Keith Olbermann of MSNBC keeps writing about election fraud and I keep writing about him. His current column gives an indication of how closely he looks at the news vs. how much he takes from questionable source.

Part way down he is talking about the value of a sworn affidavit:

One need only remember the flurry of paperwork that accompanied last summer’s Swift Boat advertisements and book— and in particular the one Vietnam vet who changed his story faster than a sportswriter providing a running round-by-round description of a championship boxing match— to recall that today’s absolute truth can be followed by a statement like “I probably shouldn’t have signed that.”

The incident in question involved George Elliot who had given the Swift Boat Vets a signed affidavit criticizing Kerry's Silver Star. A pro-Kerry reporter for the Boston Globe printed a piece quoting Elliot as saying:

“It was a terrible mistake probably for me to sign the affidavit with those words. I'm the one in trouble here.” The affidavit states that the incident for which Kerry received the medal was actually shooting “a wounded, fleeing Viet Cong in the back.” Elliott said he felt “time pressure” to sign the affidavit “That's no excuse,” Elliott said, “I knew it was wrong. … In a hurry I signed it and faxed it back. That was a mistake.”

This got a lot of press coverage. The next day Elliot announced that he had been misquoted in the Boston Globe article, and reaffirmed his original statement with another affidavit. Afterwards Elliot refused to talk to any more reporters.

Most likely, either Elliot was bullied by the Globe reporter into changing his story and regretted it later or the Globe misquoted him. Given an experience like that I would refuse to talk to reporters. Regardless, Olbermann's characterization of the incident is pretty shoddy.

The heart of Olbermann's story is that a congressman, John Conyers, has gotten involved in the Ohio election by asking the FBI to investigate. For some reason, Olbermann breaks journalism style rules and only identifies Conyers as being from Michigan without mentioning party affiliation (Democrat). Olbermann says of Conyers, "John Conyers is clearly not a tin-foil-hatter."

The tin-foil-hat status is is doubt. A quick look at Conyers' list of correspondence shows that he writes a lot of letters to a lot of officials. He wrote 145 letters during the last two years, many involving suspected election fraud or voter intimidation in other states. In October he wrote a letter the FCC about Sinclair Broadcasting's intention to air an anti-Kerry documentary alleging that "it sets a precedent that endangers our very democracy." (The special turned out to be rather pro-Kerry.) On September 19, 2001, Conyers wanted a special White House/Congressional meeting with Arab Americans and South Asian Americans about hate crimes.

Anyway, Conyers seems to take every allegation of election fraud as seriously as Olbermann. This does not mean anything. You can find congressmen with all sorts of strange ideas. Olbermann should know this.