<font color=blue>"Somebody gave the documents to 60 minutes and they released them, then somebody gave the documents to the white house and they released them too. How can we ever trust the white house again." <font color=black>
<font size=4>....The documents that CBS News used were not documents from any of Bush's personnel files from his time in the National Guard. Rather, CBS News stated that they were documents uncovered in the personnel files of Killian. That would explain why the White House or the Pentagon had never before released or even seen them.....<font size=3>
Message 20511798
.....<font color=green>"It is my limited opinion that Killian did not sign those documents,"<font color=black> Mr. Hussey told The Washington Times. He said he uses the phrase <font color=green>"limited opinion"<font color=black> because he does not have the original documents. <font size=4>He, like other experts interviewed by the press, relied on copies of originals first obtained by CBS. The White House then distributed copies of the memos in what is said was the interest of full disclosure.....<font size=3>
Message 20512297
<font size=4>Why Doesn't The White House Denounce These Forgeries?<font size=3>
By The MinuteMan
Some folks argue that these Killian documents presented by CBS still have some life, because the White House as not denounced them as forgeries.
Well. If I were an earnest White House staffer, I would remind people of the wise old saying - when your opponent is digging himself a hole, all that is necessary is for good men to do nothing (or something like that).
Right now the White House has ABC, NBC, CNN, the NY times, and the WaPo phoning experts and debunking the CBS story (and this latest time-warp is brutal). But if the White House announces their belief that the documents are forgeries, the Big Media will reflexively go into oppositional, Fight the Power mode and try to figure out why Bush is lying and what he is hiding.
That's my free advice, anyway - let the media sharks chew on each other; don't unite them against their common foe.
Message 20512274
<font size=4>BACK TO THE CBS MEMOS <font size=3>
[09/11 02:32 PM] (Hat tip to LindyBill)
KERRYSPOT
<font size=4>
The only expert cited by CBS in this case, Marcel Matley, wrote in the September 27, 2002 issue of the journal, <font color=blue>"The Practical Litigator":
In fact, modern copiers and computer printers are so good that they permit easy fabrication of quality forgeries. From a copy, the document examiner cannot authenticate the unseen original but may well be able to determine that the unseen original is false. Further, a definite finding of authenticity for a signature is not possible from a photocopy, while a definite finding of falsity is possible.
<font color=black>
Attempting to authenticate a signature from a photocopy is exactly what Matley did for CBS.
<font color=red>
Game over.<font color=black>
UPDATE: A couple of readers question whether this really is <font color=red>"game over"<font color=black> - whether CBS can hunker down and wait for the storm to blow over.
<font color=red>
Actually, it appears CBS no longer has any witnesses
backing up its case. <font color=black>
RatherBiased.com notes that Robert Strong told the New York Times that he does not believe that his former associate [Jerry Killian] used a proportional font typewriter during his time in the Texas guard. <font color=purple>"'I'm skeptical that Killian was working on that,' Mr. Strong said."<font color=black>
Now we also hear that in an interview with The Los Angeles Times, Marcel B. Matley, CBS' document examiner <font color=blue>"said he had only judged a May 4, 1972, memo — in which Killian ordered Bush to take his physical — to be authentic. He said he did not form a judgment on the three other disputed memos because they only included Killian's initials and he did not have validated samples of the officer's initials to use for comparison."<font color=black>
The sole remaining individual cited in CBS's report is author Jim Moore, who Rather said, <font color=blue>"has written two books critical of President Bush and his service in the Guard."<font color=black>
Moore, however, simply asserts that the documents are real
and that the lack of a White House statement discrediting
the documents (yet) shows that <font color=blue>"the White House probably
knows that these documents are, in fact, real."<font color=black>
<font color=red>
Uh, no. That statement is meaningless. By that standard, I
can assert that the fact that Ed Bradley, Mike Wallace,
Morley Safer and the rest of the Sunday 60 Minutes crew
haven't come to defend Rather means they "probably know
that these documents are, in fact, fake, and so badly done
that a third-grader could recognize the differences
between a document created with a typewriter and one
created on a modern computer, and that Rather has gone
cuckoo for cocoa puffs."<font color=black>
Right now, the camp that believes the documents are the
real deal consists of Dan Rather, Jim Moore, Tom Harkin,
and possibly Terry McAuliffe, although the DNC head also
apparently thinks Karl Rove did it.<font size=3>
Message 20514502 |
