good job love the parody

"in Dallas" for "with glasses". . .nice touch.

thanks white trash and john

We'll never know if Oswald acted alone -- or at all -- but I'm convinced Ruby did. And I understand his reasons, avenging JFK, wanting to spare Jackie the pain of a trial. But he still shouldn't have done it. The American people deserved to know if Oswald did it, and, if so, why. Ruby was no hero. Then again, even if he didn't kill JFK, Oswald was scum anyway, and there's plenty of evidence for that (betrayed his country, beat his wife, sided with Castro, etc.). Here's something weird, on a totally unrelated subject: The security code for this comments was MWD. If anybody finds WMD... as a security code... does that prove that Bush deserves supportive parodies?

thank michael...i've always been fascinated with the JFK / LHO / JR thing...i was 8 and it was the first time i really payed atention to anything in the news....and i hope bush's colonoscopy is especially painful

nice one al, but I'm especially interested in MP's comments...MP..MP..MP - that's so you'll see this, MP ;-)

Michael, I've always been more intrigued by the Ruby story than the LHO story, so I'm interested that you say you're "convinced" Ruby acted alone. Why are you convinced? Is it really just because of the 2 reasons you just gave. ie. that you think that he wanted to give away his freedom and his life just to avenge his country's leader (happened in Shakespeare's plays and Greek mythology I guess, so it might be possible), or that he decided to give away his freedom and his life simply to spare Jackie some discomfort? Or do you have another reason? Because it's the precise unbelievablility of those 2 reasons (imo) that I've always been 100% sceptical of the motives, and that's where the truth always lies.

So the answer is probably in the results of his actions, and who desired those results. The results of his actions were that nobody was able to find out the truth about LHO's involvement (him being suddenly dead and unable to be cross-examined) - and whose purpose did that obstruction of truth serve? The Govt's? The Mafia's? The Commies? Oliver Stone's?

I think the whole answer to the mystery of JFK's murder lies in the motive or the reasons for Ruby's actions, yet there is so little information or speculation on it. Does anybody else agree? Why am I the only person who seems to wonder about this?

* chirping of crickets *

(sigh)

Sorry about the delay, Stuart. Anyway, while there's plenty of evidence Ruby knew a bunch of mobsters, that evidence also suggests they wouldn't have counted on him to "do a job" for them. I'd still rather be stuck on an 8-hour bus ride with him than Oswald, but he was a small-time strip-club owner who thought he was a bigshot. He was Jewish (his real name was Jacob Rubenstein), and yet he was able to overcome prejudice in Texas, and loved America for it. It wasn't specifically JFK but the Presidency he was trying to avenge. And he did say after he was arrested that he wanted to spare Jackie a trial. A lot of people thought of him as a hero for that, but I can't accept him as such. Now, if he'd gunned down Carlos Marcello and Santo Trafficante, the mob bosses who were the likeliest guys to have ordered a "hit" on JFK, I would applaud him. Those guys were scum even if they weren't involved. But guys like that didn't think much of Ruby before the shooting. That's why I find it hard to believe they hired him to silence Oswald. After all, if Oswald talked about them, I'm not sure he would've been believed. And the Mob's lawyers would've said just that: "This guy killed the President, he renounced his citizenship, he's a Communist. You can't trust his word." I guess you're lucky to live in a country where leaders don't get assassinated (Gough Whitlam doesn't count), Communism has always been an afterthought, and the closest thing to a true Mob boss is... Rupert Murdoch. Come to think of it, he's the biggest one here, too.

multiple lols on the 8-hour busride, Gough, and Rupert (btw we've had our own gangland wars here in Melbourne the last 5 years - a bit Al Capone-ish - they're making a miniseries about it - the 2 rival gangs were so determined to knock each other off there was a real worry that soon Melbourne mightn't have any dumb-ass gangsters left)

thanks for the interesting info on Ruby MP, but it's still just generally accepted that Ruby was what he appeared, ie. a small-time hoodlum with a fierce and unlikely patriotic streak - unlikely because as I said before, since Shakespeaere died, there haven't been many characters prepared to fall on their sword out of love for their leader, let alone their leader's wife (Janette Howard can handle attending a murder trial, as far as I'm concerned - I'm not prepared to go to prison for the rest of my life in an attempt to avoid her the uncomfortable seating, like Jack Ruby apparently did.)

That Jack Ruby's generally-accepted insanely-noble, patriotic, selfless motives haven't been re-examined by the Oliver Stones and the Moores and the Vidals over there is an endless source of wonder to me. The truth of the whole JFK thing lies in who REALLY benefited from Ruby's actions - Ruby certainly didn't.

PS: MP, why would having to overcome prejudice in Texas make you love America? (as you said above)

and PPS: did you ever google "Khemlani" and the "loans affair"?