On The Trail Of Delusion

[Fred Litwin]

The HSCA did not report that at all.

fred

[Jon Banks]

The HSCA did not report that at all.

fred

The memo we’re referencing was part of the HSCA’s investigation.

The quote comes from CIA historian, Kenneth McDonald

https://jfkfacts.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Shaw-as-informant.pdf

[W. Tracy Parnell]

Excellent summary of the evidence Fred. Until documents surface that prove McDonald's claim, we have to assume it was a misinterpretation of the records.

[Jon Banks]

Excellent summary of the evidence Fred. Until documents surface that prove McDonald's claim, we have to assume it was a misinterpretation of the records.

We don’t “have to” assume anything.

The idea that the CIA-HSCA report was an error is entirely speculative…

Btw, why did Fred start a new thread on the same topic?

[Steve M. Galbraith]

Was Clay Shaw a "Contract Agent" for the CIA?
The Oliver Stone documentary, JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass, makes the claim that Clay Shaw was a "highly valued contract  agent" of the CIA." An honest evaluation of the evidence says differently.

https://www.onthetrailofdelusion.com/post/was-clay-shaw-a-contract-agent-for-the-cia

If he had been a "highly paid valued contract agent" wouldn't there be a great deal of evidence, certainly more than has been reported, of that contract work? The CIA was highly paying valuing him for what work? And why did it stop in 1956?

And if he was a highly paid valued "agent" would he have been briefed by a DCS agent, Shaw's contact Hunter Leake? Wouldn't it have been more formal?

My errors: I wrote "paid" instead of "valued."

[Steve M. Galbraith]

Again: The evidence is that Shaw had absolutely nothing to do with the assassination. Nothing.

This is so ridiculous. Stone and DiEugenio believe Oswald was a patsy, an innocent man framed for the assassination. But if Garrison was right and Shaw (and the CIA) was involved then that implicates their Dreyfus, one Lee Oswald. Because the claim is Shaw conspired with Oswald and Ferrie to murder JFK.

Pick one story, please. Was Oswald innocent and framed? Or was he one of the conspirators?

[Jon Banks]

Again: The evidence is that Shaw had absolutely nothing to do with the assassination. Nothing.

This is so ridiculous. Stone and DiEugenio believe Oswald was a patsy, an innocent man framed for the assassination. But if Garrison was right and Shaw (and the CIA) was involved then that implicates their Dreyfus, one Lee Oswald. Because the claim is Shaw conspired with Oswald and Ferrie to murder JFK.

Pick one story, please. Was Oswald innocent and framed? Or was he one of the conspirators?

If you haven’t already, I suggest you watch the documentary, JFK Revisited for context.

Shaw, Ferrie, and Bannister are only mentioned briefly and it references that CIA-HSCA memo about Shaw being a “high paid contract source”.

The documentary mostly discusses stuff that has been learned from declassified documents since the 1990s. It doesn’t spend much time rehashing the same stuff from Stone’s 1991 “JFK” film (at least not the 2 hour version which is available to watch now. A longer version will be released next year). I was a bit surprised by how little time they spent on the Garrison/New Orleans stuff given Stone and DiEugenio’s backgrounds.

I’ve read that the film was originally intended to be based on DiEugenio’s Destiny Betrayed book but I’m glad that they went in a different direction with the final product.

FWIW, I personally am not convinced that Shaw was involved with the Kennedy assassination.

[Jon Banks]

If he had been a "highly paid valued contract agent" wouldn't there be a great deal of evidence, certainly more than has been reported, of that contract work? The CIA was highly paying valuing him for what work? And why did it stop in 1956?

And if he was a highly paid valued "agent" would he have been briefed by a DCS agent, Shaw's contact Hunter Leake? Wouldn't it have been more formal?

My errors: I wrote "paid" instead of "valued."

He worked with the CIA for several years so that means his service was at the very least “valued”. It wasn’t a one-off thing.

If the CIA historian was wrong about Shaw’s status as a CIA contractor, can we assume that he was also wrong that ‘nothing in the classified files implicates the CIA as part of a plot against JFK?’

Not that I believe there’s a smoking gun hidden in the files but for an agency that has nothing to hide, they have a weird way of showing it. Look at the whole Joannides thing for example. Why go to that length to control the information that went to the HSCA?