Thursday, September 09, 2004

Forgerygate at CBS

Below is a round-up of some of the most interesting developments in CBS's Forgerygate scandal.

But before we get to that, let me reproduce something that Ted Koppel just said on Nightline tonight. Koppel began by talking about the nature of negative politics--euphemisticaly called "opposition research"--which was the main topic of the show. Koppel's job was to introduce the report on the forgeries, covered by Nightline's Chris Bury. Then he said this:

Above all else, though, the story cannot be a complete fabrication. It can be 30 years old. It can be one item out of context. But it has to contain at least a kernel of truth. My old friend Dan Rather, for example [emphasis mine], had himself a peach of a story on 60 Minutes last night, raising more questions about the President's record and the Texas Air National Guard. Just so there's no misunderstanding: If someone had dropped that story into my lap and we'd been able to confirm it through our own sources, you would have seen it on "Nightline." I have absolutely no idea how Dan got that story, but you have to believe that the Kerry campaign was awfully pleased that he did. Except that today questions are being raised about the accuracy of one key element in that story.

I will leave it to those like Hugh Hewitt and others, who know how the game works in the media, to tell us how serious it is when one of the figureheads of Big Media gently suggests that his old friend has been caught in a complete fabrication.

On to the developments:

Drudge reports:

CBS NEWS executives have launched an internal investigation into whether its premiere news program 60 MINUTES aired fabricated documents relating to Bush National Guard service, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

"The reputation and integrity of the entire news division is at stake, if we are in error, it will be corrected," a top CBS source explained late Thursday.

The source, who asked not to be named, described CBSNEWS anchor and 60 MINUTES correspondent Dan Rather as being "shell-shocked" by the increasingly likelihood that the documents in question were fraudulent.

Rather, who anchored the segment presenting new information on the president's military service, will personally correct the record on-air, if need be, the source explained from New York.

Killian's Widow

From the Washington Post:

In a telephone interview from her Texas home, Killian's widow, Marjorie Connell, described the records as "a farce," saying she was with her husband until the day he died in 1984 and he did not "keep files." She said her husband considered Bush "an excellent pilot."

"I don't think there were any documents. He was not a paper person," she said, adding that she was "livid" at CBS. A CBS reporter contacted her briefly before Wednesday night's broadcasts, she said, but did not ask her to authenticate the records.

From ABC News:

"The wording in these documents is very suspect to me," she told ABC News Radio in an exclusive phone interview from her Texas home. She added that she "just can't believe these are his words."

Connell said her late husband would be "turning over in his grave to know that a document such as this would be used against a fellow guardsman," and she is "sick" and "angry" that his name is "being battled back and forth on television."

Her late husband was a fan of the young Bush, said Connell, who remarried after her husband died in 1984. "I know for a fact that this young man … was an excellent aviator, an excellent person to be in the Guard, and he was very happy to have him become a member of the 111th."

She told Ted Koppel tonight on Nightline that she is "livid." The transcript is here.

Killian's Son:


Gary Killian, who served in the Guard with his father, spoke to ABC News:
  • "It was not the nature of my father to keep private files like this, nor would it have been in his own interest to do so," he said. "We don't know where the documents come from," he said, adding, "They didn't come from any family member." (via ABC News)

The Personnel Chief in Killian's Unit

  • "They looked to me like forgeries. I don't think Killian would do that, and I knew him for 17 years." Rufus Martin.

The Experts

  • "These documents do not appear to have been the result of technology that was available in 1972 and 1973. The cumulative evidence that's available … indicates that these documents were produced on a computer, not a typewriter."William Flynn, one of country's top authorities on document authentication.(via ABC News) "These sure look like forgeries. I would say it looks very likely that these documents could not have existed" in the early 70s.--William Flynn. (via The Weekly Standard)
  • "I'm virtually certain these were computer-generated." Sandra Ramsey Lines--document examiner. (via the Associated Press).
  • "Either these are later transcriptions of earlier documents (which may have been handwritten or typed on a typewriter), or they are crude and amazingly foolish forgeries. I'm a Kerry supporter myself, but I won't let that cloud my objective judgment: I'm 99% sure that these documents were not produced in the early 1970s."--Richard Polt, operater of a websiteThe Weekly Standard)

The Evidence

Virtually all of the following can be found at the indispensable Powerline Blog.
  • The memos contain "proportional typeface" (where letters take up variable space according to their size), not "fixed-pitch typeface" (where each letter takes up the same amount of space). Highly doubtful that the National Guard could have been using proportional typeface in the early 70s.
  • The memos have a superscript "th" in "187th." But this was unavailable on typewriters
  • The memos list "147th" with a space in between the "147" and the "th." If you do this in Microsoft Word, you avoid the superscript, which apparently the forger was attempting to do.
  • The memos have "curly" apostrophes (instead of "straight" apostrophes). Curly apostrophers weren't used on typewriters.
  • The memos used New Times Romans font, which is not available on typewriters.
  • The memo font and spacing is an exact match with a recreation done today on Microsoft Word.
  • The memos included "curly" apostrophes rather than straight apostrophes found on typewriters.
  • The memos have a 13-point vertical spacing, unavailable on typewriters.
  • The memos appear to be on 8.5 x 11 paper, though genuine memos were on 8 x 10.5 paper. If the documents were genuine, the xerox lines should be evident, indicating the paper size change.
  • The formatting of the memo was not used by the Air Force until the mid-80's or early 90's.
  • The terminology "MEMORANDUM FOR" was never used in the 70's.
  • The abbreviations are incorrectly formatted.
  • The signature by Lt. Col. Killian does not match his known signature, and it is improperly placed and incorrectly formatted.
  • The 'SSCI' code (the Standard Subject Classification Indicator code)--found on every piece of US military correspondence--is omitted.
  • The subject line should be in all caps
  • "Lt Colonel" should be "LC" or "LTCOL" or "Lieutenant Colonel, (branch of service)"
  • "Commander" should be "COMMANDING"
  • The memo refers to Gen. Staudt as pressuring Hodges about Bush. But Gen. Staudt retired in 1972.
  • Memos were not used for orders; letters were. But the order for Lt. Bush to take a physical is found in a memo.
  • Memos did not get filed in personnel files.