Post by mainframetechPost by bigdoghttps://www.usnews.com/debate-club/was-jfks-assassination-a-conspiracy/multiple-shots-prove-jfk-assassination-was-a-conspiracy
Just the blatant misstatement of facts is enough to disqualify these
people without even getting into their FUBAR analysis.
The name of the course should be JFK Mythology 101.
Through nothing but OPINION you have just dismissed a good idea in
teaching, and many facts in the JFK case.
It isn't opinion that these yahoos blatantly misstated facts. We can start
with the first one when they wrote:
"One important fact that comes out early in the trial is that Lee Harvey
Oswald tested negative when given a paraffin test on his cheeks. When
someone fires a Mannlicher-Carcano, the rifle found on the sixth floor of
the Texas School Book Depository that day, residue emits from the chamber
onto the cheek of the individual. We know this because all of the FBI
marksmen that tested the very same Mannlicher-Carcano tested positive for
residue when given a paraffin test."
This is absolutely and undeniably wrong. Since you have never read the WCR
you wouldn't realize it so I'll post this passage for your benefit from
Appendix X, beginning on page 560:
[quote on]
The Paraffin Test
During the course of the interrogation of Lee Harvey Oswald following the
assassination a paraffin test was performed by the Dallas police on both
of his hands and his right cheek. The paraffin cast of Oswald's hands
reacted positively to the test. The cast of the right cheek showed no
reaction. 87
To perform the paraffin test, layers of warm liquid paraffin, inter-leaved
with layers of gauze for reinforcement, are brushed or poured on the
suspect's skin. The warm sticky paraffin opens the skin's pores and picks
up any dirt and foreign material present at the surface. When the paraffin
cools and hardens it forms a cast, which is taken off and processed with
diphenylamine or diphenyl-
Page 561
benzidine, chemicals which turn blue in the presence of nitrates. Since
gunpowder residues contain nitrates, the theory behind the test. is that
if a cast reacts positively, i.e., if blue dots appear, it provides
evidence that the suspect recently fired a weapon. 88 In fact, however,
the test is completely unreliable in determining either whether a person
has recently fired a weapon or whether he has not. 89 On the one hand,
diphenylamine and diphenylbenzidine will react positively not only with
nitrates from gunpowder residues, but nitrates from other sources and most
oxidizing agents, including dichromates, per-manganates, hypochlorates,
periodates, and some oxides. Thus, contact with tobacco, Clorox, urine,
cosmetics, kitchen matches, pharmaceuticals, fertilizers, or soils, among
other things, may result in a positive reaction to the paraffin test.
Also, the mere handling of a weapon may leave nitrates on the skin. 90 A
positive reaction is, therefore, valueless in determining whether a
suspect has recently fired a weapon. Conversely, a person who has recently
fired a weapon may not show a positive reaction to the paraffin test,
particularly if the weapon was a rifle. A revolver is so constructed that
there is a space between the cylinder, which bears the chambers, and the
barrel. When a revolver is fired, nitrate-bearing gases escape through
this space and may leave residues on the. hand. 91 In a rifle, however,
there is no gap between the chamber and the barrel, and one would
therefore not expect nitrates to be deposited upon a person's hands or
cheeks as a result of his firing a rifle. As Cunningham testified:
Mr. CUNNINGHAM. ... I personally wouldn't expect to find any residues on a
person's right cheek after firing a rifle due to the fact that by the very
principles and the manufacture and the action, the cartridge itself is
sealed into the chamber by the bolt being closed behind it, and upon
firing the case, the cartridge case expands into the chamber filling it up
and sealing it off from the gases, so none will come back in your face,
and so by its very nature, I would not expect to find residue on the
right. cheek of a shooter.
The unreliability of the paraffin test has been demonstrated by
experiments run by the FBI. In one experiment, conducted prior to the
assassination, paraffin tests were performed on 17 men who had just fired
5 shots with a .38-caliber revolver. Eight men tested negative in both
hands, three men tested positive on the idle hand and negative on the
firing hand, two men tested positive on the firing hand and negative on
the idle hand, and four men tested positive on both their firing and idle
hands. 93 In a second experiment, paraffin tests were per formed on 29
persons, 9 of whom had just fired a revolver or an automatic, and 20 of
whom had not fired a weapon. All 29 persons tested positive on either or
both hands. 94 In a third experiment, performed after the assassination,
an agent of the FBI, using the C2766 rifle, fired
Page 562
three rounds of Western 6.5-millimeter Mannlicher-Carcano ammunition in
rapid succession. A paraffin test was then performed on both of his hands
and his right cheek. Both of his hands and his cheek tested negative.
95
[quote off]
So contrary to what these schmucks claimed, the FBI agent did not test
positive for residue after firing the Carcano and then being given a
paraffin test. He tested negative.
That is just their first mistake. When people don't even have command of
basic facts about which they are pontificating, what reason is their to
give them any credibility. It would appear they heard this factoid
repeated numerous times and accepted it as authentic. One would expect
more of those teaching at the collegiate level, but maybe I am
naïve.
