Ed Butler and Oswald in New Orleans

[John Simkin]

Edward Scannell Butler was born in New Orleans in 1934. He went into the Army Management School from 1957-59 at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. After completing the course he was employed as an account executive with Brown, Friedman and Company, an advertising firm.

Butler became friendly with Clay Shaw and Lloyd Cobb of the International Trade Mart and persuaded these men to help fund his anti-communist campaigns. This included the establishment of two organizations: Free Voice of Latin America (FVLA) and the American Institute for Freedom Project (AIFP). Butler employed former FBI agent Guy Banister to work for the AIFP.

In 1961 Alton Ochsner, with the financial help of Clint Murchison, established the Information Council of the Americas (INCA). Ed Butler was appointed as Executive Director of INCA. The main objective of the organization was to prevent communist revolutions in Latin America. Ochsner told the New Orleans States Item: "We must spread the warning of the creeping sickness of communism faster to Latin Americas, and to our own people, or Central and South America will be exposed to the same sickness as Cuba." (16th April, 1963)

Edgar and Edith Stern, owners of WDSU radio and television, were members of INCA. Eustis Reily of the Reily Coffee Company personally donated thousands of dollars to INCA. However, it was Patrick J. Frawley, a Californian industrialist and close friend of Richard Nixon, who was INCA's largest financial contributor. The organization used some of this money to make a film about Fidel Castro entitled, Hitler in Havana. The New York Times reviewed the film calling it a "tasteless affront to minimum journalistic standards."

According to James DiEugenio (Ed Butler: Expert in Propaganda and Psychological Warfare) Butler was also in close contact with Charles Cabell, Deputy Director of the CIA, and Edward Lansdale.

In April, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald moved to New Orleans. On 26th May, 1963, Oswald wrote to the Fair Play for Cuba Committee and proposed "renting a small office at my own expense for the purpose of forming a FPCC branch here in New Orleans". Three days later, without waiting for a reply, Oswald ordered 1,000 copies of a handbill from a local printers. It read: "Hands Off Cuba! Join the Fair Play for Cuba Committee, New Orleans Charter Member Branch, Free Literature, Lectures, Everyone Welcome!"

Oswald also rented an office for the FPCC at 544 Camp Street. No one joined the FPCC in New Orleans but Oswald did send out two honourary membership cards to Gus Hall and Benjamin Davis, two senior members of the American Communist Party.

On 9th August, 1963, he was giving out his Fair Play for Cuba Committee leaflets when he became involved in a fight with Carlos Bringuier. Oswald was arrested and on 12th August, he was found guilty and fined $10. While in prison he was visited by FBI agent, John L. Quigley. Five days later Oswald debated the issue of Fidel Castro and Cuba with Bringuier and Ed Butler on the Bill Stuckey Radio Show. Later that month Oswald was seen in the company of David Ferrie and Clay Shaw.

John M. Newman (Oswald and the CIA) discovered that in 1963 the CIA had an anti-Fair Play for Cuba Committee in operation. It was being run by David Atlee Phillips and James W. McCord. As James DiEugenio has pointed out a CIA document describes Ed Butler as "a very cooperative contact and has always welcomed an opportunity to assist the CIA."

In 1967 Jim Garrison began investigating the activities of Lee Harvey Oswald in New Orleans. Alton Ochsner told a friend that he feared Garrison would order his arrest and the seizure of INCA's corporate records. Ed Butler took these records to California where Patrick J. Frawley arranged for them to be hidden. Ronald Reagan, the governor of California refused all of Garrison's extradition requests. Frawley had previously helped fund Reagan's political campaigns in California.

Alton Ochsner attacked the Garrison investigation as being unpatriotic because it eroded public confidence and threatened the stability of the American government. In his article, Social Origins of Anticommunism: The Information Council of the Americas (Louisiana History, Spring 1989) Arthur Carpenter claimed that Ochsner launched a propaganda campaign against Garrison. This included sending information to a friend who was the publisher of the Nashville Banner.

According to Carpenter, Butler and Ochsner also attempted to discredit Mark Lane, who was assisting the Garrison investigation. Ochsner told Felix Edward Hebert that Lane was "a professional propagandist of the lunatic left". Ochsner also instructed Herbert to tell Edwin E. Willis (Chairman of the House Committee) to dig up "whatever information you can" on Lane.

Felix Edward Hebert later sent Alton Ochsner a report on Mark Lane extracted from confidential government files. This included "the files of the New York City Police, the FBI, and other security agencies." These files claimed that Lane was "a sadist and masochist, charged on numerous occasions with sodomy". Hebert also supplied Ochsner with a photograph that was supposed to be Lane engaged in a sadomasochistic act with a prostitute.

Butler wrote a book in 1968 entitled Revolution is My Profession in which he attacked as communist infiltrators those whose tactics have "been to try to link the CIA with all sorts of crime, especially President Kennedy's assassination."

Butler continued to work with Patrick J. Frawley. Together they put out a magazine called The Westwood Village Square which tried to blame the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King on the communists.

Here is a transcript of the Lee Harvey Oswald, Carlos Bringuier and Ed Butler debate on Bill Slatter's radio show Conversation Carte Blanche in 1963.

Lee Harvey Oswald: The principals of thought of the Fair Play for Cuba consist of restoration of diplomatic trade and tourist relations with Cuba. That is one of our main points. We are for that. I disagree that this situation regarding American-Cuban relations is very unpopular. We are in the minority surely. We are not particularly interested in what Cuban exiles or rightists members of rightist organizations have to say. We are primarily interested in the attitude of the US government toward Cuba. And in that way we are striving to get the United States to adopt measures which would be more friendly toward the Cuban people and the new Cuban regime in that country. We are not all communist controlled regardless of the fact that I have the experience of living in Russia, regardless of the fact that we have been investigated, regardless of those facts, the Fair Play for Cuba Committee is an independent organization not affiliated with any other organization. Our aims and our ideals are very clear and in the best keeping with American traditions of democracy.

Carlos Bringuier: Do you agree with Fidel Castro when in his last speech of July 26th of this year he qualified President John F. Kennedy of the United States as a ruffian and a thief? Do you agree with Mr. Castro?

Lee Harvey Oswald: I would not agree with that particular wording. However, I and the Fair Play for Cuba Committee do think that the United States Government through certain agencies, mainly the State Department and the C.I.A., has made monumental mistakes in its relations with Cuba. Mistakes which are pushing Cuba into the sphere of activity of let's say a very dogmatic communist country such as China.

Bill Slatter: Mr. Oswald would you agree that when Castro first took power - would you agree that the United States was very friendly with Castro, that the people of this country had nothing but admiration for him, that they were very glad to see Batista thrown out?

Lee Harvey Oswald: I would say that the activities of the United States government in regards to Batista were a manifestation of not so much support for Fidel Castro but rather a withdrawal of support from Batista. In other words we stopped armaments to Batista. What we should have been done was to take those armaments and drop them into the Sierra Maestra where Fidel Castro could have used them. As for public sentiment at that time, I think even before the revolution, there were rumblings of official comment and so forth from government officials er, against Fidel Castro.

Ed Butler: You've never been to Cuba, of course, but why are the people of Cuba starving today?

Lee Harvey Oswald: Well any country emerging from a semi-colonial state and embarking upon reforms which require a diversification of agriculture you are going to have shortages. After all 80% of imports into the United States from Cuba were two products, tobacco and sugar. Nowadays, while Cuba is reducing its production as far as sugar cane goes it is striving to grow unlimited, and unheard of for Cuba, quantities of certain vegetables such as sweet potatoes, lima beans, cotton, and so forth, so that they can become agriculturally independent ...

Ed Butler: Gentlemen I'm going to have to interrupt you. Our time is almost up. We've had three guests tonight on Conversation Carte Blanche, Bill Stuckey and I have been talking to Lee Harvey Oswald, Secretary of the New Orleans Chapter of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee, Ed Butler, Executive Vice-president of the Information Council of the Americas (INCA) and Carlos Bringuier, Cuban refugee. Thank you very much.

[John Simkin]

Great information John! I have a sense that the Forum, with your guidance, has slowly narrowed-in on many important features of the BIG-LIES and DISINFORMATION we all have been vicitims of - robbing us of our REAL history. An important post. I highlighted those portions I thought of greatest import.

Thank you. I suspect you will also be interested in what I found out about his partner, Patrick J. Frawley.

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=10684

[William O'Neil]

Edward Scannell Butler was born in New Orleans in 1934. He went into the Army Management School from 1957-59 at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. After completing the course he was employed as an account executive with Brown, Friedman and Company, an advertising firm.

Butler became friendly with Clay Shaw and Lloyd Cobb of the International Trade Mart and persuaded these men to help fund his anti-communist campaigns. This included the establishment of two organizations: Free Voice of Latin America (FVLA) and the American Institute for Freedom Project (AIFP). Butler employed former FBI agent Guy Banister to work for the AIFP.

In 1961 Alton Ochsner, with the financial help of Clint Murchison, established the Information Council of the Americas (INCA). Ed Butler was appointed as Executive Director of INCA. The main objective of the organization was to prevent communist revolutions in Latin America. Ochsner told the New Orleans States Item: "We must spread the warning of the creeping sickness of communism faster to Latin Americas, and to our own people, or Central and South America will be exposed to the same sickness as Cuba." (16th April, 1963)

Edgar and Edith Stern, owners of WDSU radio and television, were members of INCA. Eustis Reily of the Reily Coffee Company personally donated thousands of dollars to INCA. However, it was Patrick J. Frawley, a Californian industrialist and close friend of Richard Nixon, who was INCA's largest financial contributor. The organization used some of this money to make a film about Fidel Castro entitled, Hitler in Havana. The New York Times reviewed the film calling it a "tasteless affront to minimum journalistic standards."

According to James DiEugenio (Ed Butler: Expert in Propaganda and Psychological Warfare) Butler was also in close contact with Charles Cabell, Deputy Director of the CIA, and Edward Lansdale.

In April, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald moved to New Orleans. On 26th May, 1963, Oswald wrote to the Fair Play for Cuba Committee and proposed "renting a small office at my own expense for the purpose of forming a FPCC branch here in New Orleans". Three days later, without waiting for a reply, Oswald ordered 1,000 copies of a handbill from a local printers. It read: "Hands Off Cuba! Join the Fair Play for Cuba Committee, New Orleans Charter Member Branch, Free Literature, Lectures, Everyone Welcome!"

Oswald also rented an office for the FPCC at 544 Camp Street. No one joined the FPCC in New Orleans but Oswald did send out two honourary membership cards to Gus Hall and Benjamin Davis, two senior members of the American Communist Party.

On 9th August, 1963, he was giving out his Fair Play for Cuba Committee leaflets when he became involved in a fight with Carlos Bringuier. Oswald was arrested and on 12th August, he was found guilty and fined $10. While in prison he was visited by FBI agent, John L. Quigley. Five days later Oswald debated the issue of Fidel Castro and Cuba with Bringuier and Ed Butler on the Bill Stuckey Radio Show. Later that month Oswald was seen in the company of David Ferrie and Clay Shaw.

John M. Newman (Oswald and the CIA) discovered that in 1963 the CIA had an anti-Fair Play for Cuba Committee in operation. It was being run by David Atlee Phillips and James W. McCord. As James DiEugenio has pointed out a CIA document describes Ed Butler as "a very cooperative contact and has always welcomed an opportunity to assist the CIA."

In 1967 Jim Garrison began investigating the activities of Lee Harvey Oswald in New Orleans. Alton Ochsner told a friend that he feared Garrison would order his arrest and the seizure of INCA's corporate records. Ed Butler took these records to California where Patrick J. Frawley arranged for them to be hidden. Ronald Reagan, the governor of California refused all of Garrison's extradition requests. Frawley had previously helped fund Reagan's political campaigns in California.

Alton Ochsner attacked the Garrison investigation as being unpatriotic because it eroded public confidence and threatened the stability of the American government. In his article, Social Origins of Anticommunism: The Information Council of the Americas (Louisiana History, Spring 1989) Arthur Carpenter claimed that Ochsner launched a propaganda campaign against Garrison. This included sending information to a friend who was the publisher of the Nashville Banner.

According to Carpenter, Butler and Ochsner also attempted to discredit Mark Lane, who was assisting the Garrison investigation. Ochsner told Felix Edward Hebert that Lane was "a professional propagandist of the lunatic left". Ochsner also instructed Herbert to tell Edwin E. Willis (Chairman of the House Committee) to dig up "whatever information you can" on Lane.

Felix Edward Hebert later sent Alton Ochsner a report on Mark Lane extracted from confidential government files. This included "the files of the New York City Police, the FBI, and other security agencies." These files claimed that Lane was "a sadist and masochist, charged on numerous occasions with sodomy". Hebert also supplied Ochsner with a photograph that was supposed to be Lane engaged in a sadomasochistic act with a prostitute.

Butler wrote a book in 1968 entitled Revolution is My Profession in which he attacked as communist infiltrators those whose tactics have "been to try to link the CIA with all sorts of crime, especially President Kennedy's assassination."

Butler continued to work with Patrick J. Frawley. Together they put out a magazine called The Westwood Village Square which tried to blame the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King on the communists.

Here is a transcript of the Lee Harvey Oswald, Carlos Bringuier and Ed Butler debate on Bill Slatter's radio show Conversation Carte Blanche in 1963.

Lee Harvey Oswald: The principals of thought of the Fair Play for Cuba consist of restoration of diplomatic trade and tourist relations with Cuba. That is one of our main points. We are for that. I disagree that this situation regarding American-Cuban relations is very unpopular. We are in the minority surely. We are not particularly interested in what Cuban exiles or rightists members of rightist organizations have to say. We are primarily interested in the attitude of the US government toward Cuba. And in that way we are striving to get the United States to adopt measures which would be more friendly toward the Cuban people and the new Cuban regime in that country. We are not all communist controlled regardless of the fact that I have the experience of living in Russia, regardless of the fact that we have been investigated, regardless of those facts, the Fair Play for Cuba Committee is an independent organization not affiliated with any other organization. Our aims and our ideals are very clear and in the best keeping with American traditions of democracy.

Carlos Bringuier: Do you agree with Fidel Castro when in his last speech of July 26th of this year he qualified President John F. Kennedy of the United States as a ruffian and a thief? Do you agree with Mr. Castro?

Lee Harvey Oswald: I would not agree with that particular wording. However, I and the Fair Play for Cuba Committee do think that the United States Government through certain agencies, mainly the State Department and the C.I.A., has made monumental mistakes in its relations with Cuba. Mistakes which are pushing Cuba into the sphere of activity of let's say a very dogmatic communist country such as China.

Bill Slatter: Mr. Oswald would you agree that when Castro first took power - would you agree that the United States was very friendly with Castro, that the people of this country had nothing but admiration for him, that they were very glad to see Batista thrown out?

Lee Harvey Oswald: I would say that the activities of the United States government in regards to Batista were a manifestation of not so much support for Fidel Castro but rather a withdrawal of support from Batista. In other words we stopped armaments to Batista. What we should have been done was to take those armaments and drop them into the Sierra Maestra where Fidel Castro could have used them. As for public sentiment at that time, I think even before the revolution, there were rumblings of official comment and so forth from government officials er, against Fidel Castro.

Ed Butler: You've never been to Cuba, of course, but why are the people of Cuba starving today?

Lee Harvey Oswald: Well any country emerging from a semi-colonial state and embarking upon reforms which require a diversification of agriculture you are going to have shortages. After all 80% of imports into the United States from Cuba were two products, tobacco and sugar. Nowadays, while Cuba is reducing its production as far as sugar cane goes it is striving to grow unlimited, and unheard of for Cuba, quantities of certain vegetables such as sweet potatoes, lima beans, cotton, and so forth, so that they can become agriculturally independent ...

Ed Butler: Gentlemen I'm going to have to interrupt you. Our time is almost up. We've had three guests tonight on Conversation Carte Blanche, Bill Stuckey and I have been talking to Lee Harvey Oswald, Secretary of the New Orleans Chapter of the Fair Play for Cuba Committee, Ed Butler, Executive Vice-president of the Information Council of the Americas (INCA) and Carlos Bringuier, Cuban refugee. Thank you very much.

John , Could you give me a source for your 2nd paragraph, regarding Butler employing Guy Banister in AFIP?

Thanks, -Bill

[Michael Hogan]

John , Could you give me a source for your 2nd paragraph, regarding Butler employing Guy Banister in AFIP?

In his book Dr. Mary's Monkey, Ed Haslam relates the eerie story of how in 1982, he visited a downtown New Orleans office building where he got a glimpse of Guy Banister's files. Ten years later he and Gus Russo go to visit Ed Butler, whom Haslam thinks might be the same man he met in 1982.

Haslam's account of his time spent with Ed Butler is fascinating.

[Nathaniel Heidenheimer]

Turner and Christian, in the must-read The Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy: The Conspiracy and the Coverup, point out that BUTLER WAS ALSO INVOLVED IN THE COORDINATION OF A BLAME IT ON CASTRO PRESS CONFERENCE FOLLOWING THE MURDER OF RFK IN 1968.

A cuban exile who gave his name as Major Jose Antonio Duarte tried to say that Sirhan had accused him of being a CIA agent when Duarte had spoken out against Castro at a leftist political meeting on May 21. Thus did Duarte imply that Sirhan was working on behalf of pro-Castro Cubans. No pubications believed it save one: The Anaheim Bulletin, which published the a strory about Duarte's allegations in its June 11, 1968 edition.

The authors write that in time the LAPD "discredited Duarte's identification of Sirhan by producing a look-alike Iranian student who had been at the leftist

meeting and recalled being involved in the altercation. HOWEVER THE ENTIRE SCENARIO STRUCK US AS ALL TOO FAMILIAR(my emph)" The authors then point out that Butler coordinated both the Duarte Press conference following the RFK assassination in 1968, and much of the PR that attempted to make a similar pro-castro association with Oswald in NO in 1963.

The authors claim that both Butler and another right wing PR agent neame Anthony Hilder were funded by Patrick J FrawleyJr. (see Frawley thread) They also state that Frawley funded LA right wing Democrat (and soon to be Republican) mayor Sam Yorty. Yorty was a member of the American Security Council.

NOTE: if you have a copy of Turner and Christians' book I strongly recommend rereading pp. 55-60. There are so many incredible connections that need further tracking down in these pages! If you don't have this book it is a MUST READ and is easy to get as it was recently reprinted. Also Jim De Eugenio sp? has a very interesting essay on the history of its suppressed publication.

Any details on the Anaheim Bulletin? Bet they had an interesting definition of a muckraker!

Edited January 25, 2008 by Nathaniel Heidenheimer

[Stephen Roy]

One other interesting note about Ed Butler:

You've probably all heard of the Houma armaments transfer/burglary in September 1961. Despite my efforts, the story is still a bit murky. In some fashion, Gordon Dwane Novel and friend Rancier Blaise Ehlinger learned about stores of armaments at a Schlumberger bunker at the Houma air base.

Ehlinger contacted his COUSIN, Ed Butler, who put them in touch with Arcacha, who then brought in Ferrie, Martens, Blackmon and Woodcock. There are conflicting stories as to whether the arms were picked up or stolen, but they were stored for a few weeks in the office of Guy Banister.

[Nathaniel Heidenheimer]

I found the following posted by a person named Jerry Shinley:

---------------------------------

Congressional Record Senate Feb 20, 1967 P3958

-

Assassination of President Kennedy

-

Mr. Dodd. Mr. President, according to press dispatches of the past few days, the office of District Attorney Jim Garrison in New Orleans has been conducting an independent investigation into the Kennedy assassination and his staff has apparently come up with information pointing to the conclusion that the assassination was the work of a conspiracy. Mr. Garrison is quoted as saying that other people besides Lee Harvey Oswald were involved; that the office has the names of people who participated in the initial planning in New Orleans; and that arrests will be made.

Mr. Garrison has an enviable reputation as a district attorney and I am impressed by the fact that he feels confident enough to speak in such positive terms about his findings.

The Warren Report has frequently been cited as finding that Oswald acted alone and that there was no conspiracy. What the Commission actually said was that it had been unable to find evidence of a conspiracy.

The Commission, of course, made its findings on the evidence available at the time its hearings were held. Certainly the members of the Commission would be prepared to review any new evidence bearing on the assassination.

In any estimate of Oswald's motivations, it is important to determine the strength of his pro-Castro sympathies and the extent of his associations with Castro Cuba and pro-Castro Cubans in this country. It is important to learn whether he was simply a Marxist sympathizer or a hardened Communist acting in concert with others.

In that conjunction, I want to call the attention of the Senate to a remarkable record captioned "Oswald : Self-Portrait in Red," which is a debate with certain commentaries between Lee Harvey Oswald and Edward Scannell Butler, which took place over a New Orleans radio station on August 21, 1963, just about 3 months before the assassination of the President.

Mr. Butler, who was known to me prior to the assassination, called my office immediately after it to inform me of the debate with Oswald. At my request, he came to Washington to testify before the Internal Security Subcommittee, and he did so on Sunday, Nov 24, 1963.

I ask unanimous consent, Mr. President, to insert into the record at this point a transcript with comments of Mr. Butler's debate with Lee Harvey Oswald in New Orleans.

[Transcript omitted; too bad because there is some interesting commentary by Hale Boggs and Alton Ochsner. Ochsner claims to have observed the debate.]

p3962

Mr. Dodd. Mr. President, I intend to speak at some length on this general subject soon, and I hope to make public the testimony of Mr. Butler before the Internal Security Subcommittee on November 24, 1963.

[end of excerpts]

Jerry Shinley

--------------------------------

As someone on that thread noted, this was near the beginning of the Garrison investigation, and later Dodd almost certainly changed his stated position of Garrison. What interested me however was his using the Garrison investigation as a vehicle to reintroduce the Ed Butler associated allegations about ties between Oswald and anti-Castro Cubans. As jerry Shinley also points out, 1967 was not a good year for Dodd: "Disgruntled staffers had copied his records and given them to columnist Drew Pearson. The Senate was considering a censure vote on various charges, including diverting funds raised at testimonial campaign dinners to purely personal use. "

It was around this time (?) that Butler moved to Southern California.

Interestingly Sen Dodd's subcommittee that investigated arms through the mail used Manny Pena-- at that time working as an investigator for the LAPD, and If I am not mistaken, already with ties to the CIA in 1963 (please correct me here if I am wrong, it is possible that we do not have proof that Pena was already with the LEIU in 1963)-- to help with the investigation of Oswald's mail order rifle.

Pena and Butler would both figure in the RFK assassination. Butler would stage a press conference with the aim of tying Sirhan Sirhan to Pro-Castro Cubans. Pena was one of two top LAPD-LEIU CIA connected detectives who were the lead investigators in the RFK assassination.

Sen Dodd was also associated with the right wing evangelical preacher Dr. Fred Schwartz of Orange County. I seem to recall other close associates of the Dodd's in the Orange County area, although I could be making too much of this. These connections would seem to flow from the Southern California and Connecticut's common interest in defense spending. Southern California, of course was also perhaps the epicenter of activity by the John Birch Society.

Edited January 29, 2008 by Nathaniel Heidenheimer

[Ron Bulman]

On ‎1‎/‎28‎/‎2008 at 8:04 PM, Nathaniel Heidenheimer said:

I found the following posted by a person named Jerry Shinley:

---------------------------------

Congressional Record Senate Feb 20, 1967 P3958

-

Assassination of President Kennedy

-

Mr. Dodd. Mr. President, according to press dispatches of the past few days, the office of District Attorney Jim Garrison in New Orleans has been conducting an independent investigation into the Kennedy assassination and his staff has apparently come up with information pointing to the conclusion that the assassination was the work of a conspiracy. Mr. Garrison is quoted as saying that other people besides Lee Harvey Oswald were involved; that the office has the names of people who participated in the initial planning in New Orleans; and that arrests will be made.

Mr. Garrison has an enviable reputation as a district attorney and I am impressed by the fact that he feels confident enough to speak in such positive terms about his findings.

The Warren Report has frequently been cited as finding that Oswald acted alone and that there was no conspiracy. What the Commission actually said was that it had been unable to find evidence of a conspiracy.

The Commission, of course, made its findings on the evidence available at the time its hearings were held. Certainly the members of the Commission would be prepared to review any new evidence bearing on the assassination.

In any estimate of Oswald's motivations, it is important to determine the strength of his pro-Castro sympathies and the extent of his associations with Castro Cuba and pro-Castro Cubans in this country. It is important to learn whether he was simply a Marxist sympathizer or a hardened Communist acting in concert with others.

In that conjunction, I want to call the attention of the Senate to a remarkable record captioned "Oswald : Self-Portrait in Red," which is a debate with certain commentaries between Lee Harvey Oswald and Edward Scannell Butler, which took place over a New Orleans radio station on August 21, 1963, just about 3 months before the assassination of the President.

Mr. Butler, who was known to me prior to the assassination, called my office immediately after it to inform me of the debate with Oswald. At my request, he came to Washington to testify before the Internal Security Subcommittee, and he did so on Sunday, Nov 24, 1963.

I ask unanimous consent, Mr. President, to insert into the record at this point a transcript with comments of Mr. Butler's debate with Lee Harvey Oswald in New Orleans.

[Transcript omitted; too bad because there is some interesting commentary by Hale Boggs and Alton Ochsner. Ochsner claims to have observed the debate.]

p3962

Mr. Dodd. Mr. President, I intend to speak at some length on this general subject soon, and I hope to make public the testimony of Mr. Butler before the Internal Security Subcommittee on November 24, 1963.

[end of excerpts]

Jerry Shinley

--------------------------------

As someone on that thread noted, this was near the beginning of the Garrison investigation, and later Dodd almost certainly changed his stated position of Garrison. What interested me however was his using the Garrison investigation as a vehicle to reintroduce the Ed Butler associated allegations about ties between Oswald and anti-Castro Cubans. As jerry Shinley also points out, 1967 was not a good year for Dodd: "Disgruntled staffers had copied his records and given them to columnist Drew Pearson. The Senate was considering a censure vote on various charges, including diverting funds raised at testimonial campaign dinners to purely personal use. "

It was around this time (?) that Butler moved to Southern California.

Interestingly Sen Dodd's subcommittee that investigated arms through the mail used Manny Pena-- at that time working as an investigator for the LAPD, and If I am not mistaken, already with ties to the CIA in 1963 (please correct me here if I am wrong, it is possible that we do not have proof that Pena was already with the LEIU in 1963)-- to help with the investigation of Oswald's mail order rifle.

Pena and Butler would both figure in the RFK assassination. Butler would stage a press conference with the aim of tying Sirhan Sirhan to Pro-Castro Cubans. Pena was one of two top LAPD-LEIU CIA connected detectives who were the lead investigators in the RFK assassination.

Sen Dodd was also associated with the right wing evangelical preacher Dr. Fred Schwartz of Orange County. I seem to recall other close associates of the Dodd's in the Orange County area, although I could be making too much of this. These connections would seem to flow from the Southern California and Connecticut's common interest in defense spending. Southern California, of course was also perhaps the epicenter of activity by the John Birch Society.

And I thought he was just the business man who set up the Oswald debate, had it recorded and sent it Immediately to the MSM after the assassination. 

[Joe Bauer]

A truly informative  must read thread.

[Michaleen Kilroy]

I went to read a bit more about Butler on Jim Di’s site and found this:

Quote

Finally, apparently completing Butler's public relations tour, the tape of the WDSU interview was forwarded by the CIA to Ted Shackley at the Miami station and used in the CIA's broadcasts into Latin America, furthering the legend about Oswald the communist killing President Kennedy. Declassified files reveal that the label on the box with the tape says, "From DRE to Howard". This means that Bringuier's group (DRE) probably gave a copy to Howard Hunt who forwarded it to Shackley who, in spite of later denials, was still funding the DRE at the time of the assassination.

I think "Howard" would have to be George Joannides who ran the DRE from the JMWAVE station in Miami and used Howard as his pseudonym with the group.

Edited December 2, 2018 by Mike Kilroy