This at least gives me pause about the LN narrative

[Michael Capasse]

The explanation is that the statement was written up by a human being and human beings make mistakes. That's not unusually when transferring something from one document to another. I can only guess as to why the mistake was made. The notes from the interviews of Baker,, Reid, and possibly others were handed to someone to write statements for Baker and Reid to sign. The person who transcribed those notes into formal statements could have simply conflated Reid's statement with what Baker said. It might be no more mundane than that or it could be something equally mundane.

Hanlon’s Razor — Never Attribute to Malice What Can Be Explained by Incompetence

No one is disputing the statement was written by someone else. 
Undocumented reasons why or how is the  you consistently make up

[Steve M. Galbraith]

One would have supposed that someone would have cleared this up long before Baker's WC testimony by clarifying with the individual who prepared the Baker and Truly affidavits. It's an oddly specific thing to gratuitously include, unlike "near the Coke machine" or something like that. Perhaps this person could have also have clarified what Baker said when he made the correction. If he immediately said, "No, you got that wrong - he wasn't holding anything," this would obviously be significant.

Baker testified on March 25, 1964. The amended affidavit (probably prepared by FBI agent Richard Burnett) that's in question was signed on September 23, 1964. So there was nothing to clarify at the time of his testimony.

My understanding was that the WC was closing up shop and rushing through affidavits to meet the schedule.

Jean Davison made this point: "Baker's affidavit of Sept 23, 1964 and a similar one from Truly were dated only one day before the Warren Report was officially released, and both their statements were, unlike all the other FBI documents I'm aware of, *handwritten*. IOW, they were prepared in a big hurry. Their statements are footnoted to a WR paragraph on the "rumor" that there was someone else in the lunchroom when Baker confronted Oswald. (Neither Baker or Truly had been specifically asked this in their testimony. Their 9/64 affidavits supplied the explicit answer: no one else was in the lunchroom.) I surmise that someone at the WC realized at the last minute that they needed a "cite" for this statement.""

David Von Pein has more details on it here: https://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/oswald-baker-truly-and-coca-cola.html

[Richard Smith]

As stated, I find Oswald the man the most interesting aspect of the JFKA. I’ve read everything there is about him, and my sister-in-law and her husband worked in the Minsk factory at the same time. I think I “know” him about as well as he can be known.

I’m a provisional Lone Nutter but troubled by several aspects of the narrative, including the one I’ll describe here. The standard LN response is, “The evidence says he did it. It doesn’t matter who he was, why he did it, or what was going on inside his head.” Well ...

When he took a shot at Walker (we’ll assume he did), he left behind a detailed note, and Marina said he arrived home in a state of considerable agitation. Compare the JFKA.

1. I’m puzzled by his behavior at the Paine home the evening before the JFKA. He begs Marina to join him in Dallas, makes promises, and gives absolutely no clue he is contemplating the JFKA. He leaves no note.

2. He has long been convinced he is destined for a place in history and has written fairly extensively about his views, but he leaves no explanation or manifesto concerning the JFKA. There is nothing like this in his room on Beckley.

3. He shoots JFK, stashes the rifle, scurries down the stairs, hears Baker and Truly coming up – but then is utterly calm and collected when Baker confronts him and sticks a gun in his stomach.

4. He exits the TSBD, boards a bus, leaves the bus and hails a taxi – but then offers the taxi to an older woman who approaches.

5. He is grilled by Fritz, who is a legend for wheedling confessions out of suspects – but he is so cocky and unflappable that Fritz not only fails to break him but emerges speculating that he has been trained to avoid interrogation.

6. In custody, he tells his brother Robert, “Don’t believe the so-called evidence.”

7. In custody for more than 36 hours, and despite the seemingly compelling evidence against him, he never cracks or gives anything other than flat denials of his involvement in the JFKA and Tippit shooting.

I at least find this all bizarre enough to contemplate that “something more” than the LN narrative may have been going on. It seems to me inadequate to say, "The evidence says he did it and nothing else matters." Yes, Oswald was a massive liar even when lying served no purpose, but all of the above is extremely odd and gives me pause about Oswald as a Lone Nut who just snapped. The problem is, I have no real theory as to what the “something more” might be that would explain his behavior. "He was a wholly innocent patsy" would do it, of course, but that just doesn't fit the evidence unless one postulates a conspiracy so elaborate as to be comical.

Fascinating.

The evidence links Oswald to this crime beyond all doubt.  Some things can only be known to Oswald about why he committed this act.  Assassinating the president is not a rational act.  There are often not rational explanations for the whys.  Oswald was smart enough to know that committing this act would result in his arrest or death.  That was baked into the decision to do it.  The perpetrators themselves likely do not know the real motivations.  They can espouse a lot of grievances but none of that explains mass shootings or assassinations.  Some people are just wired differently.  None of that, however, casts a single iota of doubt about the fact that Oswald did it.  The evidence tells its story. 

Oswald also had no idea his life was going to end within 48 hrs of his arrest.  His confession was all that he had to bargain for his life.  If he had gone to trial, it's likely he would have followed the James Earl Ray path to confess and get a life sentence.  Then spend the rest of his life hinting that he was involved in some larger conspiracy to stay in the limelight and play conspiracy theorists.  But he wasn't going to talk that weekend.

[Lance Payette]

Baker testified on March 25, 1964. The amended affidavit (probably prepared by FBI agent Richard Burnett) that's in question was signed on September 23, 1964. So there was nothing to clarify at the time of his testimony.

My understanding was that the WC was closing up shop and rushing through affidavits to meet the schedule.

Jean Davison made this point: "Baker's affidavit of Sept 23, 1964 and a similar one from Truly were dated only one day before the Warren Report was officially released, and both their statements were, unlike all the other FBI documents I'm aware of, *handwritten*. IOW, they were prepared in a big hurry. Their statements are footnoted to a WR paragraph on the "rumor" that there was someone else in the lunchroom when Baker confronted Oswald. (Neither Baker or Truly had been specifically asked this in their testimony. Their 9/64 affidavits supplied the explicit answer: no one else was in the lunchroom.) I surmise that someone at the WC realized at the last minute that they needed a "cite" for this statement.""

David Von Pein has more details on it here: https://jfk-archives.blogspot.com/2010/07/oswald-baker-truly-and-coca-cola.html

Thanks again, Steve. I now remember reading - possibly in one of the books by one of the WC attorneys - about the circumstances under which those affidavits were prepared. Still, only in the JFKA, where nothing goes smoothly, would the "holding a coke" statement "just happen" to find its way into a draft affidavit and create havoc.

Here is an old thread (2010) from the McAdams forum on Google in which Jean Davison participates and speculates the handwritten affidavits were prepared by an FBI agent who prepared them in advance and simply included the "established myth" about the coke. DVP suggests basically the same thing. Pretty weak, it seems to me, and in any event how this damning statement appeared in the draft affidavit should have been firmly nailed down.

https://groups.google.com/g/alt.assassination.jfk/c/_TSEJPDFU4c/m/LWDpqCFXF94J

It looks like DVP's site may preserve the same thread, but I find it impossible to wade through these endless "and then he said" discussions. I just happened to stumble immediately on Jean's contribution.

Dulles (of all people) somehow knew to ask Truly at the WC specifically whether Oswald was holding "a coke." When Truly said no, Dulles asked whether Oswald was holding any drink. I suppose Dulles could have been informed enough about Oswald's alibi to know he had claimed to have bought a coke.

[Lance Payette]

Somewhat off-topic, but Bart Kamp does a nice job of rendering highly dubious Mrs. Reid's supposed encounter with a zombie-like, coke-carrying Oswald: http://www.prayer-man.com/tsbd/mrs-robert-reid/.

Apart from this, Baker wrote in a handwritten affidavit at an early date (apparently Nov. 23) that Oswald was wearing a "lt. brown jacket" during the lunchroom encounter. He testified (at length) at the WC that Oswald was wearing a "light brown jacket." Mrs. Reid wrote on Nov. 24 that Oswald was wearing a "white t-shirt." She expanded on Nov. 26 to say that he was wearing a white t-shirt and not wearing or carrying a jacket." Ditto at the WC. Roy Truly told an interviewer immediately before his WC testimony that Oswald was wearing a white t-shirt during the lunchroom encounter and testified at the WC that Oswald had nothing in his hands. But then Mary Bledsoe sees him on the bus in a brown shirt with a hole in the elbow.

Oh, hell, I give up. Maybe I need to take another look at the whole Harvey and Lee thing.

[John Corbett]

Somewhat off-topic, but Bart Kamp does a nice job of rendering highly dubious Mrs. Reid's supposed encounter with a zombie-like, coke-carrying Oswald: http://www.prayer-man.com/tsbd/mrs-robert-reid/.

Apart from this, Baker wrote in a handwritten affidavit at an early date (apparently Nov. 23) that Oswald was wearing a "lt. brown jacket" during the lunchroom encounter. He testified (at length) at the WC that Oswald was wearing a "light brown jacket." Mrs. Reid wrote on Nov. 24 that Oswald was wearing a "white t-shirt." She expanded on Nov. 26 to say that he was wearing a white t-shirt and not wearing or carrying a jacket." Ditto at the WC. Roy Truly told an interviewer immediately before his WC testimony that Oswald was wearing a white t-shirt during the lunchroom encounter. But then Mary Bledsoe sees him on the bus in a brown shirt with a hole in the elbow.

Oh, hell, I give up. Maybe I need to take another look at the whole Harvey and Lee thing.

Oswald would have been wearing his tan (light brown) shirt over his white t-shirt. He probably had it unbuttoned part way down so it is easy to understand why some would remember the t-shirt and Baker remembered the shirt as being a jacket. There was really no reason for Reid or Truly to pay close attention to what Oswald was wearing at the time they saw him. Truly didn't consider him a suspect and Reid had no reason to either. Why would they be expected to pay close attention to what he was wearing. Think of how many people you encounter casually during the course of a day. How accurately do you think you could remember what they were wearing? This is why I don't put a lot of faith in human recollections. We tend to remember bits and pieces of what we saw and fill in the blanks with the rest. People just aren't that observant or details. As an example, I saw the Amazon delivery guy drop a package on my porch yesterday. I sort of remember him wearing blue jeans, a blue shirt, and blue cap but I wouldn't bet my monthly Social Security deposit on any of that.

PS. I tried a Banquet pot pie. Not bad but I'm glad I only paid $1 for it.

[Lance Payette]

Oswald would have been wearing his tan (light brown) shirt over his white t-shirt. He probably had it unbuttoned part way down so it is easy to understand why some would remember the t-shirt and Baker remembered the shirt as being a jacket. There was really no reason for Reid or Truly to pay close attention to what Oswald was wearing at the time they saw him. Truly didn't consider him a suspect and Reid had no reason to either. Why would they be expected to pay close attention to what he was wearing. Think of how many people you encounter casually during the course of a day. How accurately do you think you could remember what they were wearing? This is why I don't put a lot of faith in human recollections. We tend to remember bits and pieces of what we saw and fill in the blanks with the rest. People just aren't that observant or details. As an example, I saw the Amazon delivery guy drop a package on my porch yesterday. I sort of remember him wearing blue jeans, a blue shirt, and blue cap but I wouldn't bet my monthly Social Security deposit on any of that.

PS. I tried a Banquet pot pie. Not bad but I'm glad I only paid $1 for it.

I don't think that quite works. Encountering the presidential assassin would have to have been among the more significant events in Baker's and Reid's dull lives. The difference between a light brown jacket and a white v-neck t-shirt is pretty stark. Baker said "lt. brown jacket" the day of the JFKA and didn't waver at the WC - he even suggested it was over some sort of white shirt. Reid said "white t-shirt" the day after the assassination and "not wearing or carrying a jacket" two days later. This is a far cry from the Amazon delivery guy or even me hunting for my wife in Walmart and having no answer other than "clothes" when some employee asks me what she is wearing.