Boing Boing: Did the White House release forged documents about Bush's service record?

Thursday, September 9, 2004

Did the White House release forged documents about Bush's service record?

Charles at Little Green Footballs presents a persuasive argument that the memos recently released by the White House about President Bush's National Guard service are forgeries.

I opened Microsoft Word, set the font to Microsoft’s Times New Roman, tabbed over to the default tab stop to enter the date “18 August 1973,” then typed the rest of the document purportedly from the personal records of the late Lieutenant Colonel Jerry B. Killian.
And my Microsoft Word version, typed in 2004, is an exact match for the documents trumpeted by CBS News as “authentic.” The spacing is not just similar—it is identical in every respect.

(Background: CNN reported that "the White House, without comment, released to the news media two of the memos, one ordering Bush to report for his physical exam and the other suspending him from flight status." Here are PDF copiesof the memos the White House released.)

I think the documents are indeed forgeries, but who made them? Could it be a White House dirty trick to make the Democrats look bad? Are there real documents that these forgeries are based on that are even more damning about the President's behavior? I'm sure there's more news to come. Link (Thanks, Bob!)

UPDATE: Eric sez: If you weren't reflexively looking for the interpretation of events that reflected most poorly on Bush, you might have noted that the White House did not release those records, they merely passed along without comment copies that had been sent to them by CBS.

UPDATE:David sez: "Saw your post on this on BoingBoing. Fark.com had a couple big discussions today about the potential forgeries (here and here).

Someone posted the two images (White House released and Word generated), so I fired up an image editor and had a look. While the font character spacing are very similar, most typography experts in the threads agreed that the original had type-write like characteristics (number 8 slightly high on the line, etc.) that would be hard to reproduce in Word. More importantly, the superscript "th" which caused most of the interest is not in the same position in the two images (see attached superimposed comparison).

It's possible that the original was generated on a typewriter with a proportional width Times New Roman font wheel or ball (available at the time), with the same common margin settings as Word uses by default. The superscript used in Word is artificially generated (smaller font size, elevated baseline), whereas the typewritter superscript "th" would need to be carved in the same space as other characters, which is why it appears lower. David Schwab

posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 12:54:06 PM permalink | Other blogs' comments

suggest a link \| defeat censorware \| rss \| archives \| t-shirts \| digital emporium \| podcast feed \| mark \| cory \| david \| xeni \| john
Support Bloggers' Rights! HOWTO: Get a link posted to Boing Boing Boing Boing Mobile powered by Winksite Fark rules! This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution. Boing Boing is a trademark of Happy Mutants LLC in the United States [and other countries]. Stats (About our stats) defeat censorware Policies Our first five years' worth of posts in one file	Thursday, September 9, 2004 Did the White House release forged documents about Bush's service record? Charles at Little Green Footballs presents a persuasive argument that the memos recently released by the White House about President Bush's National Guard service are forgeries. I opened Microsoft Word, set the font to Microsoft’s Times New Roman, tabbed over to the default tab stop to enter the date “18 August 1973,” then typed the rest of the document purportedly from the personal records of the late Lieutenant Colonel Jerry B. Killian. And my Microsoft Word version, typed in 2004, is an exact match for the documents trumpeted by CBS News as “authentic.” The spacing is not just similar—it is identical in every respect. (Background: CNN reported that "the White House, without comment, released to the news media two of the memos, one ordering Bush to report for his physical exam and the other suspending him from flight status." Here are PDF copiesof the memos the White House released.) I think the documents are indeed forgeries, but who made them? Could it be a White House dirty trick to make the Democrats look bad? Are there real documents that these forgeries are based on that are even more damning about the President's behavior? I'm sure there's more news to come. Link (Thanks, Bob!) UPDATE: Eric sez: If you weren't reflexively looking for the interpretation of events that reflected most poorly on Bush, you might have noted that the White House did not release those records, they merely passed along without comment copies that had been sent to them by CBS. UPDATE:David sez: "Saw your post on this on BoingBoing. Fark.com had a couple big discussions today about the potential forgeries (here and here). Someone posted the two images (White House released and Word generated), so I fired up an image editor and had a look. While the font character spacing are very similar, most typography experts in the threads agreed that the original had type-write like characteristics (number 8 slightly high on the line, etc.) that would be hard to reproduce in Word. More importantly, the superscript "th" which caused most of the interest is not in the same position in the two images (see attached superimposed comparison). It's possible that the original was generated on a typewriter with a proportional width Times New Roman font wheel or ball (available at the time), with the same common margin settings as Word uses by default. The superscript used in Word is artificially generated (smaller font size, elevated baseline), whereas the typewritter superscript "th" would need to be carved in the same space as other characters, which is why it appears lower. David Schwab posted by Mark Frauenfelder at 12:54:06 PM permalink \| Other blogs' comments Email this entry to: Your email address: Message (optional):	Boing Boing Sponsored by: Your Text Ad Here Get BB by email: