This is an exclusive interview with FreeRepublic commenter TankerKC, the first known person to express any doubts on the internet about the authenticity of the CBS documents. Since parody interviews are common on the internet, I should note up front that this is a serious interview.

A little background: the media has reported that a FreeRepublic.com commenter named Buckhead expressed the first doubts on the internet about the (possibly) forged CBS documents. But Buckhead himself correctly notes that the very first doubts were expressed by another FreeRepublic commenter called TankerKC. As Buckhead explained on a FreeRepublic forum board:

Victory in this case justly has a thousand fathers. Tanker KC first pegged them as fakes by the overall look, and I later noted the font issue. Many other defects have been noted by others.

Buckhead is correct: TankerKC was indeed the first known person to express any concern regarding the memos’ authenticity. In this post, which he put up during the program, after briefly seeing the documents on the TV screen, TankerKC noted an issue with the signature blocks:

WE NEED TO SEE THOSE MEMOS AGAIN!

They are not in the style that we used when I came in to the USAF. They looked like the style and format we started using about 12 years ago (1992). Our signature blocks were left justified, now they are rigth of center…like the ones they just showed.

Can we get a copy of those memos?

This comment was posted at 5:19 PDT — 7:19 in TankerKC’s Central Time Zone, as he explains here. Having seen the documents briefly on a TV screen, TankerKC had not had a chance to examine the more detailed discrepancies with the fonts — issues which were raised several hours later, by Buckhead, in this post.

Yesterday I contacted TankerKC and persuaded him to answer some questions via e-mail.

I asked TankerKC to tell me a little bit about himself. He told me that he is currently stationed at Maxwell AFB, AL. “I’ve lived all over the place for the past 23 years,” he said. He is currently a Major in the USAF, and is a registered Republican in Illinois. I asked him whether he is politically active, and he told me he was not, explaining: “it is hard to be while an active duty officer.” I asked him whether he had given any money to political candidates, and he replied: “I may have given a small amount to the RNC at one time. I have never given to a candidate.”

I asked him how he first learned about the allegedly forged documents. He said:

I first learned of the documents while watching the 60 Minutes piece. They showed quick shots of the memos. I watched the whole piece, then posted to FreeRepublic. I also looked in my personal files for older letters to confirm my memory of how old documents were formatted.

I asked him whether he had followed the controversy on the blogs, and he said:

I don’t read any blogs—FR is all I need! I stay informed by watching the news (FOX & MSNBC) and reading several web sites.

. . . .

I did see some Power Line coverage of this. I’ve never been there before, but I followed a link from FR [FreeRepublic]. I don’t think I went to any other sites.

I hope TankerKC becomes a regular Patterico reader after this!

I asked TankerKC how he felt about the fact that he and Buckhead had helped break a Page One story in the Washington Post. TankerKC responded:

I wasn’t aware of the Washington Post front page story, but I’m glad that a regular citizen can call the big network news outlets on their mistakes.

TankerKC said he has not been contacted by any journalists.

In this post, I discussed recent suggestions by NPR and Media Matters that the people who initially spotted issues with the documents — meaning TankerKC and Buckhead — were actually the people who forged the documents. I asked TankerKC to respond to these suggestions, and he told me:

I’m part of a conspiracy? Wow! What’s in it for me … I
can’t wait for the check.

Conspiracies are usually silly, this one is unusually silly. I noticed the problems with the memos because I have been in several staff positions for the past 11 years … I have to make sure the paperwork is right.

TankerKC confirmed that he is in no way attached to the Bush campaign.

I asked TankerKC what he thought the impact would be on the credibility of CBS and Dan Rather. He said that “CBS news may take a hit in credibility,” but explained that it may not be that great a hit — because the people who still watch Rather should already know about his biases, but watch him anyway. TankerKC’s thoughtful response reflects many Americans’ increasingly deep distrust of the liberal media:

Media coverage about this so far has surprised me. I figured that this would just stay on the net—and mostly on the conservative side of the net. What do I think will happen to Dan Rather’s credibility? He has been a jackass for sometime—those that weren’t aware, still won’t be aware.

It’s a sobering thought: if you haven’t figured out Dan Rather and CBS News already, why would this change your mind?

Thanks to TankerKC for answering these questions.