Sunday, April 19, 2015

Richard Dolan and the Roswell Slides

In news that is more than a month old, I learned that Richard Dolan has been invited to participate in the presentation in Mexico City. He wrote that in “February 2015, to my great surprise, I was asked by Jaime Maussan if I would attend” but that he was hesitant to do so. 
Later he said, “I didn’t agree to participate, however, until after I had a long conversation with Don Schmitt. Of all the people with a connection to the slides, I know Don the best. He helped to fill in many of the blanks I have had on the controversy, and I came away with an even stronger feeling that this is indeed a fascinating development in the UFO field. I also had a long and productive conversation with Tony Bragalia, for whom I have a lot of respect.”
Dolan isn’t going to talk about the validity of the slides because he doesn’t believe it would be appropriate to jump into that controversy. That will be left to Schmitt, Tom Carey and the other experts in various fields. According to Dolan, “Jaime’s reply was that he wanted me to offer my thoughts on the future of ufology and the potential for the end of UFO secrecy--that is, ‘Disclosure’ -- if there were to be general agreement that the slides are authentic. I did co-author a book on the potential ramifications of Disclosure, and do find it interesting to speculate on this subject.”
Dolan recaps much of what has been discussed on a variety of blogs and web sites, telling us the things that we all now know, or rather what we have been told. We don’t need to go through all that here, however, for those interested you can find Dolan’s remarks at:
 In his discussion, Dolan does make a couple of comments that are relevant, not only to the Roswell Slides, but to UFO research in general. He wrote:
There will always be things to criticize by those people who are simply intent on finding something to criticize. Nearly everything in UFO research is messy. Plus, there is a perennial shortage of funds to do things the way we would all like. No research money, for starters. Nor, with a few exceptions, is there much funding in the way of presenting highly professional conferences. So when an opportunity comes along in which the evidence can be presented in a professional manner to a large audience, is this really what critics want to focus on? Isn’t it more relevant to restrict one’s analysis to the actual slides and the story behind them?

Dolan suggests that he won’t be arguing for or against the slides showing an alien body but he is excited to have a ring side seat for the presentation of the evidence and the unveiling of high quality copies of the slides in the first public venue.
He might have expressed it best for those of us who have hovered around the periphery of this discussion for the last couple of months. He wrote, “As of now, I am not expecting these slides or this event to be a make-or-break event in ufology. But they are fascinating to me, and I do think they have the potential to be of real interest.”

17 comments:

  1. The plot thickens...

    http://nickredfernfortean.blogspot.com/2015/04/the-roswell-slides-kodachrome.html

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  2. Ah yes, the voice of reason. Thank you, Richard.

    Others could learn so much from him.

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  3. Nick and Jim -

    If you wish to communicate with one another, use a different venue.

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  4. Nope, I have no wish. Had his comment not appeared, I wouldn't have been forced to reply. I'm not to blame for starting anything.

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  5. @Kevin

    How many articles do wan to write with "...and the the Roswell Slides", yet?

    Let me give you some hints:

    "Jesus and the Roswell Slides"

    "Buddah and the Roswell Slides"

    "J. F. Kennedy and the Roswell Slides"

    "Bill Clinton, Monica Lewinsky and the Roswell Slides"

    "Spiderman and the Roswell Slides"

    "E.T. and the Roswell Slides"

    "The Roswell Slides strike back"

    "The Return of the Roswell Slides"

    "The Roswell Slides awakens"


    ...and, and, and! ^^

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  6. Michael:

    I assume the titles in your list are either forthcoming films or TV series.

    Your third title should be

    "J F Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe and the Roswell slides". JFK supposedly told MM all about Roswell, didn't he?

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  7. @Mu:

    ...you forgot to add to your list:

    "What if Spartacus had the Roswell Slides?"

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  8. Dolan is making about the same comments as I have in various posts about the (Roswell) slides. I’m not sure how to figure Dolan. I’ve read his books UFOs and the National Security State. He does a very thorough job of detailing a lot of historical UFO events. But, in his second book he ”jumps the shark” by taking seriously things like the “alien reproduction vehicles” and claims that the defense black budget has produced game changing advances in fundamental science that are still being kept secret. This seems paint Dolan as a conspiracy theorist. So his conservativism on the Roswell Slides is hardly a vote in their favor.

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  9. This is great news! Dolan will take an objective, neutral view to this whole topic instead of the increasingly negative, cantankerous old man viewpoint that we've recently come to expect from Kevin.

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  10. John Smith -

    This cracks me up. On the one hand I am criticized for being too supportive of the slides and on the other I am a "increasingly negative, cantankerous old man," because I ask some difficult questions about the slides.

    I also get that we should wait until all is revealed in Mexico City, but most of the discussion was driven by their releases of some of the information. Why shouldn't we question that and ask for additional information? After all, for the most part, all they had to do was remain silent until they arrived in Mexico for the big reveal. Up to the last few months, they had refused to say anything.

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  11. Dolan is at least objective - but on the other hand he is not neutral - he is an ET'er like the rest of those participating in the Mexico reveal. And Kevin - I haven't seen a single thing you have posted that is "supportive" of the slides - after all if they were real and not even of Roswell aliens it would go to strengthen your case.

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  12. Brian -

    Really? I have posted articles by Tony Bragalia without comment on several occasions. Those alone present a positive point of view.

    In other circumstances I have pointed out what are potential flaws without suggesting those flaws are fatal... lack of provenance, for example, is worrisome.

    And I have been criticized for being too positive... you pick your side of the fence and then criticize away.

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  13. I don’t see that much difference between the Dolan post and what Kevin has been saying here. The big difference is that Dolan is going to Mexico City and Kevin isn’t. Or, am I wrong about that?

    The thing about Dolan isn’t his support of UFOs but rather some of the conspiracy stuff he bought into with his second book. Dolan has this very expansive view of the U.S. black budget which is way out of proportion to reality. He seems to believe that our government actually operation flying saucers under its control and has had them for perhaps thirty years.

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  14. I don't disagree John, however I would not be so quick to rule out DoD projects that have since developed this technology. That technology was being experimented on well before WW2. Some of what people see is no doubt defense projects or operational flying craft not currently divulged to the general public.

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  15. Dolan writes: "Indeed, the conversations on this subject have been marked by extreme opinions, especially by a few skeptics who seem to revel in trivializing the subject matter and the researchers associated with it."

    Dolan is a ridiculous person. There has been bipartisan skepticism about the slides. But his brain is so habituated to speaking in a partisan matter that he slings the usual insults.

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  16. @Terry the Censor: You haven't the foggiest clue about what you're talking about. We need more people like Dolan in this field and less close-minded skeptards such as yourself.

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  17. > less close-minded skeptards such as yourself.

    "fewer" not "less" (look it up)

    "close-minded" should be directed at the sliders, for they have recruited unreliable polemicists such as Maussan, Mitchell, Dolan, Friedman and Schmitt (good on Stan for declining)

    "skeptards" should be used by no one older than 8 years of age (shame!)

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