government

It's easy to say "politics as usual" after reading this book
on the life nad politics of LBJ, but, believe it or not, this
one will give you a glimpse of politics you wish you had never
seen.
LBJ has to have been the most sleazy man to ever hold the office
of President of the US, and his records almost is beyond belief.
But this author gives most of the names and dates, with all
the connections, that show LJB was involved in a lifetime of crime, including bribery, extortion, influence-peddling of the
worst kind, womanizing of the lowest kind, and then, worst of
all, complicity in the murder of JFK.
The writer has good credentials for his knowledge, since he worked for the Dallas law firm that represented LBJ's personal
interests, and the senior partner for that firm served as LJB's
personal bagman, as well as being the one who usually delivered the payments as well as the ultimatiums. He went into that firm
as a young guy after the JFK murder, but he was there for years,
and he recounts how he learned the truth over a period of years,
as the 2 senior men decided they could trust him to be quiet and
keep the secrets.
The author is rather self-serving in his denial of any duty to
report crimes at the time, as he learned about them, and he
rather akwardly tries to use the legal profession's canons of
ethics as an excuse. He repeatedly asserts that the "lawyer-client privilege" kept him from repeating any of this information, but he even relates examples where crimes were planned in advance, with the help of these lawyers, and he still
tries to say that privilege protected everyone. That is simply
not true, and we have to wonder in surprise at his assertions,
when the law is very clear that such privilege would not allow
lawyers to conspire to commit crimes with immpunity.
But it is an interesting story and one which should be read by
every voter in the country.
As to the main claim that LBJ participated in the murder of JFK,
the writer even gives the name of the shooter who fired one of
the fatal bullets (now dead of course), and he repeats the oft-heard claim that Oswald was a patsy.
The book could have been better edited, because in one section,
he claims he knows who the other shooter was but says he has to
await the development of further proof before actually naming
him publicly. But in a later section, he says the exact identify of the other shooter will never be known.
But he gives details of where the 2 shooters of fatal bullets
were stationed and the order of firing, etc., and he further
explains their ability to escape by pointing out that LBJ's
help allowed them to have false Secret Service credentials. He
also explains that the plan was for Oswald to be caught on the
spot and shot and killed in a shoot-out with police, but that Oswald slipped away too quickly, to be apprehended a little later in a theater.
He explains that Oswald fired 2 bullets at JFK, but that both
missed their target, while the 2 real shooters both connected.
Also pointed out by him is that 3 men (the 2 shooters and a look-out) were supplied with the false Secret Service credentials, but that only Oswald was not included in that part
of the plan.
You don't have to be a "conspiracy" buff to find his details
interesting, so it is very worthwhile reading. And even if
the reader can't quite believe Vice-Pres. Johnson conspired to
kill a sitting President, the full details of LBJ's life of
thuggery and law-breaking are very believeable, with, as stated,
considerable detail. From stealing the Senate election of 1948
(and he names the man who illegally filled in the voters' registration lists of a particular Texas precinct so the total
votes allegedly cast wouldn't exceed the number of registered
voters) to the murder of a man who would have embarrassed LBJ
with public revelations of the sister of LBJ, this list of
crimes and wrong-doing goes beyond even what even the most cynical of us would have believed.
As said, every voter should read this list of crimes and political excesses.

I found this book to be utterly compelling, forgiving the "faction" sections in favor of the real facts presented. Barr McClellan, former attorney of Lyndon B. Johnson, steps forward and claims that LBJ assassinated JFK. The evidence better be good.

The key piece of evidence given is a latent fingerprint. It was taken from a box, possibly used as a sniper's mount, on the 6th Floor of the Texas Schoolbook Depository Building (TSDB) where Oswald allegedly shot at Kennedy.

But the fingerprint is not Oswald's.

An expert chosen by McClellan was shown the latent print with no prior knowledge of its context, and found that it matched a fingerprint on record for a Texan named Mac Wallace. The affidavit of this expert, Nathan Darby, is impressive, as are his credentials. Darby found a minimum of 14 matching points, whereas the FBI had inferior prints and far fewer matching points from the barrel of the gun Oswald ostensibly used. (Publishers Weekly, in their recent review, referred to this key latent print as a questionable "smudge," and devalued the book as a result. But on what basis? The reader should note that the Warren Commission took this latent print extremely seriously; so seriously that they circulated an internal memorandum among themselves -- exhibited in the book -- expressing "anxious" concern over it.) That memorandum and the latent fingerprint set the stage.

Together they are certainly worthy of examination -- and of a book, if the right links can be proven. That this book is written by Barr McClellan, Texas insider and former lawyer for Johnson, makes the potential all the more compelling. From behind the wall of the attorney-client privilege, the details come forward.

The question then becomes this:

If the latent print proves Mac Wallace was on the sixth floor of the TSDB, then what was Wallace's relationship to LBJ's inner circle?

Wallace, it turns out, was the lover of Josefa Johnson, LBJ's sister. Wallace murdered Douglas Kinser, her other lover, in a fit of rage. The trial was handled by LBJ's attorneys, Edward Clark and associates. (Clark, a Texas super-lawyer, was the kingmaker behind Johnson and the leader of their group. He made Barr McClellan the youngest partner in his law firm.)
Wallace was convicted of the murder, but walked away with a suspended sentence.

Soon after his conviction, Wallace was hired at LTV, a company owned by D.H Byrd, a player in Texas big oil.
Clark got him the job. It so happens that Byrd owned the Texas School Book Depository building.

The connections do not end there.

Read the book for the whole story. It's really worth the time. The chain of causation explaining Wallace's link to the Clark-LBJ inner circle is fascinating -- and very probably incriminating. The beginning of the text is a little circuitous, but McClellan hits his stride soon enough and lays the evidence bare. Walt Brown - a very good, solid JFK author and noted assassination expert -stands behind McClellan.

Bottom line for this reader: If Darby's 42 years as a fingerprint expert are valuable; and if the Warren Commission did not see this print as a "smudge," but as a key piece of evidence to be reckoned with - and they documented it as such -- then McClellan has some very real evidence and a strong case. See for yourself, I say. There is enough evidence presented in the book to enable careful readers to form an opinion of their own.

(Note: The details of LBJ's life are also compelling on their own. Here is a bio on him written by someone who represented his political and money interests.)

This book was a page-turner and very hard to put down. A good half or more was really an LBJ biography that offered new information not found in similar works I have read. This bio provided some very unflattering data on LBJ that - unfortunately - I really feel is more-or-less accurate. As far as the assertions that LBJ and Edward Clark had JFK assassinated, well that evidence is inconclusive. The assertions that LBJ (and Clark) committed some despicable acts are very arguable, but to advance beyond the other garden-variety conspiracy theories of Kennedy's assassination, the author needs to formulate a better case. The author readily admitted to the use of "faction" in this last chapter or so, but I feel he used that technique well before then. He includes almost 100 pages of photocopied evidence in the book's appendix, but while it may legitimately show LBJ as a dishonest, power-hungry, and pathological man, it falls far short of implicating him in JFK's assassination.

For McClellan to have presented this book as an unflattering LBJ bio and suggested possible involvement in the assassination is one thing, but for him to offer this as definitive proof, "Blood..." fails. For a look at the seamier side of LBJ, and the indictment of legal abuse of the state judicial system, it's a good read.