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Author: Unsealing JFK Assassination Files Is a ‘Gift’ to Many Who Still Have Questions

October 24, 2017
Staff

WRITER

More than half a century after President John F. Kennedy was assassinated, the government is releasing a trove of files about his death. What will be in the unsealed files? Will they actually be released as promised? And most of all, is there a smoking gun?

Gerald Posner, an investigative journalist and the author of “Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK,” talked about what we should expect to find in the documents if they are released as scheduled this Thursday.

“The gift is every word and every document that the CIA and everybody fought for so many years to keep sealed,” he said of the release.

Don’t get too excited though – Posner scoffed at the idea that we’ll discover some huge government conspiracy in the files.

“If there had been a massive plot at the highest government levels, the last place you’re going to find evidence of it is … at the National Archives,” he said.

This article provided courtesy of TheBlaze.

GLENN: So earlier, Donald Trump came out and said he is going to -- he's going to open up the JFK files, which I think is great.

I have not heard from Rafael Cruz. I believe he has -- he is either in Canada by now, or maybe Argentina, alluding police. Because once those files come out, that show that he was clearly involved in the assassination, I think then you'll know.

But he's -- they're going to release these files, which I think is fantastic and wildly interesting for no reason than fun.

Jared Posner is a friend. An author. Case close. Lee Harvey Oswald and the assassination of JFK.

I have been good friends with one of his good friends for a very, very long time. So when this story came up, I immediately thought, what does Gerald think is in these files?

Welcome to the program, Gerald Posner.

GERALD: Glenn, great to be on with you.

As a matter of fact, our mutual friend, Mike Opelka, said the other day in a tweet that this coming Thursday, the day for the JFK files release is Christmas for all JFK researchers. And I had never thought about it that way before, but I think he's absolutely right. President Trump is giving us all -- those of us who have followed this case, a gift. The gift is every word and every document that the CIA and everybody fought for so many years to keep sealed.

GLENN: So did you think that this would come through this early? Because I thought it was like 2025 or after the next generation had died or something like that.

GERALD: Well, yeah, that's what Oliver Stone -- Kevin Costner addressing the jury saying, 75 years. Your taxpayer money. They're -- you know, they're keeping these things sealed from you.

And so people had -- we never thought we would see it in our lifetime. But here we are, they passed this law back in '92, in response to Stone's film, to say, let's get the files out. They put a 25-year-limit on it, to force these agencies to take a quarter century to get their act together. And said, whoever is president on October 26th, 2017, that's the person who has the final say, if the FBI, the CIA, or anybody else still says we want to hold on to these because there's an identifiable harm to national security, law enforcement, foreign relations. They'll appeal to the president. The president gets the right to say, yay, or nay. Does the harm outweigh the public good? And they could have never have imagined, I assure you, as you know, 25 years ago, you took a poll of their top thousand people they thought would be president, they never thought it would be Donald Trump.

GLENN: No. Running against the guy whose dad was co-assassin.

GERALD: Right. So Trump raises the assassination in the campaign. Now he's sitting as the president.

GLENN: Right.

GERALD: And the interesting thing is, I think, that we will only get these files -- if they really come out Thursday. They don't come in, in the last minute, convince them to hold back a few. Because it is Trump. If this had been Obama, even Bush the younger, Clinton, they were sort of system people, who followed the roles of freedom of information. They would have listened to the agency saying, you can't disclose this name because it's going to embarrass somebody in Mexico. Help the CIA.

When Trump tweeted on Saturday that these files are coming out, it was a great sigh of relief. I think he's the only person who is president since Kennedy who would have actually released them all.

GLENN: So what do you think is in there? For the average person. I mean, don't care if there's somebody in Mexico that the CIA wants to protect that I've never heard of. I --

GERALD: Yeah. No, I get it.

GLENN: What's in there that we would care about?

GERALD: Okay.

So the first thing is. Is there a blockbuster -- to use a bad term for the Kennedy assassination. Is there a smoking gun? Is there some document that shows Jay Edgar Hoover, handwriting the escape route for Oswald? No.

The reason I say that adamantly or with such confidence is -- and you get this completely -- if there had been a massive plot at the highest government levels, the last place you're going to find evidence of it is 25 years later in the national archives.

GLENN: Right. I mean, what's his name, Sandy Berger took those out in his underpants long ago.

GERALD: Absolutely. I mean, it's just fantastic to think they pulled off the perfect crime in Dallas 54 years ago, but somebody who was responsible for burning the documents forgot and left them in the backyard.

GLENN: Right. Right.

GERALD: So we're not going to get that. But what we will find that I think will be of interest is Oswald visited Mexico City, only seven weeks before the assassination. And not just as a tourist to have -- you know, stop by and have some Mexican food. He visited to get to Cuba because he convinced that was where the real revolution was taking place. He was sick of America, sick of Russia, where he had defected. And he went to the Soviet mission twice. Pulled a gun. They threw him out at one point. They thought he was a little odd, to say the least. And he went to the Cuban mission.

Now, Mexico city was a nest of spies. This was the Cold War. '63. We had the missile standoff just the year before. So the CIA was spying heavily on the Cuban and Soviet missions.

What did they learn about Oswald? Castro later boasted to somebody for the American Communist Party, that Oswald said he was going to kill Kennedy. True? I don't know. But it might be in the files.

So I do think we will find out what the CIA had learned about Oswald in Mexico City, and then what they didn't share with anybody else. Their typical MO.

GLENN: Your -- Gerald, it's been years since I've seen your book. Your theory on Oswald was, what?

GERALD: My theory on Oswald is that he is the only shooter at Dealey Plaza that day who hits anybody. So if you had five other shooters, the forensics show that the only place that Kennedy got hit was from behind. I'm convinced that that's Oswald. The tougher question, Glenn, is always, did he do it for himself, or did he do it for part of a larger conspiracy?

GLENN: Okay. So wait a minute. I want to make sure I understand the first part first. You said he's the only one that fired a shot that hit somebody. So are you saying, I don't know if there was anybody there, but if there was, it didn't matter.

GERALD: That's right. It didn't matter. That's exactly right.

So when I say Lee Harvey Oswald acting alone, that's what the evidence shows to me.

GLENN: That there's only -- he was the only shooter there?

GERALD: Yeah, that's right.

GLENN: Okay.

GERALD: Yeah. And, you know, people say -- they always say, oh, I saw somebody in the grassy knoll. And I go through all of that. Or, I saw somebody out in the text building or underneath the sewer, as Garrison, the new ordinance district attorney thought there were sewer shooters, until he went to Dallas and found out the sewer area was too small to fit somebody into the manhole cover. So, you know, the -- in the beginning, this -- the country has never believed under 50 percent, that it was a conspiracy. Meaning that even within a year of the assassination, within months of the assassination, the Gallup took a poll. I think 60 percent thought it was a conspiracy. It dropped to 50, at one point after the Warren commission. And then started to head up. It was at 90, 95 percent thought it was a conspiracy after the Stone film. And a last poll done in 2013 showed two-thirds of the American public still thought it was a conspiracy.

GLENN: So -- so I -- so we're alone? Because I don't think it was a conspiracy. Do you?

GERALD: I don't. But I do, Glenn, and I think you get this, why people believe it was -- two major factors: The first modern assassination with a rifle, from a long-distance. So people immediately conjure up Day of the Jackal.

Spy novels. You know, we're used to someone running up with a pistol, shooting at a site like with Wallace or later with -- you know who the shooter is at least.

GLENN: Sure. Sure.

GERALD: So you have a rifle assassination. The shooter gets away in the immediate aftermath. Then they pick him up. He's a 24-year-old kid who has been to Russia, trying to get to Cuba. He took a posh job at General Walker, this right-wing general who is running for the governorship of Texas. And he's killed two days later, by a guy out of Central Casting. The Dallas nightclub owner, Jack Ruby, who has potential ties to the mob, you're guaranteed you're never going to end the conspiracy theorizing on it.

GLENN: And do you expect to find anything in this about the mob?

GERALD: Yes. I do. There's as a matter of fact a file that's being held about an attorney for Carlos Marcello, who was the godfather of New Orleans. Many people think the mob was involved. Think that Marcello was kicked out of the country by Bobby Kennedy. He certainly wanted Jack Kennedy and Bobby Kennedy dead, no doubt. I just think that Oswald beat the mob to Kennedy, essentially. They would have patted him on the back and given him a medal, but he just wasn't their boy. And that attorney's file will be interesting.

You know this so well. The mob and the CIA were partners in the early '60s, trying to kill a head of state. But it was Castro. It wasn't Kennedy.

GLENN: Yes. Yes.

GERALD: And they couldn't even wound Castro. They wanted him out. I mean, we didn't want a communist 90 miles from the American shores. And the mob wanted their casinos back. Seven times, they tried to get them. The poisoned swimsuit, the exploding cigar. They can't pull it off. And how these Keystone Cops who couldn't get rid of Castro supposedly pulled off the perfect crime in Dallas, I have my doubts.

GLENN: So these come out on Thursday, Gerald? Can we have you back on, on Friday, after you've looked at all of them and tell us what you found?

GERALD: Now, there could be -- Glenn, I would love that.

They believe that although there are 3100 files, it could add up to several hundred thousand pages. But, not only am I speed reader, but I will be able to go through these files and look for the names that I know are key. So on Friday, I will give you what I call the first brush look at what comes out, of the equivalent of Al Capone's safe.

GLENN: And, hopefully, it will be a little more interesting that Al Capone's safe.

GERALD: I hope so as well.

GLENN: Gerald Posner from GeraldPosner.com. He's an investigative journalist and author of Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and The Assassination of JFK. We'll talk to you Thursday, Gerald. Thanks a lot.

GERALD: Thank you so much. Bye.

STU: I don't know. The death of a president, maybe read the 100,000 pages in a day. Maybe just get it done. That's my recommendation.

GLENN: He thanks you for that.

STU: Am I asking too much? I mean, we're talking about presidential assassination.

GLENN: Easy for you to say.

STU: Get to work.

A Sharia enclave is quietly taking root in America. It's time to wake up.

NOVA SAFO / Staff | Getty Images

Sharia-based projects like the Meadow in Texas show how political Islam grows quietly, counting on Americans to stay silent while an incompatible legal system takes root.

Apolitical system completely incompatible with the Constitution is gaining ground in the United States, and we are pretending it is not happening.

Sharia — the legal and political framework of Islam — is being woven into developments, institutions, and neighborhoods, including a massive project in Texas. And the consequences will be enormous if we continue to look the other way.

This is the contradiction at the heart of political Islam: It claims universal authority while insisting its harshest rules will never be enforced here. That promise does not stand up to scrutiny. It never has.

Before we can have an honest debate, we’d better understand what Sharia represents. Sharia is not simply a set of religious rules about prayer or diet. It is a comprehensive legal and political structure that governs marriage, finance, criminal penalties, and civic life. It is a parallel system that claims supremacy wherever it takes hold.

This is where the distinction matters. Many Muslims in America want nothing to do with Sharia governance. They came here precisely because they lived under it. But political Islam — the movement that seeks to implement Sharia as law — is not the same as personal religious belief.

It is a political ideology with global ambitions, much like communism. Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently warned that Islamist movements do not seek peaceful coexistence with the West. They seek dominance. History backs him up.

How Sharia arrives

Political Islam does not begin with dramatic declarations. It starts quietly, through enclaves that operate by their own rules. That is why the development once called EPIC City — now rebranded as the Meadow — is so concerning. Early plans framed it as a Muslim-only community built around a mega-mosque and governed by Sharia-compliant financing. After state investigations were conducted, the branding changed, but the underlying intent remained the same.

Developers have openly described practices designed to keep non-Muslims out, using fees and ownership structures to create de facto religious exclusivity. This is not assimilation. It is the construction of a parallel society within a constitutional republic.

The warning from those who have lived under it

Years ago, local imams in Texas told me, without hesitation, that certain Sharia punishments “just work.” They spoke about cutting off hands for theft, stoning adulterers, and maintaining separate standards of testimony for men and women. They insisted it was logical and effective while insisting they would never attempt to implement it in Texas.

But when pressed, they could not explain why a system they consider divinely mandated would suddenly stop applying once someone crossed a border.

This is the contradiction at the heart of political Islam: It claims universal authority while insisting its harshest rules will never be enforced here. That promise does not stand up to scrutiny. It never has.

AASHISH KIPHAYET / Contributor | Getty Images

America is vulnerable

Europe is already showing us where this road leads. No-go zones, parallel courts, political intimidation, and clerics preaching supremacy have taken root across major cities.

America’s strength has always come from its melting pot, but assimilation requires boundaries. It requires insisting that the Constitution, not religious law, is the supreme authority on this soil.

Yet we are becoming complacent, even fearful, about saying so. We mistake silence for tolerance. We mistake avoidance for fairness. Meanwhile, political Islam views this hesitation as weakness.

Religious freedom is one of America’s greatest gifts. Muslims may worship freely here, as they should. But political Islam must not be permitted to plant a flag on American soil. The Constitution cannot coexist with a system that denies equal rights, restricts speech, subordinates women, and places clerical authority above civil law.

Wake up before it is too late

Projects like the Meadow are not isolated. They are test runs, footholds, proofs of concept. Political Islam operates with patience. It advances through demographic growth, legal ambiguity, and cultural hesitation — and it counts on Americans being too polite, too distracted, or too afraid to confront it.

We cannot afford that luxury. If we fail to defend the principles that make this country free, we will one day find ourselves asking how a parallel system gained power right in front of us. The answer will be simple: We looked away.

The time to draw boundaries and to speak honestly is now. The time to defend the Constitution as the supreme law of the land is now. Act while there is still time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Why do Americans feel so empty?

Mario Tama / Staff | Getty Images

Anxiety, anger, and chronic dissatisfaction signal a country searching for meaning. Without truth and purpose, politics becomes a dangerous substitute for identity.

We have built a world overflowing with noise, convenience, and endless choice, yet something essential has slipped out of reach. You can sense it in the restless mood of the country, the anxiety among young people who cannot explain why they feel empty, in the angry confusion that dominates our politics.

We have more wealth than any nation in history, but the heart of the culture feels strangely malnourished. Before we can debate debt or elections, we must confront the reality that we created a world of things, but not a world of purpose.

You cannot survive a crisis you refuse to name, and you cannot rebuild a world whose foundations you no longer understand.

What we are living through is not just economic or political dysfunction. It is the vacuum that appears when a civilization mistakes abundance for meaning.

Modern life is stuffed with everything except what the human soul actually needs. We built systems to make life faster, easier, and more efficient — and then wondered why those systems cannot teach our children who they are, why they matter, or what is worth living for.

We tell the next generation to chase success, influence, and wealth, turning childhood into branding. We ask kids what they want to do, not who they want to be. We build a world wired for dopamine rather than dignity, and then we wonder why so many people feel unmoored.

When everything is curated, optimized, and delivered at the push of a button, the question “what is my life for?” gets lost in the static.

The crisis beneath the headlines

It is not just the young who feel this crisis. Every part of our society is straining under the weight of meaninglessness.

Look at the debt cycle — the mathematical fate no civilization has ever escaped once it crosses a threshold that we seem to have already blown by. While ordinary families feel the pressure, our leaders respond with distraction, with denial, or by rewriting the very history that could have warned us.

You cannot survive a crisis you refuse to name, and you cannot rebuild a world whose foundations you no longer understand.

We have entered a cultural moment where the noise is so loud that it drowns out the simplest truths. We are living in a country that no longer knows how to hear itself think.

So people go searching. Some drift toward the false promise of socialism, some toward the empty thrill of rebellion. Some simply check out. When a culture forgets what gives life meaning, it becomes vulnerable to every ideology that offers a quick answer.

The quiet return of meaning

And yet, quietly, something else is happening. Beneath the frustration and cynicism, many Americans are recognizing that meaning does not come from what we own, but from what we honor. It does not rise from success, but from virtue. It does not emerge from noise, but from the small, sacred things that modern life has pushed to the margins — the home, the table, the duty you fulfill, the person you help when no one is watching.

The danger is assuming that this rediscovery happens on its own. It does not.

Reorientation requires intention. It requires rebuilding the habits and virtues that once held us together. It requires telling the truth about our history instead of rewriting it to fit today’s narratives. And it requires acknowledging what has been erased: that meaning is inseparable from God’s presence in a nation’s life.

Harold M. Lambert / Contributor | Getty Images

Where renewal begins

We have built a world without stillness, and then we wondered why no one can hear the questions that matter. Those questions remain, whether we acknowledge them or not. They do not disappear just because we drown them in entertainment or noise. They wait for us, and the longer we ignore them, the more disoriented we become.

Meaning is still available. It is found in rebuilding the smallest, most human spaces — the places that cannot be digitized, globalized, or automated. The home. The family. The community.

These are the daily virtues that do not trend on social media, but that hold a civilization upright. If we want to repair this country, we begin there, exactly where every durable civilization has always begun: one virtue at a time, one tradition at a time, one generation at a time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

A break in trust: A NEW Watergate is brewing in plain sight

Gary Hershorn / Contributor | Getty Images

When institutions betray the public’s trust, the country splits, and the spiral is hard to stop.

Something drastic is happening in American life. Headlines that should leave us stunned barely register anymore. Stories that once would have united the country instead dissolve into silence or shrugs.

It is not apathy exactly. It is something deeper — a growing belief that the people in charge either cannot or will not fix what is broken.

When people feel ignored or betrayed, they will align with anyone who appears willing to fight on their behalf.

I call this response the Bubba effect. It describes what happens when institutions lose so much public trust that “Bubba,” the average American minding his own business, finally throws his hands up and says, “Fine. I will handle it myself.” Not because he wants to, but because the system that was supposed to protect him now feels indifferent, corrupt, or openly hostile.

The Bubba effect is not a political movement. It is a survival instinct.

What triggers the Bubba effect

We are watching the triggers unfold in real time. When members of Congress publicly encourage active duty troops to disregard orders from the commander in chief, that is not a political squabble. When a federal judge quietly rewrites the rules so one branch of government can secretly surveil another, that is not normal. That is how republics fall. Yet these stories glided across the news cycle without urgency, without consequence, without explanation.

When the American people see the leadership class shrug, they conclude — correctly — that no one is steering the ship.

This is how the Bubba effect spreads. It is not just individuals resisting authority. It is sheriffs refusing to enforce new policies, school boards ignoring state mandates, entire communities saying, “We do not believe you anymore.” It becomes institutional, cultural, national.

A country cracking from the inside

This effect can be seen in Dearborn, Michigan. In the rise of fringe voices like Nick Fuentes. In the Epstein scandal, where powerful people could not seem to locate a single accountable adult. These stories are different in content but identical in message: The system protects itself, not you.

When people feel ignored or betrayed, they will align with anyone who appears willing to fight on their behalf. That does not mean they suddenly agree with everything that person says. It means they feel abandoned by the institutions that were supposed to be trustworthy.

The Bubba effect is what fills that vacuum.

The dangers of a faithless system

A republic cannot survive without credibility. Congress cannot oversee intelligence agencies if it refuses to discipline its own members. The military cannot remain apolitical if its chain of command becomes optional. The judiciary cannot defend the Constitution while inventing loopholes that erase the separation of powers.

History shows that once a nation militarizes politics, normalizes constitutional shortcuts, or allows government agencies to operate without scrutiny, it does not return to equilibrium peacefully. Something will give.

The question is what — and when.

The responsibility now belongs to us

In a healthy country, this is where the media steps in. This is where universities, pastors, journalists, and cultural leaders pause the outrage machine and explain what is at stake. But today, too many see themselves not as guardians of the republic, but of ideology. Their first loyalty is to narrative, not truth.

The founders never trusted the press more than the public. They trusted citizens who understood their rights, lived their responsibilities, and demanded accountability. That is the antidote to the Bubba effect — not rage, but citizenship.

How to respond without breaking ourselves

Do not riot. Do not withdraw. Do not cheer on destruction just because you dislike the target. That is how nations lose themselves. Instead, demand transparency. Call your representatives. Insist on consequences. Refuse to normalize constitutional violations simply because “everyone does it.” If you expect nothing, you will get nothing.

Do not hand your voice to the loudest warrior simply because he is swinging a bat at the establishment. You do not beat corruption by joining a different version of it. You beat it by modeling the country you want to preserve: principled, accountable, rooted in truth.

Adam Gray / Stringer | Getty Images

Every republic reaches a moment when historians will later say, “That was the warning.” We are living in ours. But warnings are gifts if they are recognized. Institutions bend. People fail. The Constitution can recover — if enough Americans still know and cherish it.

It does not take a majority. Twenty percent of the country — awake, educated, and courageous — can reset the system. It has happened before. It can happen again.

Wake up. Stand up. Demand integrity — from leaders, from institutions, and from yourself. Because the Bubba effect will not end until Americans reclaim the duty that has always belonged to them: preserving the republic for the next generation.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Grim warning: Bad-faith Israel critics duck REAL questions

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

Bad-faith attacks on Israel and AIPAC warp every debate. Real answers emerge only when people set aside scripts and ask what serves America’s long-term interests.

The search for truth has always required something very much in short supply these days: honesty. Not performative questions, not scripted outrage, not whatever happens to be trending on TikTok, but real curiosity.

Some issues, often focused on foreign aid, AIPAC, or Israel, have become hotbeds of debate and disagreement. Before we jump into those debates, however, we must return to a simpler, more important issue: honest questioning. Without it, nothing in these debates matters.

Ask questions because you want the truth, not because you want a target.

The phrase “just asking questions” has re-entered the zeitgeist, and that’s fine. We should always question power. But too many of those questions feel preloaded with someone else’s answer. If the goal is truth, then the questions should come from a sincere desire to understand, not from a hunt for a villain.

Honest desire for truth is the only foundation that can support a real conversation about these issues.

Truth-seeking is real work

Right now, plenty of people are not seeking the truth at all. They are repeating something they heard from a politician on cable news or from a stranger on TikTok who has never opened a history book. That is not a search for answers. That is simply outsourcing your own thought.

If you want the truth, you need to work for it. You cannot treat the world like a Marvel movie where the good guy appears in a cape and the villain hisses on command. Real life does not give you a neat script with the moral wrapped up in two hours.

But that is how people are approaching politics now. They want the oppressed and the oppressor, the heroic underdog and the cartoon villain. They embrace this fantastical framing because it is easier than wrestling with reality.

This framing took root in the 1960s when the left rebuilt its worldview around colonizers and the colonized. Overnight, Zionism was recast as imperialism. Suddenly, every conflict had to fit the same script. Today’s young activists are just recycling the same narrative with updated graphics. Everything becomes a morality play. No nuance, no context, just the comforting clarity of heroes and villains.

Bad-faith questions

This same mindset is fueling the sudden obsession with Israel, and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in particular. You hear it from members of Congress and activists alike: AIPAC pulls the strings, AIPAC controls the government, AIPAC should register as a foreign agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The questions are dramatic, but are they being asked in good faith?

FARA is clear. The standard is whether an individual or group acts under the direction or control of a foreign government. AIPAC simply does not qualify.

Here is a detail conveniently left out of these arguments: Dozens of domestic organizations — Armenian, Cuban, Irish, Turkish — lobby Congress on behalf of other countries. None of them registers under FARA because — like AIPAC — they are independent, domestic organizations.

If someone has a sincere problem with the structure of foreign lobbying, fair enough. Let us have that conversation. But singling out AIPAC alone is not a search for truth. It is bias dressed up as bravery.

Anadolu / Contributor | Getty Images

If someone wants to question foreign aid to Israel, fine. Let’s have that debate. But let’s ask the right questions. The issue is not the size of the package but whether the aid advances our interests. What does the United States gain? Does the investment strengthen our position in the region? How does it compare to what we give other nations? And do we examine those countries with the same intensity?

The real target

These questions reflect good-faith scrutiny. But narrowing the entire argument to one country or one dollar amount misses the larger problem. If someone objects to the way America handles foreign aid, the target is not Israel. The target is the system itself — an entrenched bureaucracy, poor transparency, and decades-old commitments that have never been re-examined. Those problems run through programs around the world.

If you want answers, you need to broaden the lens. You have to be willing to put aside the movie script and confront reality. You have to hold yourself to a simple rule: Ask questions because you want the truth, not because you want a target.

That is the only way this country ever gets clarity on foreign aid, influence, alliances, and our place in the world. Questioning is not just allowed. It is essential. But only if it is honest.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.