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This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

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Site should be titled JFK assassination

Kenneth O'Donnell and Dave Powers

We shouldn't be cherry-picking lengthy quotes to put in the article, so I re-wrote the bit about what Tip O'Neill (w/ ghost-writer William Novak) claimed Kenneth O'Donnell and Dave Powers said regarding the direction of the shots.(diff) The implication here is that alleged perjury on their part somehow points to a conspiracy either by the placement of a grassy knoll gunman or that they were forced to alter their testimony. Unfortunately, leaving this as an implication makes this OR so we need sources explicitly stating how this points to a conspiracy. The O'Neill book alone is not sufficient because he did not say he thought their alleged contradictory statements were evidence of a conspiracy. Location (talk) 03:56, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

We've already dealt with this some years ago, and this material still doesn't belong in the article. Gamaliel (talk) 19:25, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

This material absolutely belongs in the article. your reference is pointed to another article "Assassination of President Kennedy" and not to this article which has to do with JFK assassination theories. BrandonTR (talk) 02:17, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

The subject matter is the same, therefore, the discussion is relevant. Do you intend to supply a source that explicitly states how O'Neill's statement is connected with a conspiracy? Location (talk) 03:28, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Yes, the subject matter is the same. That's why there are two separate articles. BrandonTR (talk) 03:46, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

The material is relevant here. Do you intend to supply a source that explicitly states how O'Neill's statement is connected with a conspiracy? Location (talk) 03:49, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Just as soon as you provide evidence that what O'Neill reported Powers as saying does not indicate conspiracy. BrandonTR (talk) 04:20, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

The article is about presenting information that indicates that there is a conspiracy, so the burden is on you to present sourced material that points to a conspiracy... not original research or analysis. You inserted the material so you must be familiar with a conspiracy author who first brought this to your attention. Location (talk) 04:37, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

The material speaks for itself. BrandonTR (talk) 04:42, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

No, it is your interpretation that the material points to a conspiracy... and the article is not about what you think. Those who think that everything points to a conspiracy need to get a clue. If you do not intent to supply a secondary source that explicitly states how O'Neill's alleged statement is connected with a conspiracy, then this should be removed. Location (talk) 04:51, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Secondary source? Where is that in the Misplaced Pages guidelines? BrandonTR (talk) 05:01, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Here it is: Misplaced Pages:No original research#Primary, secondary and tertiary sources --Guy Macon (talk) 16:50, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Yes indeed: O'Neill's book would appear to be a secondary source as per Misplaced Pages guidelines (The primary source would be Powers himself.) In either case, primary sources may be used according to Misplaced Pages, but sparingly. BrandonTR (talk) 18:01, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Seriously, Brandon? You don't know what Misplaced Pages guidelines say about secondary sources? Time for you to start over again at square one. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 07:43, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Seriously, Steven. You don't know what Misplaced Pages guidelines say about secondary sources, or you would state them along with how they apply in this case. BrandonTR (talk) 18:04, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

The primary source, Brandon, is O'Neill's book which says NOTHING about the testimony indicating a conspiracy or cover-up. You are confusing "secondary" with "second hand," which is what the account O'Neill is describing, a second-hand account of what someone else said, but the book itself is the primary source. A secondary source in this regards would be ANOTHER author taking what O'Neill has written and saying something like "the testimony related by O'Neill is evidence of a conspiracy/cover-up." Why? Because MANY people thought shots came from the Grassy Knoll, but this does not automatically mean there was a second gunman. The confusing acoustics of the plaza is a common explanation for this for those who argue only a TSBD shooter. As for the FBI, since there was no evidence of a knoll gunmen outside of some witnesses thinking the shots came from there, in contrast to the wealth of evidence pointing to the TSBD, if the FBI in fact had "pressured" them to say a different direction, a "lone gunman" interpretation of that is this was an example of the FBI, obviously inappropriately, trying to avoid bogging down the WC with investigations for gunmen there was no other evidence of who ever existed, not necessarily supressing "proof" of a second gunman, since the evidence was far from "proof" in the first place. The same goes for the Johnson phone call with Hoover - one could see that as two men - LBJ and Hoover - discussing what was known in the fall of 1963 - that LHO was the sole assassin, which then was a very obvious conclusion - and a desire to tamp talk of "conspiracy" when there was no evidence any existed. I'm not saying those interprations are the correct ones, just that it is the INTERPRETATIONS which are needed to include this on the page, as the testimony does not explicitly point to a conspiracy/cover-up. If, on the other hand, O'Neill said they said "they wanted to hide the truth about the conspiracy and so we had to change our testimony," that would be a different matter. But that's not what we have here. The POINT here is that the text as it stands does not say "conspiracy" or "cover up," and should not therefore be in a section on this page which is described as such, UNLESS a secondary source characterizes what O'Neill has described as being that. Canada Jack (talk) 18:36, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Hearsay regarding RFK's thoughts on the Warren Commission

I have removed the following from the "Possible evidence of a cover-up" section again:

In a 2013 interview with CBS journalist Charlie Rose, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. said that his father Robert F. Kennedy "...publicly supported the Warren Commission report but privately he was dismissive of it." He said that his father was "...'fairly convinced' that others were involved."

Even if RFK believed it was shoddy work, we cannot imply something that the source doesn't state (i.e. that RFK believed there was a cover-up). Location (talk) 04:36, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

BrandonTR, the section you are attempting to edit is entitled "Possible evidence of a cover-up", but the material you are attempting to insert into the article only states that RFK, Jr. says that RFK believed there was a conspiracy. The AP report says: "He said his father, later elected U.S. senator in New York, was 'fairly convinced' that others were involved." The full statement was: "I think my father was fairly convinced at the end of that that there had been involvement by somebody..."

Ignoring for a moment that this is only hearsay, it is possible for a person to believe that there was a conspiracy and that the Warren Commission did a poor job, but not believe that there was a cover-up. The material might be be acceptable in a section entitled "People who believed there was a conspiracy"—or more accurately "People who are alleged to have believed there was a conspiracy"—but there is nothing in the material that says RFK had evidence of a cover-up or even thought there was a cover-up. Location (talk) 17:28, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Yep, it's original research, IRWolfie- (talk) 23:14, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Actually that's not the full statement, but nice try. The full statement is as follows:

KENNEDY: I think my father was fairly convinced at the end of that that there had been involvement by somebody …

ROSE: Organized crime, Cubans …

KENNEDY: Or rogue CIA …

Also, your objection has changed. Your original objection was that there was no allegation of conspiracy. Now your objection is that this material does not belong in the section under coverup. Very well. I have moved this material (or I should say some of it) to the section "Role of Oswald." BrandonTR (talk) 02:32, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

"Nice try" to you, too. You inserted material that indicated a statement of fact that RFK Jr said RFK was "fairly convinced". The source I provided indicates only that RFK Jr thinks he was "fairly convinced".

And, yes, my objection changed because it is different than the original objection in which the material you inserted did not reference a conspiracy.(diff) I now object to you placing it in the section entitled "Role of Oswald" because... wait for it... it doesn't say anything about the role of Oswald. It belongs in a section "People who are alleged to have believed there was a conspiracy". Why do all these conspiracy allegations rest on someone stating what some dead person said... or in this case... what someone thinks a dead person thought? Weak. Location (talk) 03:02, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Yes your argument is weak -- nitpicking over words like "think" vs. "fairly convinced." And yes, the fact that Kennedy mentioned "rogue CIA" means that he thought others, besides Oswald, were directly involved. By the way, there is other material that doesn't necessarily fit exactly, precisely within one particular category or another. That's just the nature of writing. Learn to deal with it. BrandonTR (talk) 03:44, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

So RFK Jr. says that RFK thought rogue elements within the CIA might have been involved. That's it? Any clues on what Oswald's role was? Does WP:WEIGHT not apply here? Location (talk) 03:53, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

If you're going to pass judgement on people's opinions, or pass judgement on what witnesses say, you would have to remove much of the material already present in the article. For example, the previous paragraph says:

According to Richard Buyer, Oswald never fired a shot at the President. James W. Douglass described Oswald as "a questioning, dissenting CIA operative who had become a security risk" and "the ideal scapegoat". According to Josiah Thompson, Oswald was in the Texas School Book Depository during the assassination, but it is "quite likely" he was not the shooter on the sixth floor.

As for RFK Jr. commenting on what his father actually thought about the assassination of JFK, he might actually know something about it. After all, they lived together as father and son for almost 5 years after the assassination, before RFK himself was assassinated. By the way, the title of the article is "JFK Assassination Conspiracy Theories." That's THEORIES, not FACTS. Once again, THEORIES. Are we now going to start weighting the theories as to which is a good theory and which is a bad theory? BrandonTR (talk) 04:26, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

If we abide by WP:WEIGHT, there is a good argument to include Buyer, Douglass, and especially Thompson due to the amount of material they have presented relevant to various conspiracy theories and how frequently they have been cited in regards to that material. If we abide by WP:WEIGHT, what do have for RFK Jr.? A few sentences in a Charlie Rose interview. Location (talk) 04:23, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Nonsense. RFK Jr. lived with his father, RFK, while none of these authors did. Misplaced Pages makes no reference to the amount of published material by authors as a gauge of WEIGHT. This is your own invention. BrandonTR (talk) 04:34, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Per WP:WEIGHT: "Neutrality requires that each article or other page in the mainspace fairly represents all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in the published, reliable sources." An allegation is an allegation and some allegations have more prominence. Location (talk) 04:40, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Exactly. That's why there is only one sentence devoted to this. BrandonTR (talk) 04:44, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

By that line of reasoning, every conspiracy allegation could have one sentence devoted to it. Get real. The most appropriate place for this allegation, apparently not found anywhere else, is in the RFK Jr. article. Location (talk) 04:53, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

BrandonTR (talk) 04:58, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Comments such as "Get real" and "Just admit it" do not lead to working together and resolving disputes through consensus. Instead they cause people to dig in and fight harder. Please stick to logic and evidence, and avoid anything that even resembles a personal comment. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:11, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Actually, Brandon, you'll see from the edit history of the article that I've done a pretty good job of taking a jumble mess of conspiracy thoughts and placing them in some reasonable order. This particular assertion is incredibly weak as there is no substantial coverage about any particular conspiracy theory... and that is what this article is about. So, since you stuck the material in the section entitled "Role of Oswald", what does RFK Jr. say what RFK thought about Oswald's role in a conspiracy theory? Location (talk) 13:51, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, makes no sense to be in the "Oswald" section. As I've pointed out before, if I was as conspiracy-obsessed as some, I'd wonder why this page is such a confusing jumble, and likely conclude the conspirators or their useful idiots were at work to ensure the conspiracy side didn't get a coherent presentation. As for RFK, not really sure how one's opinion should carry so much weight, particularly from one who, like LBJ, would no doubt have contact with many sources which would have the goods on what "really" happened. Yet, by all accounts, while both men suspected there was more going on here, neither had any indication that their suspicions were correct. IOW, these opinions undermine conspiracy theories as these men who presumably would have known something apparently knew nothing. Far from me to suggest a better organization here as my contributions are not typically embraced by Brandon, but it makes sense to me to have a section which simply lists the suspicions of prominent people of a cover up and/or conspiracy. Of course, I'd title the section "Argument from authority fallacies," so I'm sure Brandon won't go for that.... Canada Jack (talk) 17:25, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

LBJ would appear to be a special case, in that he benefited directly from the assassination and may have been privy to facts about it that others were not. Moreover, because witnesses have come forward and presented evidence of LBJ's involvement in the assassination, anything that LBJ said about the assassination could be construed as self-serving. Nevertheless, LBJ's comments have been included in the article (I think appropriately).

Regarding this article being a mess, I think just the opposite. I feel that the average person can learn a lot about the assassination (including conspiracy theories -- pro-and-con) quicker than with just about any other source I have seen. Typically sites take a pro-conspiracy point of view (like CTKA) and other cites take an anti-conspiracy point of view (and, in the case of the McAdams site, I think, a fallacious and disinformative point of view). In contrast, the mostly Canada Jack inspired article on Oswald was a serious mess until I and a few other editors stepped in and corrected the most serious errors, to the point that I now feel that the Oswald article too is a pretty good article. BrandonTR (talk) 18:31, 2 April 2013 (UTC)

A Gentle Reminder

This is a topic which tends to lead to heated disagreements. I would remind everyone involved that the best way to deal with these disagreements is found at WP:BRD and WP:CONSENSUS. Following the advice on those two pages not only makes things go much more smoothly, it maximizes the chances of getting your way in the end. I'm just saying. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:58, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

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