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[bryant]

You know what? This document was not created in 1973. Maybe it's a transcription, but that's Times New Roman, and those are curly apostrophes, and there's just no way. Also, it's a lousy CYA memo, since it's just claims with no backing evidence.

CBS needs to provide an evidence trail for those memos, or give up on their authenticity.

Comments

[gentlyepigrams]

Here's the two questions I want everybody to answer:

1. Does this change your opinion about Bush's service/AWOL status/etc.?

2. Will it change your vote in the upcoming election?

This is a tempest in a fucking teapot. The memo doesn't prove anything whether it's real or not.

[bryant]

Doesn't matter what my answer is; what matters is perception. And yeah, I think this will matter -- if it's proven a forgery, that makes it easier to convince waverers that the whole AWOL thing is bogus.

Which makes a difference. Not a huge one, but a difference.

[gentlyepigrams]

This doesn't change anyone's perception. The facts are murky enough that you can support any position from them. Only political junkies care about the details--and they already know how they're going to vote. Three weeks from now, this will be buried under the next new hot election freshness.

[bryant]

The facts of what Bush did, sure. But... it is becoming painfully clear that the DNC was crowing about a self-evident forgery, and that's where the problem is.

It's not about what happened in Texas, it's about public perception of the parties.

[gentlyepigrams]

But is it going to change your vote? Is it going to change anyone's vote?

See, that's where I come from. None of this horse race stuff or Vietnam stuff or anything is going to change votes. Barring disaster on one side or the other, the debates won't do it. What will do it? A terrorist attack, a major foreign policy problem, a major and immediate domestic problem. That's about it. People are too polarized for anything else to do it.

This will all be forgotten in three weeks, except by partisan hacks. And even my partisan hacks are partisan hacks.

[bryant]

Ah, but just because my vote is solid and your vote is solid and Glenn Reynolds' vote is solid doesn't mean there aren't undecided voters. One reason I've been so confident Kerry will win is because they're leaning strongly towards Kerry... but it's a damned close election.

It's the small percentage of people who aren't yet polarized who are going to matter.

And... three years from now, people are gonna be trotting this one out as evidence that the media is biased towards liberals. I'd bet on it.