Heads Up on Discovery Channel (PST): Thom Hartmann and others

[Misskittycat]

on new book(s) re JFK assassination as mafia hit, with at least knowledge of CIA, all related to Cuba and Castro. I heard Thom talking about it on his radio show a few days ago and mentioning this TV program.

[avaistheone1]

1. Damn. I don't have Discovery Channel.

Please report back about this show.

I think the show is based on Lamar Waldron and Thom Hartman's new book "Legacy of Secrecy: The Long Shadow of the JFK Assassination" which has received excellent reviews by the premier JFK assassination scholars.

[Misskittycat]

6. It is based on that book, and some other sources.

The gist of it (in very short form) is that the Mafia was extraordinarily powerful in the late 50's and early '60's and John and Bobby were really going after them in a big way, so several families (Chicago, Traficante, Marcello in New Orleans) wanted to really get not only Bobby but also JFK. (You don't just go after the tail of the dog that bites you, go after the head of the dog, i.e., JFK)

In addition, the Mafia had been operating in pre-Castro Cuba big-time in the casino business and had a really big financial interest in overthrowing Castro -- hence, the connection with the CIA's (and the Kennedy Administration's) interest in getting rid of Castro. The CIA frequently worked with unsavory characters/groups and had worked with the Mafia in the past, so they hooked up together with in the anti-Castro effort.

There were strategic reasons why killing Kennedy had to take place in or around November of 1963, and according to Hartmann and his book partner, there were plans in place to try to make the hit earlier in November in Chicago and then again in Florida, (both of which didn't come off), and then the hit on Nov. 22nd was successful.

[avaistheone1]

12. Thank you. This sounds like a worthwhile program.

I hope the Discovery Channel puts it out on CD.

[dflprincess]

2. If the Mafia and the CIA started working to gether during WWII

when the CIA was still the OSS. It's hardly surprising that with Castro as part of the deal that they'd still be working together. I think the CIA was in it as deeply as it could be, and not just "knowledge" of it.

[avaistheone1]

3. I agree.

[patrice]

4. You're making me regret that I dumped cable TV. Could you please

keep us posted here?

And I hope you don't think it rude of me if I suggest tweeting it too.

[Misskittycat]

5. I'm afraid I don't know how to tweet.

[patrice]

9. I'm just learning myself. I suppose it isn't really worthwhile unless you have people who

follow you on Twitter, kind of like FaceBook but with less graphics and other widgetts.

I was using one of the Twitter monitors software yesterday and found some Rush Limbaugh wannabe in my city blabbing away on there using nothing but all of the cliche talking points. Not a huge deal really, but the guy had almost 200 followers. That got me to thinking about it. I wonder how many people like that organize through their churches.

[Misskittycat]

7. According to one recent source interviewed on the show,

godfather Marcello of New Orleans later confessed to ordering and arranging the hit on Kennedy. Jack Ruby was Marcello's man and had skimmed money from Marcello, and so Ruby "owed" Marcello, and was essentially ordered to shoot Oswald to silence him.

Now, they are tying Oswald to all of it; i.e., Oswald is a stooge that Marcello hoped would be shot by police as soon as police saw him in the school depository. Oswald thinks he is acting for the Communists in taking out Kennedy; when he is arrested in the movie theatre, he immediately asks for a lawyer, who it turns out is the leading Communist lawyer in the U.S. Oswald soon begins to realize he is being "had." (They also make the point that Oswald grew up in a really tough part of New Orleans and so had family ties/encounters with crime elements in N.O.; so, he was known to the Marcello family, and the fact that he had turned ardently pro-Communist was a convenient way to use him and deflect attention away from the Mafia.

(Gerald Posner is also on the show, taking a somewhat contrarian view of some of the theories of Thom Hartmann and his partner.)

[Misskittycat]

8. This FBI informant was Marcello's cellmate (years later) in prison.

[Misskittycat]

10. Good show. Look forward to reading the book. n/t

[Bozita]

11. Repeat on 12/3