CBS backs off Guard story (read further for Burkett source)

[Kilroy003]

http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/president/2004-09-21-cover-guard_x.htm


"...In earlier conversations with USA TODAY, Burkett had identified the source of the documents as George Conn, a former Texas National Guard colleague who works for the U.S. Army in Europe. Burkett now says he made up the story about Conn's involvement to divert attention from himself and the woman he now says provided him with the documents. He told USA TODAY that he also lied to CBS...

...Burkett now maintains that the source of the papers was Lucy Ramirez, who he says phoned him from Houston in March to offer the documents. USA TODAY has been unable to locate Ramirez...

...He said Ramirez claimed to possess Killian's "correspondence file," which would prove Burkett's allegations that Bush had problems as a Guard fighter pilot..."

[Kilroy003]

1. Is this not news?

Has anyone heard anything about Lucy Ramirez?

[demoman123]

8. It's big news. "Lucy Ramirez" is obviously not a real person.

A woman using that name called Burkett, and arranged a meet. But she never showed up at the meet. Instead, a man passed Burkett the papers.

I would not be surprised if the RNC were behind this--passing crude forgeries in an effort to discredit the Bush AWOL story.

[Kilroy003]

9. Who knows?

I sure don't. Are we the only folks on right now?

[Name removed]

10. Deleted message

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

[demoman123]

11. Give these women a call, and ask them.

"ARE YOU THE LUCY RAMIREZ THAT CALLED BURKETT? DON'T LIE TO ME. TELL THE TRUTH." :)

[Kilroy003]

13. I would...

but it's kinda late, don't you think?

[demoman123]

15. Sigh. Okay, first thing in the morning.

:)

[Kilroy003]

16. Afternoon more likely.

[leesa]

29. You can't be calling people that probably have nothing to do with this!

Call Rove and ask HIM if he is Lucy Ramirez.

[demoman123]

41. LOL.

He will probably answer the phone in a woman's voice. :)

[Eloriel]

43. Not allowed at DU, even if the information is publicly available

IMO you posted way too much.

[Kilroy003]

44. Sorry about that.

I tried to edit the numbers so they couldn't be used by anyone.

[fknobbit]

20. Last seen boarding a small two engine plane! nt

[drfemoe]

2. do you remember

when Wesley Clark was branded as a loony for allowing MM the freedom to broach this topic? And now it's "mainstream".


We've come a LOOOOOOOOOONG ways.

[Kilroy003]

3. No, I don't remember.

Did you notice that USA Today just identified the 2nd tier source of the CBS memo's. I Googled Lucy Ramirez in news, just the thread story so far. Who is she?

[drfemoe]

4. well

I was refering to the "AWOL" story in general (no pun intended), not "Lucy" in particular.

edit to add links >
http://www.factcheck.org/article.aspx?docID=131

http://democrats.com/display.cfm?id=322

google for more >>
http://www.google.as/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&q=wesley+clark+michael+moore+awol

[Kilroy003]

6. I know, I don't care either. Well, maybe a little.

I take it you've never heard of her?

[TaleWgnDg]

21. your link to Annenberg Public Policy Center of the U of PA needs updating

. . . the Annenberg url to which you link::

http://www.factcheck.org/article.aspx?docID=131

is last updated (as noted on that url) as "Modified: February 11, 2004." Annenberg's factcheck.org website refers frequently to the Boston Globe newspaper which has done extensive investigatory coverage regarding George W. Bush's military service.

However, since that last update (2/11/04) on the Annenberg website, the Boston Globe newspaper has done MORE investigatory articles regarding Bush's military service. All of which are NOT INCLUDED on the Annenberg website.

See, for example, this Boston Globe online webpages re investigative report regarding Bush's military service (not reported on Annenberg):

http://www.boston.com/news/politics/president/bush/national_guard/
(note the dates of these articles, particularly the dates AFTER Annenberg's last update of 2/11/04 to its webpage)

The Boston Globe is very well known for its investigative reporting and did a fine job on this series of articles by its head of investigative reporting, Walter V. Robinson.

Also, Annenberg's website (www.factcheck.org) should be taken to task for not keeping its webpages up-to-date particularly on this, such a serious issue, as Bush's military record (or lack thereof). If left unchallenged, then readers of Annenberg's website do not have complete and accurate information to reach sound conclusions.

Until Annenberg updates their website, nobody should be referred to their webpages for reliable information as you have done.

edited to add: I've emailed Annenberg w/ the above info at [e-mail] . . . perhaps you'd want to email them as well.

[drfemoe]

35. thank you

for that. However, taken in context of my previous post, this link was inlcuded only to illustrate the ridicule to which Wesley Clark was subjected from the beginning of this story. It wasn't intended as full disclosure on the current state of events.

Your information is valuable, however.

[Kilroy003]

5. Hello people.

News breaks at night too.

[Kilroy003]

7. Never mind.

I guess you cats will have to read about it after nap time.

[Chomskyite]

12. Here's a Lucy Ramirez

. . . as executive director of a hospital that serves the poor in Hidalgo County, Texas.

http://www.tachc.org/About/Membership/Member_Directory/NCV.asp

But I'm sure there are thousands of Lucy Ramirez's in south Texas.

[readmylips]

14. Lucy Ramirez in 2000 was the woman who gave Repigs Gore's...

tape of his debate speech. She worked for the bush campaign. The whole thing was that she was set up by karl rove, but was forced to take the blame and was fired. Much like Dan Rather is taking the blame and he was only the messanger.

[Kilroy003]

17. No way!

Are you saying the tape thing was done by a 'Lucy Ramirez' style shadow figure?

[demoman123]

18. n/t

[demoman123]

19. It was a Bush operative who gave a tape to the Gore campaign. Her name was

Yvette Lozano.

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/10/09/bush.tape.subpoena/

[Realistic Mom]

39. Sorry -- Lazano was on our side

http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/time/2000/10/09/investigation.html

Yvette Lazano was a life-long Democrat who took advantage of an opening she had and wound up giving Democrats a black eye. Burkett did the same thing. If we keep blaming Rove every time someone from our side shoots us in the foot, we look like fools.

[Sterling]

51. Realistic Mom? I don't think so.

Read the article again and tell us who "Mark McKinnon" worked for at the time?

[Realistic Mom]

53. Think again

Of COURSE, McKinnon was working for Bush! He was a hired media consultant. How else would Lazano get access to the tape? Look, it is clear Lazano wasn't working for Gore and no one at the Gore camp knew anything about it. But she has worked for many democratic campaigns. It is just as desperate a stretch to suggest that Rove was behind this as it is to suggest Gore was. If you look at her work history, the woman has a record of irresponsible/dishonest behavior and has been let go on many occasions. She was a nut acting on her own accord.

[Red State Rebel]

33. Not according to the article I read....?????

In 2000 there was a Yvette Lozano mailed a video tape to Gore's office - she was an employee of Maverick Media who was the organization that video taped the debate practice.

http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/time/2000/10/16/investigation.html


I personally think this was a set up and the Bush campaign just happened to find the right person to dupe. They got lucky this time, we can't let them get lucky again!!

[Ruffhowse]

22. When something is as convoluted and obtuse as this story is, I see Karl

Rove's fingerprints all over it. Keep looking behind the curtains, you're gonna find Rove eventually.

[DoYouEverWonder]

23. And here's the guy, Roger Stone, who is the link

Stone and Rove go way, way back to Reagan and Lee Atwater, may be the source of the documents. This is the same guy who organized and paid the Miami Mob during the recount and then went on to join Al Sharpton's campaign.


Folks if this is true, we have a direct link to the WH. (Found this tidbit in GD 2004)


http://www.nypost.com/commentary/30555.htm (scroll down)

The hot rumor in New York political circles has Roger Stone, the longtime GOP activist, as the source for Dan Rather's dubious Texas Air National Guard "memos."

The irony would be delicious, since Rather became famous confronting President Nixon, in whose service a very young Stone became associated with political "dirty tricks."

Reached at his Florida home, Stone had no comment.


http://www.famoustexans.com/karlrove.htm

Career: In the years of the Watergage scandal, Rove's career as a big-time political handler began with a motley crew of friends and associates. He was chairman of the College Republicans when George Herbert Walker Bush was chairman of the state Republican Party in 1973. He won the presidency of the College Republicans in a race against Terry Dolan. The late Lee Atwater, who later became famous as the political attack dog for the Reagan-Bush team, managed Rove's campaign. Dolan went on to become a Soft Money pioneer by helping form the National Conservative Political Action Committee, then died of AIDS in 1986 at age 36. Dolan's advisers in his loss to Rove were Charlie Black, Paul Manafort and Roger Stone. Those three were later instrumental in the success of Ronald Reagan's 1984 campaign.

Atwater joined the consulting firm of Black, Manafort and Stone after the '84 election. The firm later worked for the 1988 Bush-Quayle campaign. Two of Nixon's dirty tricksters also worked for Bush-Quayle: Frederick Malek, Bush's Republican National Committee rep, who had compiled lists of Jews in the Bureau of Labor Statistics as part of Nixon's investigation of a "Jewish Cabal;" and Dwight Chapin, who was jailed for lying to a grand jury about hiring Donald Sigretti to disrupt the 1972 Democratic primary campaign of Senator Edward Muskie. Chapin worked under Manafort in 1988. The firm's other clients included drug-connected Bahamian Prime Minister Oscar Pindling, Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos, and UNITA, the South African-supported Angolan rebel group led by CIA asset Jonas Savimbi. Lee Atwater lobbied for UNITA. All of which began when Atwater was introduced to George Bush in 1973, by his good friend Karl Rove.

[bklyncowgirl]

26. Why would the notoriously pro Bush NY Post run with this rumor.

It sounds very plausible though. Almost too good to be true.

[Snellius]

30. "Reached at his Florida home, Stone had no comment."

Why would he have "no comment". Not that "not comment" can't just be a "no comment", but I would think, if I had nothing to do with this, one would say "What are you talking about?".

Whoever gave these docs to Burkett, knew he would be a perfect patsy.

The only mistake CBS made is perhaps fessing up too quickly and blowing their cover to investigate further who set them up.

[starroute]

42. Long thread on Stone over at GD:2004

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x849699

This guy has been a Republican dirty trickster since 1972, when he was only 19, and is tied in with an amazing range of other right-wing figures. Whether or not he's the source of the memoes, he's worth knowing about.

[Eurobabe]

24. precisely.

this was all too convenient. It was a set-up.

[Snellius]

27. It's obviously some kind of conspiracy. There's at least 2 people involved

What strikes me as most suspicious is the cloak and dagger way in which the docs were delivered. Why wouldn't "Lucy Ramirez" send them? Why did she use an unnamed courier?

[DoYouEverWonder]

28. Could be these two?

Roger Stone and his wife Nydia


A lot of clues are starting to point in this direction. Stone has a long history of being one of Rove's major dirty tricksters.

It's time to expose this slimeball to the world.

[spotbird]

34. What disgusting looking people.

They look like you'd need a shower after being in the same room with them. Sorta like televangelists.

[KoKo]

49. She looks like the "Bi" her hubby said she was...where's the hair on the

legs and he looks like he's in the wrong department. Blech!

[bluedog]

40. man she looks like K.Harris

wonder if they are related?

[remfan]

25. In March?

So um, where was the bush AWOL-TANG story in March? It was a pretty hot story in February.

[dryan]

31. The woman's photo is familiar....

wasn't here photo on the internet during either the 1992 campaign or 1996 campaign in sexy lingerie. I'm not kidding, I remember this because she and her husband had to resign, but I can't remember which Presidential campaign it was.

[DoYouEverWonder]

Yes, Stone quit the Dole Campaign

because of some internet porn thing, that the National Enquirer had done a story on.

[DoYouEverWonder]

36. Dupe

[Catfight]

32. Why are the files missing anyway for Bush? Can't the Pentagon keep

files safe? Shouldn't we be after the head of the person who supposedly ruined the microfilm that doesn't exist? The story really is why weren't all the papers released, why this cloud of deception about Bush's service to his country and why can't we have proof to the truth?

[Spangle]

37. Tiime to stop arguing and get serious over this.

Not news?? WRONG, WRONG, WRONG!

This is sounding more and more like dirty politics. As was mentioned. Remember the debate tape that was sent to Gore??

Another article mentions that part of the deal was that he got to talk to the Kerry campaign. THAT is a major no-no and CBS set it up. Why did they do that? WHY did this guy wish possibly fishy documents want to be connected to the Kerry campaign???

Remember the Debate Tape?

The focus on that article was WRONG. The focus should have been on this guy requesting as part of the deal and THAT is fishy!

Let's see...
1) CBS released the Documents
2) White House didn't dispute them or the information contained in them.
3) If the information was WRONG, the WH would have said so.
4) White House passed out the same documents.
5) Right away people were claiming the documents were fake. (Not WH)
6) Sec. internviewed, states content is correct, documents fake.
7) Now everyone is confused over ALL the Bush documents. (public in general)
8) Bush campaign is claiming this is a Kerry dirty trick??
9) Article headlines stating the guy talked to the Kerry campaign, small mention that it was part of the DEAL and the show, etc was all ready "going" before the Kerry campaign had a clue. THIS actualy CLEARS the Kerry campaign.
10) Guy now says the memos were given to him by a guy after a women set up the met. She was a no show, but the guy was???

Sorry, this is smelling like a political dirty trick!

I think the media should run a story about the Debate Tapes that were sent to the Gore campaign in 2000. Then point out how this also is just as fishy. Then point out the people connected with this that are also connected with some other, well known political campaign dirty tricks.

Yes, Yes. I understand this takes away from other things. But those who are intrested in following and researching this, should DO IT. SOMEONE has got to work on this. Cause this is the kind of crap that "sticks." Freepers, etc.. don't talk issues. They talk gossip and BS. If WE don't do our footwork, their Bs is what will stick for a long time. Ignoring this stuff doesn't make it go away. They just keep repeating it, and repeating it. That is why the Bush White house jumped on the bandwagon wanting an investigation into this matter. For PR, to blacken Kerry! It's not going to go away, even if Kerry had nothing to do with it.

WE have already learned that the media isn't going to do real investigation. WE are going to have to do it for them. Including finding the link between this and the Bush campaign. Reporters could loose their jobs if they tried to spend time on THAT type of project. But we can, and give them the leads!

[bloom]

38. It's also fishy to me

how much CNN loves to talk about the memo story and insinuate that the content is false and the Dems are up to something, etc., etc.

[Turley]

48. I was with you right up to

<i>Then point out the people connected with this that are also connected with some other, well known political campaign dirty tricks.</i>

Who have we identified as being connected? Do we have names? Sorry, I'm getting my head beaten in on another forum and I need some ammo.

[goodboy]

45. Bush* needs to answer these questions himself.

Did he take the physical, and if not, why not?

Did he disobey a direct order?

Did he register with a guard unit in Mass?

If he has nothing to hide, then it oughta be easy for him to fully disclose everything in his military file.

[TryingToWarnYou]

46. Burkett lied already, so what makes you think he wont lie some more?

Fuck him. His credibility is shit and if they use anything gained from him, they deserve every bit of egg on their face.

I just hope the media ignores him until after the election. This crap we dont need.

[DoYouEverWonder]

47. Burkett got played by both Rove and CBS

Someone posted on another thread a statement from his lawyer.

CBS called Burkett, not the other way around. He did not want to give them the files but they kept pushing. They mislead him in a number of ways. When he finally turned over the files, he told them he didn't know they whether or not they were authentic and he told CBS to be sure they look into it before they used them. He did not have the resources to assure their authenticity.

Burkett is an honest man, who got in the middle of something that is much bigger than he is. I think Burkett is the one that got screwed by everyone.

Nice of Rove to destroy another Vet. Just another way Rove & CO like to show how much they support our troops and veterans.

[TryingToWarnYou]

52. Honest?

Honest men dont lie to get others "off their back". He ADMITTED that he misled CBS.

[peacetalksforall]

50. Weird connections...Ramirez (Roberto) with Stone

Credico recalls that Stone "mentioned Halloran's name," dumping on the inexperienced consultant, Roberto Ramirez, who Sharpton was then using. "They had a natural affinity," Sheinkopf said, "and agreed to continue talking."

http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0405/barrett.php

From Village Voice - in connection with their article on Stone helping Sharpton.

Timely coincidence though there are many Ramirez all over the country. Maybe either the famous Roberto Ramirez of New York or the
inexperienced consultant'named Ramirez (from above) have a wife named Lucy.