A Small Victory

On the face of it, it was an easy story to disprove.  A simple Freedom of Information Act request would turn up no records of me having an active duty military career.  Was sending that piece of paper too hard for anyone in the corporate media to do?  No wonder huge corporations get away with Enron-sized ripoffs. No wonder Jayson Blair was able to get away with making up the news.  No wonder that 55% of Americans still think that Saddam Hussein carried out the 9/11 attacks.  The media was sleeping on the job.  The Jayson Blair story exploded at the New York Times in April of 2003--the story about "Ranger Micah" ran in the Washington Post on July 6th, 2003.  It wasn't like they had no idea that there was a problem or that they should check their sources.  Why were they so asleep at the switch?

Anyone who's ever filled out an FOI request (I never have, but I've worked with people who have), will tell you that it's not a "simple piece of paper." Usually, the very reason people fill them out is because the government doesn't want to release the information.

No wonder he pulled all that stuff down off his web site. why start another lie when everyone is watching?

I'll agree that it's not that easy to verify someone's prior service, especially without the social security number. One would think that his publisher would exert due diligence, though. It's not like they couldn't have asked him for a copy of of his DD-214. The publisher HAD his SS#, they had to have it, they were paying him.

Great job in exposing the fraud of Micah Wright. No maybe someone in the media can work up the courage to ask Bush and Kerry to sign FOIA releases so we can examine issues that more than 8 people care about.

Geez, I was wondering what was taking the moral equivalency crowd so long.

Apples and oranges, asshole.

Hard to shoot back when you're firing blanks, eh, Macswaim?

Anyway, Leiby deserves praise for pushing the issue. This is what reporters are supposed to do, and what we see far less of these days. It's good to encourage it whenever it resurfaces.

Leiby not only did the work to pursue the story, as if that isn't enough, he also took time to leave a wonderfully informative comment on this blog. So here is to Richard Leiby's good work and to his graciousness. I'll drink a toast to him tonight.

10 bucks says somebody tries to blame some part of his outing on someone in the DoD or some devious, civil liberties-hating Republican.

Personally, I'm kinda glad it's not so easy to dig deep, dig fast on a citizen's personal background, even a phony like Micah the false prophet here.

Macswain is a tool who regularly drops loads at Oliver's pathetic site.

Actually tho i am more interested in what atrocities JFK committed in Nam then i am in either of their "offical" records, aren't you MacBraindead?

Yawn.

A troll, a troll, my Bud Lite for a troll...

I'd comment, but frankly I had my fill of the subject of Micah Wright the last time I caught Wright taking credit for the sweat of others' brows.

Moral equivalency, Michele? ... would that be like when you ascribed all sorts of shitty motives to Koppel for not reading the Afghanistan war dead?

Thanks, though, for the twofer gutbuster of the week. Your link to the Rene Gonzales dating profile was a classic howler and the twofer came when your righty followers didn’t get the joke. I couldn’t get enough of that shit. I was really pushed over the edge when one of your stooges finally started to “doubt” that it was real. Where did you find this collection of rubes?

As for hen ... looks like he/she meets the official Michele standard for the far right fringe loony. One who’d accuse Kerry of war crimes is part of that dangerous extreme element, right Michele? Sorry, hen but you’ve been pre-dissed by your dear idol and you didn’t even know it. Anytime you want to go toe-to-toe on substance bring your sorry ass on over to the O Dub site and take your whoppin’ ... oh, but what am I thinking? You righties are scared to death of debate that’s why you listen to Rush and beg the corporate media to shut the left down.

BTW – as for the name calling, I’m all for it. I love the trash talk when its brought with some humor and finesse. So just to show you there’s no hard feelings, I’ll leave with a quote from one of your faves, Jay-Z: “I got 99 problems and [michele] ain’t one.”

Macswain, dear. You're the one who brought up Bush and Kerry first.

You seem to have a knack for replying to posts by trotting out one of your agendas and trying to make it fit into the topic at hand.

I'm tiring of you.

Don't feed the trolls!

"Anytime you want to go toe-to-toe on substance bring your sorry ass on over to the O Dub site and take your whoppin’ ..."

If you're talking about Oliver Willis, I think you misspelled "buy him a Whopper."

Dude, not nice. NOt at all. First strike. Second gets you gone.

Peter, most of the people who read this site, and in the world for that matter have no clue what a DD-214 is. Maybe, just maybe they will know that you get "discharge papers" when you get out of the military. Those who have never counted down the days till they get their DD-214, picture in their mind a veteran getting a fancy certificate saying Honorable Discharge in caligraphy. Those who have a DD-214 know that it just isn't something suitable for framing. In fact, it almost doesn't look official.