Hyperbole, Insults, and the Deficiencies of arguments that employ them

How is someone going to quibble about "atomic clock" time? There was no GPS back then, nothing to auto-sync your cell phone to... people had to actually wind their Timexes, as I recall (I seem to recall that electric watches were still "very new" in the early 60's). Plus, on top of that, pretty much EVERYONE in the JFK evidence space is lying in some way, we can't even believe the police officers themselves (or the sheriffs, or the FBI, or anyone else - not even the doctors!). And, the paucity of physical evidence at this point is overwhelming, without very powerful analytical tools (ie "more than just a brain") it would be almost impossible to juggle all the different "what must have come before what" scenarios. (And which, in turn, mainly depend on "whom you choose to believe" and which pieces of data you're actually trying to account for, and which you're sweeping under the carpet or somehow "excusing" - oh and, that's a generic "you" of course, meaning "everyone including me").  Y'know... are we absolutely certain the Dallas PD sync'd their wall clock to the atomic clock that morning, or is it possible the dispatcher could have forgotten that important duty and the clock might have been one or two minutes off? This "determination of the sequence of events" is more complicated that just looking at a clock or listening to someone's testimony. I even remember seeing the picture of the Rambler where the giant clock said "12:40" - well, what are the chances it could have been a minute off? I don't know... they didn't have satellites back then, as I recall most people called 976-1212 which was the "telephone company time", which was about as precise as it got back then.

Tippit's time of death was called in the hospital ER at 1:15.  Not only is this is the most reliable piece of time evidence (its part of a doctor's duties to document time of death and hospitals set clocks on the wall for this purpose), its the only piece the cops can't fudge. This is for the the same that  the homicide rate is a city or country's only truly reliable crime statistic-- doctors don't work for the police.

Tippit was pronounced dead in the ER at 1:15, that's the single fact that any plausible theory as to his death must include.

Beowulf,

         While I agree many different versions of the timeline exist, I would not state the doctor's timeline you sighted is the definitive one. Unless most other evidence supports it. While I agree massive incompetence and corruption played a role in the actions of the DPD I would not assign nefarious action to all of them. Not because I would defend them, their repeated deficiencies cannot be adequately defended in my view. However, for many DPD officials to be involved in a conspiracy is untenable. In my view, it allows to many chances for detection and betrayal to the feasible plot's creators. The DPD investigation  was inadequate and they tried to hide their many mistakes. Yet this does not require their participation in a greater plot, it merely would imply that were seeking to insulate themselves from public backlash and affirm federal directives.

Dallas PD Property Room file has Tippit pronounced dead in ER at 1:15pm.
http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth337723/m1/1/

Dallas PD Records file has Tippit pronounced dead in ER at 1:19pm.
http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth338163/m1/1/

Secret Service file has Tippit pronounced dead in ER at 1:25pm.
https://i.servimg.com/u/f55/18/51/39/20/image208.jpg
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This isn't a "reasonable minds can differ" issue, these are supposed to be identical copies of the same document, "Supplementary Offense Report Concerning Shooting of Officer Tippit #1". There is no innocent explanation for this discrepancy (or rather, discrepancies plural). Seeing as it agrees with the time of death the ER doc reported to the coroner, I'd argue the Dallas PD Property Room version is the accurate one. Any theory that doesn't account for a 1:15 time of death pronouncement is very likely factually impossible.

beowulf wrote:Dallas PD Property Room file has Tippit pronounced dead in ER at 1:15pm.
http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth337723/m1/1/

Dallas PD Records file has Tippit pronounced dead in ER at 1:19pm.
http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth338163/m1/1/

Secret Service file has Tippit pronounced dead in ER at 1:25pm.
https://i.servimg.com/u/f55/18/51/39/20/image208.jpg
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This isn't a "reasonable minds can differ" issue, these are supposed to be identical copies of the same document, "Supplementary Offense Report Concerning Shooting of Officer Tippit #1". There is no innocent explanation for this discrepancy (or rather, discrepancies plural). Seeing as it agrees with the time of death the ER doc reported to the coroner, I'd argue the Dallas PD Property Room version is the accurate one. Any theory that doesn't account for a 1:15 time of death pronouncement is very likely factually impossible.

I agree with beowulf: the most reliable time of Tippits' pronouncement of death is 1:15 pm. He was shot dead prior to that.   
 
The reasons for this are well covered in the "Question Concerning Time" thread, specifically posts in the 11-13 January 2014 timeframe, which includes the information and rationale provided by beowulf here.

Thanks, Stan ... you beat me to digging up the reference to the earlier thread.

Just as an aside, I have personally found reasoning for or against Oswald's guilt based on timing differences which come down to just several minutes to be unconvincing, for precisely the reasons stated by nonsqtr.  This includes that crazy argument over whether Oswald could or could not have rushed down the stairs into the second-floor lunchroom in time to have beaten Truly and Baker up the stairs.**

The evidence cited here (by beowulf) suggesting that documents have been tampered with, on the other hand, is quite another thing.  It's pretty damning.


**Speaking of which, off topic, does anyone know what has become of Sean Murphy's work?  Apart from all the brouhaha about whether Prayer Man is LHO (I tend to believe so), in my opinion Murphy pretty much obliterated the second-floor tale, and it really ought to see the light of day in some form outside a forum.

I know this is not relevant to this thread ...

Or maybe it is.  If anyone is the antithesis of Dale Myers in civility, patience and rational engagement, Murphy is.

Beowulf,

       Despite your claim that reasonable minds cannot differ, they can and did. Multiple witnesses have differing times of the event, as do officials. If you have chosen certain documents to determine your preferred time of the event that is your prerogative, but not definitive. In fact if you look at the first document you source form the DPD it states while in route to the hospital, before any doctor could pronounce him dead, he was likely already dead. The document states "...And observed the doctors and nurses trying to bring the officer back to life". Then subsequently he is pronounced dead. Thus, he may have expired during his journey to the emergency room, where attempts at resuscitation were performed. 

In your second document, note the time has been overstruck, it is possible 1:09 was the time of death, perhaps it was another mistake. Please review the second document and let me know. The possible time discrepancy is present in your third document as well. As I stated before, I do not claim like so many to know the exact time with so much contending evidence.

Despite your claim that reasonable minds cannot differ, they can and did...

Let's focus on the four corners of this document. My point was a single police report that lists the time the doctor called the time of death (remember, the truth of the matter asserted is the time the doctor looked at the ER clock and called it, not when Officer Tippit crossed the River Styx) should not have three versions with different times.  As it happens we know from coroner's report what time the doctor called it, 1:15.  Maybe the hospital didn't keep its clocks accurate (sounds unlikely but lets go with it), it doesn't matter, changing the time the doctor reported in two of three copies of an "identical" document is evidence tampering.  The most accurate version (that is, noting the precise time the doc reported) was buried in Dallas PD archives for decades, the least accurate version was given to the Warren Commission by the Secret Service.  Funny how that works out.

beowulf wrote:Maybe the hospital didn't keep its clocks accurate (sounds unlikely but lets go with it), it doesn't matter, changing the time the doctor reported in two of three copies of an "identical" document is evidence tampering.

If anyone reads the posts from 11-13 January in the "Question Concerning Time" thread, there are beaucoup examples of evidence tampering that they can see with their own eyes.

beowulf wrote:Despite your claim that reasonable minds cannot differ, they can and did...

Let's focus on the four corners of this document. My point was a single police report that lists the time the doctor called the time of death (remember, the truth of the matter asserted is the time the doctor looked at the ER clock and called it, not when Officer Tippit crossed the River Styx) should not have three versions with different times.  As it happens we know from coroner's report what time the doctor called it, 1:15.  Maybe the hospital didn't keep its clocks accurate (sounds unlikely but lets go with it), it doesn't matter, changing the time the doctor reported in two of three copies of an "identical" document is evidence tampering.  The most accurate version (that is, noting the precise time the doc reported) was buried in Dallas PD archives for decades, the least accurate version was given to the Warren Commission by the Secret Service.  Funny how that works out.

'Kay, well, I'm not sure what this tell us though. "There was evidence tampering". Well... YEAH... duh, right?  After 50 years we STILL don't know how Oswald got from the TSBD to his room. And from there to the theater. Was there evidence tampering? Hell yes! That wallet, for one thing - and that money order, for another. Stuff mysteriously disappeared, and other stuff mysteriously appeared.

I'm not going to go out on a limb just yet, but all this wierdness does make sense, from a certain twisted viewpoint. You have to "find" that viewpoint, that's all. My personal opinion is that we haven't been able to build a big enough model yet, that's all. How can I say this... the CIA leaves a covered paper trail, but the mob leaves none. On the other hand, if you were the Army and you were interested in running both the mob and the CIA, how would you play that relative to the secrecy? If it were me, there are certain things that I'd trust the mob with more than the CIA, 'cause I know in advance that the very thing the CIA is going to do when it gets the information, is write it down. Or transmit it someplace.

Yes, the Secret Service gets a very bad rap in all this. It's almost unfathomable the level to which they seem to have been unprofessional at that point in time. On the other hand, DPD had some rotten groundwork too, and the FBI... well.... don't even get me started on J Edgar. He should definitely have gone to jail for obstruction of justice.

But anyway.... it is what it is. It's only 3 more years till 2017, but somehow I don't think we're going to learn a whole lot we didn't already know. What do you think?

'Kay, well, I'm not sure what this tell us though. "There was evidence tampering". Well... YEAH... duh, right?

Its kind of unusual for evidence to be tampered with and then have the untampered original left in the archives. Beyond that, Tippit's time of death call is important because the Warren Commission's timeline declares Lee Oswald shot Officer Tippit at 1:16, a minute after Tippit was declared dead at a hospital.  That's kind of unusual too, I think.
https://2img.net/h/i217.photobucket.com/albums/cc151/David_Von_Pein/MISCELLANEOUS%20JFK-RELATED%20PHOTOS/CE1119-A.png

beowulf wrote:'Kay, well, I'm not sure what this tell us though. "There was evidence tampering". Well... YEAH... duh, right?

Its kind of unusual for evidence to be tampered with and then have the untampered original left in the archives. Beyond that, Tippit's time of death call is important because the Warren Commission's timeline declares Lee Oswald shot Officer Tippit at 1:16, a minute after Tippit was declared dead at a hospital.  That's kind of unusual too, I think.
[url=https://i217.photobucket.com/albums/cc151/David_Von_Pein/MISCELLANEOUS JFK-RELATED PHOTOS/CE1119-A.png]https://2img.net/h/i217.photobucket.com/albums/cc151/David_Von_Pein/MISCELLANEOUS%20JFK-RELATED%20PHOTOS/CE1119-A.png[/url]

Well, I've heard times as early as 1:06, and.... I can only guess that someone looked at their watch.... (shrug)

It sounds like you're trying to go somewhere with this, may I ask?

The whole "minutes matter" thing comes mainly from the assumption that Oswald somehow walked from his room to the theater, doesn't it? I remember reading someplace how someone went with a stopwatch and tried to retrace the supposed "getaway route", and discovered they could do it with a minute to spare if they "walked fast".

Well, I (for one) don't really believe the official story. I don't believe that Oswald got on a bus then took a cab. You're familiar with the story of Daryll Click? That was the DA (Wade) - and now, years later, we have all kinds of people running around after the fact "trying to prove it's possible". Which in my opinion, would be a complete waste of time. (I mean, of course it's possible, no conspiracy fodder would be any good without a universe of possibilities - they'd have to come up with more than one "possibility" to keep people guessing for 50 years, yes?)

I'm not really sure why "minutes matter", unless you're really trying to squeeze reality into a pretty small box. The better thing would be to identify the other guy, the one who went into the theater a few minutes earlier. And then we have all kinds of DPD reports from the "theater manager" when in reality there was no such person. Maybe they were the same guy? Stranger things have happened... y'know... Secret Service people who aren't, cops who let 'em go on their say-so, and everyone trying to cover their mistakes. Quite the mess.

I can think of two ways to approach this, that might be "complementary" to the minutes thing. One is, you can lay out the events in logical sequence. A "chain of causality". This must have happened before that, and so on. Then what you can do is, you can pin down ONE event (the one you're most certain of the time, let's say) - and then let the other events slide according to where they best fit on the timeline. This is a useful activity, it's very close to what the Project Managers call "leveling", and they do it frequently when they're looking at Gantt charts for a production run or some such thing. The tool called "Microsoft Project" does this, it'll juggle your schedule for you and you can use it to discover several timelines that "will work" based on your stated goals.

Another way of doing it is, you can isolate some events that you think are "well defined" (in time), and pin them down on a timeline. Then, you can take the rest of the events and allow them to slide. You can even do this quantitatively, for instance you can have a "variance" for both starting time and duration. Sometimes, when you look at things this way, you'll see some "windows of opportunity" that open up based on the overlap.

So yeah, I'm exceedingly curious why we're talking about minutes. How does the death of Tippit actually matter, relative to the minutes? Or, let me rephrase - what difference does it make if it happened at 1:06 or 1:16?

The exact time in my opinion is important for the timeline. Much like official claims of Oswald in the Sniper's Nest, the varying recordings of time again contend the official story. I would not say this is among the most important details of the conspiracy, yet Tippit's death paints Oswald in assumed guilt, despite the fact he feasibly did not fire the shots in Dealey Plaza. I actually have a book out soon and included my thoughts regarding this matter. I appreciate the discussion about the subject. The overstrike of a possible earlier time is the hook in this piece of evidence, while it could be a mistake, both 1:09pm and 1:15pm do not agree with the Commission's placement of the Tippit Shooting at 1:15 pm or 1:16 pm. How can he just have been shot, be in transit, and be declared dead all at 1:15 pm. The answer is he cannot be, thus the entire timeline is suspect and disjointed.

Carmine Savastano wrote:The exact time in my opinion is important for the timeline. Much like official claims of Oswald in the Sniper's Nest, the varying recordings of time again contend the official story. I would not say this is among the most important details of the conspiracy, yet Tippit's death paints Oswald in assumed guilt, despite the fact he feasibly did not fire the shots in Dealey Plaza. I actually have a book out soon and included my thoughts regarding this matter. I appreciate the discussion about the subject. The overstrike of a possible earlier time is the hook in this piece of evidence, while it could be a mistake, both 1:09pm and 1:15pm do not agree with the Commission's placement of the Tippit Shooting at 1:15 pm or 1:16 pm. How can he just have been shot, be in transit, and be declared dead all at 1:15 pm. The answer is he cannot be, thus the entire timeline is suspect and disjointed.

Hi Carmine, I apologize for seemingly derailing the thread, it wasn't my intention.

I agree that times are important, and it seems that sometimes they can be... "boxed" (time-boxed) by considering the logic of causality. And, I also agree that there was so much alteration of evidence... some intentional maybe, some not.

So, let's see, this is one of those issues where we can be really nit-picky if we want to. (You're probably way ahead of me on this, since you're researching your book). Do we want the "official" time of death, or do we want the "actual" time of death?

It seems to me, that in order to make that distinction robustly, one must understand the events in between. So for instance, Tippit was shot (and by most accounts he was quite dead at that point), and then he was loaded into a car and taken to the hospital, which must have taken... I dunno.... 3 minutes at least... (I'm just guessing) - and then, someone wheeled him from the car to the examining room, whereupon a doctor was found, and that doctor pronounced him "officially" dead. Six minutes does seem a bit quick for a trip to the hospital, locating a doctor, and making the pronouncement - doesn't it? (I don't think I could get that done in six minutes in "this" town  )

This is why I'm trying to focus on some analytical tools that I think will help. Of course there's no substitute for actual research, but I'd be very interested in learning about that timeline, from when the shot was fired to when the certificates were issued. I'll look forward to reading your book!

No problem at all. I'm always happy to discuss the case details. I had come across one of the versions of that document that is why I was excited to discuss it and the seeming alterations. However, I did not examine all the copies which also bear the same signs. I agree your timeline is far more feasible than the official one. As the Commission operated on the "preponderance of evidence", I would think we might as well in some cases. 

Helen Markham states he was shot at 1:06 pm (the Commission uses her identification of Oswald but not the time)

The Commission states Benevides witnessed the shooting at 1:16pm, it determines 1:15pm or 1:16 pm is when it actually occurred

The Doctors, who I agree with Beowulf are just as likely to have the accurate time, at 1:09 or 1:15. 

If the doctors are correct in either version of the time, the shooting possibly happened before Oswald could get to Tippit's location. In my book I briefly cover this portion, it is a book about JFK, MLK, and RFK, and if you want more info just check out: Two Princes A A King Booksite. However, I have been looking into areas I did not focus on in greater depth recently. The Commission actually states it discounted Markham's time because it would make Oswald as the shooter impossible. Six minutes can change the entire case of Tippit's death.