The Gamut

Yahoo! News - Questions Surface About Bush Memos

Independent document examiner Sandra Ramsey Lines said the memos looked like they had been produced on a computer using Microsoft Word software. 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.

Many on the left have been commenting on this idiotic non-story, but I have a different observation to make specifically about this claim.

On the documents, there are two instances where the superscripted "th" appear. Here on page two:



...and here on page four:



There is another opportunity for the superscript to appear here on page two:



...but it is not used. However, the significant thing to note is that there are also three instances of the letters "st" being used on the document. At no time are they superscripted. They appear twice on page one:



...and:



...as well as on page three:



If this was something MSWord did automatically, it would have also done it on these three occasions. I suspect that the problem was that the typewriter in question had only the "th" character available, and that the Lt. Colonel only used it intermittently. Frankly, I think this explanation is a lot more in keeping with logic than the conspiracy theory or the hoax theory.

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