QandO

September 13, 2004

Quick Hits
Posted by Jon Henke

Items:

* If you want bloggers to write about a column, write a column about bloggers. In between attempting to discredit the mainstream media, there's nothing we bloggers like more than....attention from the mainstream media.

Alert bloggers who knew the difference between the product of old typewriters and new word processors immediately suspected a hoax: the "documents" presented by CBS News suggesting preferential treatment in Lt. George W. Bush's National Guard service have all the earmarks of forgeries.

Safire does make some good points here. In typical blogger fashion, I'm just going to skip straight to the relevant 'grafs....

The L.A. Times also checked out a handwriting analyst, Marcel Matley (of Vincent Foster suicide-note fame), who CBS had claimed vouched for the authenticity of four memos. It turns out he vouches for only one signature, and no scribbled initials, and has no opinion about the typography of any of the supposed memos.

The Dallas Morning News looked into the charge in one of the possible forgeries dated Aug. 18, 1973, that a commander of a Texas Air Guard squadron was trying to "sugar coat" Bush's service record. It found that the commander had retired from the Guard 18 months before that.
[...]
[The AP] consulted the document examiner Sandra Ramsey Lines of Paradise Valley, Ariz., and reported "she could testify in court that, beyond a reasonable doubt, her opinion was that the memos were written on a computer."

Serious allegations, and serious problems with those allegations. And Safire--albeit with professional civility--opens unambiguous fire on Dan Rather...

The Washington Post reported Dan Rather's response to questions about the documents' authenticity: "Until someone shows me definitive proof that they are not, I don't see any reason to carry on a conversation with the professional rumor mill" and questioned the critics' "motivation."
[...]
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.
[...]
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.

"Courage". The none-too-subtle message here is that the alternative to transparency in this case is cowardice.

Safire is right, I think. CBSNews is, after all, in the business of "journalism". News. Accuracy. (all snark aside, please; I'm not interested in debates about "liberal bias") At the end of the day, this is a classic debate. CBS has made an assertion, and it has been challenged. The ball is now in their court. They can either produce the evidence retract the story - back it up, or back off.

In the end, if these documents are legitimate, then an objective analysis by an expert panel can do nothing but confirm the documents accuracy, and CBS' reliability. If these documents are forgeries, then an objective analysis by an expert panel can do nothing but help CBS confirm the inaccuracy of those documents, though it would, perhaps, hurt CBS.

Why would a journalistic entity put anything above accuracy? And why would their reputation depend on not allowing an independent examination of their evidence?

"The story is true. The story is true" is not a credible defense. It is assertion, and should be treated with the contempt it deserves.

UPDATE: On the "write about bloggers, and bloggers will write about you" theme, everybody will be linking to this LA Times story. One part, in particular, stands out as utterly ridiculous....

Media experts said the role of the bloggers illustrated a significant development in the relationship between mainstream news and the still-nascent phenomenon of blogging.

This was the first time, some said, that the Web logs were engaging in their own form of investigative journalism — and readers, they warned, should be cautious.

But "the first time" that blogs have engaged in investigative journalism? Child, please. The blogosphere does that every day. Every. Damn. Day.

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* Beldar Blog--one of the most important blogs on this CBS issue--is taking a look at the new USA Today documents, and the discrepancies between them and the CBS documents. Take a look.
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* Patterico notes that the "Texans for Truth" spokesman, Bob Mintz, who claimed Bush was not in Alabama, because he hadn't seen him and "It would be impossible to be unseen in a unit of that size", has also said....

"I cannot say he was not there," Mintz said. "Absolutely positively was not there. I cannot say that. I cannot say he didn't do his duty."

* A Powerline Reader makes a very good point....

What do Brig. Gen. William Turnipseed, Capt. George M. Elliott, and now Dr. Phillip Bouffard all have in common? They were all misquoted in the Boston Globe.

What's more, there seems to be a pattern. The Globe quotes, the source objects, the MSM refers to it as a "recantation," the Globe stands by its story and claims to be relying on what the source "originally said." We have an identical situation with Sharon Bush (Kitty Kelley) and a similar set of circumstances with Maj. Gen. Bobby Hodges (CBS).

And in non-CBS-related news. (yes, there is some)

* Take this with a grain of salt or three, as it's not being reported elsewhere, but the Washington Times has an interesting report [apparently corroborated by Senator Ted Stevens and Rep. Curt Wheldon] of French military support for Iraq that went on until just a few months before the war, violating a whole bevy of UN sanctions.

New intelligence revealing how long France continued to supply and arm Saddam Hussein's regime infuriated U.S. officials as the nation prepared for military action against Iraq.

The intelligence reports showing French assistance to Saddam ongoing in the late winter of 2002 helped explain why France refused to deal harshly with Iraq and blocked U.S. moves at the United Nations.
[...]
The State Department confirmed intelligence indicating the French had given support to Iraq's military.

"U.N. sanctions prohibit the transfer to Iraq of arms and materiel of all types, including military aircraft and spare parts," State Department spokeswoman Jo-Anne Prokopowicz said. "We take illicit transfers to Iraq very seriously and work closely with our allies to prevent Iraq from acquiring sensitive equipment."

Sen. Ted Stevens, Alaska Republican and chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, declared that France's selling of military equipment to Iraq was "international treason" as well as a violation of a U.N. resolution.

* What kind of idiot is running the Bush/Cheney campaign in Florida?

State law sets a Sept. 1 deadline for the governor to certify a list of presidential electors for each party's candidates.

But Sept. 1 was also the day President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney were being nominated at their party' convention in New York. Consequently, some of their paperwork did not arrive at state elections headquarters until Sept. 2, a day after Gov. Jeb Bush certified the candidates for president.

* Captain Ed notes two witnesses to Bush's Alabama service. Well, one witness to his presence at the base in Montgomery, and one witness to his absence from the Blount campaign on those weekends...

The Decatur Daily (Alabama) published an interview this morning with former Air Force Sgt. James Copeland, who insists that he saw George W. Bush doing his required drills at Dannelly Air National Guard Base in Montgomery, AL during the period CBS and Democrats claim he was AWOL:

Copeland, who lives in Hartselle, retired from the Air Force on Jan. 31, 1980. He was the disbursement accounting supervisor, a full-time position, for Dannelly Air National Guard Base in Montgomery from Oct. 28, 1971, to Oct. 27, 1975. His office was less than 100 yards from the hangar where Bush performed drills.

[...] And the Decatur Daily, in a demonstration of actual investigative journalism that the spoiled brats at CBS could only envy, actually looked around for witnesses at the Winton Blount campaign to see if Bush missed any campaign events because of his National Guard duties. Bingo!

Joe Holcombe, 71, of Joppa worked with Bush on the Blount campaign. He told THE DAILY last week that he remembers Bush missing at least one campaign meeting because of his National Guard drills.

Oops. Sorry, guys, but that's gonna leave a mark.

UPDATE: Anybody else see Matt Lauer's interview with Kitty Kelly? Brutal. There was a palpable sense of disgust from Matt Lauer, for Kitty Kelly. Good for him.

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