THE SON of Lt. Col. Jerry Killian

Presto Pundit ^ | September 09, 2004 | Greg Ransom

[swilhelm73]

THE SON of Lt. Col. Jerry Killian is now challenging the authenticity of at least one of the CBS documents which Dan Rather claims are memos from George Bush's commanding officer in the National Guard. Hugh Hewitt on his radio show had yet another document expert look at these "memos" and this expert also judges them to be forgeries -- much more at Hugh's blog. [UPDATE: Additional Rathergate coverage at the PrestoPundit home page.]

>> FLASH UPDATE <<

Now the widow of Lt. Col. Jerry Killian is challenging the authenticity of the CBS documents. Quotable:

"The wording in these documents is very suspect to me," [Marjorie Connell, widow of Lt. Col. Jerry Killian] told ABC News Radio in an exclusive phone interview from her Texas home. She added that she "just can't believe these are his words." UPDATE: Marjorie Connel was on ABC's NIGHTLINE tonight and she's absolutely livid (her word) at the conduct of CBS News. Drudge has a transcript.

>> FLASH UPDATE <<

For continuing updates on the forgery story see Powerline. And here is an update on the story from WorldNetDaily.

And if you haven't seen it this is amazing: "here’s my image where the original PDF document from the CBS News site is overlaid on my Microsoft Word document, showing the exact match of line spacing, character spacing, and character forms." -- Little Green Footballs. More images here. MORE: Don't miss this flashing image overlay.

UPDATE: The CBS forgeries story has sent lots of folks reeling and Tom Maguire for one is devastated.

UPDATE II: The Weekly Standard is up with it's story on the "Bush memos". Quotable:

"DOCUMENTS CITED Wednesday by 60 Minutes in a widely-publicized expose of George W. Bush's National Guard Service are very likely forgeries, according to several experts on document authenticity and typography .. "These sure look like forgeries," says William Flynn, a forensic document expert widely considered the nation's top analyst of computer-generated documents. Flynn looked at copies of the documents posted on the CBS News website. Flynn says, "I would say it looks very likely that these documents could not have existed" in the early 1970s, when they were allegedly written." UPDATE III: It's never too soon to have fun with this stuff is it? "Dan Rather reveals his source." Heh. UPDATE IV: Here's the latest AP version of the story, which has this new information:

The personnel chief in Killian's unit at the time also said he believes the documents are fake. "They looked to me like forgeries," Rufus Martin said. "I don't think Killian would do that, and I knew him for 17 years." CBS stood by its reporting. "As is standard practice at CBS News, the documents in the '60 Minutes' report were thoroughly examined and their authenticity vouched for by independent experts," CBS News said in a statement. "As importantly, '60 Minutes' also interviewed close associates of Colonel Jerry Killian. They confirm that the documents reflect his opinions and actions at the time."

Independent document examiner Sandra Ramsey Lines said the memos looked like they had been produced on a computer using Microsoft Word software, which wasn't available when the documents were supposedly written in 1972 and 1973. Lines, a document expert and fellow of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, pointed to a superscript - a smaller, raised "th" in "111th Fighter Interceptor Squadron" - as evidence indicating forgery.

Microsoft Word automatically inserts superscripts in the same style as the two on the memos obtained by CBS, she said. "I'm virtually certain these were computer-generated," Lines said after reviewing copies of the documents at her office in Paradise Valley, Ariz. She produced a nearly identical document using her computer's Microsoft Word software.

And also this from an InstaPundit media source: "ABC'S NIGHTLINE DOING THE forgeries tonight, and their experts say most likely forgeries. CBS had serious meetings this evening over this." MORE: Drudge is reporting that CBS has launched an internal investigation. Finally, Roland Patrick has fact checked evidence which he says proves the CBS documents have to be forgeries.

UPDATE V: Powerline has continuing updates on the CBS forgery story, including letters from former Air Force officers providing yet more reasons to believe the CBS documents are fake.

Also the Washington Post is now on the story.

UPDATE VI: KerrySpot asks: "AT WHAT POINT DOES CBS GIVE UP?"

UPDATE VII: Even the NY Times couldn't avoid this story. Now CBS will surely report on it. Their primary source of news is telling them it's a real story. Who can argue with that?

UPDATE VIII: The Spectator -- "The Anatomy of a Forgery." Quotable:

More than six weeks ago, an opposition research staffer for the Democratic National Committee received documents purportedly written by President George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard squadron commander, the late Col. Jerry Killian. The oppo researcher claimed the source was "a retired military officer." According to a DNC staffer, the documents were seen by both senior staff members at the DNC, as well as the Kerry campaign .. A CBS producer, who initially tipped off The Prowler about the 60 Minutes story, says that despite seeking professional assurances that the documents were legitimate, there was uncertainty even among the group of producers and researchers working on the story. "The problem was we had one set of documents from Bush's file that had Killian calling Bush 'an exceptionally fine young officer and pilot.' And someone who Killian said 'performed in an outstanding manner.' Then you have these new documents and the tone and content are so different."

The CBS producer said that some alarms bells went off last week when the signatures and initials of Killian on the documents in hand did not match up with other documents available on the public record, but producers chose to move ahead with the story. "This was too hot not to push. If there were doubts, those people didn't show it," says the producer, who works on a rival CBS News program.

Now, the producer says, there is growing concern inside the building on 57th Street that they may have been suckered by the Kerry campaign. "There is a school of thought here that the Kerry people dumped this in our laps, figuring we'd do the heavy lifting on the story. That maybe they had doubts about these documents but hoped we'd get more information," says the producer. "If that's the case, then we're bigger fools than we already appear to be judging by all the chatter about how these documents could be forgeries."

UPDATE IX: Now Killian's daughter weighs in, with typical LA Times spin -- look for Patterico's unspining of the LA Times story here. Posted by Greg Ransom | TrackBack