Now we all know Foster committed suicide
in Ft. Marcy Park. The park police investigation said
it was true, various hostile GOP Congressional
committees' investigations said it was true, Robert Fiske,
Reno's original special prosecutor before
Starr became Independent Counsel and replaced him,
said it was true, and even Ken Starr's
entirely separate, start from scratch and take 3 years
investigation said it was true.
But, holy shit, what if all of these were
coverups, and Foster did NOT commit suicide in Ft. Marcy Park?
Impossible, and only absurdly claimed by
confirmed lying Clinton haters? Not necessarily.
I am an agnostic on the subject, personally, because I've given it a little study.
What Rush made up as a murder having taken
place at Hillary's private apartment, and the suggestion
that Foster was murdered and that it was
done at the Clintons' behest, is indeed the kind of unsupported
slander one would take it to be.
But there is evidence suggestive that, however
Foster ended up dead, his body was moved. And that is
the evidence that guys like Chris Ruddy
and Reed Irvine's AIM discuss in detail with considerable accuracy.
Note: How strange it is to see the
word 'accuracy' in the same sentence as 'Chris Ruddy.'
What they say is factual enough, although
leaving open the conclusion one should draw (they do tend to go
from claims of coverup to murder to Clinton's
involvement, but progressively lack evidence as their
conclusions draw more dire).
Foster's death could have been exactly the
suicide it has been officially ruled some 6 times, but not taken
place at Ft. Marcy Park, but somewhere
else where his presence would be embarrassing-- the White House
itself, or exactly that little executive
branch hideaway the financial newsletter claimed from an insider source.
The main complaints of the skeptics are
the scene of Foster's body, the condition of the body, clothing and
surroundings, the gun, the car and keys
situation, missing evidence (allegedly ruined photographs and no
bullet), and apparent official massaging
of witnesses' testimonies to reverse themselves, or to simply suppress
them altogether (Patrick Knowlton, who
had to seek an appendix status for his eyewitness testimony about
a different colored older Honda in the
parking lot than Foster's, which was published with the Starr final Foster
report only because the law allows any
'involved' persons their own say-so, and otherwise his side of things
would have remained entirely unknown to
the public).
Every one of these points of contention
is based on evidence on the official record. While the skeptics may be
wrong on every one of these points, they
haven't simply made these things up out of whole cloth. This is a rare
case where the right has at least a prima
facie case that their revisionist questions have support from the facts,
and it requires a reasoned response to
convince a neutral third party hearing the facts they adduce for their
side
that they are mistaken, or have misinterpreted
the meaning of the evidence.
Just two questions will show the ambiguity
of the evidence. Knowlton swears he was at the park at the time in
question, and didn't see Foster's family
Honda in the parking lot, but an older beat up Honda of a different faded
color. (Says he didn't hear the gunshot
either, which was the purpose of the infamous backyard melon shooting
incident by Dan Burton-- to see how far
away you could hear the report of that caliber pistol). Although Foster's
pockets were emptied as a matter of routine
when his body was taken into custody and stripped to be examined
post mortem, no car keys were originally
found. Later, the proper keys to the Honda were found in the pants,
with the medical examiner office's staffer
explaining subsequently that he hadn't reached to the bottom of the pocket.
If either Foster's car wasn't originally
there in the parking lot at that time, or he didn't have the keys and they
weren't in the car or on the grounds, only
showing up later by unknown means, the official story having him
drive himself there cannot be true. If
that crack in the official story holds up to review, that failure would
imply
others involvement with at least moving
his body and covering up the actual circumstances and place of the
death, and suggesting possibly considerably
more.
Not that these cannot be mistaken disputes.
Knowlton could have been mistaken, either as to the exact time he
was there or exactly what he saw. Maybe
the keys did go innocently undiscovered (extra deep pockets?),
even though 'emptying the pockets of all
contents' was the task at hand and one would think you couldn't avoid
touching them and being alerted to their
presence if you went into ANY pocket.
But how would one judge the alternative
takes here? See if Knowlton has any agenda to say what he says, or is
impaired, a drunk, or otherwise not a credible
witness. Find out how sure he is, how long he viewed the car,
in what lighting, at what distance, etc.
Put the exact keys in the exact pants as the ME office tech says
they were
later found, on or off a body as the re-created
case may be, and see if they escape notice in a brisk emptying procedure.
I have not done this myself, nor have I
read of anyone neutral to the case having done so. (Knowlton's entire
statement is available in the Starr report
on this, but I haven't read it). So I am an agnostic as to the meaning
of
this evidence.
But this is what should be required of anyone
who would draw an informed conclusion. There is too much official
evidence that raises questions to simply
dismiss it out of hand. Many other questions remain, and I have only
mentioned a couple for what passes as my
failed attempt at brevity.
Several rather unusual facts about the Foster
case which have received very little attention are odd events before
and after his death.
One was that Foster repeatedly made one-day
trips to Switzerland, for reasons that to the best of my knowledge
remain officially unexplained. (These were
charged to his American Express at very pricey no advance booking
rates, and confirmed by those records.)
The second is that some time after Foster's death, his sister, I believe
it was,
received a wire transfer to her account
of some $200,000. And evidently, the NSA has a considerable file on
Foster that remains undisclosed, refused
disclosure despite a Freedom of Information Act application, although its
extent of over 1,000 pages has become known.
None of these odd facts mean Foster didn't
commit suicide in Ft. Marcy Park.
But they surely imply that rather more
was going on with Foster than has been disclosed,
and they add another suggestive layer of
intrigue to the matter.
As a bizarre post script to this whole matter,
the Scaife-backed American Spectator Magazine, under veteran
Clinton hater editor R. Emmet 'Bob' Tyrell,
completely trashed Ruddy's book 'The Strange Case of Vincent Foster'
in its review, and so enraged Scaife that
he completely cut off his funding, almost ending the AS altogether.
Sadly, it regrouped under a smaller business
model.
Now, we both know anything in the American
Spectator is likely a lie. Same with GOP committee investigation reports.
Starr, the same. So we run directly into
the liar's paradox-- are they NOW telling the truth, or still lying?
Just a thought, and a glimpse into the
puzzle palace that is official Washington intrigue.
Sincerely,
Phillip A. Schuman