Rathergate Unhinged

ABC News posts that two document experts were consulted on the Killian memos by CBS about President Bush's National Guard service before the airing of the "60 Minutes" broadcast. An excerpt from that article is posted below. Below that is a posting by Bill Dyer, the proprietor of the web log Beldar Blog. It is "The online journal of a crusty, longwinded trial lawyer, bemused observer of politics, and internet dilettante". He has some deep feelings about this and an excerpt is below the ABC piece.
---Larry Everett

"By Brian Ross
ABCNEWS.com

Sept. 14, 2004 — Two of the document experts hired by CBS News say the network ignored concerns they raised prior to the broadcast of a report citing documents that questioned George W. Bush's service in the National Guard during the Vietnam War.

The authenticity of the documents in the report by CBS News' 60 Minutes II has been widely questioned. The documents were allegedly written by Lt. Col. Jerry Killian, who died in 1984.

Emily Will, a veteran document examiner from North Carolina, told ABC News she saw problems right away with the one document CBS hired her to check the weekend before the broadcast.

"I found five significant differences in the questioned handwriting, and I found problems with the printing itself as to whether it could have been produced by a typewriter," she said.

Will says she sent the CBS producer an e-mail message about her concerns and strongly urged the network the night before the broadcast not to use the documents.

"I told them that all the questions I was asking them on Tuesday night, they were going to be asked by hundreds of other document examiners on Thursday if they ran that story," Will said.

But the documents became a key part of the 60 Minutes II broadcast questioning President Bush's National Guard service in 1972. CBS made no mention that any expert disputed the authenticity.

"I did not feel that they wanted to investigate it very deeply," Will told ABC News."

[snipped]

"A second document examiner hired by CBS News, Linda James of Plano, Texas, also told ABC News she had concerns about the documents and could not authenticate them. She said she expressed her concerns to CBS before the 60 Minutes II broadcast.

"I did not authenticate anything and I don't want it to be misunderstood that I did," James said. "And that's why I have come forth to talk about it because I don't want anybody to think I did authenticate these documents."

A third examiner hired by CBS for its story, Marcel Matley, appeared on CBS Evening News last Friday and was described as saying the document was real.

According to The Washington Post, Matley said he examined only the signature attributed to Killian and made no attempt to authenticate the documents themselves."Read the Whole Thing

Beldar expresses his legal opinion and personal outrage in a manner not to be misunderstood.

"Dan Rather was complicit in defrauding the American public in an attempt to defeat a sitting President. Rather must be fired now. Congress should subpoena CBS News' lawyers and all documentation of their advice.

I try to be fair-minded. I try not to reach snap judgments. I try to "see the other side." I try not to overstate. But in this post, I will express opinions that are as blunt and as strongly felt as any I've ever stated in my life. Nothing in this post is sarcasm or snark. This is as serious as a heart attack — and it's no longer funny to me, but a national disgrace and a national tragedy."[Read the Whole Thing]