Was “60 Minutes” Relying on Forgeries?

The Boston Globe ran a story based on a 60 Minutes report that Bush was actually AWOL and that an officer was presures to “sugar coat” his evaluation for that year.

But could both places be relying on forged documents for their stories?

Power Line seems to think so, and they have pretty interesting evidence.

UPDATE: The Kerry Spot at the National Review Online is on this story, too. That post also has a link to one of the documents in question, so you can see it for yourself. You really ought to.

THE MOTHER OF ALL UPDATES: The blogosphere is working double-super overtime on this story. There’s blood in the water. Blogs everywhere are shaking the trees and interesting stuff is falling out everywhere.

First, Allah gives you the Grandmother of All Updated Roundups. Look here, then work your way up to here, here, and here. His biggest news is that at least two New York daily newspapers are all over this story, complete with forensic experts. Would you be shocked that neither of them are the New York Times?

Second, go to the Big Kahunas of this story, PowerLine. Hit their link, which has at least ten good updates, at the top of my post. Then go here to get some “end of the day” information about a possible invesitgation at CBS News. The guys there have done yeoman’s work and broke the story (as I noted this morning). Since then, it’s gotten simply huge, and, as other have noted, may well mark the day that the blogosphere showed itself capable of serious investigative journalism in a way that couldn’t be dismissed out of hand.

And speaking of investigative journalism, you must read this post by Bill of INDC Journal. Bill put on his reporter’s hat and actually put the documents before a forensic document examiner. The expert’s verdict is “… he’s pretty certain that it’s a fake”. He puts his certainty as 90 percent. If you don’t read any other reports about this incident, this is the one you have to read. This is the stake in the heart of the story, I believe.

Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs did some computer typesetting of his own, and reproduced the documents exactly. Is “exactly” the level of certainty I want to use? Look here and here and judge for yourself (and you can read Johnson’s graphics bona fides here).

And now let’s hear from Doubter’s Corner. Joshua Micah (Insert Middle Middle Name Here) Marshall says that “Something in all this doesn’t fit”. No, it appears not. But he seems to be thrown a bit by the apparent acceptance of the memos by the White House (which doens’t seem like such a ringing endorsement if you read down his posts a bit, does it?).

Atrios, after six posts squawking the story to High Heaven can only say:

I’d have a good laugh too if Dan Rather got punk’d, but the wingnuttery belief that the proportional fonts were Bill Gates’s invention is hilarious.

But, in any case, CBS more than stands by their case.

Kevin Drum appears to be the most honest (in the sense of at least acknowledging that the evidence is persuasive to a reasonable person) notes that Killian’s widow denies the accuracy of the documents and says:

In other words, things are still up in the air. At this point, there are enough legitimate questions about these memos that I really think CBS is going to have to provide additional information if they want them to be taken seriously.

I hope his site starts moving quicker soon. I’m interested in reading his more in-depth thoughts on this.

Last, but far from least we get to Oliver “Drinking All the Kool Aid” Willis. What’s his take?

I think the right is trying to muddy the waters here, big time.

If by “muddy” you mean, “try to get to the facts of the story” then yeah, that’s just what they’re trying to do.

No related posts.

Category: President George Bush