Were the 60 Minute Memos Forgeries?

[suigeneris]

I finally lost track. In all the back and forth about whether the memos about Bush were forgeries how did it finally turn out? Unclear, right?

I followed the stuff about whether a typewriter could have credibly been used in 1972 or whatever it was to type them and I thought that it turned out that could have been true, right?

One huge problem I have is that there is such a blizzard of material on topics like this that it is hard to know you have heard and assimilated the last word.

I hope there is a section in the Demopedia for such things as I would love to have a solid reference for big controversies because they never seem to die.

[shraby]

1. There were such typewriters in that time period

The secretary who was interviewed said she didn't remember the memos, but the info on them was correct.
My take on it was they were genuine, but degraded from the copying. The person who actually made the memo was probably the officer himself.

[giant_robot]

2. More importantly

the secretary confirmed that the contents of the memo were generally accurate, and the administration never stated that the contents of the documents were untrue.

[suigeneris]

3. Right

So are there any bloggers or journos working this case or has it gone cold?

[cornermouse]

4. This is one of Rove's bigger victories.

The argument has been pretty much killed. I keep wondering what he's doing right now.

[bmovies]

9. I dont understand

how the secretary could not remember the memos, yet vouch for their accuracy at the same time. And as time has went on, some of the contents of the memos turned out to be false info.

http://www.blogicus.com/archives/staudt_speaks_out_memos_fake_not_accurate.php

Will try to return with more links after I get back from wor.

[papau]

10. CBS memo's did not contain "false info" - a fellow denied he kissed Bush

ass.

That does not make the memo info false.

Retired officers have influence after retirement - General Staudt - who pressured Killian - was only 18 months retired at time of memos.

The fact that Staudt insisted Bush did not use connections to avoid being sent to Vietnam - a known lie by Staudt - makes the rest of his statement - shall we say - suspect? :-)

[bmovies]

12. Just managed to find something before work....

Why wouldn't General Staudt deny he kissed Bush's ass. After all, how many Generals kiss the assses of Lieutenants (or whatever Bushs rank was) And retired Generals do not have official influence. Yeah, they can make a friendly call to their former friends still in the armed forces and ask "Hey, could you do me a favor and promote this guy? He's a friend of mine". But that sort of thing is not done on the official, OFFICIAL level. It's not a part of regulations.

Anyways found this:

http://freedomkeys.com/w-tangfacts.htm

and this:

"how do I prove this memo is a fake? Easy -- for the weekend that 1st Lt. Bush was supposedly ordered to report for his physical, May 13-14, 1972, the Ellington Air Guard Base was closed. It was Mother's Day. Except for emergencies, Air Guard units never drilled on Mother's Day; the divorce lawyers would be waiting at the gate."

If George Bush showed up at the clinic that weekend, he would have had to get the key from the gate guard.

The drill weekend for May 1972 was the following weekend, May 20-21. A survey of the pay and flight records of several of the Texas Air Guard members of that period shows no activity for May 13-14, but drill pay vouchers and flights for May 20-21. Guard flight physicals were normally conducted on the drill weekends, because that is the only time all the required clinic personnel were on hand to complete lab work and flight surgeon consultations mandated for aircrew. Does anyone think that Jerry Killian, squadron commander and one of the drill-schedule planners would not know on May 4 that the clinic was closed the next weekend?


http://cshink.com/2005/liberal_bias_caused.htm

Now you made go me take a shower. YEESH.

[papau]

13. The clinic was closed because of no drills? say what? - where did

this fellow do his time?

The clinic schedule may be of interest - but this bull shit is not "proof" of anything.

And granted Mothers Day tradition - he offers no proof of no drills.

And what the hell is a "drill" for a typist who needs to get time in.

PLUS -AND ACTUALLY OF INTEREST - THE RULES PERMITTED THE EXAM TO BE DONE OUTSIDE OF THE CLINIC STAFF WITH PERMISSION, AND THE EXAM COULD BE DONE ANYTIME AS LONG AS IT WAS BEFORE THAT DATE.

[Bridget Burke]

14. Do you have any links that are not Right Wing progaganda?

The secretary probably remembered Bush as one of the major screwups in that unit.

[bowens43]

5. They were never shown to be forgeries.

[Borgnine]

6. There's two ways it could go...

Rove either created forgeries of real memos to discredit the geniune information, or they were geniune memos and Rove did a bang-up job of casting so much doubt that Dan Rather himself is retiring.

Either way, Rove won with this.

[punpirate]

7. As others have mentioned...

... the issue still isn't resolved. As I recall, CBS's own experts on typeface and handwriting could not absolutely say the documents were genuine, but all of them said that was due to them being photocopies--they said, otherwise, they appeared to be genuine, which is why CBS ran with them.

The greatly unfortunate part of this whole matter is how Bill Burkett handled the supposed originals. It was clearly a mistake. Then, when CBS identified him, he was sure they were trying to destroy his credibility, and wanted to sue them, rather than helping them to find the mystery man and woman who supplied the docs.

It was cock-up right from the start. I think Burkett was simply too naive, and didn't realize the extent to which the Bushies would go to discredit anyone getting in their way.

[NVMojo]

8. remember that guy who was the former Lt. Governor of Texas who

did daddy bush a favor for his little boy back then to keep him out of Nam? He was set to break his full story the week the typewriter shit came out. Whatever happened to that??? Rove always blows smoke up America's ass to keep us from hearing the real news.

[Bridget Burke]

15. Ben Barnes appeared on the same show as the memos...

The controversy over the memos' provenance overshadowed his assertion that, yes, Bush Jr did have strings pulled to get a place in TANG. How convenient that the question devolved into abstruse discussions of office technology. (Yes, proportional spacing was available back then.)

Strings were pulled so Bush would never have to face danger. But he didn't even fulfill his limited obligation. There has never been any successful contradiction of these facts.

Where were Bush's buddies, reminiscing about protecting Texas (or Alabama) in the Guard?

[baldguy]

11. They were copies.

They weren't the original documents, but the content was accurate.