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Who Really Killed Martin Luther King? -- The Case against Lyndon B Johnson and J Edgar Hoover Printer friendly page Print This
By Greg Maybury | Pox Amerikana
OpEdNews
Thursday, Jul 26, 2018

Phil Nelson has earned himself a deserved reputation as a discerning seeker and curator of the real truth behind some of history's seminal events, from the JFK hit to the attempted sinking of the USS Liberty in 1967 by the Israeli Defence Forces. He has now dome same with the assassination of MLK, which provides a timely update on the circumstances of his death, and is a welcome corrective to the official narrative.

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Who Really Killed Martin Luther King: The Case against Lyndon B Johnson and J Edgar Hoover
by Phil Nelson 2018,
Skyhorse Publishing

(Image by Skyhorse publishing)

Choose any notable event between presidents Calvin Coolidge and Richard Nixon (even beyond), such was his impact any subsequent discussion is far from complete without significant reference to J Edgar Hoover, the long-time founding Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); chances are that its Director's 'fingerprints' were all over said "event". This is one of those stories.

Such knowledge though about one of the most iconic and consequential figures in American history has only come to pass incrementally in the ensuing years after his death in 1972. Moreover, choose any significant individual public or political figure during that era, and the likelihood is that Hoover knew more about that person than they might've known about themselves. He most certainly knew much more about them than they themselves might've cared for anyone else to know, much less someone like Hoover.

One such "individual" on Edgar's 'dance-card' was the iconic civil rights leader and anti-Vietnam war campaigner Dr Martin Luther King (MLK); one such "event" was his assassination on April 4, 1968 in Memphis, TN., and the subsequent cover-up by the forces behind the murder and/or those closely aligned with them. The man who was subsequently charged with the crime, James Earl Ray, spent the rest of his life in prison, despite maintaining his innocence up until his last breath. This is an outcome we might safely opine ranks as one of the most contrived perversions of what passes for justice in the Grand American "And Justice for All" Narrative.

There can surely be little doubt now there was a high level conspiracy to eliminate King, one planned and orchestrated from the highest levels of the U.S. government on down the ranks and that James Earl Ray was framed. In short, he was the fall-guy, the patsy, and his involvement in the King assassination was both peripheral and unknowing. The essence of this preamble becomes compelling when one reads the just released book by one such "intrepid" author Phil Nelson, titled: Who REALLY Killed Martin Luther King Jr.? -- The Case Against Lyndon B. Johnson and J. Edgar Hoover.

By referencing all available evidence and documents whilst drawing upon the extraordinary work of previous authors, most notably Dr William Pepper (to whom we shall return), but others as well, Nelson delivers a thorough exposition of the real backstory behind one of modern American history's most defining and traumatic events. In the process he duly debunks both the renditions and reputations of several other authors whose names have frequently been linked with the official, yet totally bogus, narrative of his assassination, again most notably William Bradford Huie.

In doing so, as already indicated, the author shines the spotlight on two of the most reprehensible, criminally-minded public figures ever to 'grace' the political stage and be accorded the public trust in the Home of the Brave and the Land of the Free: Messrs Hoover and Johnson. Given the plethora of folks -- both living and dead -- who might fit the above profile, by any measure we can say that that is a big call.

It's axiomatic that there was no shortage of people throughout Edgar's reign who pissed him off, a not especially difficult achievement even for those who went out of their way to avoid doing so. Hoover was to be sure one of the Great Haters in that aforementioned narrative. And there can be little doubt that it was King -- along with Robert Kennedy (RFK) and his big brother John Fitzgerald Kennedy (JFK) -- who invited Edgar's hatred more so than anyone else.

Hoover, along with LBJ -- arguably one of the most unhinged Oval Office occupants to date, an observation difficult to refute for those who take the time to read Nelson's earlier work on the man -- conspired to eliminate King. All up then, if there is a more symbiotically iniquitous alliance in the annals of U.S. political enterprise, then this writer who'd be keen to know about it.

Insofar as Nelson's book is concerned, his meticulous deconstruction of the situation and circumstances attending the assassination and the actual (versus the fabricated) facts related to it, and the now half-century campaign to preserve intact the official narrative, must now stand as the definitive account of this extraordinary event -- as shameful as it is tragic -- in America's history.

That said, in a 'cut to the chase' kinda way, the following summary might be sufficient to inform those not overly familiar with some of the "actual facts", and set the stage for what is to follow.
  • The assassination of MLK was planned more than 2 years before, and was the brainchild of Johnson and Hoover, with Edgar's 2IC Clyde Tolson the point-man, ably abetted by Cartha "Deke" DeLoach;
  • The motivations for Hoover and LBJ were various and sometimes over-lapping, with Hoover having a visceral hatred of King because of his activism and his race, and LBJ resenting his popularity, political influence and opposition to the Vietnam war;
  • iThe plotters cunningly planned to have the assassination portrayed from the off as the work of another "lone nut", in James Earl Ray's case, '[A] vicious Southern racist and hater, stalker, [and] murderer', itself a total fabrication;
  • It was the famed novelist, William Bradford Huie, an old crony of Hoover's, who was given a "mission" to create this meme for Ray, one whose shelf life endures to this day, and from whom so many others took their lead in its perpetuation;
  • A civil trial in 1999 exonerated Ray (who'd died in prison the previous year just over 30 years after the murder), and it found that a government conspiracy was responsible for King's murder, [and] that Ray was a 'patsy' with no knowing involvement in the hit; and most shockingly,
  • King was not killed instantly as most people believe, but in fact was later murdered by his attending doctor who smothered him with a pillow, a contingency which had been allowed for by the plotters in the event of such an outcome.
From these basic premises, Nelson methodically unpacks this bespoke meme regarding James Earl Ray -- as removed from reality as it could possibly be imagined -- as the massive deceit that it was. He then presents us with a revised account in its place, based upon hard evidence that exonerates Ray. It needs be noted that Nelson's account is supplemented by many other authors, including Harold Weisberg, Mark Lane, and, particularly, William Pepper.

Insofar as the MLK story goes, it is to Dr William Pepper that Nelson 'dips his lid' most prominently as being his most inspired source and the most indefatigable of investigators in the search for the real truth about the man's murder, one of America's most seminal and quintessential of 'state crimes against democracy'. Pepper has written three books on this event, the latest being 2017's The Plot to Kill King: The Truth Behind the Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

In his interview with James Corbett, Pepper reveals that in the forty plus years he's been involved in investigating and reporting on the King assassination, he has spent over a million dollars of his own money and at one point relocated himself and his family to the UK as a result of numerous death threats. It is also notable that Pepper has given his seal of approval to Nelson's more recent effort to add further insight into this extraordinary story. Here's part of what Pepper had to say (via email to this writer and to Nelson):
'Phil Nelson has provided us with some valuable missing information about the actions of Lyndon Johnson in the context of events in the 1960's. I've long believed the information given to me"about LBJ's knowing involvement and collusion in the assassination of JFK. Nelson's research about Johnson's collaboration [with] and his support of the profoundly illegal and evil, public actions of J. Edgar Hoover [in the assassination of Martin Luther King] fills in many blanks and is a highly valuable historical contribution. I urge, and hope, that this work will be widely read.'
In showcasing the real truth behind one of America's greatest of criminal conspiracies, given the overwhelming, irrefutable evidence, as previously presented by William Pepper and so many others, and now by Phil Nelson, anyone who still thinks James Earl Ray was the 'only shooter' and the 'only plotter' and that there was no conspiracy, frankly needs a 'check up from the neck up'. Either that or they prefer to be on the wrong side of history.

To be sure then the state sanctioned plot to murder King as outlined by both authors, [then] blame it on an innocent man and allow him to rot in jail for forty years, all the while bringing to bear the full resources of said state the aim of which is to keep this secret from becoming public knowledge -- and to continue to do so as of this writing -- is as savage an indictment on the republic as any this writer can think of.

For his part in the proceedings, James Earl Ray certainly did end up 'rotting in jail'. Yet, if there's any justice or karma to be had in this or the next life -- in this the Empire of the Republic -- the best we might hope for then is that those who committed this crime and/or were complicit in its cover-up will either rot in hell when their time comes or are in the process of doing so as we speak. For my own part I can think of no more fitting fate for the lot of them.

In King's final book, Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community?, it is instructive to note that he argued in part that white supremacy stood in the way of America's democracy, [that] it was an ever-present force in frustrating the dreams of the nation's darker-skinned citizens. At the heart of it was a distorted understanding of the meaning of racial justice. He wrote:
'Negroes have proceeded from a premise that equality means what it says, and they have taken white Americans at their word when they talked of it as an objective. But most whites in America proceed from a premise that equality is a loose expression for improvement. White America is not even psychologically organized to close the gap -- essentially it seeks only to make it less painful and less obvious but in most respects to retain it. This is a devastating judgment about our so-called national commitment to progress. It reduces racial justice to a charitable enterprise by which white people "do good" for black people. This, in turn, provides white Americans with a necessary illusion that preserves the idea of innocence and insulates their conscience or, perhaps, their soul from guilt and blame.'
One is left pondering if King's assessment isn't as pertinent now as it was back then. When folks read Nelson's book from go to woe -- the latter being the operative word herein -- it's my belief they will more fully appreciate this statement.


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