Nutjobs Ranting About Politics.

[SlaveNoMore]

Tyrone Slothrop
Exactly. None of this changes the facts in (e.g.) the Boston Globe's reporting. Whether documents were forged or not, Bush went to Boston and failed to register with the local Reserve unit. Etc. (eta: The White House released some additional documents this week as a result of a FOIA suit brought by the AP. CBS also found additional documents, which may or may not be forged. The two are distinct. I hear rumors of stories based on still more -- perhaps explaining why Bush wouldn't take the physical -- yet to come.)

But I also agree that not many people care. To the extent that this story is helping Kerry, it's because (1) it takes momentum away from Bush, and (2) exposes his lies about his service (many of them quite recent). To the extent that it's hurting Kerry, it's because it's drowning out his message: If you like the way Bush is running the economy/Iraq/job creation/education, vote for more of the same; but if you don't, vote for me.

The Boston Globe's reporting was based on the 4 documents - which are now considered by 95% of the blogosphere as bad forgeries - that 60 Minutes "obtained" from the dead guy's personal file.

Is it too early to use the word "smear" or did Terry McAuliffe have exclusive use of the term?

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by bilmore
The stuff on which 60 Minutes and the Globe based all of this new "he disobeyed an order" theme came from someone who looked in a dead guy's private files.

Originally posted by Slave The Boston Globe's reporting was based on the 4 documents - which are now considered by 95% of the blogosphere as bad forgeries - that 60 Minutes "obtained" from the dead guy's personal file.

Wrong. (Show me otherwise, but I think you guys are all wet on this.) Much of the most recent stuff has nothing to do with the dead guy's files. Here's a recap posted yesterday by Kevin Drum:

NATIONAL GUARD UPDATE....The National Guard story has suddenly burst back on the scene. Here's the latest:

• Nick Kristof devoted his entire column today to Bush's missing months in Alabama during 1972. Bush has always maintained that he trained with the 187th Air National Guard Tactical squadron at Dannelly Air National Guard base while he was in Alabama, but the 187th was a small unit and Kristof quotes Bob Mintz, a fighter pilot in the 187th during 1972, who says that Bush was never there. (Note: Although Kristof doesn't mention it, Mintz's story was first reported last February by Jackson Baker of the Memphis Flyer.)
  
• Kristof also links to a lengthy analysis of Bush's National Guard service by retired Col. Gerald Lechliter. Lechliter charges that Bush received credit (and pay) for drills that he shouldn't have.
  
• The Boston Globe, based partly on Lechliter's document, reports this morning that Bush failed to meet his training requirements twice during his duty with the National Guard: first in 1972 when he was in Alabama, and second in 1974 when he was attending Harvard Business School. In 1999, Bush spokesman Dan Bartlett said that Bush trained with a Boston unit while he was at Harvard, but the Globe quotes Bartlett as admitting now that "I must have misspoke."
  
• A new story from the Associated Press reports that the Defense Department, after receiving a FOIA request from AP, has mysteriously located some additional Bush records. For the most part the records don't have anything new, but one of them casts some additional light on the training Bush missed with his regular unit in Houston: "Significantly, it showed the unit joined a '24-hour active alert mission to safeguard against surprise attack' in the southern United State beginning on Oct. 6, 1972, a time when Bush did not report for duty, according to his pay records."
  
• And of course 60 Minutes II will have its interview with Ben Barnes tonight. Barnes will be telling the story of how he pulled strings to get Bush into the National Guard back in 1968.

What goes around comes around. As I mentioned before, I doubt that this debate is good for the country, but apparently a lot of people figure that if the Swift Boat group can make up smear stories about John Kerry's military service with impunity, then it's fair to retaliate with true stories about Bush's. I can't say that I blame them.

The first four bullet points relate developments that have nothing to do with the alleged forgeries. (Kevin Drum's original posts is chock full o' links which I have not replicated here.)

In addition, this story in Salon by Eric Boehlert, out today and not mentioned in Drum's post above, relates other work done by a researcher named Lukasiak with the records previously released. "Lukasiak arrived at the overwhelming conclusion that not only did Bush walk away from his final two years of military obligation, coming dangerously close to desertion, but he attempted to cover up his absenteeism through swindle and fraud." For more on his work, see the AWOL Project's site.

With all of this shit hitting the fan, I can understand why it would nice if it was all based on a couple of forged documents. If the documents were forged, I agree that it's a smear, perhaps on a par with the work of the Swift Boat Veterans that you guys exalt, but it also doesn't change the rest of the story.

edited to respond to Slave, too, and to change "three" to "four"

[baltassoc]

Originally posted by bilmore
The stuff on which 60 Minutes and the Globe based all of this new "he disobeyed an order" theme came from someone who looked in a dead guy's private files. Was supposedly written in 1973, and said things like "I'm tired of covering for Bush", or something to that effect. But, seems the font, spacing, and special characters weren't available on typewriters back then, and, if you take a computer with Word, set to the default settings on New Roman Times (developed in the '90's, I think) and type out the memo yourself, you can lay it on top of CBS's copy and it's a perfect match.

It's actually hilarious.

I haven't been following this story (put me in the just doesn't matter either way category), but I know fonts. Times New Roman was developed in the 80s, based on a couple of Linotype fonts from the turn of the century popular with newspapers and that were in turn based on the 16th century work of several Italian fontographers, not that it matters to your point. More importantly, it's a kerned font, not a monospaced font. Courier is a monospaced font (all letters are the same width, and the same distance apart). Kerned fonts were once only the relm of those with access to a Linotype machine (book and newspaper printers) until the Macintosh created desktop publishing. Typewriters based on stiking technology (an outline of a letter strikes an inked ribbon or film, transfering ink to the paper) are unable to have fonts that are not monospaced. While some typewriters developed in the 80s use a different technology, the ones in the 70s were all strike models. If it was a NG typewriter, it was probably an IBM Selectric.

To anyone with a passing interest on fontography, a forgery that was done on a computer instead of a typewriter would be trivial to spot.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Since I inadvertantly double-posted, here's some of the juicy stuff from the article in Salon about Lukasiak. All of this is based on the documents the White House previously released, and (except as specifically noted) none of it has anything to do with CBS's story.

• Among the three most compelling conclusions reached by Lukasiak in his new, meticulous research, are:
  
• Bush's request to transfer to an Alabama Guard unit in 1972, in order to work on the Senate campaign of a family friend, Lukasiak found, was not designed to be temporary, but rather was Bush's attempt to sever ties completely with the Texas Air National Guard and find a new, permanent unit in Alabama for which he was ineligible, where he wouldn't have to do any training during his final two years. His superiors in Texas essentially covered for Bush's getaway. However, the Air Reserve Personnel Center (ARPC) in Denver, Colo., which had final say, uncovered the attempted scam, put an end to it, and admonished Bush's superiors for endorsing Bush's bogus request. (The CBS News report shows that the locals were chafing at interference from "higher-ups" presumably connected to the powerful Bush family.) In the interim, Bush simply ignored his weekend duties for nearly six straight months, not bothering to show up at military units in either Alabama or Texas.
  
  
• The White House has conceded that Bush missed some required weekend training drills, but insists Bush promptly made up those drills and earned enough annual credits for an honorable discharge. In fact, according to Lukasiak's research, based on the procedures in place at the time requiring that makeup dates be completed within 15 days before or 30 days after the date of the drill missed, between half and two-thirds of the points credited to Bush for substitute training were fraudulent. Some of the points credited to Bush were "earned" nine weeks beyond the date of the missed drill. According to Air Force policy, Bush could not have received permission for substitute training that far outside the accepted parameters. The evidence is also overwhelming that Bush failed to get authorization for substitute training in advance, suggesting the points were awarded by the Texas Air National Guard retroactively and without any supporting paperwork. The fraudulent points are key, because without them Bush would have fallen far short of meeting his annual obligation, which meant he should have been transferred to active duty for 24 months and made eligible for service in Vietnam.
  
  
• On Oct. 1, 1973, Bush received an honorable discharge from the Texas Air National Guard in order to move to Boston and attend Harvard Business School, where he was still obligated to find a unit in Massachusetts to fulfill his remaining nine months of duty, or face being placed on active duty. Once again, Bush made no such effort. But the Air Force in Denver, acting retroactively, in effect overturned Bush's honorable discharge and placed him on "Inactive Status" effective Sept. 15, 1973. When Bush left Texas, his personnel file was sent to Denver for review. The ARPC quickly realized Bush had failed to take a required physical exam, his Texas superior could not account for his whereabouts covering nearly a 12-month period, and because of absenteeism Bush had failed to "satisfactorily participate" as a member of the Texas Air National Guard. Bush's "Inactive Status" meant his relationship with the Air Force (and the Guard) was severed and he was therefore eligible for the draft.
  
  Soon afterward, large gaps began appearing in Bush's paper trail. Lukasiak concludes that only last-minute intervention, likely from Bush's local Houston draft board, saved him from active duty, as well as finally securing his honorable discharge, removing his "Inactive Status." Ironically, that means strings were pulled to get Bush out of the Guard in 1973, just as they were pulled to get him enrolled in 1968.

[SlaveNoMore]

Tyrone Slothrop
With all of this shit hitting the fan, I can understand why it would nice if it was all based on a couple of forged documents. If the documents were forged, I agree that it's a smear, perhaps on a par with the work of the Swift Boat Veterans that you guys exalt, but it also doesn't change the rest of the story.

1) The AWOL/Desertion/Leave/Whatever issue was already vetted in 2000 and no one really cared.

2) However, these forged documents are now going to cause John Q. Public to question these AWOL claims.

3) Via mere guilt by association, the Kerry campaign is going to get reamed on this one.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
1) The AWOL/Desertion/Leave/Whatever issue was already vetted in 2000 and no one really cared.

Maybe. I'm glad you're in touch with your principles.

eta: Vetted, but not fully vetted, since it appears that the White House keeps lying about having released all the documents. It was the cover-up that screwed Nixon and Clinton.

2) However, these forged documents are now going to cause John Q. Public to question these AWOL claims.

Just like all of the problems with the Swifties' stories -- the internal inconsistencies, the changed stories, and so on -- caused John Q. Public to question their claims, eliminating the problem for Bush.

3) Via mere guilt by association, the Kerry campaign is going to get reamed on this one.

Quite right, except that you need to replace "the Kerry campaign" with "CBS."

Not clear to me that the Kerry campaign wants this to be the story. As I said, it's getting the way of what they want to say.

[SlaveNoMore]

Tyrone Slothrop
Quite right, except that you need to replace "the Kerry campaign" with "CBS."

Not clear to me that the Kerry campaign wants this to be the story. As I said, it's getting the way of what they want to say.

I tend to think that people will associate the two.

What is your take on the blogoshpere's "conspiracy" theory making the rounds that all the Clintonites on Kerry's staff are purposely deep-sixing his campaign

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
I tend to think that people will associate the two.

No more than the Swifties and Bush, where the ties were actually more concrete than the feverish ravings of right-wing loonies. The Swifties are funded by a Texas pal of Karl Rove. CBS is owned by Viacom.

What is your take on the blogoshpere's "conspiracy" theory making the rounds that all the Clintonites on Kerry's staff are purposely deep-sixing his campaign

I think they're on crack. I don't think there are that many Clintonites on Kerry's staff, and I think they're all doing their level best.

[SlaveNoMore]

Tyrone Slothrop
I think they're on crack. I don't think there are that many Clintonites on Kerry's staff, and I think they're all doing their level best.

You've got Joe Lockhart
You've got Carville and Begala as formal advisors (begging to ask about the CNN conflict of interest issues, but why bother)
I know I read he brought on a few more last week but I'm too lazy to look them up.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
You've got Joe Lockhart
You've got Carville and Begala as formal advisors (begging to ask about the CNN conflict of interest issues, but why bother)
I know I read he brought on a few more last week but I'm too lazy to look them up.

He may have too many advisors. He needs to have someone in the room with him at all times whom he'll listen to when he's told to shut up and stay focused.

The guy who just came in was Sasso (I thought), a former Dukakis guy. Now there's so expertise you want working for you, right? Although if he knows Sasso from way back, maybe Sasso can tell him to shut up and stay focused.

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by bilmore
Sorry, I was only dealing with the new stuff that was just released. Sounds like he was a pretty good troop.

Sounds reasonably competent -- and somewhat more impressive than Quayle's stint as a "clerk-typist" in Indiana. I'd be even more impressed if the North Vietnamese had fighter jets for him to intercept, or (most important) if his Daddy's friends hadn't pulled strings to get him the slot.

Still, without even digging into the whys and wherefores of whatever stuff is now being brought up -- all of this is really nothing more than another decent reason to dislike Bush (or who he was then). His record as President -- in domestic and foreign policy is the reason to want him out. In that, Club is right.

This is the way of the world -- the well-off and connected only get themselves in harm's way if they volunteer -- and damn few do. I still sort of hope to pin my old wings on one of my children some day, but I'd keep them out of a Vietnam if I could.

S_A_M

[Say_hello_for_me]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Just like all of the problems with the Swifties' stories -- the internal inconsistencies, the changed stories, and so on -- caused John Q. Public to question their claims, eliminating the problem for Bush.

Its not easy to get 216 swift boat veterans to stick to the party lines all the time. Regardless, they showed:

1.) Kerry deliberately and forcefully lied in Congress about his presence in Cambodia;

2.) Kerry was writing himself up for all sorts of medals, at least one of which he certainly didn't deserve, and at least 2 of which were used in his quest to get out of combat duty early;

3.) Vietnam veterans, as a group, hate John Kerry... and the public should understand they, as a group, are offended by his whole "reporting for duty" bullshit.

Hello

[Say_hello_for_me]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore

What is your take on the blogoshpere's "conspiracy" theory making the rounds that all the Clintonites on Kerry's staff are purposely deep-sixing his campaign

You heard it here first. Sometimes I'm surprised the papers don't just quote "Say_Hello_For_Me".

My vacation was fine, thank you very much. I guess y'all probably discussed that 11% lead while I was sipping Old Style at the lake. What's the consensus now? Are the Dems confident? Is Bilmore still predicting a Kerry win?

This election was over a month ago.

Hello

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
Its not easy to get 216 swift boat veterans to stick to the party lines all the time. Regardless, they showed:

1.) Kerry deliberately and forcefully lied in Congress about his presence in Cambodia;

2.) Kerry was writing himself up for all sorts of medals, at least one of which he certainly didn't deserve, and at least 2 of which were used in his quest to get out of combat duty early;

3.) Vietnam veterans, as a group, hate John Kerry... and the public should understand they, as a group, are offended by his whole "reporting for duty" bullshit.

Hello

1) Bullshit. You guys keep saying this on the board, but it boils down to saying that he was there on Xmas Eve when in fact he was on the border on Xmas Eve and there a month later. Bullshit I say.

2) Bullshit again. What he did was par for the course there. Are you really offended by the fact that he was injured by shrapnel from his own grenade? I didn't think so.

3) The loud ones do. There are an awful lot of vets (especially the enlisted men) who feel otherwise, but they didn't start smearing people.

And thanks for the tacit admission that there was a lot of lying involved in smearing Kerry in this way. And so he got a Purple Heart too many -- Rassaman isn't complaining about it. The man was still a hero.

[SlaveNoMore]

SlaveNoMore
...the 4 documents - which are now considered by 95% of the blogosphere as bad forgeries - that 60 Minutes "obtained" from the dead guy's personal file.

Is it too early to use the word "smear" or did Terry McAuliffe have exclusive use of the term?

Powerline has been ripping these docs to shreds all day. Now the latest two updates:

• UPDATE 11: CBS is sticking to its story. It's not entirely clear which story, however. Initially, CBS spokeswoman Kelli Edwards said:
  
  As is standard practice at CBS News, each of the documents broadcast on '60 Minutes' was thoroughly investigated by independent experts, and we are convinced of their authenticity.
  Later, however, Ms. Edwards sent out an email that appeared to revise the nature of the "authentication" process:
  
  CBS verified the authenticity of the documents by talking to individuals who had seen the documents at the time they were written. These individuals were close associates of Colonel Jerry Killian and confirm that the documents reflect his opinions at the time the documents were written.
  So what CBS is now saying is not that the documents are authentic, but that the opinions they express are authentic, based on the hearsay reports of anonymous persons alleged to be close associates of Col. Killian, who recall his views of thirty-two years ago. This is what passes for "authentication" in the mainstream media.

• UPDATE 12: In the August 18, 1973 memo "discovered" by 60 Minutes, Jerry Killian purportedly writes:
  
  Staudt has obviously pressured Hodges more about Bush. I'm having trouble running interference and doing my job.
  But wait! Reader Amar Sarwal points out that General Staudt, who thought very highly of Lt. Bush, retired in 1972.
  
  The more I look at these "memos," the more obvious it appears that they are inept forgeries.

Going to be a lot of fired CBS employees getting drunk at the China Grill tomorrow.