"The Kennedy Detail": more commentary (from others)

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3 users commented in " Coming Soon: The Kennedy Detail "

Vince Palamara said,in November 2nd, 2010 at 1:38 pm Very well written propaganda, more like it. “The Kennedy Detail”, while with some merit, seeks to blame JFK for his own death, which most people find repugnant. President Kennedy was a very nice man, never interfered with the actions of the Secret Service, and never ordered them off the car. I base this on many interviews with many members of the Kennedy Detail, Blaine included. This book was written to counter my research.

Tom Del Toro said,in November 2nd, 2010 at 4:43 pm I have to agree with with Vince Palamara in his assessment of the book. Seems Gerald Blaine is something of a coward, too: keeps deleting Mr. Palamara’s blogs. Why? Could it be Mr. Palamara has information contrary to the wisful thinking found in “The Kennedy Detail”, perhaps?

Audrey Cromwell said,in November 2nd, 2010 at 7:15 pm Vince Palamara is the REAL authority on the Secret Service, not Blaine, a nobody agent who can’t even get his facts right

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http://books.simonandschuster.com/Kennedy-Detail/Gerald-Blaine/9781439192962

Product Reviews
Kennedy Detail
Average Customer Rating: 1.6 out of 5
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Review 1 for Kennedy Detail
Overall Rating 3 out of 5
Written By: ripperthejack
( hawaii )
NON SECRET SERVICE AGENTS" what about their "code" Date: November 3, 2010
This review is for the Print format.

""The Kennedy Detail" takes poetic license regarding some crucial matters. For one, there was NO morning-of-JFK's-funeral meeting with Chief Rowley OTHER than to discuss the security for Jackie's walk to St. Matthews Cathedral. Everyone from this 47-year-old meeting---other than Blaine--- is conveniently dead and there is no documentation for this meeting to discuss JFK's alleged comments ("order") to remove the agents in Tampa on 11/18/63, used as a very lame excuse for why the agents weren't there on 11/22/63 (as agent Win Lawson said, there were no standing orders for the agents to stay off the back of the car and the matter never came to his attention---so much for the advance agents getting wind of these "orders"). Many agents and NON AGENTS (a crucial distinction Blaine doesn't get) have denied that JFK ever interfered with the Secret Service (what "code" would the NON SECRET SERVICE AGENTS have been following, Mr. Blaine?). In addition, Blaine makes a big deal about CE1025, the 5 reports submitted to Chief Rowley in April 1964 (only because the Warren Commission asked) regarding any statements JFK may have made regarding agents being on the rear of his car. Besides the fact that two of the agents---SAIC Behn & ASAIC Boring---denied the substance of their reports to the self-described "Secret Service expert" Blaine seeks to denigrate in "The Kennedy Detail", these reports were NOT just released in 1992, as Blaine alleges, but have been available since 1964, when the Warren Commission released their 26 volumes of hearings and exhibits for sale and library holdings. If that weren't enough, many major newspapers (such as The New York Times) and massive best-selling books (such as Jim Bishop's "The Day Kennedy Was Shot") made a great issue out of these after-the-fact reports; nothing whatsoever hidden there (and the aforementioned "Secret Service expert" [unnamed: Vince Palamara] has discussed these reports many times, as have others). As for the supposed Rybka misidentification, Rybka's family and a couple former agents were fooled, as well (especially considering the fact that both Emory Roberts and Win Lawson 'mistakenly' placed Rybka IN the follow-up car in their reports, only to 'correct' the record later). This also does not address the fact that Emory Roberts can clearly be seen rising in his seat and, using hand gestures, tells the agents (whether Rybka or, as Blaine states, Don Lawton) to fall back from the car, the agent raises his hands several times in response, Paul Landis makes room for the agent in the follow-up car, and the agents and aides in the follow-up car, without smiling, follow the agents' seeming perplexed reaction as the cars move on without him. Finally, with regard to the figurative "back stabbing" (not intended) Blaine states the "Secret Service expert" made with regard to documenting what the former agents said, keep in mind: if there was NO record, WHO would choose to believe what was said to a total stranger (especially over the word of former agents)? In the vernacular of today, "it is what it is": the former agents---AND NON AGENTS---said what they said and wrote what they wrote.

With that in mind, "The Kennedy Detail" is a book I recommend everyone buy and read---some very good information and photos, written by a good and honorable man who is obviously a very good and caring friend of his former comrades in arms, who, with a few noteable exceptions, are equally good and honorable men who were just doing their jobs and following orders when JFK was killed."
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Review 2 for Kennedy Detail
Overall Rating 1 out of 5
Written By: PitcherinSeries
( Florida )
The Ultimate Revision Date: November 2, 2010
This review is for the Print format.

"When compared and contrasted with their prior protective actions, the Kennedy detail's actions and inaction that created the uniquely insecure operation in Dallas on 11/22/63 is enough to undermine this work. Strangely, the Secret Service destroyed their records as the ARRB was drafting a request for them.

If what appears to be a blatant dereliction of duty is not enough to at least raise the possibility of criminally negligent homicide, ask yourself this question: How is it possible--statistically or otherwise--that every single highly trained protective agent on Elm Street during the 6-8 seconds of gunfire on 11/22/63 could have possibly all failed simultaneously? Are we to believe that Kennedy forbade agents from leaping on to his body protecting him as they immediately did with Johnson at the sound of the first shots? No way.

Fred Newcomb, Perry Adams, Vince Palamara, and many others have thoroughly documented a strong case against the Secret Service for complicity in the murder of JFK. In Volumes IV and V of his work, Inside the Assassination Records Review Board: The U.S. Government's Final Attempt to Reconcile the Conflicting Medical Evidence in the Assassination of JFK (Volume 4), AARB researcher Doug Horne points to William Greer as a possible assassin. As sensational and tired as this theory may sound, not a single individual has explained why high quality versions of the Zapruder film show this agent turn rapidly in his seat and move his hands and arms in a manner that makes it appear as though he is shooting Kennedy. Dan Robertson claims to have corrected the location of Greer's weapon in his book Definitive Proof: The Secret Service Murder of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy. Equally disturbing are the myriad of claims of how Greer slowed or stopped the limo at nearly the exact moment Robertson claims he is shooting Kennedy--are these two pieces of the crime fitting together?

Equally disturbing are the violent actions of the Secret Service at Parkland. More than one commentator has stated that the agents protected JFK's corpse far more aggressively as they were stealing it from the local coroner, who was merely trying to maintain the chain of evidence, than they had just moments before.

Why are there corroborating reports that Greer stayed with JFK's corpse without interruption so long after the shooting instead of staying with the limo? Why are there reports that he locked JFK's clothing in his locker in the White House garage? Why in the heck were the Secret Service in charge of all of these matters at all? Why did so much evidence--body, limo, forensic tissues, x-rays, autopsy photos, clothing--wind up in the possession of the Secret Service at White House of JFK's successor within just fifteen hours of the crime?

Also, why are there reports that none of the agents were reprimanded? Why were some given positions of greater responsibility?

In the face of all of this information and by blaming JFK, this book serves as the ultimate revision of the exact cause of the death--the failure of the US Secret Service to perform has they had consistently on prior occasions. Perhaps as some researchers and authors have suggested, Dallas was uniquely insecure because that is exactly what was required to remove an independent chief executive who could not be easily manipulated by the military and intelligence apparatus.

We should all look forward to the long overdue release of "Murder From Within" before we take the word of those who blame their failure on the victim. Personally, I feel that "The Kennedy Detail" is a sickening and despicable work--the Discovery Channel program will no doubt follow suit."
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Review 3 for Kennedy Detail
Overall Rating 1 out of 5
Written By: thesetiredeyes
( Billings, Montana )
Not true Date: November 2, 2010
This review is for the Print format.

"The proposition that the President was somehow vicariously responsible for his own assassination in that he ALLEGEDLY told his Secret Service Agents to back off normal procedures in respect of his safety is beyond the pale and typical of the mistruths that have been the hallmark of the assassination investigation UNOFFICIAL one should stress all the way along. I suppose if one accepts this scenario then one must also accept that Kennedy told his Agents to ignore ALL normal procedures including not positioning themselves in tall overlooking buildings, not placing themselves between the crowd and the President either on the car or running alongside,driving the limousine at a slower speed on Elm St, not identifying Dealy Plaza itself as an obvious hazard to the Presidents safety, in short a complete and utter failure on all and every count and we are supposed to believe that Kennedy ordered all this. Kennedy may have been many things but a fool I doubt particularly where his and his wifes safety was concerned especially when death threats had been noted and where the South at that time could be aptly termed a clear and present danger to kennedy. This was the only time this lack of security took place during the whole of Kennedys term, the question is why and who engineered it. I am afraid this is a poor attempt to alter history next Hoover and Johnson will come back from the grave and tell us they had clean skins in the assassination when all reasonable half intelligent people clearly see their respective culpable actions or non action in the case of Hoover. The research by serious observers has moved on down the road much much too far for this fairy tale to be taken even half seriously."
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Review 4 for Kennedy Detail
Overall Rating 1 out of 5
Written By: trueststar
( New York, NY )
More mainstream disinformation Date: November 2, 2010
This review is for the Print format.

"The Kennedy Detail" is inacurate and self-serving fluff, and merely another in a long series of attempts to distort the truth about what really happened on November 22, 1963. For those of us who have studied the JFK assassination in some depth, one of the few indisputable facts about that day is the complete lack of response on the part of President Kennedy's Secret Service detail. The fact remains that, if the Secret Service agents had been doing their job, John F. Kennedy would not have died in Dealey Plaza.

Vince Palamara is THE expert on the Secret Service's performance, or lack thereof, the day of the assassination. It is a sad indictment of our mainstream press that pablum like this, or "Case Closed," or Vincent Bugliosi's magnus ridiculotus, gets published and massively marketed, while Palamara's ground breaking research remains available for free online, due to the generosity of the author.

Deapite these perpetual efforts to promote the impossible official fairy tale, the public remains largely unconvinced. In the case of this book, we have now reached the height of absurdity, as the victim (JFK) is now being blamed for his own murder. This is incredible gall on the part of the author, to say the least. I would urge anyone interested in the real truth about the way the Secret Service performed in Dallas that day to read Vince Palamara's online work.

Those expecting answers to the numerous questions about the assassination of John F. Kennedy, will most certainly not find them in this book."
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Review 5 for Kennedy Detail
Overall Rating 2 out of 5
Written By: Anonymous
( Telluride, CO )
The Kennedy Detail blames JFK Date: November 1, 2010
This review is for the Print format.

"As the leading civilian authority on the Secret Service, especially regarding the JFK/ LBJ era, and as someone who interviewed and/ or corresponded with close to 80 former agents between 1990-2006 (roughly double the number of former agents interviewed for this book), I was, needless to say, very much interested in what former agent and author Gerald Blaine (a nice gentleman I spoke to twice and corresponded with several times via e-mail), along with co-author Lisa McCubbin and fellow former agent Clint Hill (a very close friend of Blaine's to whom I had sent a 22-page letter to and spoke to very briefly and who also wrote the Foreword), had to say about President Kennedy and the tragic events of November 22, 1963, when the Secret Service failed in the worst way, costing the nation the life of our President. As a total stranger and an outsider, my contacts with the former agents were very much in the "cross examination" mode (often eliciting begrudging, not-too-friendly responses), while, as a trusted insider, it is fair to say that Blaine's contacts would be of the "direct/ friendly examination" variety. This dichotomy will become important for a number of reasons.

I am as certain as a human being can be that it was my lengthy letter to Clint Hill that led to the genesis of this book----I sent it in June of 2005 and received a very cantankerous "non-reply" when I phoned the gentleman this same time period. Also, during this very same time period, as Blaine admitted to the Daily Sentinel's Bob Silbernagel for his 5/23/10 article, Blaine began contacting as many living former agents who served President Kennedy for his book as he could (it is important to note that I also made contacts with Mr. Blaine during this time period, as well). Why am I so certain that my letter was a catalyst? As an ardent critic of the Secret Service's performance in Dallas (going much further than the two government "investigations", the Warren Commission and the HSCA), I sent Mr. Hill, in effect, a "Cliff Notes" version of my research for my own book ("Survivor's Guilt: The Secret Service & The Failure To Protect The President"), spelling out why I came to be certain that fellow former agents Floyd Boring (the number two agent on the Kennedy Detail and the Secret Service planner of the Texas trip), Shift Leader Emory Roberts (the commander of the agents in the follow-up car in Dallas), and William Greer (the driver of JFK's limousine on 11/22/63) were grossly negligent before, during, and after JFK was assassinated. Judging by Mr. Hill's "response" (or lack thereof), my attempt to address my concerns did not go over very well, to put it mildly.

As it bears directly on "The Kennedy Detail" , just what specifically are my concerns? Simply put: many of these former agents (and several White House aides), including several who passed away years before this book was even a thought, such as the number one agent on the Kennedy Detail, Gerald Behn; one of the three Shift Leaders, Arthur Godfrey; the number two agent on LBJ's detail (who ALSO had protected JFK), Rufus Youngblood; Sam Kinney, the driver of the follow-up car in Dallas; Robert Bouck, the Special-Agent-In-Charge of the Protective Research Section; Frank Stoner of the Protective Research Section; Maurice Martineau, the Acting-Special- Agent- In- Charge of the Chicago Office who protected JFK from '61-'63 whenever he came to the area; John Norris of the Uniformed Division; Dave Powers, the former curator of the JFK Library who rode in the follow-up car many times, including on 11/22/63; author Helen O'Donnell, daughter of the late Ken O'Donnell, JFK's Chief of Staff (based on her memory and her father's many audio tapes); and many others, told me, in no uncertain terms, that President Kennedy was a very nice man, NEVER interfered with the actions of the Secret Service, and, most importantly, DID NOT ORDER THE AGENTS OFF HIS CAR (nor did O'Donnell, as verified by the aforementioned Helen O'Donnell, Art Godfrey, and Sam Kinney and, by extension, Dave Powers)! With regard to the Tampa, FL trip of 11/18/63, not only do many existing films and photos all along the long motorcade route depict agents on the rear of JFK's car, Congressman Sam Gibbons, who RODE IN THE CAR WITH JFK, told me that he heard no such order from JFK for the agents to be removed in the first place AND that the agents rode the rear bumper all the way. Surprisingly, the number two agent, Floyd Boring (who passed away 2/1/08 and to whom I spoke to twice and corresponded with once), told me the same thing: namely, that the "Get-The-Ivy-League-Charlatans-Off-The-Limo" tale (first told by the late author William Manchester, who had interviewed Gerald Blaine, Clint Hill, and Emory Roberts, but not Boring) is false---Boring never said that to him, never spoke to Manchester in any case, the tale is not true, and that, once again, JFK was a very nice man, very cooperative with the Secret Service, and never interfered with their actions at all! Agents of the Kennedy Detail who conveyed similar knowledge to myself---that JFK never interfered with their actions--- were Walt Coughlin, Winston Lawson (the lead advance agent for Dallas), Don Lawton (who rode on the rear of the car 11/18/63), Abe Bolden, Robert Lilley, Frank Yeager, Gerald O'Rourke, Sam Sulliman, Vince Mroz (now deceased), Larry Newman, and, quite surprisingly, Gerald Blaine himself, a little over a year before he began writing his book!

Although very well written, along with some nice photographs, as well, "The Kennedy Detail" is really a thinly veiled attempt to rewrite history (a la Gerald Posner and Vince Bugliosi, who believe 11/22/63 was the act of a single lone man) and absolve the agents of their collective survivor's guilt (and to counter the prolific writings of a certain reviewer). In the eyes of those from "The Kennedy Detail", the assassination was the act of TWO "lone men": Oswald, who pulled the trigger, and JFK, who set himself up as the target. Simply put: President Kennedy WAS indeed a very nice man, did not interfere with the actions of the Secret Service, did not order the agents off his limousine (in Tampa, in Dallas, or elsewhere), and did not have his staff convey any anti-security sentiments, either. The sheer force and power of what these men all told me, a complete stranger, in correspondence and on the phone, is all the more strong because, not only did they have a vested interest to protect themselves, the vast majority believe that Oswald acted alone and that all official "stories" are correct. Floyd Boring, as agency planner of the fateful trip, in spite of what he forcefully stated to me, did indeed convey the exaggerated---some would say false--notion that JFK had asked that the agents remove themselves from the car 4 short days before Dallas, taking it upon himself to tell several Dallas agents, depending on who you choose to believe, either as an "anecdote" of alleged presidential kindness and consideration in not wanting to have the agents "over exert" themselves (what Boring told the ARRB's Doug Horne in 1996) or a strict "presidential admonition" to stay off the car (as Clint Hill conveyed to the Warren Commission's Arlen Specter, under oath, in 1964). In addition, the motorcycle escort was reduced to (as the HSCA put it) a "uniquely insecure" smaller formation for Dallas, allegedly because, as Boring told the ARRB (and as Win Lawson, assigned to the Dallas trip by Boring [and who would have been merely following orders], told the Warren Commission under oath), JFK allegedly didn't like alot of noise from motorcycles, although he had no problem in countless prior motorcades, including that very same morning in Fort Worth and the day before in San Antonio and Houston. Emory Roberts ordered an agent back from JFK's limo at Love Field (as this reviewer discovered back in 1991 and had popularized for the first time back in 1995 and, again, in 2003 on The History Channel, long before this clip became something of an internet sensation), recalled an agent during the shooting and, as Sam Kinney told me, ordered the men on the follow-up car not to move! For his part, Bill Greer slowed the President's car down during the shooting, twice looked back at JFK, and disobeyed Roy Kellerman's order to get out line (and denied all of this to the Warren Commission). Coupled with several---many?---of the agent's stated anger about JFK's private life (as stated to author Seymour Hersh, among others), these actions, inactions, and feelings are cause for concern.

That said, the vast majority of these men (Blaine included) are honorable former government employees that were merely following orders on that fateful day in Dallas. In light of the work of this reviewer, future pensions, professional and personal reputations, and so forth, "The Kennedy Detail" makes perfect sense. After the reviewer's letter to Clint Hill, it truly WAS "a book that HAD to be written"."