CNN: CBS' experts say they didn't authenticate Bush memos (Wed, 9/15/04)

[IndianaGreen]

CNN's Jeanne Meserve, Dana Bash, Suzanne Malveaux, Peter Ornstein, Sarah Irwin and Ted Barrett contributed to this report.

CBS' experts say they didn't authenticate Bush memos
Wednesday, September 15, 2004 Posted: 3:44 AM EDT (0744 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Three document experts who were asked by CBS News to examine memos alleging that President Bush received special treatment during his service in the Texas Air National Guard told CNN Tuesday that they did not authenticate the documents -- and one said the network "ignored" her reservations about them before a "60 Minutes" broadcast last week.

Emily Will, a document examiner in North Carolina who said she examined two of the documents for CBS News prior to the broadcast, said she "had serious questions" about their authenticity, although she did not reach a definitive conclusion about whether they were fabrications.

Will told CNN she had concerns about signatures on the documents, as well as the type of the text and the content. She told ABC News that she questioned whether the memos could have been produced by a typewriter and found "five significant differences" in the questioned handwriting.

While Will told CNN that she did not advise the network to spike the story, she said she did tell CBS News that "if you run this on Wednesday, on Thursday you are going to have 100 document examiners asking you these questions."

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/09/15/bush.guard.memos/index.html

[ibegurpard]

1. Hmmmm...CNN vs. CBS

Who to listen to?

[TheDebbieDee]

2. And why would this story break at 3:20am????????????

HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhmmmmmmmmmm

[the Kelly Gang]

3. well she was wrong about the typewriter..so just what is she on

about here..?

[aquart]

6. She's wrong about the handwriting, too.

[roguevalley]

4. smoke and mirrors. nothing more. :)

[IndianaGreen]

5. Rather and CBS threw down the gauntlet when they circled the wagons

What you are going to see in the next couple of days is the rest of the mainstream media reporting on their own investigation of CBS's documents, affectionately being referred to as "Memogate" by the 24/7 cable news channels. It is not just the rightwing now!

ABC News yesterday:

Casting Further Doubt
Document Analysts: CBS News Ignored Concerns About Disputed Bush Military Records

By Brian Ross

Sept. 14, 2004 — Two of the document experts hired by CBS News say the network ignored concerns they raised prior to the broadcast of a report citing documents that questioned George W. Bush's service in the National Guard during the Vietnam War.

The authenticity of the documents in the report by CBS News' 60 Minutes II has been widely questioned. The documents were allegedly written by Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, who died in 1984.

Emily Will, a veteran document examiner from North Carolina, told ABC News she saw problems right away with the one document CBS hired her to check the weekend before the broadcast.

"I found five significant differences in the questioned handwriting, and I found problems with the printing itself as to whether it could have been produced by a typewriter," she said.

Will says she sent the CBS producer an e-mail message about her concerns and strongly urged the network the night before the broadcast not to use the documents.

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/WNT/Investigation/bush_guard_documents_040914-1.html

[TomClash]

9. ABC News is the right wing

[freeplessinseattle]

28. yep, they're the one station

here that has a policy against showing protestors' signs on tv, don't want to help them you know. facist media.

[wildeyed]

25. I have not been following this story all that closely.

So I have some basic questions that have probably already been covered in other threads.

1. Who is supposedly responsible for the alleged forgeries? I see all this speculation about forgery, but none on the identity of the forger.

2. Are the alleged forgers complete dumbasses? You would have to be to try to forge 70's era documents on a computer. Even I would have gone out and bought a 70's era typewriter on ebay and some original paper stock. And I am no forger, this is just common sense.

My thought, probably not all that original, is this forgery nonsense is a RW ploy to take the spotlight off of the President's less than sterling behavior 30 years ago while we debate raise th's and arcane military language instead.

Hey you stupid media whores, you are getting played again. Wake up!

[Uroboros]

10. Agreed

The more you read this right-wing nonsense; the more you have to come to the conclusion these documents are real.

All this time and no one has actually proving these things to be fake. This Emily Will claims that she "found five significant differences in the questioned handwriting" and "found problems with the printing itself as to whether it could have been produced by a typewriter,"

But no where in the article does she mention any specifics. What? No one bothered to ask her what these difference that she claims to have found were?

And she mentions handwriting; by which I assume she means the signatures (since the damn things were typed). If so then her opinion doesn't agree with Marcel Matley who says "Lt. Col. Jerry Killian's signatures on the documents in question were from the same source."

And Linda James place in all this is to make the statement that the documents were "very poor quality," which she found surprising given "what they were about ... and who it was concerning."

WOW! What insight!.

If this is all they got..then it truly is smoke and mirrors.

[RivetJoint]

12. Even the CONTENT

of some of the memos is bogus. This doesn't add up at all.

[reprobate]

23. Thre media is helping the bushies now. prepare for four more.

There were two articles and a column in todays Orlando Slantinel. All explained the rights spin without mentioning the fact that typewriters in that time had the dapability to do proportional spacing, and that the type on the docs matched the type on other docs from that office at the time.

The bushies now own all four branches of gov't . Executive, legislative, judicial, and fourth estate. The media was meant by the founding fathers to be another check on the powers of the gov't and it has completetly failed in that job in orde to be just a mouthpiece of the administration.

The republican party has become a criminal enterprize and the democrat party is once again in disarray.

If the bushies steal four more like last time, any hope for the United States will be lost. By the end of his next term we will be a third world country. Byt that's all right. Money is fungible and we can live anywhere. I prefer canada, but the wife like costa rica. In any case, we plan to return to participate in the revolution. And the revolution is the one thing we can count on if they get four more.

[mac56]

34. Well, there we go. May as well just give up then,

Puh-leeze.

:eyes:

[oldtime dfl_er]

42. I tend to agree

with you, and the SO and I are considering New Zealand and Canada. I think Kitty Kelley's Salon interview was what really bothered me....her saying "but he doesn't plan to lose" and the ensuing explanation was very chilling. Very chilling. I have not lost hope, though, and will continue to fight, make phone calls, write emails, knock on doors, send letters, right up until nov 2.

[Turley]

7. CBS has been had

It only remains to track it back to Karl Rove.

[gonefishing]

8. And his plan would have worked brilliantly if..

only for that darn IBM Selectric Composer typewriter.

[lostnfound]

14. It would make no sense for Rove to drag this issue up for intense scrutiny

He's capable of almost anything, but this would have been high-risk -- just to damage CBS? Scrutiny of AWOL really hurts Rove.

[Eloriel]

29. Yeah, it's hurt Bush so much so far, this "scrutiny"

The whole discussion is about the damned memos, not the underlying facts.

If these documents do turn out to be bogus, Rove is exactly who I'll suspect. Here's why. Rove revealed Bush's cocaine use to author James Hatfield (now dead, supposedly by suicide -- "Fortunate Son" is the book) but gave him one wrong "fact." Not only that, Rove had some fairly damaging personal info about Hatfield. When the book was about to be released by St. Martins (already printed), Hatfield was mercilessly discredited due to these two things, his personal history and that wrong "fact" from Rove. St. Martin's destroyed the books before distributing them. And, as I said, James Hatfield sometime later turned up dead. (The book was subsequently published by Soft Skull Press, I think it's called. It has a website.)

[Artemis Bunyon]

30. But it does! Bush's desertion and "priviledged" dispensation are now...

...reduced to a single talking point, hammered on incessantly by their co-conspirators and hired guns in the conservative movement media: "The documents were fake! The documents were fake! The documents were fake! The documents were fake!"

This dovetails perfectly into the conservative movement's pre-existing talking points, such as "the media is liberal!" and "conservatives are victims!" and "liberals hate and lie!"

By the end of this, where the story USED to be "Bush is a freeloading son of priviledge who had strings pulled to get into the guard, then didn't even come close to fulfilling his obligations, the story is now, Liberals are dirty cheating haters who will stop at nothing to gain control of the nation to enact their filthy perverted agenda.

It's a brilliant way for Rove to defuse his candidate's weakest point: by attaching them to another, more minor, but more IMMEDIATE scandal. Remember what he allegedly did in 1999? James Hatfield? Revealing the cocaine arrest? Then destroying Hatfield? First mass book-burning of a single author in the USA since Wilhelm Reich.

[Mountainman]

11. I often wonder how much threats by the BFEE play into this.

So often there is a story that is not favorable to Bush and a few days afterword, the story is refuted by the source of the information.

Kitty Kelley said that Sharon Bush was told she could be found in a dark alley some day. I think Kelley said that Bush 41, being the head of the CIA, could have people willing to make these threats.

My feeling is that Bush is a sock puppet and there is great pressure to keep the public believing that he is a legitimate public figure rather than some alcoholic, drug abusing buffoon being used as a place holder for some powerful group.

[Beam Me Up]

22. I'm with you Mountainman: *'s pResidency is PROOF of a real Conspiracy

Evidence abounds on many fronts but PROOF is the fact that this "alcoholic, drug abusing buffoon" is not only IN the White House but KEPT THERE by arm twisting and media slight of hand. W's administration is PROOF that our Democratic checks and ballances no longer work and that the media is OWNED by "the National Security State."

In fact, I've come to believe that part of the reason *Bush exists at all is to act as a FOCUS for our hostility, deflecting attention away from the REAL powers that be.

[Karmadillo]

13. And this gets buried: Bush missed physical; went to Alabama w/o paperwork

From page 3 of the ABC link above:

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/WNT/Investigation/bush_guard_documents_040914-3.html

<edit>

Killian's former secretary, Marian Carr Knox, told ABC News she believes the documents are fake, but that they do reflect some of what her former boss thought of then-Lt. George W. Bush.

"He did have complaints about Bush. Bush missed his physical and went off to Alabama with none of the paperwork, I remember Killian talking about that," Knox said. "But it wasn't in memo file."

[Media_Lies_Daily]

15. CNN = NeoCon shill. Very weak attempt to discredit - try again.

[MallRat]

16. CBS never said that Matley vouched for the DOCUMENTS, just SIGNATURES!

:wtf: is everyone's problem here? The Matley angle is a real non-story.

-MR

[CookieD]

17. OMG! Tom DeLay is demanding Rather reveal his source

Why isn't he demanding Robert Novak reveal his source for the CIA leak? (I know, stupid question.) Ok, why aren't reporters "hammering" DeLay on this inconsistency?

Sorry but I think you know how I feel about that jerk DeLay ...

[Yuna]

37. Part of me fears

the source might be an anonymous long distance call from Rove using a voice synthesizer.

[rocktivity]

18. First they said there was "no way" they could have been typed

Which turned out to be completely wrong. Now I'm supposed to take stock in their "doubts"? It's a weapon of mass distraction to divert attention away from the indisuptable facts that Bush ignored orders, avoided a physical, lied about serving in the Air Force (he was trained there), and wore medals he didn't earn.

:headbang:
rocknation

[Rockholm]

19. I think what is being overlooked is what Barnes said.

He verballed confirmed what he did regarding getting bush into the National Guard. Why is this falling under the radar. Memos, schmemos. Divert, divert, divert your attention.

[skypilot]

20. Barnes who???

Thanks for posting this. I posted the same thing last week but no one seemed to take any notice. Everyone has forgotten that what got this whole ball rolling was Barnes saying that he'd pulled strings to get Bush into the National Guard. People are talking about memos and typewriters as though that's the crux of the matter.

[GoldenOldie]

21. CNN Devotes 6-reporters??????

To verify 2-memo's, yet they fail to expend any time or attention on George W. Bush's actual ANG service. Why are they not demanding his ANG records. If this doesn't throw the floodlights on the media blackout when it comes to Georege W. Bush I don't know what will.

I am thinking there is a whole lotta truth in Kitty Kelly's book....the Bush family is even more ruthless than we can imagine and their tentacles are both far and wide.

[reprobate]

26. "I don't know what will" That's the point. Nothing will.

The american people are, by and large, characterized by a lack of education, inability at critical thinking, and able to be led with lies and half truths, without the ability to see thru the lies.

Some say that we get the gov't we deserve. I believe it. Wasn't it Franklin who said "The price of liberty is eternal vigilence"? If true we have *not* paid the price and will lose our liberties.

The only thing certain in my mind is that there will be a Second American Revolution. It will happen when most people have to decide between prescription drugs and paying the rent. When the cost of health insurance exceeds their paycheck. When the rights of workers are negated by executive order. Wherever I may be in the world at the time, I pledge to return to participate in the revolution.

[reprobate]

24. That's the way this bunch of criminals works.

First you start with a lie, not about the matter itself but about some fine point involved with the matter. Then you get the media to trumpet over and over the lie. Pretty soon it's assumed that the whole thing was a lie to begin with and bush once again skates past another truth that should have destroyed him, but in fact makes the dems look bad and him look like the wronged innocent.

[Wolfetone]

27. Barnes wasn't Lt Governor until 1969

Bush was inducted into the Guard in May of 1968.

"I got a young man named George W. Bush into the National Guard when I was lieutenant governor of Texas, and I'm not necessarily proud of that, but I did it," Barnes said. Barnes actually was Texas House speaker when Bush entered the Guard.

It looks like Ben is a liar or he had a different job when he pulled the strings.

http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/ref/abouttx/ltgov.html
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/030411.html

[Raster]

31. don't start that bullshit. That point has been debunked.

Why are you repeating it?

[Wolfetone]

32. Obviously Georgie pulled strings to get into the national

guard, but it Barnes couldn't have done it when he was Lt Governor or am I missing something here. Please educate me.

[Judi Lynn]

41. Occassionally someone still tries to post this, apparently unaware

Du'ers almost unanimously read a lot. There's been a LOT of references here already to Barnes' being Speaker of the House in Texas during the time in question, so DU'ers aren't in the dark about it, and won't likely be fooled:

The clash over Bush's service was fully ignited when Barnes, a former Texas lieutenant governor, said for the first time on "60 Minutes" that the Bush family had sought his help, through a family friend, to secure a spot in the Texas air guard.

At the time, Bush's father, former President George H.W. Bush, was a congressman representing Houston. Bush had just graduated from Yale University and could have become eligible for the draft.

Barnes said he was approached by Sidney Adger, a wealthy Texas oilman and friend of the senior Bush, who asked on behalf of the Bush family for help in obtaining a pilot's position in the Texas Air National Guard.

"He said basically, would I help young George Bush get into the Air National Guard," Barnes said in the interview with CBS's Dan Rather.

Barnes said he called Brig. Gen. James Rose, the head of the Texas Air National Guard, to discuss Bush's application. He said he used his clout as House speaker to make sure Bush and many other well-connected young men got positions in the guard.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/09/09/MNGKE8LUFG1.DTL


Source: Mo Paul

[Wolfetone]

44. thank you

I had read the claim that he said he was Lt Gov when he helped bush. I verified that he was not the Lt Gov at the time, but it was stupid of me not to verify the quote.

[Red State Rebel]

33. CBS is supposed to make an announcement on all of this at noon

Eastern time I believe. I wonder if they are changing their tune on backing these documents??

[Snellius]

35. Knox's statement to the NY Times suggests docs may be real

HOUSTON, Sept. 14 - The secretary for the squadron commander purported to be the author of now-disputed memorandums questioning President Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard said Tuesday that she never typed the documents and believed that they are fakes.

But she also said they accurately reflect the thoughts of the commander, Lt. Col. Jerry B. Killian, and other memorandums she typed for him about Mr. Bush. "The information in them is correct," the woman, Marian Carr Knox, now 86, said in an interview at her home here. "But I doubt,'' she said, pausing, "it's not anything that I wrote because there are terms in there that are not used by Guards, the format wasn't the way we did it. It looks like someone may have read the originals and put that together."

"We did discuss Bush's conduct and it was a problem Killian was concerned about," Mrs. Knox said. "I think he was writing the memos so there would be some record that he was aware of what was going on and what he had done." But, she said, words like "billets," which appear in the memorandums, were not standard Guard terms.

Mrs. Knox, who was the secretary for the squadron at Ellington Air Force Base from 1957 to 1979, said she recalled Mr. Bush's case and the criticism of him because his record was so unusual. Mr. Killian had her type memorandums recording the problems, she said, and he kept them in a private file under lock and key. She said she had never voted for Mr. Bush because she disliked his record in office.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/15/politics/campaign/15g...

[Yuna]

36. Roves work

If this is Roves work you've got to hand it to him as being genious. He needed the AWOL claims to appear false, and he may have managed to do it by of all things producing documents that would seem to prove the very claims he wanted disproved. Makes you wonder what else he has cooked up.

[wishlist]

38. CBS new article today- Killian had secret locked backup file per secretary

CBS still defending their story and debunking ABC and other media allegations disputing CBS. CBS believes Killian's secretary actually helps their case since she does not dispute contents of memo about babyBush's problematic service and mentions Killian had a private locked backup file of memos 'to cover his back' and that she doesn't know what happened to that file when he died in 1984:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/09/06/politics/main641481.shtml

[Snellius]

43. Bingo. How could someone forge a doc from a "secret" file

Far from exonerating Bu**sh**, Knox's statement is actually extremely damning. She directly testifies that such docs did exist, why they were written, that she actually typed similar ones, and where they were secretly stored in a secret file which Killian daughter said did not exist. They're trying to label her as a partisan "Bush-basher". But if she was so anti-Bush, why did she deny so emphatically they were not genuine. All she can testify to is that she did not type them.

[Donkeyboy75]

39. CIA experts say they didn't authenticate Niger/uranium memos.

Doesn't change the fact Bush used them in is SOTU address.

[wishlist]

40. ABC news just said that Killian's secretary confirms accuracy of contents

ABC noonday news on my local news channel made it absolutely clear that Killian's secretary confirmed the accuracy of the contents of the Killian memos but of course they are still hammering about the forgery allegations to distract from the main issues.

[mmonk]

45. Ask them to authenticate

the forged Niger documents or find another profession. If they are news(CNN), I'm Mickey Mouse.

[Raster]

46. CNN: Conservative News Network

We outfox Fox. 'nuff said.

When Ted Turner left, so did the credibility.