Rathergate docs "forgeries," says computer science PhD Newcomer

Joseph M. Newcomer has an incredible curriculum vitae that includes fabulous experience specifically on fonts, typefaces, and the like.  His business, FlounderCraft Ltd.,

provides consulting, training, and development of Windows NT/2000/XP-based and Windows 95/98/Me applications. Specialties include GUI design, system architecture and control interfaces for embedded systems, and device drivers. FlounderCraft Ltd. and its predecessor, The Joseph M. Newcomer Co., has been providing technical consulting services since 1972. In 2002, he incorporated as FlounderCraft Ltd. 

Dr. Newcomer received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carnegie-Mellon University, and spent several years on the CMU CS faculty. He was a founding scientist of the Software Engineering Institute (SEI) at CMU. He has over 40 years of experience in developing commercial, industrial, and research applications.

On his own website — it doesn't appear that he's a pajama-wearing blogger, by the way — Dr. Newcomer has posted a fabulous article that is  heavy with graphics and illustrations, and written in language that anyone who can manage to work a web browser should be able to follow.  Here's how he starts off:

... I am not a fan of George Bush. But I am even less a fan of attempts to commit fraud, and particularly by a complete and utter failure of those we entrust to ensure that if the news is at least accurate. I know it is asking far too much to expect the news to be unbiased. But the people involved should not actually lie to us, or promulgate lies created by hoaxers, through their own incompetence.

There has been a lot of activity on the Internet recently concerning the forged CBS documents. I do not even dignify this statement with the traditional weasel-word "alleged," because it takes approximately 30 seconds for anyone who is knowledgeable in the history of electronic document production to recognize this whole collection is certainly a forgery, and approximately five minutes to prove to anyone technically competent that the documents are a forgery.

Can you put the probabilities in percentage terms for us, Dr. Newcomer?

The probability that any technology in existence in 1972 would be capable of producing a document that is nearly pixel-compatible with Microsoft’s Times New Roman font and the formatting of Microsoft Word, and that such technology was in casual use at the Texas Air National Guard, is so vanishingly small as to be indistinguishable from zero.

He then proceeds to demolish each of the "defenses" offered by CBS News and Bush opponents as plausible explanations for how the CBS News documents could be authentic.  He knows his kerning and his Linotype and his TrueType and even a little Thirteenth Century philosophy.  Final conclusion — which he invites anyone to quote and rely upon (no shrinking violet, he):

All I can say is that the technology that produced this document was not possible in 1972 in the sort of equipment that would have been available outside publishing houses, and which required substantial training and expertise to use, and it replicates exactly the technologies of Microsoft Word and Microsoft TrueType Fonts.

It is therefore my expert opinion that these documents are modern forgeries.

Dan Rather ended his Friday evening defense of the "60 Minutes" broadcast with this arrogant claim-plus-a-promise:  "If any definitive evidence to the contrary of our story is found, we will report it. So far, there is none." 

Hey Dan — lemme introduce you to Dr. Newcomer.

Anyone who'd like to help me make the introduction can contact CBS News via this link.

(Hat-tip to reader Tom Mortensen, who picked this up the Newcomer URL from a post on the SwiftVets' Geedunk and Scuttlebutt (off-topic non-Kerry) forum.)