Where were you when .............J.F.K. assassination

[Old Sweat]

I was a second lieutenant on a 12-week course at the RCSA in Shilo during the Cuban Missile Crisis and was convinced, as were my classmates, that the nukes were going to fly. My only concern was that I was going to die away from my regiment in Gagetown.

At the time none of us knew just how screwed up the Diefenbaker government was, with a pacifist minister of external affairs who hated the military; a minister of national defence who effectively cut the prime minister out of the decision loop; an army and air force in Europe equipped and trained for nuclear warfare including delivery, but without warheads; and a prime minister who so hated JFK that he could not bring himself to cooperate with the Americans in the greatest crisis of the cold war.

 

[mariomike]

Great program on Discovery last night did a pretty good job of debunking the grassy knoll shot theory - though it didn't really mention anything about the magic bullet, or how an average shot with a carbine that wasn't zeroed property got three shots off in less than ten seconds.

I saw that show. I'm glad Mrs. Kennedy wasn't alive to watch some dude practicing head shots on her husband while she is crawling along the trunk of the car.

 

[Old Sweat]

I've been to the plaza and up to the sixth floor in the building. Although I was not able to look out the window in question, I was able to do so from the one next to it. In my opinion, it was an easy short range shot at a target moving directly away from Oswald at a slow speed and not taking any evasive action. To address the observation about three shots in ten seconds, that meant that he only had to operate the bolt twice. Two of his three rounds hit JFK, one in the neck/upper chest and the other in the head. One certainly was fatal and the other, if not fatal, would have inflicted a very serious injury that at the very least would have required the transfer of presidential powers to LBJ.

 

[mariomike]

The shooting skills of two ex-marines, Whitman and Oswald, in Texas back in the 1960's is discussed at the 4:40 mark:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eRlIpu1mt4

 

[Blackadder1916]

. . . and the other, if not fatal, would have inflicted a very serious injury that at the very least would have required the transfer of presidential powers to LBJ.

Not necessarily, even if such non-fatal wounds had incapacitated JFK.  At the time of the Kennedy assassination, the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the US constitution (Presidential disability and succession) had not even been proposed in Congress, let alone ratified.  While the Kennedy assassination undoubtedly provided some impetus for speeding through this amendment, work had been ongoing for a few years at the time of JFK’s death.  Congress proposed the Twenty-fifth Amendment on July 6, 1965 and ratification was completed on February 10, 1967.  On February 23, 1967, the amendment's adoption was certified.

Previously, succession to the office of President as a result of the death of an incumbent had been governed by Article II, Section 1, Clause 6 of the Constitution; however, this was ambiguous as to when, or how, or by whom, a sitting US President could be declared incapable of fulfilling his office, nor was there any procedure for filling the office of Vice President outside of an election.  While there had been a few occasions when a Vice President had taken over upon the death of a President, there had been many occasions when a President had been incapacitated with no transfer of powers and duties (such as Wilson’s stroke or Eisenhower’s heart attack).

It is possible that had JFK lived (but with some disability) there would have been a significant constitutional debate (crisis?) about him retaining the office.

Edited to add

To keep it to the topic:

Being of the generation that keeps the memory of where one was on that day, not surprisingly it is still one of the vivid memories from my youth.  School was out and I was walking home with a friend (we still walked in those days, uphill for miles both ways. . . . luxury).  We were at the corner of Lemarchant Road and Casey Street, the weather was unseasonably warm and sunny for the day; another classmate came up to us and relayed the news that the President had been shot.  By the time I got home it was confirmed that he was dead.  I don't know how he was viewed in other parts of Canada, but in Newfoundland part of his attraction may have been that he was "Irish" and "Catholic".  He was one of us, in a time when it was still (at least down home) unusual for a non-Protestant to be a major player in the political arena.

 

[mariomike]

It is possible that had JFK lived (but with some disability) there would have been a significant constitutional debate (crisis?) about him retaining the office.

There were tabloid reports that he survived:
http://img9.imageshack.us/i/vmjfka2.jpg/
http://img405.imageshack.us/i/vmjfka1.jpg/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weekly_World_News

 

[vonGarvin]

I've been to the plaza and up to the sixth floor in the building. Although I was not able to look out the window in question, I was able to do so from the one next to it. In my opinion, it was an easy short range shot at a target moving directly away from Oswald at a slow speed and not taking any evasive action. To address the observation about three shots in ten seconds, that meant that he only had to operate the bolt twice. Two of his three rounds hit JFK, one in the neck/upper chest and the other in the head. One certainly was fatal and the other, if not fatal, would have inflicted a very serious injury that at the very least would have required the transfer of presidential powers to LBJ.

The part I put into bold makes perfect sense to me.  I remember that awful Oliver Stone movie JFK, in which Kevin Costner is at the shooter's site, and asks the question "Why shoot there, when he could have shot here (when JFK was approaching)".  The question goes unanswered, except by the Technoviking, screaming at the screen "BECAUSE HIS SHOT WAS OBSTRUCTED WHEN HE WAS APPROACHING, BUT UNOBSTRUCTED WHEN GOING AWAY!  IDIOT!"


In any case, where was I?  It depends on one's religious and/or philosophical views.  Since this predated my birth by just under 3 years, the Technosoul may (or may not have) been in some "Soul Pool", screaming to come into the 3D world. Or I just had yet to come into Technoexistence.  I prefer to think that I was in a Soul Pool, and estimated that the time was not yet right to come into the 3D world, as my time estimate would still put me a few years early for the really good Techno beats of the latter 1990s.

 

[gaspasser]

Luckily in diapers and on the floor, my mom dropped the iron!!!!

Or so that's her story    I think she dropped me!  :blotto: