My huge vanity post, on the CBS fake Killian memos!

Me | 9/09/04 | Me

[Oblongata]

I have to just take a minute to do some bragging here. I apologize in advance.

Last night I was reading FR as this story broke. I submitted a tip on the drudgereport page, and sent this email to drudge at 2:42am :

"http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1210702/posts

The documents CBS supplied recently are written in a PROPORTIONALLY SPACED font.

If you can figure out how Lt. Col. Jerry Killian managed to produce a document like that, on a typewriter in 1972, I would like to hear it.

The only typewriter capable of proportional fonts at the time, was an IBM Executive. Secretaries had to go to school to learn how to use these. Each line had to be typed twice. They cost a fortune.

In other words, this is not the typewriter a Lt. Col. would use to type a personal memo.

Regards,

Oblongata "

I also mentioned the superscript feature in the May 4th memo in the submitted tip.

This just proves the power of FR and the internet. None ofthis would have been possible without the dedicated work of all you FReepers. We must keep the poressure on!

[Oblongata]

Right now I am flying Sky High. FR Rules!!

[cajungirl]

Congrats Dude! You did good. Damn, FR is a fine place to be.

[Monti Cello]

Great work!

[Huck]

Let's wait and see the final conclusion. Good job.

[intolerancewillNOTbetolerated]

You FLY!!

Then get back to business. We have a very important election to win!:>)

[sarasota]

Well done!

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

Great job! Congratulations.

[timestax]

RATHERLIES

[Goreknowshowtocheat]

Nice work. Let's get the word out to the radio guys. This could kill the Demoncrats once and for all..

[95Tarheel]

You rock, no doubt about it.

[dc-zoo]

Kudos! Very good work! You are obviously better than see-bs and their crap lawyers.

[RandallFlagg]

My Mom, who used all different kinds of typewriters at that period, just confirmed this. $11,000 for this machine in the early '70s.

[dfwgator]

Freepers, you so totally rock!!!

[struwwelpeter]

The 'letterhead' could have been done by the base print shop, but the date is in exactly the same font and spacing. Weird.

Looking back through some old military documents (USAF, USAF Reserves, Army & Army Reserves), I see an interesting evolution in the fonts and date formats.

Alleged letter from W's TANG commander

List of test results from USAF basic training

Proficiency report from USAF

Student rating, Army reserves

Misc. letter, Army reserves.

The TANG letter looks like some of the documents I received in the late 70s, early 1980s. Probably done on an IBM Selectric model from that time period, which didn't have an 'th' character, as I recall.

[libstripper]

In all my time as an Armhy officer and a practicing lawyer during that time I never say one of those IBM Executive typewriters. All the machines I saw and worked with were monospaced Selectrics.

[noodler]

I'm proud just to be among you.Take a bow.

[Squantos]

Wow...........!

[Pitiricus]

I remember the selectric, with these sphere-like characters you changed... Is this the same as IBM Executive?

[jrawk]

Random thinking here but...

If I was a PA on 60 Minutes charged with creating the digital graphics for this story the following might happen:

After scanning the original documents I find they are illegible digitally. So I retype verbatim screen shot, bring it into PhotoShop, paste, apply a dimestore old XEROX filter, then photoshop out the signature and place it. Deadline met, the stylized graphic for production has been created. In general the networks do not require the actual document be shown, they have often in the past insisted it is ok to display the actual text in whatever format meets their production needs. So long as the content is not changed.

It needs to be confirmed that those images on the web, and in the show are images of the actual documents before this story goes on.


-- l8s
-- jrawk