The Real Robert Strong

Powerline Blog ^ | 09/12/04 | Hindrocket

[conservative in nyc]

I think this mystery is closer to being solved.

We know from recent news articles that Robert Strong is a "professor" in Austin, Texas. There's a Robert W. Strong listed on the faculty or staff of St. Edward's University in Austin. His official title is "Post-Doctoral Associate". You can see some of the classes this Robert W. Strong taught in the links from this Google search. They sound rather wishy-washy, research-oriented and open ended.

Caution: We still don't know this is the real Robert Strong for sure.

The USA Today article. I can't quote from it, since it's a Gannette Snoozepaper. Strong is quoted near the end, in the "Colleagues" and "Family and Associates" sections of the article.

[pushforbush]

Amazing. Once again, not a single main stream newspaper or network is able to interview or identify "Professor" Strong, except for the distorted info provided by CBS itself. And the blogosphere comes through with the info.

[plushaye]

Here's a new voice in all of this from a Fox News online article:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,132157,00.html

Retired Col. Maurice Udell, the unit's instructor pilot who helped train Bush, said Friday he thought the documents were fake.

"I completely am disgusted with this [report] I saw on '60 Minutes,'" Udell said. "That's not true. I was there. I knew Jerry Killian. I went to Vietnam with Jerry Killian in 1968."

Here's someone who knew Killian and worked with him, as opposed to Strong who didn't. Who has more credibility?

[Diddle E. Squat]

Further, Strong said that he doesn’t think it matters whether the documents are genuine are not. Like many English professors, Strong has always been anti-Bush, and he and his wife made anti-Bush comments to our correspondent during this conversation. At the same time, notwithstanding his claim to have served in the Texas Air National Guard, Strong admitted that he had never served with or even met Lt. Bush. He admitted further that Jerry Killlian had never discussed Lt. Bush with him. Strong acknowledged that he had “no personal knowledge about Bush’s service.”

[conservative in nyc]

USA Today tracked him down and interviewed him. I think his home phone number is listed.

[hoosiermama]

Wonder if Strong wrote the papers and then commented on them to authenticate them? Sort of like a firebug that joins the volunteer firefighters.

[RJL]

By my reckoning, there are only two "witnesses" relied on by CBS News to support its forgery scam who have not already repudiated the statements attributed to them by CBS: Marcel Matley...

Mr Matley wrote a paper in 1999 stating that one could not prove the authenticity of copied documents, but in some cases copied documents could be proven to be forgeries.

By Mr Mately's own words, be admits he really can't prove Dan Rather's documents are real.

[Jeff Chandler]

I think his home phone number is listed.

Uh oh.

[conservative in nyc]

I wonder if this article in Volume 11, Number 3 of the American Journal of Distance Education (1997) is the REAL Robert Strong's. It seems consistent with what he's teaching --- a sort of research studies/humanities course. If someone could find a copy, we might be able to figure out where he went to school. As best I can tell, a Robert W. Strong obtained some sort of degree from St. Edward's University in 1973. Again, I don't know if this is THE Robert W. Strong.

Online Graduate Degrees: A Review of Three Internet-based Master's Degree Offerings Robert W. Strong and E. Glynn Harmon

This article reviews and contrasts three on-line Master's programs. Two of the programs are in Management and one is the field of Library and Information Science. The following universities are involved in the study: the University of Phoenix's three different management degrees, the Master of Arts in Management conferred by The Graduate School of America, and the Master of Science in Library and Information Science conferred by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Strong and Harmon develop a "Consumer's Guide" that offers important questions for potential students.

Although the article describes briefly differences among the three programs, the focus is general questions to take into account when considering any online university programs. Some of the questions are: does the program meet the needs of the students and help him/her reach their goal, qualifications of faculty, type of interaction between learners and instructors, e.g., synchronous/asynchronous subjects, requirements for on-campus orientation or instruction, and cost. "The evaluation of these offerings (not of the degrees themselves) indicates clear and distinct differences in the aims, the quality of information provided, and the potential benefits of various programs." Strong and Harmon consider their article a initial step to apprise potential student about some specific graduate degree options, but more importantly, how to evaluate them.

[conservative in nyc]

I'm not suggesting that anyone call to harass Mr. Strong. The media's probably doing that already.

I'm only stating a fact, based on the description of where he lives near Austin and a simple check of publicly available online databases. It's not rocket science.

[Weirdad]

Amazing information bump.

[Poincare]

Robert Strong was an administrative officer for the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam years.

If he got a degree in 1973, then he must have left the TANG in 69 or 68 or before. He was 26 in 1968.

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

Ping!

[Poincare]

Then again he may have got a Batchelors in 1964 at age 22, entered the Guard in the early years of the VN War, and got a Masters in 73. But that still means that he had to leave the Guard in 1970 (after 6 years) and so he did not know that Staudt had retired etc.

[conservative in nyc]

E. Glynn Harmon is a professor of Library Science at the University of Texas at Austin. A Bob Strong was a graduate student there in 1998, and may still be matriculated there.

[conservative in nyc]

It is the National Guard. He could have been a student while attending college.

[jnarcus]

Post docs are usually young folks....mainly because this is the equivalent of an internship after one has finished your PhD...most folks who would have been old enough to serve in 1968 to 1970 are of an age that being in a post doc position would be A) economically stupid and B) the most unlikely thing I have heard since...ummm I don't know, maybe , Dan Rather "defending" his position....Look this is probabaly NOT the guy you are looking for

[jnarcus]

Yeah but he wouldn't be a post doc NOW as the first poster suggested...ANyone who is a postdoc 30 years after their PhD is so totally pathetic we should just pray for them

[Poincare]

Could he have attended college and been an administrative officer at the same time?

[tiki]

No, but a FReeper with real journalism skills could call and try to get an interview.