Letters to the Editor
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Surely Blumenthal knows what a typed memo from 1970 looks like
I have little doubt that the core of this story is true, and was pretty amazed at the reaction of the White House to the original story, not even attempting to deny it, as well as the non-reaction of most of the news media to this telling point. There is much evidence backing up Bush's absence from the Texas Air National Guard, some of it published in Salon.
But the documents--those images made available on the Internet--are bogus. There just isn't an argument to be made about it. Indeed, there have been variable pitch typewriters for over 60 years, though they have never been the norm for routine memos from non-executives. But these don't produce text like the Kilian memos, which are very clearly identifiable as fax-distorted Word documents. Anyone who does not find this self-evident can look at Joseph Newcomer's analysis (http://www.flounder.com/bush2.htm) for example, which is not politically motivated and goes into great depth.
For all I know, there are real Kilian memos that were reproduced in this odd fashion for unknown reasons. As I said, the case against Bush was already so clear that it's a shame it became muddied in this fashion. But for Blumenthal to suggest that there is serious reasonable doubt as to the inauthenticity of the documents presented is either disingenuous or may mean that he has never looked at them.