Odd interaction with a road rager

Raoul Duke wrote:
"Muttley" wrote in message
...

They hope that he will be re-elected, continue his current policies,
and provide them with even more confused and hostile young men who
can be sent to their deaths while they sit safely in their caves.

Are these "confused and hostile" young men kinda like John Kerry when
HE volunteered for combat?

Does Al Qaeda have "reserves"?

Bill "naval, at that" S.

The IBM Selectrics were a staple Pete. Almost all typewriters had
proportional spacing. The fonts came on a plastic ball that snapped into
the typewriter. There was a lever on the typewriter that allowed you to
choose between fixed and proportional spacing.

My mom had an IBM selectric at home that could do this in 1971, and we
didn't have the budget of a National Guard unit..

This would be like arguing in the future that it would be unlikely for
someone in this day and age to own a cell phone.

Jack Dingler

Pete wrote:

"Jack Dingler" wrote



I loved that one. Actually us old guys know that typewriters with
interchangeable font heads and proportional spacing were commonplace. In
fact, the proportional spacing that the experts claim was impossible to
do with a typewriter, was introduced by IBM in 1941. Back in the 1970s,
you could swap typefaces in the middle of letters and even use different
colored print ribbons. Was a heady time for the typewriter industry.

Them young-uns have no idea what was possible using 20th century


technology.

All highly unlikely to be done by an Air Guard Lt. Col. when typing up a
memo, even if the Guard sported the extra money for such a typewriter.

And the other teminology faults make this a nonstarter as far as validity.

Pete

"Jack Dingler" wrote in message
news:Jho2d.61692$D%.49575@attbi_s51...
The IBM Selectrics were a staple Pete. Almost all typewriters had
proportional spacing. The fonts came on a plastic ball that snapped into
the typewriter. There was a lever on the typewriter that allowed you to
choose between fixed and proportional spacing.

My mom had an IBM selectric at home that could do this in 1971, and we
didn't have the budget of a National Guard unit..

Personal budgets and military unit budgets are two completely different
animals. Especially for mundane stuff like typewriters. When I was a
programmer in the USAF, I *always* had a better, faster, more costly PC at
home than at work.

This would be like arguing in the future that it would be unlikely for
someone in this day and age to own a cell phone.

I was in the military a few years after the period in question.
And the probability of stopping midsentence (midWORD), to change balls for
two letters in superscript, and then changing back, just wasn't happening.

Assuming, of course, the Lt. Col. could locate the alternate ball without
asking his secretary.

Typing grp, when you mean gp, just didn't happen either. There is even a
regulation on acceptable abbreviations. As there is/was also a regulation on
fonts, proportional or fixed. (I'd bet at the time it stipulated fixed on a
typewriter)

All this is moot, because even Rather has his doubts now.
Whatever your thougts about Bush and his military service...don't hang them
on forged documents.

Pete

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 09:46:33 +0200, Elisa Francesca Roselli
wrote:

It was purely laughing at the idiocy of allowing people to leave the country
just because they didn't *say* they were terrorists.

Osama's father has 20 wives and Osama himself is one of 56 brothers and sisters. As
far as we know he is the only terrorist. The mere fact of being a blood relative of
his does not suffice to incrimminate a family the size of a large village.

Besides, real terrorists have those special terrorist license plates.

I don't see the proof here. The military would've had to have bought
typewriters that predated WWII to avoid getting these basic features.
Something that would've been costly in 1971.

I think to make you point that the military couldn't afford the cheapest
of student typewriters at the time, would be to argue that the military
couldn't afford typewriters at all. My mom certainly couldn't afford an
expensive one.

I never argued that the balls were changed mid-memo, I just argued that
it was easy to do.

The argument is that proportional spacing and alternate fonts were
impossible to produce on a typewriter in 1971. That's just false. In
fact the main argument that proportional spacing was impossible was also
false as even manual typewriters had had that feature for 30 years.

I think your best case here is just to say you don't believe it. And
that's cool. But the case that this was impossible, has to be false.

I'm curious though, which Micorosoft Font fades the top half of the
letters like in the memos, so it looks like it was written by a
typewriter? I don't think I've ever seen a computer typeface that fades
the top half of the letters. Would be something a programmer could
create though.

Jack Dingler

Pete wrote:

"Jack Dingler" wrote in message
news:Jho2d.61692$D%.49575@attbi_s51...


The IBM Selectrics were a staple Pete. Almost all typewriters had
proportional spacing. The fonts came on a plastic ball that snapped into
the typewriter. There was a lever on the typewriter that allowed you to
choose between fixed and proportional spacing.

My mom had an IBM selectric at home that could do this in 1971, and we
didn't have the budget of a National Guard unit..



Personal budgets and military unit budgets are two completely different
animals. Especially for mundane stuff like typewriters. When I was a
programmer in the USAF, I *always* had a better, faster, more costly PC at
home than at work.



This would be like arguing in the future that it would be unlikely for
someone in this day and age to own a cell phone.



I was in the military a few years after the period in question.
And the probability of stopping midsentence (midWORD), to change balls for
two letters in superscript, and then changing back, just wasn't happening.

Assuming, of course, the Lt. Col. could locate the alternate ball without
asking his secretary.

Typing grp, when you mean gp, just didn't happen either. There is even a
regulation on acceptable abbreviations. As there is/was also a regulation on
fonts, proportional or fixed. (I'd bet at the time it stipulated fixed on a
typewriter)

All this is moot, because even Rather has his doubts now.
Whatever your thougts about Bush and his military service...don't hang them
on forged documents.

Pete

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 21:00:07 GMT, Jack Dingler
wrote:

Back in the 1970s,
you could swap typefaces in the middle of letters and even use different
colored print ribbons. Was a heady time for the typewriter industry.

Do that a lot when you typed your memos? Swapping font balls in the
middle of the page and all? Most of the extra font balls were in the
desks of the exectuive secretaries. And I don't remember one of them
doing anything like that, even if it could be done.

And back then the rest of us typed on plain typewriters or used pens
and memo pads.

Now that CBS is backing away, you may be the last line of defense on
this one.

Curtis L. Russell
Odenton, MD (USA)
Just someone on two wheels...

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 07:25:10 GMT, Jack Dingler
wrote:

I think your best case here is just to say you don't believe it. And
that's cool. But the case that this was impossible, has to be false.

Interesting. Because that is exactly what several IBM Selectric
experts are saying. Do a google on this and you can find the follow-up
articles that lead to the apparently non-potical nerds that have tried
- and failed and then explained why it is probably a forgery. And this
is using the IBM Selectrics that they believe are best able to produce
the memo.

Word OTOH can produce it with little effort. I've done two myself and
the only problem was cleared up by someone else (I was comparing the
screen to the PDF and didn't print it - the superscript prints
differently - higher - than it appears on screen).

Curtis L. Russell
Odenton, MD (USA)
Just someone on two wheels...

On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:45:37 GMT, (Dave Mount)
wrote:

Osama's father has 20 wives and Osama himself is one of 56 brothers and sisters. As
far as we know he is the only terrorist. The mere fact of being a blood relative of
his does not suffice to incrimminate a family the size of a large village.

Very fair point, but it doesn't really address what I said: i.e.

| It was purely laughing at the idiocy of allowing people to leave the country
| just because they didn't *say* they were terrorists.


Nothing to do with who, or how many.

Except that it has been documented over and over that they did not
leave the country while everyone else was grounded and that the
securityt procedures in place at that moment were followed. If you are
either poster that brought up the Bin Laden flight, it isn't off
topic, but it is simply false. And you don't see it mentioned by
credible sources after it was brought up the first week and slapped
down.

You need a new conspiracy. Your old one is getting weak.

Curtis L. Russell
Odenton, MD (USA)
Just someone on two wheels...

Curtis L. Russell wrote:
On Thu, 16 Sep 2004 12:45:37 GMT, (Dave Mount)
wrote:

Osama's father has 20 wives and Osama himself is one of 56 brothers
and sisters. As far as we know he is the only terrorist. The mere
fact of being a blood relative of his does not suffice to
incrimminate a family the size of a large village.

Very fair point, but it doesn't really address what I said: i.e.

It was purely laughing at the idiocy of allowing people to leave
the country
just because they didn't *say* they were terrorists.


Nothing to do with who, or how many.

Except that it has been documented over and over that they did not
leave the country while everyone else was grounded and that the
securityt procedures in place at that moment were followed. If you are
either poster that brought up the Bin Laden flight, it isn't off
topic, but it is simply false. And you don't see it mentioned by
credible sources after it was brought up the first week and slapped
down.

You need a new conspiracy. Your old one is getting weak.

Except, of course, that it will live on indefinitely in Michael s'Moore's
hatchet piece. Then the audience will tell someone, and they'll tell
someone, and so on and so on...

Bill "false believers" S.

IBM Selectrics and other common typewriters of the time couldn't do
proportional spacing?

Jack Dingler

Curtis L. Russell wrote:

On Fri, 17 Sep 2004 07:25:10 GMT, Jack Dingler
wrote:



I think your best case here is just to say you don't believe it. And
that's cool. But the case that this was impossible, has to be false.



Interesting. Because that is exactly what several IBM Selectric
experts are saying. Do a google on this and you can find the follow-up
articles that lead to the apparently non-potical nerds that have tried
- and failed and then explained why it is probably a forgery. And this
is using the IBM Selectrics that they believe are best able to produce
the memo.

Word OTOH can produce it with little effort. I've done two myself and
the only problem was cleared up by someone else (I was comparing the
screen to the PDF and didn't print it - the superscript prints
differently - higher - than it appears on screen).

Curtis L. Russell
Odenton, MD (USA)
Just someone on two wheels...