(CNN) -- Fifty years after President John F. Kennedy's assassination, there are very few down-the-line defenders of the Warren Commission to be found. The investigation into JFK's murder was inadequate, rushed and manipulated by powerful officials.

Just consider a few of the commission's flaws.

-- President Lyndon Johnson and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover had all but decided what the report would say -- that Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone gunman with no conspiracy -- within 48 hours of the shooting.

-- The report was issued on a political timetable. LBJ wanted it out well before his election in November 1964.

-- The FBI was less interested in the full truth and more determined to avoid blame for misreading Oswald's violent character. Hoover later admitted: "We failed in carrying through some of the most salient aspects of the Oswald investigation. It ought to be a lesson to all."...