Oliver Stone's so-called documentary, JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass, alleges that Gerald Ford disclosed to French President Valery Giscard D'Estaing that the JFK assassination was a conspiracy.
Screen shot from JFK Revisited
Here is an excerpt from a transcript: (1:05:54)
Dr. Cyril Wecht: As I recall, they said about Gerald Ford that he could not chew gum and walk at the same time. Now all of a sudden, he becomes a forensic pathologist, and a photographer, and a criminalist, and an expert, and he knows where the bullet hole was and he moved it up.
Whoopi Goldberg: But then in 1979, the House Select Committee moved it lower in the back because they had pictures from the autopsy. It is conceivable that, at the time, the Warren Commission thought no one would ever see the autopsy photos. When the review board declassified the notations showing what Ford had done, the former commissioner replied that it had nothing to do with a conspiracy theory. He was only trying to be more precise.
Whoopi Goldberg: This is directly contradicted by a conversation Ford had with French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing. Ford told him the assassination was not the work of one person. "It was something set up. We were sure it was set up. But we were not able to discover by whom."
Did Gerald Ford really say this? It would be completely out of character and contradicts everything he said publicly for decades.
"Lors de ce voyage officiel, je suis accueilli par le Président Gerald Ford, qui fut l’un des membres de la Commission Warren, chargée de faire la lumière sur l’assassinat de Kennedy.
Alors que nous faisons route vers Mount Vernon, l'ancienne demeure du Président George Washington, je lui demande s'il s'est fait une opinion à ce sujet.
Il me répond : ''Oui. Nous sommes arrivés à la conclusion que cet assassinat avait été préparé. Il y a eu complot. Mais nous n'avons pas été capables d'identifier quelle organisation l'avait commandité.''
Cette opinion, je la partage. J'en ai acquis la certitude quand, trois ans après cette entrevue, j'ai abordé cette question avec un entrepreneur pétrolier très important de La Nouvelle-Orléans avec qui je chassais en Ecosse.
Naïvement, je lui ai demandé : ''Savez-vous qui a assassiné Kennedy ?'' Il m'a répondu sans ciller : ''Oui.'' Ce n'est pas un tireur fou et isolé qui a tué le président des Etats-Unis."
Here is an English translation:
On this official trip, I am greeted by President Gerald Ford, who was one of the members of the Warren Commission, charged with shedding light on the Kennedy assassination. As we make our way to Mount Vernon, the former home of President George Washington, I ask him if he has formed an opinion on this subject. He answers me: "Yes. We came to the conclusion that this assassination had been prepared. There was a conspiracy. But we weren't able to identify which organization sponsored it."
This opinion, I share it. I was sure of this when, three years after this interview, I broached this issue with a very prominent New Orleans oil contractor with whom I was hunting in Scotland. Naively, I asked him, '' Do you know who murdered Kennedy? '' He answered bluntly: "Yes. It was not some mad, lone gunman who killed the President of the United States."
"Perhaps Giscard simply misunderstood what Ford said. As Giscard showed in a 2016 appearance, his command of the language is decent but he is not entirely comfortable speaking English."
In another version of the story, the words "nous avons abouti a une premiere conclusion." which might mean an initial conclusion. One can easily see how this all could have been misinterpreted.
"He also once told this Washington Post reporter that when Mitterrand was on his death bed, he had admitted to Mr. Giscard: “The only way we could beat you was to destroy you” with fabricated scandal."
This is exactly the sort of story that JFK Revisited writer James DiEugenio likes - the single-sourced anecdote about somebody no longer alive. He wrote in his review of my book, I Was a Teenage JFK Conspiracy Freak:
"When asked if Oswald was the actual killer, he [J. Edgar Hoover] replied with, “If I told you what I really know, it would be very dangerous to this country. Our whole political system could be disrupted.” (James DiEugenio, Destiny Betrayed, Second Edition, p. 246)"
The actual source is Anthony Summers book Official and Confidential: The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover. Summers quoted Billy Bryars, a student who had a conversation with Hoover in the summer of 1964. But, did this really happen? Was Hoover perhaps thinking the Soviets were involved? Well, we don’t really know.
DiEugenio tells a whopper of a story about Clay Shaw. An interior designer, Phil Dyer, met with Shaw in 1972 and said Shaw admitted that he not only knew Oswald fairly well, but that Oswald was a double agent. When this supposedly happened, Shaw was in the middle of his damages lawsuit against Jim Garrison. A strange time for a statement that could be used against him. Perhaps, Shaw was pulling his leg. Or, perhaps this never happened.
DiEugenio is suspicious of just about anything the government does or says, but in this case, he finds no need for any skepticism. Indeed, DiEugenio says Dyer “certifies the defendant’s knowing perjury.”
What makes this all surprising is that JFK Revisited makes a big deal out of the claim that much of the evidence would not be admissible in a trial of Lee Harvey Oswald. That supposition is certainly debatable. And yet, Oliver Stone's so-called documentary is full of hearsay, which would definitely not be admissible.
Previous Relevant Blog Posts on JFK Revisited
Robert Kennedy, Jr. believes in a massive conspiracy regarding Covid and the intelligence agencies.
While Gerald Ford edited some language in the Warren Report, he did not change the location of the back wound. Autopsy photographs show exactly the location of the back wound.
Oliver Stone's so-called documentary alleges that Oswald was "moved" to Dallas and "placed" in the Texas School Book Depository. This is totally ridiculous.
The preponderance of the evidence indicates JFK"s throat wound was one of exit.
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Gochenaur's writings don't back up his allegations in JFK Revisited.
Oliver Stone's so-called documentary claims that Guy Banister gave Oswald a room at 544 Camp Street. The evidence does not support the allegation.
Dr. Robert Kirschner's consultation with the ARRB explains a mystery in the documentary.
JFK Revisited makes a big deal about the weight of JFK's brain and ignores a non-conspiratorial explanation.
Oliver Stone's so-called documentary makes it sound like the autopsy photographer said that he did not take the photos of JFK's brain that are in the current inventory,
Oliver Stone took to Twitter last weekend to bemoan the fact that the mainstream press is ignoring his so-called documentary, JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass.
There is something really obscene about Oliver Stone once again going after Clay Shaw.
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Oliver Stone tries to make it seem like Marina Porter has denied taking the backyard photographs of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Oliver Stone once again raises the issue of the legitimacy of the backyard photographs of Lee Harvey Oswald.
This post debunks every witness that ever claimed Shaw was Bertrand.
He cannot imagine any sort of non-conspiratorial explanations for any of the suspicious pieces of evidence in his film.
No, Clay Shaw was not a "contract agent."
Steve Roe Blog Posts on JFK Revisited
"Stone/DiEugenio hatch another Bogus Mystery with Sinister Strap/Sling Mounts on Oswald's Rifle"
Oliver Stone claims that Oswald could not have been in the sniper's nest on the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository. Steve Roe exposes Stone's mistakes.
In an interview on RT [Russia Today], Oliver Stone says that the throat wound might have been made by a flechette.
Steve Roe presents some examples of Oliver Stone's 'creative' abilities.
Oliver Stone distorts the testimony about Oswald's palmprint on the Mannlicher-Carcano rifle.