SilverNRed Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 OK, things that happened 30+ years ago aren't too relevant to right now. But forging documents in 2004 - that's relevant. '60 Minutes' Documents on Bush Might Be Fake The experts also raised questions about the military's typewriter technology three decades ago. Collins said word processors that could produce proportional-sized fonts cost upwards of $20,000 at the time. "I'm not real sure that you would have that kind of sophistication in the office of a flight inspector in the United States government," Showker said. "The only thing it could be, possibly, is an IBM golf ball typewriter, which came out around the early to middle 1970s," Haley said. "Those did have proportional fonts on them. But they weren't widely used." But Haley added that the use of the superscript "th" cast doubt on the use of any typewriter. "There weren't any typewriters that did that," Haley said. "That looks like it might be a function of something like Microsoft Word, which does that automatically." Take it with the appropriate grain of salt. Nothing about the mainstream media surprises me anymore, especially 60 Minutes, so who knows? I almost don't want the documents to be forged just so that I can have the piece of mind of knowing that CBS wouldn't use forged documents to attack the President. EDIT: There should be a question mark in the Thread title. It should read "Forged Documents?" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 Before you all go careening off the cliff with the rest of the lemmings, please tell me why the White House is not disputing the authenticity of the records. And while you are at it please explain this comment. I'm afraid the Post 47 at Free Republic is not compelling. By 1969, I was using an IBM Selectric typewriter, with proportional type balls. They were widely available in the public sector-and thus readily available to the military. I do not recall having used a Palatine typeface, but Times Roman was certainly common. While I do think the entire argument about "Bush/AWOL" is bull, the raising of type faces is not useful. In fact, it's counterproductive because it's demonstrably false. And if most of the arguments for forgery center around the supposed unavailability of proportional-font typewriters in 1973, explain why that's true if this typewriter was available as early as 1966 with proportional typesetting capabilities. Not only that, but -- holy stevestojan! -- IBM had been making electric typewriters with proportional spacing capabilities since 1941! You people have to be kidding me. Forging documents? Let's not forget these are the same ilk who insisted that the initials "KJW" meant Kerry wrote his own medal recommendations. Hey, maybe Kerry wrote these too! I mean, after all, "Killian" and "Kerry" start with the same initial! Christ. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichFan Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 The most powerful argument is the appearance of "th", which no typewriter at the time did and which Word conveniently does as an automated function. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilverNRed Posted September 9, 2004 Author Share Posted September 9, 2004 If anyone bothers reading that first link of yours, it takes them to the Powerline Blog, which has mostly info that brings the authenticity of the documents into question. Funny how you picked out only the one snippet that helped you and ignored the rest. Thanks for the 'lemmings' quip. I made it pretty clear I was taking the reports with a grain of salt (and that everyone else should to) but I guess that's not enough for you. Even entertaining the idea that they might be fake is stupid. "They're real." "What if they aren't?" "Why are you questioning documents that we already know are real?" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 The most powerful argument is the appearance of "th", which no typewriter at the time did and which Word conveniently does as an automated function. 24257[/snapback] Untrue. I used to use an IBM Selectric back in the day and superscript was easy. Adjust the platen, that's all there is to it. Just because it wasn't automated doesn't mean it wasn't easy to do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 Thanks for the 'lemmings' quip. I made it pretty clear I was taking the reports with a grain of salt (and that everyone else should to) but I guess that's not enough for you. 24261[/snapback] I said "all you" lemmings, not you. As you can see, I was talking about people like MichFan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilverNRed Posted September 9, 2004 Author Share Posted September 9, 2004 Another analysis along with the credentials of the man who performed the analysis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KD in CA Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 The most powerful argument is the appearance of "th" stevestojan. We should trade th and start McGahee. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 The funny thing is that these documents also claim that Saddam was trying to get yellow cake from Africa. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 Another analysis along with the credentials of the man who performed the analysis 24277[/snapback] Yeah, the funny thing about all that is that Times New Roman was designed in 1932 and was available on type balls for IBMs in the 1960s and 1970s, although certainly Courier was more popular. Sheesh people act like there was only block lettering before computers came along. Where do you think Microsoft et. al. got these fonts in the first place? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GG Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 Untrue. I used to use an IBM Selectric back in the day and superscript was easy. Adjust the platen, that's all there is to it. Just because it wasn't automated doesn't mean it wasn't easy to do. 24272[/snapback] But, did you also change the key type to adjust for the smaller font of the "th?" I'm assuming that 1972 was before the days of the ball type. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 But, did you also change the key type to adjust for the smaller font of the "th?" I'm assuming that 1972 was before the days of the ball type. 24307[/snapback] The IBM Selectric with the ball type was introduced in 1961. Both Selectric I and Selectric II were available in standard and wide-carriage models and in various colors, including red and blue as well as traditional neutral colors, and both used the same typeballs, which were available in many fonts, including symbols for science and mathematics, OCR faces for scanning by computers, script, Old English, and more than a dozen ordinary alphabets. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GG Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 The IBM Selectric with the ball type was introduced in 1961. 24330[/snapback] Fair enough, but were the "th"s in different font on those? I guess we should assume that the author of the memo changed the ball and adjusted the platen to pretty up the document. The military is known for a lot of anal neat freaks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 Here's one of the Selectric typeballs that was available at the time. Note the closed "4," which the so-called "expert" cited above said was impossible to do at the time. Looks an awful lot like that in the memos, doesn't it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
enoff Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 I don't know if the documents are true or not, but this whole thread makes an old man like me laugh. At about the time these documents were supposedly created, I was using an IBM typewriter. We had “balls” back then. It was sort of a geek art form to use different balls to make different printer marks such as the “th” and the like. We all had our collection of balls and everybody played with them. I guess its true everyone over 40 is dead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 We all had our collection of balls and everybody played with them.24369[/snapback] Yeah well, you just stay away from my balls. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 Fair enough, but were the "th"s in different font on those? I guess we should assume that the author of the memo changed the ball and adjusted the platen to pretty up the document. The military is known for a lot of anal neat freaks. 24357[/snapback] This is something I know nothing about, but perhaps someone with more direct experience might know whether a colonel in the Texas Guard in 1972 might have been likely to have a secretary or someone else to type up his documents. If he did, then hopefully someone will try to figure out who it was and if that person's alive to corroborate or deny. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mickey Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 Here's one of the Selectric typeballs that was available at the time. Note the closed "4," which the so-called "expert" cited above said was impossible to do at the time. Looks an awful lot like that in the memos, doesn't it? 24359[/snapback] That's impossible, they didn't invent closing 4's until 1982, the technology just simply didn't exist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRH Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 That's impossible, they didn't invent closing 4's until 1982, the technology just simply didn't exist. 24464[/snapback] Oh that's right! I remember well those days of slaving over parchment beneath an oil lamp with an inkwell. Then I heard about this thing called Microsoft Word. These people probably think the world was in black and white until color television was invented. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blzrul Posted September 9, 2004 Share Posted September 9, 2004 Amazing how the military had the foresight to forge documents, knowing that journalists would sue for them under the Freedom of Information Act. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts