Forgeries Fool the Media

The Sixty Minutes “exclusive” on Bush’s National Guard service (yawn) is the mirror image of the Swift Boat story–not terribly relevant to this, this, this, or even this, but a great indicator of how bad our news media have become. It’s a reminder of how tempting it is to believe something, if you want to believe it badly enough.

The Sixty Minutes story appears to be based on a collection of fourth-rate forgeries. Look at the documents here, here, here, and here. Now look at this superimposed comparison between a version made on a PC in ten minutes and the documents CBS posted. They’re a perfect match. Now compare the signature on the CBS documents with an authenticated signature. Finally, look at what one of the world’s foremost experts on typefaces in questioned documents says. Of course, the autocorrected small-type superscript “th,” the distinctive Times New Roman font, the curly apostrophes, and the general lack of understanding of military writing formats are all nearly instant dead giveaways. And as of this moment, nearly every single major media source still has this “expose” posted. Bottom line: the media wanted to believe this so much they ran with it, without doing some fairly obvious fact-checking.

Even more here. And then, of course, don’t miss Scrappleface’s take (1972 E-mail Proves Bush Was AWOL!).

And how are the same media handling the Swift Boat allegations? By not even reporting them unless they meet a stringent initial burden of proof:

Dear Mr. Stanton,

I raised your concern with senior editors at The Times who explained that
the staff is working hard on this issue, and when there’s anything reliable to
say, as opposed to rumors and suspicions, they intend to report it fully.

Sincerely,

Arthur Bovino
Office of the Public Editor
The New York Times

I cannot emphasize enough how little I care about the comparative military records of the candidates from 30 years ago. None of that tells me anything about their solutions to today’s problems. But when a candidate tries to base his qualifications for office on his past service–which is like basing bridge pilings on chocolate pudding–then I gain the right to examine whether he’s botoxed up the facts asserted. (Now picture this: “I’m George Bush, and I’ll lead this country like I led my F-102 over Nagadoches! Yearrrrrrrrgh! What? You didn’t hear that? Well, neither did I.).

But here is a short list of genuine questions that had been raised about Kerry by the time Mr. Bovino sent me his E-mail, and before the most recent full rectal examination of Bush’s guard records: Kerry claims to have won a medal that doesn’t exist; his own diary disputes his eligibility for his first purple heart; one of the “Band of Brothers” who spoke about his leadership at the Dem convention barely knew him; and his campaign had to admit that he didn’t spend Christmas 1968 in Cambodia after all (even though he had stated on the Senate floor that this was “seared–seared” into his memory).

Don’t expect to read that in the Times.

Some objectivity, please?

More on Kerry’s position(s) on North Korea here and here (via MTV and e-deity James Lileks . . . scroll, baby!). Somewhat more detail in this WaPo interview: keep the six-party talks, also begin bilateral talks (!), and put every issue (except for human rights, apparently) on the table for discussion. Bush has given some lip service that is cause for restrained optimism, as have some of his political allies.

I’m voting for Bush because he will prosecute the war with determination and oppose abortion. I’m voting for him despite the fact that I have no problem with gay marriage, hate his runaway spending, don’t trust his immigration amnesty, and see little promise in his North Korea policies at present. At least I know what he believes. What’s more, I’m fairly certain that the media have fully informed me of his personal and professional limitations. Can’t say that about Kerry, now can ya?

UPDATE: Allow me to add another good question for the big media guys: In this of John Kerry testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 1971, he admits to flying to Paris to meet with both the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong delegations to the peace talks. At the time, the VC and NVA were shooting at our troops and torturing American POWs (in all fairness, Kerry may not have known about the torture part). This official service record from Kerry’s own Web site proves that he was still a commissioned U.S. Navy officer at the time. Unless Kerry was a registered representative of North Vietnam or the Viet Cong, wouldn’t that violate ?

And to me, that one IS a legit issue for 2004.