Lee Harvey Oswald – Audibly Speaking: A Site of History and Memory

In Chapter Four we have an overview of the evidence against Oswald.  Here I summarize the chapter.

A recent podcast episode by the excellent historians of the JFK assassination, Gerald Posner and Fred Litwin, prompted this podcast episode of mine. Given the need to speculate about so much that is important about the behavior of Oswald on November 21 (pre-assassination) and November 33 (post-assassination), is it possible to employ speculation as a technique for getting at the t

It’s core findings remain untouched.  Its conclusions have stood the test of time. In this episode we see the tour de force that lies at the foundation of this seminal chapter in The Warren Report: Chapter Three.  While subsequent research has expanded on the insights we gain from this chapter, which distilled the most important work of the Warren Commission, nothi

Today I summarize the Warren Report’s Chapter Two, “The Assassination.” It is a chapter that promises much but really delivers less than meets the eye. Focusing on the details that form the background of the assassination, and continuing by trading in the shadowlands of lacunae about the event, chapter two is a mere overture to the real opera of the assassination

The Warren Commission’s Warren Report, at 888 pages, is a long slog.  For those for whom it is too long, I begin here a series of summaries of each of the chapters in the Report.  Each chapter exhibits the strengths and weaknesses of the Commission’s investigations.  The Commission’s faults can be exaggerated and it accomplishments overlooked. 

We have an intermission episode in this series on the JFK assassination, with a personal view of the memories of the host on the assassination and why he was not taken in by conspiracy theories, in contrast to so many of his boomer cohorts along the way.

Today, Audibly Speaking reviews the magisterial book by famed prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi, Reclaiming History: The Assassination of President John F. Kennedy.  We revisit the things that make it unique and utterly unanswerable as a riposte to the crazy conspiracy theories that still pollute the writings about the 35th US President.

In this sidebar episode tracing the movements of Lee Harvey Oswald and we step back from the forest to examine the trees of the story. In this politically portentous year of 2024, learn what the conspiracy nonsense can do to help us save American democracy. And begin to learn why the strengths of the Warren Commission and its Warren Report far out weigh the particular weaknesses e

Why did Lee Harvey Oswald go east from his boarding house in the aftermath of the JFK assassination, only to go west before his fatal encounter with Police Officer J.D. Tippit on November 22, 1963? The only possible answer was that his plans must have changed, along with his destination, at least temporarily. Ironically, however, his confrontation with Tippit, murderous though it

We have now arrived at the critical moments.  What happened as the assassination occurred and what do we know of Oswald’s behavior during these most important of minutes? It turns out we know a great deal–so much in fact that we can even infer what was going on in Oswald’s mind on a minute by minute basis.  In this episode, we also speculate about the m