Letters to the Cyborgs

by Judyth Baker

  Newspaper article shows witness saying Lee was writing an “Anti-Red Book” but the reporter then says Lee Oswald was “an admitted Communist sympathizer.…”

  Lee’s “System Opposed to the Communist”

  Warren Commission Exhibit 98, pp. 431-434. “Note: In the interest of clarity and legibility, spelling, punctuation, and capitalization has been corrected in certain cases.”

  Lee’s spelling and punctuation was corrected then, as shown above, and is further corrected here, as any editor would do for any published work (with comments added).

  “A System Opposed to the Communist.”

  In that the state (or any group of persons) may not administer or direct funds or value in circulation, for the creation of means of production. [Against banking systems.]

  A. Any person may own private property of any sort. [Private property ownership, the opposite of Communism.]

  B. Small business or speculation on the party of a single individual may be guaranteed. [Free enterprise.]

  C. That any person may exchange personal skill or knowledge in the completion of some service, for remuneration. [Receiving pay for work or services rendered.]

  D. That any person may hire or otherwise remunerate any other single person for services rendered, so long as that service does not create surplus value. [Lee was against padding payments.]

  A System Opposed to Capitalism in That:

  No individual may own the means of production, distribution, or creation of goods or any other process wherein workers are employed for wages, or otherwise employed, to create profit or surplus profit or value in use or exchange. [No profits beyond those needed to run the business properly and to justly pay everyone; if owners made excessive profits, they were either underpaying workers and/or overcharging consumers.]

  A. In that all undertaking of production, distribution or manufacture or otherwise the creation of goods must be made on a pure, collective basis under the conditions: [Profit-sharing.]

  1. Equal shares of investment be made by members.

  2. Equal distribution of profit after tax, be made to all investors [of course, based on percentage of ownership of stock.]

  ٣. That all work or directive or administrative duties connected with the enterprise be done personally by those investors. [Those not directly associated with the business should not be able to buy stock.]

  4. That no person not directly working or otherwise directly taking part in the creational process of any enterprise, have a share of or otherwise receive any part of the resultant profit of it. [Lee believed that outsiders should not be allowed to conduct hostile buyouts/piracy on an enterprise.]

  Stipend [unfinished note area]

  Agronomist [unfinished note area]

  The Atheian System [Αθειαν = “Atheist-Athenian” System]

  A system opposed to communism, socialism, and capitalism

  A. Democracy at a local level with no centralized State. [Argued for city-states].

  1. That the right of free enterprise and collective enterprise be guaranteed. [Free enterprise, etc.].

  2. That fascism be abolished [anti-Nazi, anti-fascist].

  3. That nationalism be excluded from every-day life. [no militant form of patriotism].

  4. That racial segregation or discrimination be abolished by law. [Civil Rights for All].

  5. The right of the free, uninhibited action of religious institutions of any type or denomination to freely function. [Freedom of Religion].

  6. Universal Suffrage for all persons over 18 years of age. [When written, US voting age was 21].

  7. Freedom of dissemination of opinions through press or declaration or speech. [Freedom of Speech].

  8. That the dissemination of war propaganda be forbidden as well as the manufacture of weapons of mass destruction. [WMD: used this term years before it reached common vocabulary].

  9. That Free compulsory education be universal until 18. [free education for all]

  10. Nationalization or communizing of private enterprise or collective enterprise be forbidden. [no Communist practices]

  11. That monopoly practices be considered as capitalistic. [anti-monopoly]

  12. That combining of separate collective or private enterprises into single collective units be considered as communistic. [For example, today most US media is owned by just a few large corporations, which is a monopoly akin to certain forms of Communism. Chinese?]

  13. That no taxes be levied against individuals [Only businesses could be taxed]

  14. That heavy graduated taxes from 30% to 90% be leveled against surplus profit gains.

  15. That taxes be collected by a single ministry, subordinate to individual communities.

  That taxes be used solely for the building or improvement of public projects. [Lee leaves out taxes for defense, education and running governments … however, this suggested system was just a first draft, and Lee was only 22 when he wrote it.]

  Lee Harvey Oswald, the Reader: Oswald’s Reading Habits in New Orleans, and Evidence Manipulation

  by Judyth Vary Baker

  Why should we care about what the accused assassin of Kennedy read in New Orleans?

  The FBI did. They confiscated every book they could find that Oswald read in New Orleans. But did you know that the FBI described the title of one book Oswald read as Conflict, when its actual title was Conflict: the history of the Korean War, 1950-53? However, the FBI did not shorten the title of this book, Portrait of a Revolutionary: Mao Tse-Tung.

  The manipulation of evidence concerning Oswald extended to even such small details.

  Even today, such manipulation continues. For example, Oswald’s reading the works of Marx and Engels is highlighted in the Wikipedia encyclopedia biography without mentioning that he read many kinds of books. The Wikipedia article is influenced by the same Internet team associated with John McAdams’ Marquette University-sponsored websites promoting Oswald as guilty of killing Kennedy, a position no longer tenable since a plethora of recent, new evidence has emerged.1

  This paper provides a resource for students, scholars and researchers as an aid to discerning the truth about Oswald’s reading habits, how evidence was manipulated in matters related to the materials he read from various sources, and what Oswald’s reading choices might suggest about the true character of the accused assassin.

  Introduction

  The life of Lee Harvey Oswald has been recorded many times by friends, foes, investigators and researchers, with little information about his reading habits, though one early book, Marina and Lee, makes some mention of them. Its author, Priscilla Johnson-McMillan2 presents a highly biased negative portrait of the accused assassin of President John F. Kennedy. It is also a source of information regarding what Lee’s Russian-born wife, Marina Prusakova, purportedly knew about his reading selections and habits (little).

  Another useful resource: the twenty-six volumes of the Warren Commission’s interviews and exhibits (CE’s). The FBI not only attempted (unsuccessfully) to track down all the books Lee checked out from public libraries in Dallas and New Orleans, they also confiscated every book they found (27 of the 34 books on their list). Seven books were “in the hands of private citizens” at the time – 20.6% – a rather large percentage, considering how many thousands of books were available for check-out: in fact, Lee’s book choices often included current best-sellers in their field.

  According to the Secret Service report to the Warren Commission, Lee’s New Orleans library card was issued May 27, 1963, and was set to expire May 27, 1966. The Librarian at the Napoleon Branch told Special Agent Roger D. Counts, of the Secret Service, that Lee’s library card number was #8460 – not #8640 (CE 2650) as reported by the FBI. The Secret Service obtained a copy of the book list from the FBI for the Commission.

  The Napoleon Branch kept Lee H. Oswald’s card on file and wrote down what books he checked out and when they were returned. But six other libraries in town, including the Main Library, used a numeric sy
stem to register checked-out books. The FBI noted, “…of the nine remaining libraries, five have a record system similar to the Main Library.” While books Lee borrowed from the Napoleon Branch library had findable records, those keeping only his library card number on file against books checked out made it impossible for the FBI to go through the Main Library’s records, which were kept on microfiche.

  The FBI apparently neglected to check any of the other library branches using the same filing system as the Napoleon Branch. Lee could have checked out books and magazines at other branches, as well as at the Main Library, but if he did, we’ll never know. What we have, therefore, is a record of the minimum number of books Lee is known to have read in New Orleans, as recorded at one branch library. Nevertheless, the list is long. Below is the report by agent Roger D. Counts, of the Secret Service.

  The Shark and the Sardines

  Only one book (Feb, 19, 1964 report, CE 2650, p. 565) was reported as checked out by Lee Oswald after an examination of Dallas library records. That book was The Shark and the Sardines by Juan Jose Arevalo. In Dallas, only books with late charges preserved the name of who checked out a book. The Shark and the Sardines is the only book on record that Oswald supposedly kept over the time limit in Dallas, or anywhere else.

  But the book was not found among Lee’s possessions. It was therefore not on the official list. Nor was the book ever returned to the Dallas library. These facts place the book in a “suspicious” category. The book was supposedly checked out November 6, 1963. It became due November 13, 1963. This is the only known instance of Lee Oswald failing to return a library book, who is also on record as never missing a day of work while employed throughout 1963.

  For perspective, in the Cold War era of 1963, having materials mailed from the USSR to one’s actual physical address, or from the U.S. Communist Party, was risky, just as if someone who had returned recently from Iran, in 2010, kept receiving mail from Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan, with anti-American slogans all over it. Lee, who was fluent in Russian, chose to have most of his Russian language magazines and newspapers delivered to his post office boxes. Lee.3

  Lee was not only careful that all the books he checked out from the New Orleans Napoleon Branch library were returned in a timely manner, but he seems to have gone to extraordinary lengths to make sure of it. Oswald, according to the FBI and the CIA, was in Mexico by September 26, where he remained until October 3. But the last four library books Lee Oswald checked out, Goldfinger, Moonraker, Ape and Essence, and Brave New World, were returned to the library on October 3 by an unknown person. No effort was made to locate the person responsible. Had they done so, they might have learned that Susie Hanover, my landlady at nearby 1032 ½ Marengo St., a mutual friend of both Lee and myself, dropped off the books for him before they became due. Such a discovery might have revealed more than the Commission would have wanted the American people to know.

  On the day these four books were returned to the library, Lee had just left Mexico. Passengers on a bus from Laredo heading toward Dallas said they saw him, and the FBI reported this as his mode of travel.4 Whether that was true or not, Lee was not in New Orleans. Notwithstanding his care in making sure the last four books he checked out in New Orleans were returned when due, during the same time period Lee was being maligned by the Garners as a deadbeat who skipped out on his rent and utility bills, which was echoed by US government agents, and McMillan. This is important because of what we see next, regarding Lee’s supposedly never returning a particular overdue library book in Dallas in November 1963.

  The reported failure to return the book to the Dallas library system thus takes on a suspicious note. Such a failure, especially in the 1960s, could be seen as an indication of the accused assassin’s growing instability and unreliability.

  The Oak Cliff branch library was 8/10’s of a mile from the boarding house at 1026 North Beckley, twice as far as it had been from Lee Oswald’s apartment in New Orleans, but even so, Lee was said to have visited it frequently.5 Known to be meticulous as to details, and careful with money, Lee would have avoided a fine on an overdue book if possible. For these reasons, we should inspect the particulars of the reported incident carefully.

  The Shark and the Sardines (1961, 256 pages) was a notorious, controversial book in 1963, considered “anti-American” by the CIA. Such a book in Oswald’s possession could help buttress the case against him as anti-American. The overdue book was the last known, according to the FBI, that Lee Oswald borrowed from the public library before Kennedy’s assassination.

  What was this book about? Its author, Juan Jose Arevalo, was Guatemala’s first democratically elected president (1944). Before that, the country had been run by a series of dictatorships. When President Jacobo Arbenz implemented his predecessor’s failed land reform policies, in 1954, the CIA designed and conducted a Coup d’etat through Operation PBFORTUNE and Operation PBSUCCESS to get redistributed land back into the hands of big private plantations run by the United Fruit Company. Guatemala became a harsh dictatorship, with three decades of bloodshed and war as a result of the people’s attempts to restore a democratic government.6

  Arevalo remained an unpopular figure in the US in 1963. His complaints about the CIA-sponsored coup d’etat that deposed Arbenz made him a pariah to American media. But the book told the truth. The Shark and the Sardines, published in 1956, was followed in 1963 with a sequel, Anti-Communism in Latin America. In their Jan. 5, 1962 article, “Guatemala: Echoes from a Sardine,” Time Magazine, possibly inspired by the CIA’s blacklisting of the author, trumpeted the fact that Castro and the Fair Play for Cuba Committee had embraced Arevalo’s little book, while admitting that the author took no royalties from Castro’s reprinting of his story:

  A self-styled “spiritual Socialist,” he blamed his country’s ills on the United Fruit Co., which had immense holdings in Guatemala, [and] accused the U.S. Government of backing the company’s “exploitations,”… Though a devious administrator, he gave his country some freedoms it had not known under a previous long line of dictators.

  The one party he refused to legalize was the Communist – but he did nothing to restrain the Communist clique behind gullible Army Colonel Jacobo Arbenz, who succeeded him as President… Arévalo protests, “I am a Christian and an idealistic anti-Marxist.” He insists that, “I am not anti-American. I oppose the American Government when it turns into a protector of American corporations.” As for Castro, says Arévalo, Communism will not work in Latin America or anywhere else. “You can see that by going over their record in Cuba.”

  In other words, Lee Oswald was reported to be reading a work by an anti-communist socialist whose anti-American little book was reprinted by Castro even as it was damned by the CIA and the US media. The book was available in the Dallas public library, we have been told. But because so much evidence against Lee Oswald in Dallas is now known or suspected to have been planted, and because this book has never been found, we have to ask if the notably right-wing Dallas library would actually have purchased such a book for its upright citizens to read. The fact that The Shark and the Sardine was “late” – the one and only record of a late book for Oswald that can be found (and the sole evidence for the tardiness that could be found in the Dallas library records by the FBI) places this “find” on shaky ground.

  Other volumes are known to have been read by Lee H. Oswald in Dallas: CE 2652 tells us that Marina Oswald witnessed her husband reading two thick, blue books in New Orleans that she believed were US history books. The two volumes were last seen in Robert Oswald’s possession: he turned them over to the FBI. The books were H.G. Well’s massive and popular tomes, The Outline of History, Vols. I and II. At least 1,324 pages long, with expanded material after WW II. Robert Oswald identified both books as belonging to his brother, and the locale where he read them was changed to Dallas, prior to the move to New Orleans. We do not know how Robert Oswald happened to have obtained possession of these books. Interestingly, Lee mentioned H.G. Wells
in his Russian diary: “I don’t like: picture of Lenin which watches from its place of honour and phy traning at 11.00-11.10 each morning (complusery) for all. (Shades of H.G. Wells).”7

  The apparent dyslexia from which Oswald suffered did not stop him from reading. His British form of writing “honour” – and some other words in the British form – probably derived from his reading so many books written by British authors. H. G. Wells, for example, was born in London. And then there was Ian Fleming, whose James Bond novels were an Oswald favorite.

  Were There Other Overdue Books?

  But weren’t there other overdue books? The Mary Ferrell Chronology, trusted by many researchers, raises the question, despite the entries on the FBI list:

  “Sept. 5, 1963 (Thursday) - Oswald had three library books due this date. He probably didn’t return them until 9/9/63. (22:83)”

  When we access the record Ferrell cites, it is the wrong page (page 2) of the same FBI library book list that everyone references. No dates of 9/9/63 are listed there, or on any other page. Ferrell was in error. Checking the entire record, three books were checked out on August 22, 1963: From Russia with Love, The Sixth Galaxy Reader, and Portals of Tomorrow. All three were returned on time, on Sept. 5, 1963 (Thursday). We conclude that no books were returned late in New Orleans, despite Ferrell’s insinuation.

  Ferrell makes other statements that betray prejudice in dealing with Lee’s life story and his financial records, especially regarding what she and the Warren Commission decided that which constituted his and his family’s daily expenses, leaving out transportation, magazines, clothing, medicine and other needs, by assigning a mere pittance to “miscellaneous.” Thus they were able to conjure up “savings” that they assigned to Lee as available for travel and other expenses, otherwise wholly unaccountable. Their “budgets” for Lee were wholly out of range with the demands of reality. Had they been honest, they would have had to admit that Lee Oswald had to have obtained funds from ignored sources for his travels to and from the USSR and for his and his family’s daily needs. As a woman who was forced to live on a tight budget at the same time that Lee was forced to seem to do so, in the same city, between April and September of 1963, I know from personal experience that no one could live and travel as Lee, and later Lee and his family did, on the limited amounts so arbitrarily assigned.