Subject: Re: JFK Propaganda: 2 Paradigms
Date: Mon, 06 Dec 1999 22:52:56 GMT
From: dlifton@earthlink.net
Organization: Deja.com - Before you buy.
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy.jfk

To all:

Roger Feinman paints himself as the victim of a series of injustices. Let me
tell you what Roger Feinman is all about, because this is a situation in
which the issues cannot be understood without some context, and particulary,
some knowledge of the person.

After all, the question must be asked: who is Roger Feinman; and why
couldn't
Groden, if he had such a good case, get a better, more experienced legal
mind
to represent him?

Read on.

* * * * *

After Posner/Random house published, in connection the promotion of CASE
CLOSED, that awful NY Times ad which showed photographs of six JFK authors
(including me) and carried the banner "Guilty of Misleading the American
Public", I consulted a top attorney. The man I consulted was not a recent
graduate of law school, or some legal hack, but an experienced top flight
attorney who deals with major corporations and who is a personal  friend of
mine.  He looked at the issues, gave it some serious study, then explained
why, although it was a gray area, Random House was on the "other side" of
the
line, and legal action would probably get nowhere. Since life is finite, and
we have to choose our battles, I chose not to make an issue of it.

Roger Feinman behaved otherwise.  Undoubtedly filled with a great sense of
mission, and lord only knows what concept of the law or the facts in this
case, he went up against Random House, in a case which (according to my very
well credentialed friend) had very little (and possibly no) legal merit.
And
look what happened.  Look at what happened not because of the issues, but
because of the manner in which Feinman behaved:

1. He lost the case, and in a manner in which it could not be refiled;

2. He lost his appeal of the case;

3. Because of his behavior, he was brought up on five disciplinary charges;
on which he was found guilty of three;

4  Roger Feinman was disbarred by the Federal Court in Manhattan.

Were it not for my own personal experiences with Feinman, I might be
inclined
to give him the benefit of the doubt, or even feel sorry for the guy, but I
don't.

At the Midwest Symposium held in the aftermath of the great JAMA publication
of the Humes-Boswell-Finck article defending the Warren Commission
Report---this was Spring, 1992, where a number of critics (me, Wallace
Milam,
Aguilar, etc.) were in a debate format against the folks from JAMA), and
before an auditorium packed to capacity--- Feinman took the opportunity of
his few minutes NOT to attack the other side (JAMA, represented by George
Lundberg et al), but to attack me.  It was totally uncalled for,
unprofessional, highly unethical, completely irresponsible. For me, it was
like being fragged in a major public appearance.  Fortunately, I antipicated
the possibility that Feinman might do something like that, and had a ready
response.

But that wasn't the end of it.

Out in the lobby afterward, he told people he not only didn't agree with my
theory, but held me responsible for his not getting his book published.
(What
book?  A very good question.)  He also said that the publication of my book
had served to prevent the publication of other, more worthy, theories.  (I
didn't know I had that much power.)

Feinman then returned to New York, at which point he---who admitted to
having
"writer's block" and having been unable to author the book he had been
promising one and all for some 20 years---then authored his great tour de
force---a multi-hundred page manuscript attacking me. (Yes. That is the way
Feinman finally broke through his "writer's block.")

Feinman distributed---on Compuserve---a totally slanderous diatribe which
alleged, among other things:

1. That I was supported financially by the CIA;

2. That I was responsible, in part, for the suicide of RFK researcher Greg
Stone (who I had met just once, for breakfast, a week or so prior to his
taking his life);

3. That I made up the major portion of BEST EVIDENCE---fabricated it
outright---just to get a book contract;

4. And much else.

This malicious libel was spread all over Compuserve by the very pompous
Roger
Feinman, Esq., who can write well but who can't reason worth a damn, and is
(apparently) filled with hatred of me personally, and envy at my own
accomplishments. (And by "accomplishment", I am talking about the fact that,
whether you agree with my conclusions or not, my book was published, was a
Book of the Month Club selection, was nominated for a Pulitzer in History,
was a NYT Times best seller; and was then republished by three other
publishing houses and remained in print for some 17 years, etc. etc.).

But Feinman doesn't (and didn't) see it that way. All he saw---and he told
this to others---was a plot (yes, a "plot") on the part of David Lifton to
keep his book ("What book?" you ask? Ask Feinman) from being published.
And,
as noted, he joined this with a screwball theory that my work has prevented
other "correct" theories (undoubtedly, like his) from seeing the light of
day.

Feinman claimed that the publication of my book was the result, in part, of
improper legal vetting on the part of my publisher.

So Feinman has gone about maligning me and spreading lies about me and my
work all these years.  From personal experience, I can attest to the fact
that Feinman is nothing more that Harrison Livingstone with a law degree.
The
same hysteria; the same paranoia.  The same envy.  The same inability to
deal
with the evidence of body alteration in a rational manner.

When Feinman first began distributing his garbage, I consulted an attorney,
but it wasn't too long after that that I learned the true state of Feinman's
finances; and after that, I made the very practical decision not to bother
with him, legally. You can't get blood out of turnip, and I have no
intention
of wasting my life in a garden of turnips.  But I was still ticked off by
all
the nonsense being spread by this mean-spirited oh-so-scholarly sounding
individual, and I decided to do something constructive with my anger.  So I
gathered together various documents, clips, correspondence, going back some
20 years---and relating to Feinman---and put together an essay, "Who is
Roger
Feinman, and Why Does He Hate Me So Much?"  It tells the story of Roger
Feinman, in the context of the JFK researcher movement, starting back in
1966, and how many of those people made a fatal error: confusing the message
with the messenger. And by that I mean: believing that because the Warren
Commission Report is wrong, that the Warren Commission *was* the conspiracy.
One of the reason Feinman (and others) can't deal with the evidence properly
---and particularly the evidence of body alteration---is that they are
unwilling to believe that the Warren Commission could have been deceived.
They make the WC  the active architect of the coverup. To them, BEST
EVIDENCE
lets the commission off the hook, and that's one of the many reasons they
don't like my book.

I made copies of this essay, and sent it (by mail) to some 200 people.

It is loaded with documentation, and deals with Roger Feinman and his phony
and malicious charges once and for all.  (When Feinman tried to re-circulate
his nonsense to an ARRB person, I simply sent the essay to that person, and
that was the end of Feinman's credibility. Yes, it is that obvious.)

All the while, I said to myself: "What goes around comes around."  Sooner or
later, I believed, Feinman would try his irrational toxic nonsense with
someone who would hit back, and he would get trounced.

Well, it happened when he went before the court to try the Groden case.

Only someone not knowing Feinman's personality, instability,
mean-spiritedness, and complete lack of ethics and tendency to spread lies
and slander, and personalize a debate, could possibly evaluate what happened
in that case and blame it on "the system" (as Shackelford apparently does).
To repeat the scorecard:

1. He lost the case, and in a manner in which it could not be refiled;

2. He lost his appeal of the case;

3. Because of his behavior, he was brought up on five disciplinary charges;
on which he was found guilty of three;

4.  Roger Feinman was disbarred by the Federal Court in Manhattan.

Its a free country and anyone is entitled to put on rose colored glasses
when
viewing this situation. Or to attribute my remarks and evaluation to a
"feud".

But I have had to deal with this slimeball personally. And as to what the
system has done to poor Roger Feinman, I will quote my late father, who used
to say: "It couldn't have happened to a nicer guy."

David Lifton

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Before you buy.