Lllaaaaaaaaame

[theducks]

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/007760.php

Basically, The White House and CBS released some documents from Bush's alledged military file, which are poorly done forgeries. Very lame.

I could have done better than that :P

Comments

forgeries?

[(Anonymous)]

Actually there is a great debate raging about whether they are in fact forgeries.

As soon as they came out several experts stated they were clearly fake because the technology to do at least of one of the following (depending on the expert) did not exist at the time:
1) superscript
2) curved apostrophes
3) proportional or varied spacing depending on the size of the letter.

These doubts have been dismissed by many other experts. It would appear that the doubters overlooked a certain type of typewriter available at the time that was able to do all these things. For example, there are memos from the late 1960's released by the White House that use superscript.

I suggest you read further, for example, for a balanced argument see [link=http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2004/09/11/authenticity_backed_on_bush_documents].

But surely, in the end, if they are not true, the White House and/or Bush personally would have made a statement to that effect. Various people have confirmed that the content of the documents is accurate, including Killian's secretary. For independent verification of the content of the documents, see for example, [link=http://www.usnews.com/usnews/issue/040920/usnews/20guard.htm], and for a visual depiction of his 'service record' according to documents released ONLY by the White House, see [link=http://simonwoodside.com/weblog/images/reserves/reserves.gif].

Re: forgeries?

[(Anonymous)]

*hits self on head*

idiot. accidentally hit post. forgot to sign name.

anita.

Re: forgeries?

[theducks.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I have come across the theory. The superscripts don't bother me as much as the proportional font which is 99.99% the same as Microsoft Times New Roman. There was a machine available at the time which could have produced something similar, however it was so expensive and difficult to use, that there is almost no chance it would have been used by a national guard officer to write a 3 line memo. Also the fact that the name of the detactment up the top is centred, no easy feat to do on a typewriter, but really easy with Microsoft word.

And yes, the content of the memos might well be accurate, but I wouldn't put it past certain US TV networks to fabricate documents just because they were fairly sure similar ones probably existed at some point. But to my mind, this is just as bad as fabricating documents from scratch.

And Anita.. Graham? :)

Re: forgeries?

[(Anonymous)]

oh, they're probably forgeries, I was just pointing out that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that there has been serious debate over it for the last few days (week?). I've been exposed to much ranting and raving about it lately :)

The thing that seems to have most people in an uproar is that a news network seems to have produced biased information in order to affect the election! Shock horror! Not like that impartial Fox network huh.

I think one of the more important issues is, if they are forgeries, what happened to the originals? And does the end justify the means in this case? In the light of the fuss Bush has been making trying to impugn Kerry's record, should the public be reminded of his appalling past regardless of how it is done? That he bought his way into the NG to avoid his tour of duty has been known since his running for Governor of Texas, as was that he was given an honourable discharge in the end. But I'm not so sure about his missing physicals, going AWOL for a year, etc. How he got his honourable discharge after all the stuff he pulled can only be explained by his daddy's network and money. I think it's important that he be exposed as the hypocrite that he is, though I'm not sure I agree that documents should be forged to do so, if that is what has in fact happened. But then again, far too many original documents detailing Bush's past, including military records, have gone missing or have been altered.

Meh. Still not sure :)

Anita Sharma (shuruga)