Lights Out
So I think the "newly discovered" records suggesting President Bush did bad things in the Air National Guard are fake. Why do I think that?
Well, first there's the denial from the son of their supposed author. Then there's the learned examinations of the records by various experts consulted by conservative journalists. And then there's the fact that when you actually examine the documents they appear to be totally fucking fake.
This is about to become a huge story. It will not be good for John Kerry.
Who, you might wonder, would orchestrate a hoax that could be so quickly identified as a hoax? Wouldn't any Kerry supporter realize that they would be caught, and that their candidate would suffer the backlash? Of course they would. And that's why I don't think a Kerry supporter is involved.
This is the work of Karl Rove, a guy who once bugged his own office to frame an opponent for dirty tricks. No other Republican is smart enough to put this together -- and no Democrat is dumb enough. Rove says this is his last campaign, and what could be a better last hurrah?
How did he do it? Easy. First he saw to it that the fake documents reached CBS News -- the same hungry, allegedly left-leaning outfit that broke that pesky Abu Ghraib story. Take that, CBS.
Coveniently, the records are from the "private files" of a dead man who can't be questioned. So White House officials dutifully give other news organizations copies of the CBS documents, saying it doesn't know enough about them to dispute their accuracy. That gives the records a sense of authenticity, and pack journalists go wild.
Finally, some of Rove's underlings tip off one or two neo-con suck-ups to the fact that the mainstream media has swallowed a bad story. Rove sits back and watches the blogosphere go crazy -- and a few days later enjoys all the mainstream media soul-searching about what went wrong.
In the end, Rove gets everything he could ever want:
-The mainstream media looks really bad. (CBS said in its original story last night that it "consulted a handwriting analyst and document expert who believes the material is authentic." But by midafternoon today they claimed to have checked with numerous "independent experts." Riiiiiight.)
-The conservative media looks good. (Way to get spoon-fed, conservative media. You'll be working for the regular media before you know it.)
-Bush looks like the victim of a vicious lie, much worse than any of the Swift Boat lies. All criticisms of Bush's military record are now tarnished, and viewed with new suspicion.
-Kerry looks like a sleaze, and loses.
So seriously, Mr. Rove, well-played! I sure am glad that with this being your last campaign and all, you know, at least it's the last one you'll win. At least, I'm assuming you'll win.
If no one else figures you out.
posted by laser cub @ 9:31 PM
8 comments
8 Comments:
You don't say why they "appear to be totally fucking fake" ... perhaps because they don't. In fact, they're authentic, typed on a Selectric with a custom typeball. (But who did the see-through marksalot over Bush's address? That wasn't on the CBS fax.) Other documents with the same font and the same "th" superscript exist, and there's no way that
Microsoft Word would produce such docs, with uneven vertical alignment. What's quickly identified is that the so-called "experts" are frauds.
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thank you for your opinion.
I think lasercub is spot on.
There's no doubt in my mind that Smirking Fratboy was sleeping off a two-year hangover when he should have been serving his country. I think the documents are certainly fake --- but the content is genuine (i.e., someone replaced handwritten notes with simple forgeries in order to discredit the actual content).
None of this is a surprise to me. What is scary is that there is a chance the Rethugs have a mole in the Kerry campaign who did the actual placement (and wittingly or unwittingly will take the rap). If that is the case, that would be a fatal body blow to the Kerry campaign. The Rethugs are professionals with decades of experience in dirty tricks, but I am hoping that Rove's evil brilliance does not extend that far in this case.
I agree this looks like a Republican dirty trick that CBS fell for.
There's really little new in the memos released by CBS (then released again by the White House) that wasn't suspected already. There's been a flood of FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests and it was just a matter of time before some smoking guns had to get out.
So what was Rove to do? Plant these memos, throw up some "reasonable doubt" in the mind of the public regarding the whole AWOL issue, and make Bush's enemies look bad in the process. Even if the truth comes out in a couple weeks (or some lame explanation), the public will be so sick of hearing about this story that it'll be discounted when they vote.
If Rove didn't think of it himself, he's probably wishing right now he had thought of it because it's so ingenious.
So the next two weeks will be wasted talking about typewriter balls and refried history, while we really should be talking about the disasterous war in Iraq, the lousy economic recovery, that laundry list of things Bush didn't accomplish but thinks we should give him a second chance to do, the scandals of the neocons, and the complete failure of this administration to bring justice to the people who caused 9/11.
One possibility to consider is that these documents are based on real documents that all the FOIA requests have been closing in on. Since they can't hide the documents forever (they've thrown various excuses along the way), they decided to leak them as obvious forgeries by transcribing their contents but with a modern word processor. Now, even if the real originals do get out that say the same thing, they'll be lumped into the dispute, thus neutralizing whatever negative effect they could have on Bush's reelection.
When the facts aren't good, obfuscate. The public's fast asleep anyway.
There are other possible scenarios. Stay tuned, this story isn't over by a longshot.
Good work, lasercub.
its all v Wag the Dog, n'est pas?
I never understood why this topic mattered so much to the Dems, but I guess Rove had their number. Who cares what Bush did 35 yrs ago when the truly scary stuff has been committed in the past 3+ years? He had already admitted to being a drunk in his younger years; it's not like skipping months of nat'l guard training tarnishes the character of an irresponsible alcoholic.
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