of the Yale University campus, stands a cold-looking, nearly windowless Greco-Egyptian building with padlocked iron doors. This is the home of Yale's most famous secret society, Skull and Bones, and it is also, in a sense, one of the many homes of the family of George W. Bush, Yale '68. Bush men have been Yale men and Bonesmen for generations. Prescott Bush, George W.'s grandfather, Yale '17, was a legendary Bonesman; he was a member of the band that stole for the society what became one of its most treasured artifacts: a skull that was said to be that of the Apache chief Geronimo. Prescott Bush, one of a great many Bonesmen who went on to lives of power and renown, became a U.S. senator. George Herbert Walker Bush, George W.'s father, Yale '48, was also a Bonesman, and he, too, made a conspicuous success of himself. Inside the temple on High Street hang paintings of some of Skull and Bones's more illustrious members; the painting of George Bush, the most recently installed, is five feet high. There were other Bush Bonesmen, a proud line of them stretching from great uncle George Herbert Walker Jr. to uncle Jonathan Bush to cousins George Herbert Walker IIIand Ray Walker. So when George W. was "tapped" for Skull and Bones, at the end of his junior year, he, too, naturally became a Bonesman -- but, it seems, a somewhat ambivalent one. New members of Skull and Bones are assigned secret names, by which fellow Bonesmen will forever know them. Some Bonesmen receive traditional names, denoting function or existential status; others are the chosen beneficiaries of names that their Bones predecessors wish to pass on. The leftover initiates choose their own names. The name Long Devil is assigned to the tallest member; Boaz (short for Beelzebub) goes to any member who is a varsity football captain. Many of the chosen names are drawn from literature (Hamlet, Uncle Remus), from religion, and from myth. The banker Lewis Lapham passed on his name, Sancho Panza, to the political adviser Tex McCrary. Averell Harriman was Thor, Henry Luce was Baal, McGeorge Bundy was Odin. The name Magog is traditionally assigned to the incoming Bonesman deemed to have had the most sexual experience, and Gog goes to the new member with the least sexual experience. William Howard Taft and Robert Taft were Magogs. So, interestingly, was George Bush. George W. was not assigned a name but invited to choose one. According to one report, nothing came to mind, so he was given the name Temporary, which, it is said, he never bothered to replace; Temporary is how Bush's fellow Bonesmen know him today. (In recent interviews I asked a number of Bush's Bonesmen classmates about the name and elicited no denials.) The junior George's diffidence in the matter of his secret name seems to reflect a larger ambivalence toward Yale and its select, the most elite of whom are the members of Skull and Bones. The elder George holds his fellow Yalies -- particularly his Bones brethren -- in great esteem, and over the years has often gone to them for advice. George W., in contrast, has publicly made a point of his disdain for the elite northeastern connections that shaped his father's world and, to some extent, his own. Fay Vincent, the former commissioner of baseball, who is a Bush family friend and himself the son of a Bonesman, says, "Young George is as unlikely a Bonesperson as I've ever met." Young George has not attended a Yale reunion since he graduated. Bush's dismissal of Yale and all it stands for may be a response to the repeated charges of political opponents that he is not much more than a papa's boy. Kent Hance, who trounced Bush in his 1978 congressional race, insinuated that Bush was not a true Texan and accused him of "riding his daddy's coattails." If George W. truly wanted to detach himself from his father and from the traditions of a long line of ancestors, he chose a curious path -- in effect, retracing his father's footsteps. SKULL and Bones is the oldest of Yale's secret societies and by far the most determinedly secretive. As such, it has long been an inspiration for speculation and imagination. It still is. The society is, of course, the inspiration for the new Universal Pictures thriller The Skulls, about a nefarious secret society at an Ivy League school in New Haven. In 1968, when George W. Bush was in Skull and Bones, there were eight "abovegrounds," or societies that met in their own "tombs," and as many as ten "undergrounds," which held meetings in rented rooms. In an article in the 1968 Yale yearbook Lanny Davis, a 1967 Yale graduate and a secret-society member who would go on to become a White House special counsel in the Clinton Administration, described how Bones, famous for its distinguished list of members, held more sway than the others.
Fewer than a tenth of Yale's 1,400 seniors are members of the university's secret societies, which many undergraduates view as self-serving vehicles for real and aspiring aristocrats. Certainly this view seems to have some validity when it comes to Bonesmen. Until 1992, when it became one of the last two secret societies to admit women, Skull and Bones had a history of picking the same kinds of people over and over. Davis's yearbook article explained,
Indeed, George W.'s 1968 brethren slip easily into the desired slots: among them were the Olympic swimmer and gold medalist Don Schollander; a future Harvard Medical School surgeon, Gregory Gallico; a future Rhodes scholar, Robert McCallum; the Whiffenpoofs' pitch, Robert Birge; Donald Etra, an Orthodox Jew; Muhammed Saleh, a Jordanian; a future deputy director of the National Institute of Mental Health, Rex Cowdry; and the black soccer captain Roy Austin. Only George W. himself fell into none of the aforementioned categories. He was generally regarded as a legacy tap. Given the society's history as an incubator and meeting point for rising generational elites, it is not surprising that an especially susceptible kind of "barbarian" -- the Bones term for a nonmember -- has long seen the society as a locus of mystery, wealth, and conspiracy. One doesn't need to scratch deeply to uncover accusations of sinister ties with the CIA, the Trilateral Commission, the Illuminati, the Council on Foreign Relations, even the Nazis. It turns out that the Yale admissions committee that voted to admit George W., despite his poor record at Andover, included three members (out of seven) who were Bonesmen; those seeking evidence of malign influence will surely raise an eyebrow. (For the conspiracy-minded, the most useful omnium gatherum is the British writer Antony C. Sutton's feverish 1983 tract An Introduction to the Order.) World domination aside, the most pervasive rumors about Bones are that initiates must masturbate in a coffin while recounting their sexual exploits, and that their candor is ultimately rewarded with a no-strings-attached gift of $15,000. Bonesmen, who are sworn to secrecy at initiation, have not publicly denied or confirmed these rumors; they have usually made a point of refusing to speak to the press about the society at all. As The Skulls was about to be released, and as George W.'s quest for the Republican presidential nomination looked increasingly certain to succeed, the society sent all members a memo reminding them of their vow of silence. Still, as I recently discovered in the course of looking into Skull and Bones, not all Bonesmen see the necessity of remaining tight-lipped about a society whose biggest secret may be that its secrets are essentially trivial. THE story of Skull and Bones begins in December of 1832. Upset (according to one account) by changes in the Phi Beta Kappa election process, a Yale senior named William Russell and a group of classmates decided to form the Eulogian Club as an American chapter of a German student organization. The club paid obeisance to Eulogia, the goddess of eloquence, who took her place in the pantheon upon the death of the orator Demosthenes, in 322 B.C., and who is said to have returned in a kind of Second Coming on the occasion of the society's inception. The Yale society fastened a picture of its symbol -- a skull and crossbones -- to the door of the chapel where it met. Today the number 322, recalling the date of Demosthenes' death, appears on society stationery. The number has such mystical overtones that in 1967 a graduate student with no ties to Skull and Bones donated $322,000 to the society. (The number 322 has also been a particular favorite of conspiracy-minded hunters for evidence of Skull and Bones's global connections. It was the combination to Averell Harriman's briefcase when he carried classified dispatches between London and Moscow during World War II. Antony C. Sutton claims that 322 doubles as a reminder of the society's mother organization in Germany; the American group, founded in 1832, is the second chapter -- thus 32-2.) In 1856 Daniel Coit Gilman, who went on to become the founding president of Johns Hopkins University, officially incorporated the society as the Russell Trust Association, and Skull and Bones moved into the space it still occupies. The Bones tomb is forbidding only on the outside. Marina Moscovici, a Connecticut conservator who recently spent six years restoring fifteen paintings from the Skull and Bones building, describes the atmosphere inside as "funny spooky." She says, "Sort of like the Addams Family, it's campy in an old British men's-smoking-club way. It's not glamorous by any means." "Bones is like a college dorm room," a 1980s Bonesman told me. "Ours was a place that used to be really nice but felt kind of beat up, lived in. There were socks underneath the couch, old half-deflated soccer balls lying around." Dozens of skeletons and skulls, human and animal, dangle from the walls, on which German and Latin phrases have been chiseled ("Whether poor or rich, all are equal in death"), among moose heads, sconces, medieval armor, antlers, boating flags, manuscripts, statuettes of Demosthenes, and a pair of boots that one member wore throughout his active duty with American forces in France during World War II. The gravestone of Elihu Yale, the eponymous eighteenth-century merchant, was stolen years ago from its proper setting in Wrexham, Wales, and is displayed in a glass case, in a room with purple walls. As noted, for many years the society has possessed a skull that members call Geronimo. In the 1980s, under pressure from Ned Anderson, a former Apache tribal chairman in Arizona, the society produced the skull in question. The skull didn't match Anderson's records, and it was returned to the society's tomb. Anderson wasn't finished. He reportedly took the issue up with his congressman, John McCain; McCain tried to arrange a meeting between Anderson and George Bush, who was then the Vice President. Bush wasn't interested, and the matter was dropped. "We still call it Geronimo anyway," a Bonesman says. The issue of Geronimo's skull never surfaced in the public record during the bitter contest between McCain and George W. for the Republican nomination. The most private room in the building, known as the Inner Temple, or (this will be no surprise) Room 322, is approximately fourteen feet square and guarded by a locked iron door. Inside, a case contains a skeleton that Bonesmen refer to as Madame Pompadour. Compartments in the case guard the society's cherished manuscripts, including the secrecy oath and instructions for conducting an initiation.
The initiation ceremony, held in April, involves as many alumni, or "patriarchs," as possible, one of whom in each instance serves as the supervisor, known as Uncle Toby. The Inner Temple is cleared of furniture except for two chairs and a table, and Bonesmen past and present assemble: Uncle Toby in a robe; the shortest senior, or "Little Devil," in a satanic costume; a Bonesman with a deep voice in a Don Quixote costume; one in papal vestments; another dressed as Elihu Yale; four of the brawniest in the role of "shakers"; and a crew of extras wearing skeleton costumes and carrying noisemakers. According to the initiation script, Uncle Toby "sounds like the only sane person in the room." As an initiate enters the room, patriarchs standing outside the Inner Temple shout, "Who is it?" The shakers bellow the initiate's name, which the patriarchs echo. The shakers push the initiate toward the table, where the secrecy oath has been placed, and he is enjoined to "Read! Read! Read!" The shakers then half-carry the initiate to a picture of Eulogia, and the Bonesmen shriek, "Eulogia! Eulogia! Eulogia!" After another trip to the oath, the shakers fire the initiate toward a picture of a woman that Bonesmen call Connubial Bliss. Rituals along these lines go on for quite some time, recalling a cross between haunted-house antics and a human pinball game -- "like something from a Harry Potter novel," in the words of one Bonesman, now an engineer. It is perhaps worth noting, in light of George W.'s controversial episode at Bob Jones University and the specter of anti-Catholicism, that at one point in the proceedings every initiate kisses the slippered toe of the "Pope." At last the initiate is formally dubbed a Knight of Eulogia. Amid more raucous ritual he is cast from the room into the waiting arms of the patriarchs. WITHIN the tomb students run on Skull and Bones time, which is five minutes ahead of the time in the rest of the world. "It was to encourage you to think that being in the building was so different from the outside world that you'd let your guard down," a Bonesman ('72) explains. At 6:30 on Thursdays and Sundays the Bonesmen gather in the Firefly Room for supper. The room is dim and intimate; light shines through the gaping eyeholes of fixtures shaped like skulls. Bonesmen drink various refreshments from skull-shaped cups, but never alcohol. The dry-society rule, fervently enforced, was designed to keep members level-headed for discussions -- a change of pace for George W., who drank heavily during his college years. At 7:55 barbarian time Uncle Toby rings a bell to summon the members to the session. When the knights are seated, they sing two sacred anthems before the Hearing of Excuses, during which members are assessed fines for errors, such as arriving late or using a society name outside the tomb. Uncle Toby then draws debate topics and an order of speakers from the Yorick, a skull divided into compartments. The ninety-minute period of debate can be frivolous or grave. One of the standard pieces of lore about Skull and Bones is that each member must at some point give an account of his sexual history, known as the CB (for "Connubial Bliss"). "After the first one or two times it's like guys listing their conquests, and that gets old," one young Bonesman told me recently. "There's just not that much to talk about" -- and so CBs have evolved into relationship discussions. "It's the kind of stuff a lot of guys do with their teammates," says another Bonesman ('83). "There was nothing perverse or surreal or prurient -- just an open exchange. It's like TV's Ricki Lake -- there's now a national mania for purging thoughts at large. This is a way of doing it in a very private, non-sensationalist way that benefits the people who are listening and the people who are telling." By mid-autumn, after each member has presented a CB, the time slot shifts to Life Histories, when Bonesmen spend one or more nights giving their autobiographies. George Bush's autobiography focused on his military service but also looked ahead, a 1948 member told me. "He was talking about the future, first about his family and then about being able to have an impact in public service." George W., in contrast, spoke often about his father. George W.'s fellow Bonesmen have been unwilling to elaborate. WHEN U.S. News & World Report asked President Bush in 1989 why he had chosen to attend Yale, he replied, "My family had a major Yale tradition." Today George W. Bush distances himself from Yale (although supporters cite his alma mater to combat charges that he is a lightweight). He has criticized its "intellectual snobbery" and has maintained that the school epitomizes "a certain East Coast attitude" and an "intellectual arrogance." George W.'s attitude toward Yale extends to its most elite society. Whereas George Bush returned to the tomb in 1998 to be the dinner speaker at the annual Skull and Bones commencement party, George W. has stayed away. In his 1999 campaign autobiography, A Charge to Keep, George W. Bush mentions his membership in Skull and Bones only in passing: "My senior year I joined Skull and Bones, a secret society, so secret I can't say anything more." Yet Skull and Bones was not relegated entirely to George W.'s past after he graduated. In 1971, having been rejected by the University of Texas Law School and needing a job, Bush called a Bonesman, Robert H. Gow. Gow, who later told The Washington Post that his Houston-based agricultural company had not been looking for anyone at the time, hired Bush as a management trainee. In 1977, when Bush formed Arbusto Energy, his first company, he once again applied to Skull and Bones for financial aid. With assistance from his uncle Jonathan Bush (Bones '53), he lined up $565,000 from twenty-eight investors. One of them contributed $93,000 -- the California venture capitalist William H. Draper III (Bones '50). Twelve Bonesmen (including family members)and the son of a patriarch gave a total of $35,500 to Bush's 1998 gubernatorial campaign. At least forty-six Bonesmen or sons of patriarchs have given approximately $1,000 apiece to his presidential campaign -- the maximum allowed by law. Not surprisingly, loyalty often flows in the other direction. In 1984 Bush flew to Tennessee to accompany the Republican Senate nominee and Bonesman ('67) Victor Ashe on a seven-city tour. Ashe lost to Al Gore. That George W. keeps his Skull and Bones connections in repair is hardly a sign of anything insidious; it's just business as usual in America. Compared with his family connections and his family's Yale connections, the Skull and Bones network is just a sideshow. But in the eyes of the conspiracy-minded, interconnections of any kind, especially when cloaked in mystery and ritual, constitute virtual proof of dark doings. Skull and Bones will probably never rid itself of innuendo -- innuendo that has not helped the Bonesmen Bushes in the pursuit of politics. Conspiracy theories, which George W. has called "the kind of connect-the-random-dots charges that are virtually impossible to refute," contributed to Bush's defeat in his 1978 congressional campaign. Bill Minutaglio, in his biography of Bush, First Son, recalls an afternoon debate moderated by the radio talk-show host Mel Turner: Turner ... wanted to know if the young Bush was a tool of some shadow government; it was the same thing people had confronted his father with when they had called him a "tool of the eastern kingmakers." George W.'s father has certainly felt that membership in Skull and Bones damaged him politically. When Fay Vincent made a consolation call to Bush after his 1980 loss of the Republican presidential nomination to Ronald Reagan, the weary candidate said, "Fay, let me tell you something. If you ever decide to run for office, don't forget that coming from Andover, Yale, Skull and Bones, and the Trilateral Commission is a big handicap. People don't know what they are, so they don't know where you're coming from. It's really a big, big problem." In The Skulls, members of the secret society murder a student journalist who is attempting to probe its mysteries. Real-life journalists have not met the same fate, so far as we know, although Ron Rosenbaum, the author of a 1977 Esquire article on Skull and Bones, wrote that a Bonesman warned him not to get too close: "The alumni still care," the source warned.
When I read this excerpt to one young Bonesman, he laughed and said, "I really don't think I'd be working nights as a paralegal while trying to be an actor if I had access to some golden key." SKULL and Bones doesn't own an opulent island hideaway like the one depicted in The Skulls. It does own an island on the St. Lawrence River -- Deer Island, in Alexandria Bay. The forty-acre retreat is intended to give Bonesmen an opportunity to "get together and rekindle old friendships." A century ago the island sported tennis courts and its softball fields were surrounded by rhubarb plants and gooseberry bushes. Catboats waited on the lake. Stewards catered elegant meals. But although each new Skull and Bones member still visits Deer Island, the place leaves something to be desired. "Now it is just a bunch of burned-out stone buildings," a patriarch sighs. "It's basically ruins." Another Bonesman says that to call the island "rustic" would be to glorify it. "It's a dump, but it's beautiful." The fading of Deer Island exemplifies the dwindling finances of Skull and Bones, which can no longer claim the largest society endowment at Yale. Unlike members of other societies, Bonesmen pay no dues, though patriarchs receive an annual letter requesting a "voluntary contribution to the Russell Trust Association." In truth, Skull and Bones has never been wealthy. The society's accounts are much fatter in the ineffables department. A Skull and Bones document states,
Hardly a tool of Hades, but rather a staid wayside for students, its heyday past, its glory faded, Skull and Bones may have little more than this to conceal. As for the $15,000 graduation gift, George W.'s contemporary Rex Cowdry says, "I'm still waiting for mine." Alexandra Robbins, a 1998 graduate of Yale University, is on the staff of The New Yorker's Washington bureau This article originates at http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/05/robbins.htm and is listed here only to augment our material. Ms. Robbins has a book entitled "Secrets of the Tomb" that deals with the society in greater depth. Obedience to Authority a now famous study done at Yale. Posted at: 03:21 AM | Permalink
WERE JFK AND JOHN JOHN MURDERED: PROBLEMS WITH AUTOPSY EXPOSEDAugust 3, 2008
THE KENNEDYS AN AMERICAN ROYALTY
WHO KILLED THE KENNEDYS? CLICK BELOW
PROBLEMS WITH THE ALLEGED JFK AUTOPSY X-RAYS AND PHOTOS: HAVE THE JFK AUTOPSY MATERIALS BEEN FAKED OR ALTERED? Michael T. Griffith 2001 @All Rights Reserved Second Edition Revised and Expanded on 5/7/2001 Lone-gunman theorists maintain that the alleged JFK autopsy photos and x-rays are genuine, pointing to the fact that they were authenticated by two expert panels retained by the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) in the late 1970s. However, those panels based their "authentications" on a few narrow criteria, and they did not explain the indications of fakery in the autopsy materials. Indications that the autopsy x-rays and photographs are invalid are as follows: * The HSCA admitted the following about the photographs: - They are generally of rather poor photographic quality. - Some of them were taken in such a manner that it is nearly impossible to anatomically orient the direction of view. - In many of them, scaler references are entirely lacking, or, when present, are positioned in such a manner that it is difficult or impossible to obtain accurate measurements of critical features from anatomical landmarks. - Not one of them contains information identifying the victim, such as his name, the autopsy case number, and the date and place of the examination. - Due to their lack of documentation and poor quality, the defense could have challenged the use of these photos as evidence in a trial, and even the prosecution might have had "second thoughts about using certain of these photographs since they are more confusing than informative." - The onus of establishing their authenticity would have rested with the prosecution. Harrison Livingstone correctly notes that this point and the previous one can rightly be seen as an admission that the photos would have been prima facie inadmissable as evidence in a court of law, and that the prosecution could have used them only after establishing their validity (Livingstone, HIGH TREASON 2, 315). * Earl McDonald of the National Archives, who trained in autopsy photography under autopsy photographer James Stringer, has noted other oddities about the autopsy photos. McDonald has compiled a list of things that should appear in the autopsy photos but that are not found in them: - There are no autopsy tags visible in any of the photographs. - There are no whole body photographs in the collection. - There is no photograph of the brain (at autopsy) immediately following removal from the cranium. - There is no photograph of the inside of the skull following brain removal showing its condition. - There is no photograph of the reassembled skull. - There is no photograph of the chest cavity. - There is no extreme close-up of the back wound. - There is no wide-angle and/or medium field view of the cranium viewed from the outside. (I've taken this list from chapter four of Ed Dorsch's fine online book on the assassination. The book is available at http://pages.prodigy.net/whiskey99/.)* The HSCA medical panel authenticated the x-rays partly on the basis of a right frontal sinus, but if the x-rays are composites, or if they are in fact the originals but have been altered, an authentication based on sinuses would not automatically prove authenticity. * In the color versions of the right-profile and top-of-the-head pictures, there are three large bloody red stripes hanging down on top of Kennedy's hair, giving the appearance of a severe wound at the top of the head. However, in the black and white reprints of these photos the stripes are WHITE OR LIGHT GRAY. This is a photographic impossibility, if orthochromatic film was used. With such film, red turns to black, not to white or light gray. Professional photographer Steve Mills has said the following about this problem: Orthochromatic film, unfiltered, records blue very lightly and red very darkly. This makes perfect sense in [autopsy photos] F1 through F5. Yet, here's a supposedly bloodied scalp in F6 and F7 recorded as light gray. This can be done with a red filter on ortho film, but the blood drops on the towel show me this is not the case. The scalp can't be gray and three bloody spots still be dark if a filter was used. It is common to use ortho film in forensic photography to show differences and details in red and blue areas. But this is no proof. The record declares one type of film, and the photos declare either another or fraud. (Livingstone, HIGH TREASON 2, 584) Mills goes on to discuss indications of fraud in the Groden color autopsy photos in relation to the stripes and the scalp: They [the autopsy photos] also show Groden's color shots to be frauds. Let me explain. 1) Let's say it was pan b/w. F6 and F7 would have to be shot with a blue filter to lighten the stripe. That would darken the supposedly bloody scalp. You can't have it both ways, i.e., light red AND light blue, so there's no red filter either. This would not work. So, if it's truly pan film, then the scalp is not bloody skin but brain matter. 2) Let's say it's ortho film. The blue stripe will always be light and the red will always be dark. No filter is required if the scalp is really brain tissue, but a red one is still needed to lighten blood. But here the bloody spots prove this is not the case once again. So do the bloody marks on his shoulder. So, here's the result: They probably used ortho film and no filtering of any kind. THAT IS BRAIN and NOT SCALP. We can see that NO COMBINATION OF FILM AND FILTRATION CAN GIVE YOU B/W PHOTOS THAT WILL JIBE WITH GRODEN'S COLORS. THEY HAVE TO BE FAKE. (Livingstone, HIGH TREASON 2, 584-585, original emphasis) Furthermore, nearly all of the medical witnesses who have commented on the condition of the top of the head have said it was virtually undamaged (Livingstone, HIGH TREASON 2, 156, 182; Livingstone, KILLING KENNEDY, 254, 255, 256-257; Livingstone, KILLING THE TRUTH, 139; see also the discussion herein on the location of the large head wound). Numerous witnesses reported that the large head defect was not visible when the back of the head was lying flat on the table. * The autopsy photos were supposedly taken at the morgue of the Bethesda Naval Hospital, but some of the medical technicians who worked there--and who also assisted with the autopsy--have stated that the background in those pictures is not that of the Bethesda morgue. Among other things, these technicians argue that the instrument tray shown in the F7 top-of-the-head photo is not the kind of tray that was used at the Bethesda morgue. Additionally, the left-profile picture shows a black phone on the wall beside the table, but these autopsy technicians say there was no phone at that position at the morgue. * The x-rays of the skull show two-thirds of the right side of the brain to be gone. All that remains is a torn and flattened base. Yet, the x-rays also show a trail of tiny metal fragments across the top of the head on the right side, from the alleged entrance point in the rear to the forward margin of the supposed exit wound in the right front. How can this be? What is supporting the metal if there is no brain in that part of the head? The fragments in the right frontal lobe are particularly problematic. Dr. Richard Lindenberg, an expert consultant for the Rockefeller Commission, noted that in the skull x-rays the entire right frontal lobe is MISSING. But the x-rays show bullet fragments in that lobe. What is supporting those fragments if the lobe is not there? One cannot have the right frontal lobe missing and still have fragments seen in it on an x-ray. * Floyd Riebe, one of the two autopsy photographers, stated in a filmed interview for KRON-TV in 1988 that the autopsy x-rays and photos had been doctored in some way, and that the photos did not show the wounds that he saw on the night of the autopsy. Riebe said he recalled seeing "a big gaping hole in the back of the head." The other photographer, James Stringer, stated in a taped interview that he did NOT take the photos of the back of the head, which show that area intact, contrary to the testimony of literally dozens of credible witnesses. Who, then, took the back-of-the-head pictures? * In the skull x-rays, according to government-hired experts who have examined them, there does not appear to be a large defect in the right rear part of the head. Similarly, in the autopsy photographs of the back of the head, this area of the head is intact. However, numerous medical professionals and federal agents who saw Kennedy's body have stated there was a large hole in that part of the skull. Some of these witnesses include the following: - Audrey Bell, a nursing supervisor at Parkland Hospital. - Diana Bowron, Parkland Hospital nurse. Nurse Bowron actually cleaned the large defect and packed it with gauze squares in preparing the body for the casket. She vividly remembers that the large head wound was in the right rear part of the skull. - Dr. Kemp Clark, Parkland Hospital. - Dr. Charles Crenshaw, Parkland Hospital. - Dr. Richard Dulaney, Parkland Hospital. - Dr. John Ebersole, Bethesda Hospital radiologist. In an extensive interview with his hometown newspaper in 1978, Dr. Ebersole said, "When the body was removed from the casket there was a very obvious horrible gaping wound in the back of the head" (Lifton 543). - William Greer, Secret Service agent, who drove the presidential limousine. - Clint Hill, a Secret Service agent who was taken to the morgue for the express purpose of viewing the President's wounds and who was also in the Parkland trauma room when the President was being treated. It was Agent Hill who climbed onto the back of the limousine to get Jackie Kennedy to return to her seat. Hill testified that as he was lying over the top of the back seat "I noticed A PORTION OF THE PRESIDENT'S HEAD ON THE RIGHT REAR SIDE WAS MISSING and he was bleeding profusely." Hours later, when Hill was taken to the morgue for the express purpose of viewing the President's wounds, he again reported seeing a large defect in the right rear area of the skull. - Patricia Hutton (now Patricia Gustaffson), a nurse at Parkland Hospital, who placed a bandage against the wound in the back of the head. - James Curtis Jenkins, a Navy lab technician at Bethesda Hospital who was present at the autopsy. - Dr. Robert Karnei, Bethesda Hospital, who was present at the autopsy. - Roy Kellerman, a Secret Service agent who was present at the autopsy. - Dr. Robert McClelland, Parkland Hospital. - Doris Nelson, a chief nurse at Parkland Hospital. Nurse Nelson, who got a very good look at Kennedy's head in the trauma room at Parkland Hospital, balked when shown the alleged autopsy photos of the back of the head: Doris Nelson, the supervising Emergency Room nurse, carefully inspected the body. Ben Bradlee, Jr., asked her, "Did you get a good look at his head injuries?" "A very good look," she replied. "Oh, I did see it. When we wrapped him up and put him in the coffin. I saw his whole head." She was then asked if the alleged autopsy photos were accurate. "No. It's not true. Because there was no hair back there. There wasn't even hair back there. It was blown away. Some of his head was blown away and his brains were fallen down on the stretcher." (Groden and Livingstone 454) - Aubrey Rike, an ambulance driver and funeral home worker in Dallas. Rike was called to Parkland Hospital soon after the shooting and assisted in placing the President's body in the casket. Rike could actually feel the edges of the large wound in the back of the head. - Tom Robinson, the mortician who had the job of putting the President back together after the autopsy in case the family wanted to take one last look at him. Robinson, of course, had to spend a good part of his time handling the President's head. He saw and felt the large wound in the right rear. - Jan Gail Rudnicki, a lab assistant at Bethesda Hospital who was present at the autopsy. - Roy Stamps, a Fort Worth newsman who saw Kennedy lying in the limousine before he was moved into Parkland Hospital. Said Stamps, "I rushed up and saw Kennedy lying in the car. . . . The back of his head was gone" (Marrs 362). - Dr. David Stewart, Parkland Hospital. It should be noted that according to some private experts, the anterior-posterior (AP) x-ray does indicate some missing bone in the occipital region. * The skull x-rays show a large 6.5 mm fragment in the outer table of the skull below what government-hired experts have described as an entrance hole in the top part of the back of the head, in the cowlick area. However, neither the autopsy doctors nor the radiologist reported seeing this fragment in the skull x-rays that were taken on the night of the autopsy (Livingstone, KILLING THE TRUTH, 131-133, 622, 630). When the chief autopsist, Dr. James Humes, testified before the Warren Commission, he discussed at length the fragments he observed in the skull and in the skull x-rays, and he mentioned that he and the other doctors were looking for fragments to retrieve, yet he said nothing about seeing a 6.5 mm fragment anywhere in the rear part of the skull (see, for example, 2 H 351-355, 358-360). Additionally, ballistics expert Howard Donahue has pointed out that it is highly unlikely that the 6.5 mm fragment could have come from a bullet fired from the alleged sniper's nest. Defenders of the x-rays speculate that the fragment "sheared off" from the bullet as the missile entered the skull. But Donahue observes that a bullet fired from the TSBD, and thus entering the skull at a downward angle, should have deposited a sheared-off fragment ABOVE the entrance point, not below it. He further notes that he has never heard off a fully metal-jacketed bullet shearing on impact (Menninger 68, 160). Detective Shaun Roach, an Australian forensics expert, agrees, saying, ". . . due to the inherent strength of the 6.5 mm Carcano jacket, I also believe that it would NOT shear off a fragment upon entering the head, then deposit that fragment on the outer table of the skull, either above or below the wound" (Livingstone, KILLING THE TRUTH, 57). In fact, forensic science knows of no case where a fully metal-jacketed bullet deposited a sheared-off fragment in the outer table of the skull after striking the skull. Moreover, the alleged entrance hole in the x-rays, near which the 6.5 mm fragment appears, is a staggering four inches HIGHER than the entry point described in the autopsy report. It is extremely hard to believe that the autopsy pathologists mislocated this wound by a whopping four inches, especially since one of them, Dr. J. Thornton Boswell, in effect triangulated the wound to the external occipital protuberance (Livingstone, KILLING THE TRUTH, 129-130). * Dr. Mantik has concluded the x-rays are abnormal. Dr. Mantik reached this conclusion after studying the radiographs at the National Archives with sensitive light-measuring equipment. Dr. Mantik has noted that the measured light in the large white area on the right lateral x-rays is "a thousand times the maximum seen in any other x-rays" (in DATELINE: DALLAS, April 12, 1994, p. 13; see also Livingstone, KILLING KENNEDY, 79-87). (For the record, Dr. Mantik, B.S., M.S., Ph.D., M.D., is a board-certified radiation oncologist and the Director of Radiation Oncology at Eisenhower Memorial Hospital. He was formerly an Assistant Professor of Radiation Science at Loma Linda University, Loma Linda, California, and is the author or co-author of several scholarly publications in these fields. Dr. Mantik's Ph.D. is in physics.) * The Select Committee's medical panel claimed that in the lateral skull x-ray fracture lines radiate outward from the proposed cowlick entry site and correspondingly from the 6.5 mm fragment that now appears in the skull radiographs. But Dr. Mantik points out that these lines do not actually radiate from this location: On the AP [anterior-posterior] view, however, these lines do not actually extend to the proposed entry site; they stop short of it. Dr. David O. Davis [an HSCA consultant] was careful to choose his words: ". . . the linear fractures seem to MORE OR LESS emanate from the embedded metallic fragment." Unless they unequivocally extend to this 6.5 mm object they cannot represent fracture lines caused by a posterior skull bullet. On the contrary, based on the radiographs and on Boswell's diagram, several of these obvious fracture lines may lie in the inferior orbital rim and not on the posterior skull at all. The inferior orbital rim fractures were confirmed by radiologist Seaman [another HSCA consultant]: "Fractures were evident through the upper part of the right eye, including the top and bottom of the right orbit." If these fractures lie on the anterior skull surface they cannot, of course, represent fracture lines emanating from the proposed cowlick entry site, and therefore, they cannot be used as evidence of a cowlick entry. (Livingstone, KILLING THE TRUTH, 613) * Dr. Humes, the chief autopsist, removed a large bullet fragment behind the right eye's supraorbital ridge. Humes told the Commission that this fragment was "visible by x-ray just above the right eye." In other words, Humes removed this fragment AFTER it had been x-rayed in the skull. Yet, apparently this fragment was NOT present in the autopsy x-rays that were examined by the Clark Panel in 1968, since the panel didn't even mention it. Given the fact that panel's purpose was to provide a comprehensive review of the autopsy x-rays and photos, it is hard to believe the panel would have failed to mention the fragment had it appeared in the x-rays that the panel studied. Moreover, to further complicate matters, Dr. Wecht and Dr. John Lattimer have stated that the large right-eye fragment DID appear in the skull x-rays that they examined a few years later at the National Archives (i.e., after the Clark Panel completed its work). * So far the 6.5 mm object seen in the skull x-rays has been referred to herein as a "fragment." However, Dr. Mantik discovered that this "fragment" is really not a bullet fragment! After direct study of the x-rays, coupled with optical density measurements, Dr. Mantik found that this object is composed of an artificial image that was superimposed over the image of a smaller, genuine bullet fragment. Dr. Mantik has even duplicated the process by which the image of the 6.5 mm object could have been created. This image could only have been added to the x-rays after the autopsy. Dr. Mantik discusses these important findings in the recent book ASSASSINATION SCIENCE: EXPERTS SPEAK OUT ON THE DEATH OF JFK (Chicago: Catfeet Press, 1998), edited by Professor James Fetzer of the University of Minnesota. * Bethesda x-ray technician Jerrol Custer has stated that on November 23, the day after the autopsy, he was instructed by his superiors to tape bullet fragments to pieces of skull and then to x-ray them. At the time, Custer was told these x-rays were for a "bust" of JFK's head, but no such "bust" has ever surfaced. Custer suspects the radiographs he was ordered to take on November 23 were used to make the autopsy x-rays (Livingstone, HIGH TREASON 2, 219, 554). * According to Dr. Lattimer, the photographs of the President's brain show the cerebellum "to be intact." However, several Dallas doctors reported that the cerebellum was badly damaged. One Dallas doctor after another testified that the cerebellum--a structure at the bottom of the back of the brain--was damaged. It was "macerated," said Dr. Carrico; "blasted out," said Dr. McClelland; "present . . . on the cart," said Dr. Baxter; "herniated from the wound," said Dr. Jenkins; and "damaged and exposed," said Dr. Kemp Clark, the neurosurgeon. (Lifton 504) In all, seven of the Dallas doctors, all of whom got a good look at the large defect, reported seeing considerable damage to the cerebellum (Livingstone, KILLING THE TRUTH, 631-632). It should be noted that cerebellar tissue is easy to distinguish from other brain tissue. Even Dr. Humes noted damage to the cerebellum. Dr. Humes examined microscopic sections taken from seven areas of the brain, including the cerebellum. He said that ALL of the sections were "essentially similar" and that they showed "EXTENSIVE DISRUPTION OF BRAIN TISSUE WITH ASSOCIATED HEMORRHAGE" (WCR 545, emphasis added). * In the autopsy photos of the back of the head, the occipital region is undamaged. But there is considerable evidence that these pictures have been doctored, or that they are entirely fake. For example: - As discussed above, there is massive eyewitness testimony that there was a large defect in the right occipital-parietal area. - The AP x-ray of the skull indicates, or suggests, missing bone in the occipital area (Livingstone, KILLING THE TRUTH, 630, citing a letter from Dr. Gary Aguilar, Dr. Wayne Smith, Dr. Anthony White, Dr. Patricia James, and Dr. Mantik). - Two of the autopsy pathologists, Dr. Humes and Dr. Pierre Finck, reported that the large defect extended into the occipital region. - The autopsy report itself says the large wound extended "somewhat into the temporal and occipital regions" (WCR 540). - We now know from recently released files that Dr. Ebersole, who was the radiologist at the autopsy, told HSCA investigators that a sizable OCCIPITAL BONE FRAGMENT arrived late that night from Dallas (Livingstone, KILLING KENNEDY, 259). Understandably, Dr. Ebersole said the photos of the back of the head did NOT show the large defect as he recalled it (Livingstone, KILLING KENNEDY, 41-42). When shown one of the back-of-the-head photographs, Dr. Ebersole told HSCA investigators that his recollection was that the large defect was in the occipital region, and that he "certainly" could NOT state that the image seen in the photo was "the way it [the back of the head] looked" (Livingstone, KILLING KENNEDY, 41). - Similarly, Dr. Boswell made it clear to the HSCA that part of the rear entry wound, which he and the other pathologists said was located in the middle of the occiput, was contained in a piece of missing bone that didn't arrive until late that night. Thus, according to Dr. Boswell's detailed description to HSCA investigators, that late-arriving bone fragment would have had to be mostly or entirely from the occipital area. Perhaps the above evidence explains why Saundra Kay Spencer, who processed the autopsy photos that Secret Service Agent James Fox brought from the autopsy, told the Assassination Records Review Board (ARRB) that she did NOT process any of the autopsy photos now in evidence, i.e., that the autopsy photos that she processed were different from the autopsy pictures now in evidence. She also told the ARRB she did not process any black and white photos, only negatives and color positives. This suggests the black and white autopsy photos were processed elsewhere, and that there were TWO sets of autopsy photos Joe O'Donnell, who worked with White House photographer Robert Knudsen, told the ARRB that Knudsen showed him autopsy photos that showed a grapefruit-sized hole IN THE BACK OF THE HEAD. This is yet another witness who saw a sizable wound in the rear of the skull. In light of this evidence, how can any credence be placed in the alleged autopsy photos of the back of head, which show no damage to the occipital region, especially since these photos were allegedly taken prior to the start of the autopsy? Some experts assert that the x-rays are authentic but that they have been misinterpreted by the government-hired consultants and pro-WC doctors who have examined them. For instance, Dr. Randy Robertson, a radiologist who has examined the x-rays at the National Archives, says they show that two bullets struck President Kennedy in the head, and that one of them entered from the front. Dr. Joseph Riley has likewise concluded the skull x-rays show that two bullets struck Kennedy's head. And, Dr. Mantik and others maintain that the AP x-ray at the National Archives gives indications of a sizable right-rear defect. Much of the controversy surrounding the skull x-rays could be cleared up if the originals were to be released for detailed, prolonged examination by independent experts. In the meantime, the conflicts between the x-rays and the photographs remain, and the photos that show the back of the head intact are strongly contradicted, not only by the AP x-ray, but by the huge amount of eyewitness testimony that there was a large, gaping wound in that area. Bibliography Dorsch, Ed, THE KENNEDY ASSASSINATION FOR THE NOVICE, online book at http://pages.prodigy.net/whiskey99/.Fetzer, James, editor, ASSASSINATION SCIENCE: EXPERTS SPEAK OUT ON THE DEATH OF JFK, Chicago: Catfeet Press, 1998. Groden, Robert and Harrison Edward Livingstone, HIGH TREASON: THE ASSASSINATION OF PRESIDENT KENNEDY AND THE NEW EVIDENCE OF CONSPIRACY, Berkley Edition, New York: Berkley Books, 1990. Lifton, David, BEST EVIDENCE, New York: Carroll & Graf, 1988. Livingstone, Harrison Edward, HIGH TREASON 2, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1992. -----, KILLING KENNEDY AND THE HOAX OF THE CENTURY, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1995. Must reading. -----, KILLING THE TRUTH: DECEIT AND DECEPTION IN THE JFK CASE, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1993. -----, STUNNING NEW EVIDENCE IN THE JFK CASE, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1999. Marrs, Jim, CROSSFIRE: THE PLOT THAT KILLED KENNEDY, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, 1989. Menninger, Bonar, MORTAL ERROR: THE SHOT THAT KILLED JFK, New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992. Posner, Gerald, CASE CLOSED: LEE HARVEY OSWALD AND THE ASSASSINATION OF JFK, New York: Random House, 1993. ---------------------------------------------- ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Michael T. Griffith holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Excelsior College in Albany, New York, and two Associate in Applied Science degrees from the Community College of the Air Force. He is also a two-time graduate of the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California, and of the U.S. Air Force Technical Training School in San Angelo, Texas. He has earned instructor certification from both the U.S. Army and the U.S. Air Force. He is the author of the book Compelling Evidence: A New Look at the Assassination of President Kennedy (Grand Prairie, TX: JFK-Lancer Productions and Publications, 1996). His articles on the assassination have appeared in several journals that deal with the subject. In addition, he is the author of four books on Mormonism and ancient texts. JFK Assassination Web Page (Old)
Posted at: 04:04 PM | Permalink
BUSH FAMILY---. MEMBERS OF YALES SKULL AND BONES SECRET SOCIETYAugust 2, 2008AS YOU ENTER THIS POST....I CHALLENGE YOU TO BELIEVE OF DISBELIEVE THE CONTENT OF WHAT YOU READ OR SEE.....BUT EITHER WAY I WELCOME THOSE WHO STILL BELIEVE IN LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL!
President Bush? YALE'S SKULL & BONESSOCIETY MEMBERS http://www.skullandcrossbones.org/articles/skullandbones.htmBy Eric Samuelson, J.D. I am presently researching a biography on David Rockefeller. An overview of the book will soon be sent to a SURNAME GIVEN NAME S&B YEARELECTION 2000 This election was as close as can be Was it Gore or Bush?... we waited for the answer so patiently But the chads were still floating in Florida you see
The votes were not counted as election night dragged on…
They called in a judge to decide what the people had said Were you a blue? or were you a red? Is this any way to vote from your head?
In the end, the people did choose But in Mr. Bush, did America win or lose? It’s up to time to judge his fate That began when Mr. Gore conceded on that date
Yes, it was a date in history and a place in time… When the state of Florida turned a presidential election into a state of the sublime.
November 2000
* ELECTION REACTION-2004
I’ll call him President Bush even though the push to start anew has died
* POLITICALLY SAID
Just a poem to say what is politically said In hopes that a vote for the people is not politically dead Red or Blue....which one are you? A President named Bush has won the popular vote they say Now the Reds rule and the Blues must concede But did he really win the popular vote or just plant the seed? We must never give in to arrogance or corruption And never let the free world fall into consumption If something isn't right, we still need to take a stand It doesn’t matter if it's said by a politician or by a common man So stand up for your rights and never give in We can still change the world no matter what state we are in Ohio or Florida, Pennsylvania or Maine We must continue to hear the people's voice So don't let it die in vain...... November 2004 Posted at: 08:23 AM | Permalink
PLEASE ENTER INTO MY POETRYWORLDJuly 30, 2008I INVITE YOU TO ENTER INTO MY 20 PAGES OF LOVE, SPACE, EMOTION AND POETRY BY USING THE WEBLINK BELOW
http://www.poetryworld.mysite.com/index_3.html I HAVE INCURRED ANOTHER PROBLEM WITH MY WEBSERVER AND "WEBMASTER" WHO I BELIEVE TO BE IN INDIA...... PLEASE CONTINUE TO SCROLL DOWN AND READ MY UPDATED SPACE LOG OR LINK INTO MY "LUNA WORLD" AND BEGIN AGAIN THE LOVE STORY OF ROMEO AND JULIET.....
CLICK ON THE WEBPAGE BELOW AND YOU MAY BE ABLE TO VIEW WITHIN MY PAGE OF LOVE POEMS AND PICTURES AS I CONTINUE TO OVERCOME THE OBSTACLES THAT I COME ACROSS EACH DAY iN THIS WORLD OF INSTANT COMMUNICATION IN HOPES THAT ONE DAY I CAN BREAK THROUGH THE WALLS AND FINALLY SEE THE LIGHT SHINNING IN THE EYES OF MY JULIET...TO HELP SPREAD MY WORDS OF SPACE AND LOVE AND TO CONTINUE MY SEARCH FOR WISDOM AND TRUE LOVE THROUGH ENLIGHTENMENT. http://www.poetryworld.mysite.com/index_2.html WITH LOVE ALWAYS, DANIEL "WINGSAND" REED aka. ROMEOICON Posted at: 03:42 PM | Permalink
REMEMBERING JACKIE KENNEDY- OUR 31-year old FIRST LADYJuly 28, 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Your tributes to the king of rock'n'roll, Elvis Presley
The enduring appeal of the King of rock'n'roll
