[Sample B: Approval/Signature Sheet] - George Mason University

who felt alienated from society and couldn’t get along with anyone…and one who hated
his country and its representatives.” 313 For some reason, however, most Americans have
not been persuaded by the evidence presented by the Warren Commission, and Bugliosi’s
attempt to reclaim history on behalf of the Commission does not appear to have been
successful, partly because only the hardiest reader could plow through his ponderous
book.
Moore, Posner, and Bugliosi all stayed within the confines of the Warren
Commission’s version of Oswald’s life. They sought to convince the public of Oswald’s
guilt. Some of the other defenders of the Warren Commission emphasized the
ideologically motivations of Oswald as a Marxist, and Soviet- and Cuban-sympathizer.
Some even speculated whether “Oswald the Red” had help from the other side of the
Cold War divide. However, this seems far-fetched given the attempts to ease tensions
following the Cuban Missile Crisis. The world would have faced nuclear Armageddon if
the Soviets or Cubans had been implicated in a plot to kill Kennedy.
The defenders of the Warren Commission tried to determine Oswald’s
motivations and to counter critical assaults on the report. To the Commission’s critics,
Oswald may in fact be guilty of firing shots at President Kennedy, but in their renderings
of his life, Oswald was not portrayed as a loner. He had connections to shadowy figures
in the U.S. and Soviet intelligence communities, in the mob, and among right-wing anti-
communists. In these works, Oswald emerges as an enigmatic figure, operating in the
netherworld of spies and organized crime. Oswald is still the key to the assassination, but
313 Bugliosi, 949.
137