Posted on 09/09/2004 6:42:06 AM PDT by Sue Bob
The Globe story is itself based on last night's 60 Minutes report: "New questions on Bush Guard duty." The online version of the 60 Minutes story has links to the memos. Killian died in 1984; CBS states that it "consulted a handwriting analyst and document expert who believes the material is authentic." Reader Tom Mortensen writes:
Every single one of the memos to file regarding Bush's failure to attend a physical and meet other requirements is in a proportionally spaced font, probably Palatino or Times New Roman. In 1972 people used typewriters for this sort of thing (especially in the military), and typewriters used mono-spaced fonts.
The use of proportionally spaced fonts did not come into common use for office memos until the introduction high-end word processing systems from Xerox and Wang, and later of laser printers, word processing software, and personal computers. They were not widespread until the mid to late 90's.
Before then, you needed typesetting equipment, and that wasn't used for personal memos to file. Even the Wang and other systems that were dominant in the mid 80's used mono-spaced fonts. I doubt the TANG had typesetting or high-end 1st generation word processing systems.
I am saying these documents are forgeries, run through a copier for 15 generations to make them look old. This should be pursued aggressively.
(Excerpt) Read more at powerlineblog.com ...
The IBM Executive typewriter, available at that time, created documents with proportional spacing. The military had lots and lots of them.
I know this, because about the time these memos were supposed to have been written, I used an IBM Executive to typeset the body text for a small magazine I published at the time.
This argument won't fly.
Forward to Fox, Drudge, etc
The question is what type did KILLIAN use. Not you.
Dead wrong.
The Air National Guard WAS NOT a magazine, and the ANG used a different "style" of printing and wording in the "real" documents.
Example: These "forgeries" use superscripts for the 111th designation, but the real documents just type "111th" in plain letters.
These are perfectly typed, but have no clerks initials, nor filing numbers. Military doesn't do that.
The "memo" format is different, too.
The signatures are redically different. See the other thread for more differences.
Such an expensive "typesetting quality" typewriters wasn't used by any other "real" documents from Bush's records. Even for promotion letters, and letters on the ANG letterhead.
It is absolutely true that in the '70s, very very few, if any, office memos were composed on systems that could print proportional fonts.
NBI made some of the first systems, but those were very rare and high-end. They were NOT used for routine correspondence. They were used for creating documentation of high-value systems, and other low-volume/high-value documents.
This looks like a very promising smoking gun.
Bump.
The military and most of the government did not allow the use of anything other than a mono-spaced font, typically courier, for official documents and memos. It was that way the whole 20 years I was in and probably still is. One of the reasons for the limitation was OCR.
Whether the documents are a forgery is a waste of time. Even if they are, the media wing of the DNC will never print one word of the truth - they can't. The unguided nature of man is self-destruction and the MSM is leading the way.
I have a question, is falsifing Gov docs (no matter how old)a crime?
Oh man, I smell a smoking gun...
From selectric.org, here is a list of fonts:
10 Pitch Type Styles: Advocate, Bookface Academic 72, Delegate, Orator, Courier 72, Pica 72, Prestige Pica 72
12 Pitch Type Styles: Adjutant, Artisan 12, Courier 12 Italic, Scribe, Prestige Elite, Courier 12, Elite 72, Letter Gothic
Special Typing Applications: Light Italic, Script, Printing ANSI-OCR, Symbol 10, 108 OCR, Manifold 72, Symbol 12
I will confirm if this is an exhaustive list.
No, the question is - Is it possible that Killian used a typewritter with proportional spacing? And the answer is yes, no matter how you try to justify your head buried in the sand with respect to this issue.
The thing is 60 minutes claim they came from a personal file of the commander. So who knows what was in his personal file ... although it is interesting the use of proportional fonts.
Hey where is that Italian guy that the French government use to fake Niger documents????? Joe Wilson's buddy.
not to democrats
Doogle
Don't be so pessimistic. With the Internet there is a good chance the forger can be nailed.
Without getting into the superscripting and font argument, didn't the WH acknowledge they were legit?
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