“Forged” Documents Update

Jeez, this story is taking on a life of its own. A few things that should be reiterated :

  • There were typewriters available in the early 70’s that could type in the fonts and spacing of the CBS documents.
  • The White House may have just released documents that CBS provided, but it doesn’t change the fact that they have not questioned the credibility of those documents. Only the interpretation of the documents.
  • Considering that the White House was provided the documents prior to the broadcast, I’m sure they made a phone call to whomever is in charge of the records in question and ensured their authenticity. That’s the very least they would have done prior to releasing the documents themselves. More likely than not, they’re digging through the files that these documents came from for something that discredits Killian or makes Bush look good.
  • Using modern technology (ie MS Word) to replicate an old document isn’t that remarkable. Word processing programs were designed specifically to mimic typewriters.

    Finally, since there seems to be so much certainty that there’s no way anyone would have been using proportional fonts in 1972, let me point you to a portion of this document from a tobacco company, dated July 6th 1972, next to a similar portion of the Bush document in the post below :


    prop-font.gif

    There’s more documents to use as a comparison here. While the fonts may not be identical, the fact that the tobacco memo also contains proportional spacing should put to rest the myth that the lack of a monospaced font somehow proves that CBS is guilty of forging documents.

    UPDATE : Is there a kerning problem with the documents? Here’s what one commenter says :

    The final word on this: kerning. No typewriter can do it.

    Check out the word “November” in your sample. Note how that is one word that does match up in your overlay. Also note the kerning. Note how the “v” overlaps the preceding “o” and the following “e”. This is something that word processors do, and typewriters cannot.

    Here’s a closeup of the example cited :


    kerning.gif

    I don’t see any overlap there. Do you?

    While on the subject of things that typewriters can and can’t do, I recommend checking out the user manual for the IBM Selectric Composer. Even though it came out in 1966, it had the ability to justify text, change font sizes, and print special characters. Glancing at the document, it seems that the default font size is 12 points (1 pica) and the default font is “Press Roman”. The similarity between this and the defaults for MS Word should be kept in mind. Just because you easily can replicate something that was typed thirty years ago with modern technology doesn’t prove that the documents were forged.

    Also, Josh Marshall has pretty much debunked that whole “Superscript” nonsense. It would be one thing if the Superscript in question was something odd, but it wasn’t that unusual for some typewriters to have a special character for something as common as TH or ¢.


    • posted by greg on September 9, 2004 @ 4:12 pm

    13 comments

    1. Um, modern typography is much better then what you’re showing with that tobacco image. The proportional typewriters in those days had 1-3 spacings for a letter, modern computers can do fractions of a pixel, kerning, etc. In the disputed document, every letter seems to be a different width, and there is some evidence of kerning in the text.

      Its quite possible that you could produce such a document in 1972, but I’m quite skeptical that someone would have done so in 1972 for a routine memo.

      So you’re trivializing a pretty complicated issue. Its not just the monospaced vs. proportional, its also the use of of superscripts in the may 4th letter and the 18th of August memo.

      And Staudt had retired by August 1973…

      More I look into this, the more I think that CBS got conned.

      Killian’s son is skeptical, too.

      http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/politics/9622425.htm

      Comment by Opinionated Bastard — September 9, 2004 @ 4:39 pm

    2. I think you’re doing a great job of dealing with the forgery issue, except for one mistake. It’s one I’ve seen repeated on several message boards today, too–that a program like MS Word is designed to produce output like a typewriter’s. It isn’t. It’s trying to produce output like a typesetting machine. The two produce drastically different output. I’m old enough to have learned how to type on a Selectric II, and I turned in more than a few term papers done on some version of a manual or electric typewriter.

      If a student turned in a term paper now that was typed on a Selectric, it would be quite obvious, and it would look terrible too.

      Now, that doesn’t rule out the possibility that those memos were done on an IBM Executive or similar machine, which could do proportional fonts etc, but it seems unlikely. A secretary may have taken the memos as dictation, but the very secretive nature of the last “memo to file” makes that scenario quite unlikely too.

      I wish there were no such controversy. There’s already enough evidence to show beyond doubt that Bush shirked his last year of Guard duty. The appearance of these memos doesn’t really help, and has the potential to hurt the Kerry campaign tremendously, even though they aren’t even involved with the claims.

      Cheers, keep up the good work.

      Comment by A Kerry Supporter — September 9, 2004 @ 5:39 pm

    3. As an european weasel I find the whole typewriter discussion very strange. Kerry went to Vietnam, Bush didn’t. So far there is not much ‘prove’ that Bush was very much into soldiering and progressing democracy in America, Kerry started this pretty young after his war experience. I guess true warriors don’t count in the US (like John McCain and John Kerry) – but fake ones (Arnold and W. Bush) do.

      Comment by orangeguru — September 9, 2004 @ 6:18 pm

    4. There is no kerning in Word. None. Word has never kerned type, nor has WordPerfect or any other word processor. You can can try it for yourself: type ‘To’ in Word and raise the size to, say, 72 point. If Word did any kerning, the ‘o’ would be tucked slightly under the T. Not all fonts contain kerning pairs, but Times New Roman does. I just cracked it open in a font editor, and it has, in fact, 867 kerning pairs, of which ‘To’ is one.

      Page layout programs like PageMaker and Quark kern, but not Word. Folks that say they see ‘kerning’ in the original document and that means it’s from Word are smoking bad crack.

      Comment by Don Munsil — September 9, 2004 @ 8:54 pm

    5. Here’s a link to some type from an IBM Executive, and it looks remarkably like the type in the documents:

      http://www.microsparc.com/news.htm

      The ad on the right was done with an IBM Executive.

      In addition, the IBM Executive typewriter typeface was created by Monotype, who also created (you guessed it) Times New Roman.

      There were a lot of models of Executive over the years, and they were pretty popular. I certainly remember seeing them – they had a distinctive split space bar.

      See my comment in the other thread for more.

      Comment by Don Munsil — September 9, 2004 @ 9:01 pm

    6. As for the kerning issue, look at the CYA in the 1973 memo. It very clearly is not kerned.

      Comment by Keith — September 9, 2004 @ 9:39 pm

    7. Just look on the records that Bush has released to see if the disputed small “th” is present. Like this one.

      Line 2 clearly has the small “th” in question. This can again be seen here on page 3 (pdf) of the same document by increasing the magnification.

      Cheers.

      Comment by Robert McClelland — September 9, 2004 @ 9:56 pm

    8. I’m glad you guys were here to clear everything up. I guess Nightline, the Washington Post and the NY Times are all part of the vast rightwing conspiracy after all.

      And (retired) general Staudt must be really persuasive, to pressure Killian from the golf course like that.

      Although I am surprised that Lt Col Killian could call a flight readiness review over the issue of Bush’s foreign language proficiency pay (IAW, or in accordance with, AFM 35-13).

      You gotta know when to hold em…

      Comment by Tom — September 9, 2004 @ 10:20 pm

    9. I’m not convinced one way or the other, but the appearance of “kerning” in the Bush document is partly due to the fact that the ink smudged – it is definitely an illusion.

      RE:

      Its quite possible that you could produce such a document in 1972, but I’m quite skeptical that someone would have done so in 1972 for a routine memo.

      I’m guessing Killian tended to write longhand and have a secretary type it up.

      Comment by Misplaced Patriot — September 10, 2004 @ 4:29 am

    10. Hey Don, I loved your posts earlier (I actually sent them to my liberal boss). But MS Word can “kern”, although it is not the default option. I think it’s under format/font.

      Comment by check — September 10, 2004 @ 6:07 pm

    11. Yeah, I made a mistake on the kerning in Word, as I mentioned in the earlier thread (Grasping at Straws). When I was active in typography, Word couldn’t kern. Apparently they’ve added that feature, but it’s turned off by default.

      More to the point, the documents CBS provided show no evidence of kerning, and the Word doc that Little Green Footballs put together does not have kerning turned on. Moreover, the features they point out as evidence of “kerning” are not kerning at all, and are features that an IBM Executive could do.

      It’s still not clear at all that an IBM Executive with the appropriate typeface could make these memos. On the other hand, it’s not at all clear that one couldn’t. To my eye, several of the type samples folks have found from the Executive look remarkably close to the CBS memos.

      Now, the guy who runs INDC blog says he’s talked to a type expert who has a database of type styles, and he says that the expert says none of the Executive fonts is a match. That’s a little bit third-hand to me. I’d want to know why they don’t match. I certainly don’t think that Times New Roman matches perfectly, based on the letterforms.

      Just for grins, I typed the phrase that appears in the type sample in this ad:

      http://www.etypewriters.com/1953-a-exec-3.JPG

      “IBM Bold Face Type is a strong
      straightforward type, distinctly
      masculine in character.”

      Paste that into Word and set it to Times Bold. Amazing resemblance, no? And the lines break exactly the same! If you set the type to Book Antiqua (Palatino) or Bookman Old Style, the lines don’t break the same.

      That must mean that IBM ad is a forgery, as no typewriter could have produced type like that in 1953! Right? Right?

      Comment by Don Munsil — September 10, 2004 @ 9:36 pm

    12. Tom, AFM 35-13 wasn’t being cited to require “foreign language proficiency”.

      Here’s a PDF of three pages from AFM 35-13, vintage 1971.

      Now you can see what’s being cited as authority in

      (1) the CBS/Killian memo of 1 August 1972 (whose authenticity is being disputed),

      and also in

      (2) Major General Greenlief’s order of 29 September 1972 (whose authenticity has not been disputed) ? which confirms “verbal orders of the Comdr on 1 Aug 72 suspending 1STLT GEORGE W BUSH… from flying status”.

      AFM 35-13’s Paragraph 2-29m, titled “When a Rated Officer Fails To Accomplish a Medical Examination Prescribed by AFM 160-1“, states:

      All rated officers on flying status must accomplish a medical examination annually or biannually (flight surgeons) as prescribed by AFM 160-1. Failure to accomplish a required medical examination disqualifies the officer for flying duty and he will be suspended effective the first day of the month following his birthmonth, citing this paragraph as authority.

      (The next block of text discusses investigating “why the individual failed to accomplish the medical examination”, and convening a board on the matter.)

      Greenlief’s order accordingly cites “Authority: Para 2-29m, AFM 35-13.”

      George W. Bush was born on 6 July 1946. The verbal order suspending him was issued “the first day of the month following his birthmonth”, 1 August 1972, according to that undisputed document in Bush’s official military records.

      The CBS/Killian memo dated 1 August 1972 is stating just what the undisputed record already shows:

      1. On this date I ordered that 1st Lt. Bush be suspended from flight status due to failure to perform to USAF/TexANG standards and failure to meet annual physical examination (flight) as ordered.

      2. I conveyed my verbal orders to commander, 147th Ftr Intrcp Gp with request for orders for suspension and convening of a flight review board IAW AFM 35-13.

      Now we can see that this was indeed IAW (in accordance with) AFM 35-13.

      Comment by Raven — September 27, 2004 @ 3:07 am

    13. Documents fake, Rather lied.

      End of Story

      Comment by Angel Elf — September 30, 2004 @ 6:35 pm

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