Posted on 09/09/2004 3:47:33 PM PDT by GOPcapitalist
(scroll down to the bottom of the article for the update section):
UPDATE: NEW PROOF OF FORGERY
Following the Little Green Footballs blog lead, CB decided to test the pantograph replication technique on another of the CBS documents to see if it held true. Using Microsoft Word on its factory default settings with 12 point Times New Roman font we copied the address line of CBS memo #1 and overlapped the two for comparison.
As you can see the test worked and, in doing so, inadvertantly uncovered more proof that the document is a forgery. The new evidence revolves around the fact that Microsoft Word auto-formats its text using the centering function. When the text alignment for “center” is selected each subsequent line will be precisely centered underneath the previous one with each word of the text readjusting to meet this alignment as new letters are entered into the line. Since typewriters mechanically stamp letters onto a sheet of paper one at a time, it is physically impossible to create a mechanical typewriter document that perfectly aligns two or more centered rows of text on top of each other. The address bar on CBS Memo #1 is perfectly centered and perfectly aligned, thus it had to have come from a computer word processor and not a typewriter. The replication experiment in Microsoft Word with an identical match further validates this origin.
This whole story was planted to the media. I wouldn't be the least bit suprised if the Clintons did it to scuttle Kerrys campaign. It's just too coincidental that it broke right when Kerry replaced the campaign staff with Clinton hatchet men
My Gawd, Kenneth!! Do you hear the rumblings of the torch-bearing villagers? If you know the frequency you had better tell Dan soon!
Rather isn't going anywhere. The best we can hope for is that Bush sues him and CBS, et al.
John
Congressman Billybob
Latest column, "I'm Mad as Zell, and I'm Not Going to Take It Anymore."
If you haven't already joined the anti-CFR effort, please click here.
PING
"Zell Miller needs to barge into the CBS newsroom, grab Rather by the neck and shake his teeth out."
No, too crude. Dueling is the gentleman's way of settling matters of honor.
But there are half spaces in the example. Which meant the typist would have had to manually center the text. I remember spending hours doing it, but would a military man typing a memo to a personal file do it? I highly doubt it.
Finally got my old mentor on the phone, he doesn't remember using Times New Roman back then either but he did use similar fonts on mechanical typesetting machines. Did not think they would look anything like Times New Roman except to the untrained eye.
Thanks for the photo of the linotype machine. Big ugly mother, but for the times it was incredibly far advanced.
I worked in a shop where some of the type was set by hand, and I used to etch halftone photographs onto zinc, which would then be attached to wooden blocks using small nails.
As I recall, the typical zinc cut was 33 dots per inch, although a few presses could handle 65 dots per inch. When I was hand composing four color for pre-press, the smallest dpi (dots per inch) was 200 dpi, and I could just barely see that. I don't have the kind of visual acuity necessary to really do well below 200 dpi.
These days it's all done with computers.
Hmmm...
Having been an enlisted man in the Army, let me assure you that some very talented people found themselves doing jobs very much below their highest capabilities.
Military life is not always fair. Some people get too much work and others get too little. When you get too little, sometimes a superior supplies more. Sometimes you get dismissed early instead. It was an art being able to predict which would be the case.
A clerk-typist might either tell his superior that he had too little to do, or he might figure out ahead of time the exact spacing required to center the unit's letter head. Once the numbers had been worked out the first time there would be no need to do it again.
The observation above, however, that the memo exhibits "kerning", that is that letter spacing is a function of specific adjacent letters, is, as has been stated, beyond the capabilities of the equipment available at the time.
Listen, I was in the REAL U. S. Air Force in the early 1990's, and spent time (and have LOTS of documentation from) three bases in Air Force bases in Texas: Lackland, Laughlin and Randolph.
I have letters from squadron commanders, wing commanders, and base commanders. EVERY SINGLE DOCUMENT is either an Air Force form or on base/squadron letterhead. No one ever TYPES THE NAME AND ADDRESS OF THE SQUADRON on a letter or memo!!!! Not even in the the 1970's. Not even in the ANG. And there are no such thing as "unsigned" memos.
P.O. BOX
Any Freeper's out there serve who served in the air guard have a P.O. BOX as their squadron's address????
ALSO...
Every single piece of paper I have, form or letter, was done in a fix-spaced font...either courier or OCR or something arial like. I don't have anything in my collection of documents that uses a proportationally spaced Times Roman font...not from any Air Force Base I spent time at...not from any officer. And this is in the early 90's.
Some doc's I have were printed on the base's mainframe line printer, and it looks it...
These CBS documents are such incredibly obvious forgeries I'm shocked they even bothered to post them.
No doubt in my mind that the CBS idiots created these on their office PC's. Either that, or they came from Ragin' Cajun's word processor directly to Dan Rather. No self-respecting forger would pass something off that bad.
No, but my eight-grade typing teacher did. And, by the end of the semester, so did I.
(You simply count the spaces -- conclusive proof you've never used a typewriter.)
I think your logic was correct on this test but can you duplicate non-proportionally spaced and non-kerned type on a word processor?
I have in fact used a typewriter, though your post appears to evidence that you've never worked very much in the way of reading comprehension. It is indeed possible to reach an approximate center on a typewriter - even to the point that it is barely noticeable at the glance of an eye. It is NOT possible, however, to perfectly center three consecutive lines in block succession and have them match precisely with a computer-generated version of the same. To do so would be a freak coincidence with chances of happening somewhere in the one in a billion range.
The reason for this is simple and has been explained many times on this thread by myself and others. The mechanical method of centering a typewriter is substantially different from the algorithms used by a computer to center something. The mechanical method is based off of calculations made from the left side of the paper moving in a left to right direction whereas the more precise computer method is based around a central axis in the middle of the page with the text moving outward from it in two directions simultaneously. Hence the computerized centering will always line up precisely with the middle of the page and with all other computerized centerings of the same text in the same font and size (see the image). Mechanical centering will not because of imprecision that is inherent to even the most careful of centering methods.
Doubt me? Then let's try a little experiment, chief. Go pull out your typewriter and try to replicate the centered address block on the CBS memo. When you're done post it here. You can then compare it to the memo itself and the word processing version, both of which are in the image at the top of the page.
Another thing to think about. Lines 1 and 3 of the address have an even number of figures. Line 2 has an odd number, 15. If all it takes is counting the letters, care to explain why all three center perfectly?
You're right, of course. There in NO WAY IN HELL this is not a modern document. Those of us in the graphics biz, who studied typography.... can only chuckle at the amateurish effort here. I've created several fonts in Fontographer.
This appears to be an amazingly careless forgery... like the suicide note for Vince Foster that appeared and disappeared in one day.
From the same bumbling Democrat hands?
Pocket calculator was available in 1972. I remember looking at one in NYC, and wanting it, even though it was only a 4-function calculator. But $200.00 was more than two weeks pay at the time.
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