WP: Expert Cited by CBS Says He Didn't Authenticate Papers

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A18982-2004Sep13?language=printer

The lead expert retained by CBS News to examine disputed memos from President Bush's former squadron commander in the National Guard said yesterday that he examined only the late officer's signature and made no attempt to authenticate the documents themselves.

"There's no way that I, as a document expert, can authenticate them," Marcel Matley said in a telephone interview from San Francisco. The main reason, he said, is that they are "copies" that are "far removed" from the originals.

Matley's comments came amid growing evidence challenging the authenticity of the documents aired Wednesday on CBS's "60 Minutes." The program was part of an investigation asserting that Bush benefited from political favoritism in getting out of commitments to the Texas Air National Guard. On last night's "CBS Evening News," Rather said again that the network "believes the documents are authentic."

A detailed comparison by The Washington Post of memos obtained by CBS News with authenticated documents on Bush's National Guard service reveals dozens of inconsistencies, ranging from conflicting military terminology to different word-processing techniques.

[rawstory]

1. All I can say is...

what is the POST's PROBLEM? Since when did they become a Bush lackey? This is a really sad day. Honestly, even if they were forgeries, which I think they are not, the post is the ONLY paper which is on a crusade to damage Kerry.

[candy331]

2. The day when th media (most ) in this country will be out of

existence is quickly moving forward.

[Julian English]

3. I disagree--we need to concentrate on Bush's failure, not some documents

The real problem is people still care about these documents.

There is plenty in the released record to nail Shrub--such as his failure to report in Alabama and in Massachusetts.

Even if the documents are real there are not necessary and the debate over them takes away the more important issues in the past and present. The WP should have on its front page Powell's admission that Iraq was not involved in the 9/11 attack and the statement by Marine Beneral Conway that Fallujah seige was a debacle. This is important, current information of the failures of the Rethuglicans. Big failures and lies!

http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/WO0409/S00160.htm
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=823865&mesg_id=823865&page=

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16309-2004Sep12.html?nav=headlines
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x824750

[krkaufman]

17. Exactly. All of this draws attention away from Bush's...

... very much present-day abysmal failures.

[henslee]

19. All I can say is.... Rove got to him.

[KittyWampus]

24. No, Rove Didn't Get To Him. CBS Never Claimed The Guy Authenticated Papers

they only said he authenticated Killian's SIGNATURE.

This story is attempting to make something out of nothing.

They are implying CBS said something THEY DID NOT SAY.

CBS had OTHER experts authenticate the papers.

[henslee]

27. I was clowning, CS.

[dennis4868]

30. YOU ARE RIGHT.....

but when peole get up in the morning and read the paper with their coffee they wiol not know that and then go to work and tell all their co-workers that Bush is not a bad guy after all and that Kerry would do anything to win....you are right but politics is about using the media to your advantage and my god Bush and KKKRove have perfected that....

can you imagine if the WP put in half the effort they are putting in now analyzing the evidence when it came to Bush lies before the war regarding WMD and 911 connections....my friend would most likely have a right leg and would not be in a bed at Walter Reed Hospital....

[The Zanti Regent]

23. The WHORESHINGTON POST IS THE PROBLEM

Ever since Bill Clinton ran for President, the WHORESHINGTON POST has become the #1 organ for the GOP.

The WHORESHINGTON POST is Exhibit "A" for instituting a Three Strikes law against the media. Three lies and you should be shut down for good!

[IndianaGreen]

33. Dan Rather and CBS blew the story!

They did not follow the proper journalistic standards and are now trying to defend documents that appear to be forgeries.

Our mistake is that we let our hatred of Bush suspend our critical thinking. We are making the same mistake when we embrace trashy people like Kitty Kelley.

[ElectroPrincess]

48. No, I've followed Dan Rather for years and HE'S thorough ...

No way, Dan Rather and CBS always have multiple sources to back up ALL their story items. Don't jump ship just because the "conservative noise machine" is now at fervor pitch. The louder and more nasty the claims, the more you know that they are desperate.

[popinjay]

63. Indiana Green vs Electro Princess

I.G. nailed it. And ElectroPrincess, your use of absolutes, "CBS 'always' have multiple sources to back up 'ALL' their story items", is implausible. We're ultimately talking about human beings, and if you'll pardon the irony, absolutes NEVER apply.

Mr. Rather is by nature fallible, as is the entire staff of CBS News. Hopefully the checks and balances catch dubious items such as these, but it appears (at least to me) that he was blinded by his desire to damage Shrub (no secret that he supports our man, which I'm cool with), and pushed when he should have pulled (which I'm not). Now he's only making it worse by his denials. Nature abhors a vacuum, and if he doesn't come up with the goods (and soon), the public will draw their own conclusions, and believe me, they will be highly unfavorable to us. Terry McAuliffe tried to blame the repubs by saying they submitted the document against bush just to discredit the Dems? Puh-leeeeze.

To simply consume without question what Mr. Rather (or Fox, or Kerry, or Bush) offers is to admit that we've stopped thinking for ourselves.

[Bandit]

58. Let's see you use a word processor to use the letter l for a 1

Selectric typewriters did that all the time. It is impossible with a computer word processor. That is what was done on these documents. these documents are not forgeries and that has been verified by more than one expert.

[Name removed]

61. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[papau]

50. The WASHPOST under DOWNIE has long been on a crusade to Hurt Dems

The tone of the paper comes from the lying turd that is the editor.

As we all can see, every Secretary must use the same terminology or phrases or the document is a fake.

Hell, he will not even list those problem phrases - just says in my pocket I have proof of GLARING problems.

And to say Typing problems from a 5th generation photocopy - who is the expert this time that asserts the IBM Executive and the IBM Selectric Composer could not have produced a given character?

DOWNIE LIES.

THE WASHINGTON POST LIES.

when it comes to politics and Dems.

:-(

[Spinzonner]

4. Umm, how can there be an issue of 'different word processing techniques'

when the damn things were done on typewriters (if sophisticated ones) NOT Word Processing equipment.

[Dr Fate]

5. Bush needs to have a press conference & clear all this up.

Bush and only Bush is the one who can tell us which parts are true and which parts he says are not true.

[meisje]

15. Why would he do that

CBS is on the defensive no Bush

[Jim Sagle]

31. Chickenshit bullshit. Bush is on the defensive, not CBS. Here's a clue:

http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml

[Dickie Flatt]

6. Where is the White House denial?

I'm waiting.

[shraby]

7. The white house doesn't deny

they stonewall and divert attention or discredit the messenger. They can't discredit CBS because of it's reputation so they've diverted the dialogue from "did Bush get in trouble" to "are the documents forged"

[RamboLiberal]

9. WH Denial - Hey Pickles is out there denying

From article: Meanwhile, Laura Bush became the first person from the White House to say the documents are likely forgeries. "You know they are probably altered," she told Radio Iowa in Des Moines yesterday. "And they probably are forgeries, and I think that's terrible, really."

[yardwork]

21. It's interesting that she said "probably altered"

Nobody has ever suggested that they were altered. CBS says they are genuine, and the opposition say they are fakes.

Who said anything about "altered?" That interests me because I've found that when the WH or Rove accuse somebody else of doing something, it usually means that they did it themselves.

I wonder what they altered?

[DoYouEverWonder]

53. Gee Laura, isn't it even worse

that your husband went to war in Iraq, based on documents that he knew were forged?

[annxburns]

8. This is Dobbs and Kurtz

I wondered when these RW shills would team up. Total BS Limbaugh Talking points. Kurtz wife is a republican media consultant and Dobbs has been excusing the Swift Vet liars for WEEKS.

This pisses me off to no end. Howie does a lame "sorry we didn't quesition Bush when he took us to war" and then spends 90 percent of time protecting Chimpy's back.

[glitch]

10. Another extremely misleading headline. Poor WP, sad old whore. nt

[ElectroPrincess]

49. Yeah, WP has degraded it's reputation ...

I became starkly aware of that fact when a representative of the WP editorial staff intimated during the build up the the Iraqi invasion that they leaned decidedly toward "DA President."

"Rode hard and put up wet." Give this ole' nag (WP) a complete make-over or look out NY Post - here's your competition.

Edited for grammar :P

[Spazito]

11. This is ridiculous and piss reporting...

The expert and CBS never said he authenticated the documents, he authenticated the signature. He was asked because he is an expert in that area. CBS has other experts that looked at other aspects of the memos. Unbelievable how far the WP has fallen that they would actually print this drivel.

[MeinaShaw]

12. This is old news

This is old news. He said this on Friday, that he did not authenticate the documents. Why is the media regurgitating this now?

[bigdogblues]

13. The good news is...

At least ^this is not appearing on ^the front page.

[DulceDecorum]

16. Welcome to the Democratic Underground

bigdogblues
and thank you for giving me the best laugh I have had all day.

[lostnfound]

20. LOL. That's easier to do on a typewriter..

from what I recall, than with this darn HTML stuff. A quick roll of the spool.

Welcome to DU!

[DoYouEverWonder]

52. Back in the day when you couldn't graduate from college

unless you knew how to do footnotes on a typewriter.

[bobbyboucher]

29. Save it.

Transparent. Do you think you're skating?

[wishlist]

14. Not very convincing arguments to support forgery

There are plausible explanations for all of the supposed inconsistencies mentioned- such as different typewriters used by different clerks which was common in govt offices back then. And why wouldn't babyBush have used his daddy's address as his main one since baby moved around during this period of time from TX to Alabama to Massachusetts?

This article is a fraud by ignoring the main issues and focusing only on the fog of the forgery accusations that obscure the nagging questions about babyBush's service. If these are not the true original documents then what happened to the real documents that should have been made at the time in light of babyBush failing to take the physical and show up for duty for such a long period of time and asking for two transfers of his post from Tx to Alabama to Massachusetts.

Irrelevant for Laura to give her opinion since she didn't even know him during this period of time. Begs the question of why Bushy isn't contradicting and providing correct info if docs aren't real.

[countmyvote4real]

26. Nice summary, wishlist. Everyone else, go there now. Do not pass go.

You are right on all accounts.

[DBoon]

18. So what?

The guy is an expert on signature verification.

He was hired to verify the signature and did.

He will not comment on anything he was not hired or qualified to do.

He wasn't hired to verify the documents overall, so he won't

Where is the problem?

[baldingrockwarlord]

22. thats okay

we only needed his expertise on the handwriting anyway.....next?

[bluedeminredstate]

25. The media needs to focus on WHY Bush

didn't take his physical. Everyone can agree on that he didn't take it.
My husband who flew jets in the Navy during Viet Nam, but as a flight instructor stateside, said that no way would you decide for yourself that your ORDER doesn't make sense, therefore you would just ignore it. Furthermore, you earned those wings and no one he knew would let them just go.
This forgery bullshit is typical Rove smokescreen. Change the subject and watch the news shows have newsgasms.

[JDPriestly]

28. Maybe CBS did not need to

authenticate the documents because it got them from a reliable source. I don't know, just guessing. CBS tends to be careful about these things.

[Julian English]

32. CBS defends the documents

While we should be focusing on Bush's numerous current failures as president, to keep folks entertained:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/14/politics/campaign/14guard.html

The buried lead (last 4 paragraphs):

Richard Katz, a computer software expert in Los Angeles who was featured on the "Evening News" segment, said in an interview that he had called his local affiliate, KCBS, after looking at the memos on the CBS Web site after the initial broadcast, when some experts were saying that the memos looked as if they had been composed using the Times New Roman font in Microsoft Word.

Comparing the CBS memos with a replication produced on Microsoft Word, he noticed a slight variation in the boldness of the letters, as there is on many typewritten documents. "It doesn't look like you can do this very easily," he said. "If you use something like Photoshop you could come close to faking it, but why not just go out and buy a Selectric for $75?"

Bill Glennon, a technology consultant and I.B.M. typewriter specialist who had posted his thoughts on the memos on a blog and was quoted over the weekend in publications including The New York Times, said CBS called him Monday morning. The producer asked him to come in and look at the memorandums and say whether he thought that an I.B.M. typewriter could have produced the documents. He said he was initially leery of talking. "Because quite honestly there's some people out there, they're scary," he said. "You don't agree with them, you offer opinions that don't jibe with theirs and you get a target on your back."

Mr. Glennon was in charge of service for 1,000 contracts for I.B.M. typewriters for 15 years, starting in late 1972, around the time the memorandums were produced. He spent 15 minutes with the CBS documents, he said, and believes that they could have been created using the kind of typewriters he worked with at I.B.M.

[IndianaGreen]

35. Glennon "could not vouch for the documents authenticity."

The fact that CBS does not have the originals, and has not allowed impartial experts to examine their data, should be raising red flags everywhere.

From WP:

But Glennon said he is not a document expert, could not vouch for the memos' authenticity and only examined them online because CBS did not give him copies when asked to visit the network's offices.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A18982-2004Sep13?language=printer

[Wednesdays]

54. Who would you consider

an "impartial expert?"

[trotsky]

65. Sounds like Mr. Glennon knows how freepers operate.

"Target on your back"? Poor guy.

[IndianaGreen]

34. CBS is relying on expert that testified to Vince Foster's suicide note

Conservative columnist Bill Safire really lowers the boom on CBS:

Those Discredited Memos
By WILLIAM SAFIRE

Published: September 13, 2004

It may be that CBS is the victim of a whopping journalistic hoax, besmearing a president to bring him down. What should a responsible news organization do?

To shut up sources and impugn the motives of serious critics - from opinionated bloggers to straight journalists - demeans the Murrow tradition. Nor is any angry demand that others prove them wrong acceptable, especially when no original documents are available to prove anything.

Years ago, Kurdish friends slipped me amateur film taken of Saddam's poison-gas attack that killed thousands in Halabja. I gave it to Dan Rather, who trusted my word on sources. Despite objections from queasy colleagues, he put it on the air.

Hey, Dan: On this, recognize the preponderance of doubt. Call for a panel of old CBS hands and independent editors to re-examine sources and papers. Courage.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/13/opinion/13safire.html?n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fOp%2dEd%2fColumnists%2fWilliam%20Safire

I count myself among those DUers that think that the memos are a hoax, which were intended to be easily debunked, in order to cast doubt on all of the other and more credible stories about Bush's service in the Air National Guard.

[Sandpiper]

36. You're entitled to your opinion

But really. Can't you do better the peddling the garbage of a Murdoch toady like William Saffire, editor of a wignut propaganda rag.

[IndianaGreen]

37. Had you read the piece, you would have seen that Safire encapsulated

all of the objections that have been published on Memogate, from Howard Kurtz to the LA Times.

If you are among those that think that Memogate and Kitty Kelley are going to lead us to victory in November, instead of being an unnecessary distraction from Kerry/Edwards message, then there is no way I can convince you otherwise.

I will predict that CBS will end up eating crow because of Memogate!

[Sandpiper]

38. I'm not

If you are among those that think that Memogate and Kitty Kelley are going to lead us to victory in November, instead of being an unnecessary distraction from Kerry/Edwards message, then there is no way I can convince you otherwise.

I'm simply saying, surely you can do better than citing a paid GOP propagandist to support your position.

[IndianaGreen]

40. I posted the LA Times and Dallas Morning News article that debunked

the "sugar coated" allegation. I saved the article:

Authenticity of memo to 'sugar coat' Bush record is further questioned

12:11 AM CDT on Saturday, September 11, 2004

By PETE SLOVER / The Dallas Morning News

AUSTIN – The man named in a disputed memo as exerting pressure to "sugar coat" President Bush's military record left the Texas Air National Guard a year and a half before the memo was supposedly written, his own service record shows.

An order obtained by The Dallas Morning News shows that Col. Walter "Buck" Staudt was honorably discharged on March 1, 1972. CBS News reported this week that a memo in which Col. Staudt was described as interfering with officers' negative evaluations of Mr. Bush's service was dated Aug. 18, 1973.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/091104dnpolguard.117c8.html

I think many of us are suffering from fundamentalism. Like religious fundies, many want to believe so bad that they suspend their critical thinking. This is why they have endorsed without question things like the CBS TANG memos and Kitty Kelley's trashy book.

Ask yourselves if these distractions are winning any votes for us, or are they they adding to the fog of war.

[Voltaire99]

41. "I think many of us are suffering from fundamentalism."

Surely you detected hints of this before the CBS brouhaha. :-)

The military record issue is pathetic, another attempt to use martial symbolism to mask the essential conservatism into which we have allowed the party leaders to slip. As some of us have pointed out, going around saying "*I'm* the real war hero and he shirked his duty" helps to support the culture's omnipresent war spirit, which is not only a kind of social illness but can lend itself to the return of the draft as well.

If the election is lost due to this silly fiddling, it'll be time to clean house of anything to do with McAuliffe and the DNC. First up: no more war heroes, please.

[Sandpiper]

44. I agree with you

I think that regardless of their authenticity, the more these memos are discussed the more it helps Bush because it draws attention from actual substantive issues.

[allemand]

51. I think we should always welcome critical thinking and discussion.

For example, how to explain the "slight variation in the boldness of the letters" if it really was a hoax produced with a computer using MS-Word?

Why does the "Roman Press" typeface of the Selectric Composer match the typeface of the memos even better than the MS-Word font "Times New Roman"?

The question is if Killian had access to a Selectric Composer and if there are more memos or other documents typed in the same style. CBS should try to get some of those.

[trapper914]

56. I Agree

I've said all along the Vietnam service issue is a loser issue for both sides. It was used on Quayle. It was used on Clinton. It makes good talk radio and blogger fodder, but it's a distraction.

I would like Kerry to stand up and say something to the effect of, "Both Bush and I served 35 years ago, and we both were honorably discharged. Now...let's talk about the last four years, and how I'll work the next four years to fix the damage and make your life better."

[EST]

42. Safire?

Safire is to journalism what Bushbaby is to patriotism and credibility.
Why bother?

[IndianaGreen]

43. Some people will only read the King James version of the Bible

thinking that anything else cannot be trusted. I may not agree with Bill Safire on many things, anymore than I agree with Tom Friedman, but Safire mentions all of the objections that have been published by other news sources about the CBS memos.

[EST]

45. So does the average illiterate at the kingdom of freep.

Doesn't make him a journalist. I have read his "postings" ever since he became syndicated, off and on. (couldn't take a steady diet)

Back in ancient history, he would occasionally make some sense. His sharper and further veer to the right has pretty well rendered him incoherent, in real world terms. Of course, the same could be said for me, if one views real world relationships as purely relativistic.

The inane cackling of uninformed "pundits" or "editorialists" with absolutely zero access to original sources is of no more value than the same uninstructed noise from anywhere else. It strikes me that such utterances arise more from envy and a need to constantly show up in the public eye of ones admirers than they owe to any sort of journalistic integrity.

In other words-the man is a worthless hack and lives only for the applause of other empty asshats!

[IndianaGreen]

46. The problem is that CBS has refused access to documents

and CBS does not have the original sources. I think CBS has placed itself in an untenable position and it is now stone-walling.

[EST]

47. I must point out-

That is not the problem. CBS' refusal is just that-a refusal. They have that right, you know. And it forestalls a bigger problem, which is- If someone else had gotten to the docs first, there might now be no documents.

Your second point has no underlying value at all that I can see.Neither you nor I are in any position to authoritively speak on whether they have anything original or not. We don't know!

[The Stranger]

59. The problem with this is precisely that it is coming from Bill Safire.

And he has a very, very serious credibility problem. If Bill Safire published an article stating that the sky is blue, I would go outside and check three or four, maybe five times, just to make sure.

[EST]

39. So friggin' what?

_______________

[MallRat]

55. MATLEY ALREADY SAID THIS. THIS IS NOT NEWS.

Matley only vouched for the handwriting, and CBS' experts said that they needed to see the originals to fully confirm the authenticity of the documents themselves.

They said this LAST WEEK.

WTF, WaPo? I thought you were better than this... repeating an already-reported, irrelevant news item to make it sound like a major breakthrough in the story?

:wtf:

-MR

[Surf Cowboy]

57. I'm starting to think that CBS got tooled with their source.

This thing is really starting to look fake to me, and I don't want that to be the case, but I gotta tell ya...

I think that Rove&Assoc. pulled some classic tradecraft on Kerry's folks and gave CBS a Trojan Horse.

[Name removed]

60. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[indypaul]

62. One question still remains

Mr. President, did you refuse to pee in the bottle or
did you pee in the bottle and fail? You can fuss all
you want about the documents and "experts" can be hired
that will tell you exactly what you want to hear
irrespective of the truth. The question still remains.

[FatSlob]

64. This can't be good.