Proofs of a conspiracy?

Posts below hint at a "Reichstag fire" explanation of the CBS documents. Xymphora and others have come up with some very intriguing data buttressing just such a conclusion. I've been double-checking the info, and have added a few of my own data-nuggets.

Here's the rundown:

1. The first detailed attacks on the documents -- including all sorts of details concerning fonts and superscripts -- came a mere three hours after the 60 Minutes segment was broadcast. At that time, who could have had access to the documents themselves? They had not yet been posted, and they flashed on screen for mere seconds.

This strangely prescient attacker was a Freeper nicknamed "Buckhead," who turns out to be a far-right GOP activist lawyer named Harry MacDougald, of Atlanta. MacDougald has an interesting history.

Seems he has also been stumping for the use of Diebold electronic voting machines, which he feels are absolutely trustworthy. In MacDougald-vision, Ken Starr was conspired against, as opposed to running a conspiracy. Elsewhere, he refers to the previous president as "Comrade Clinton," oh-so-cleverly speaks of the French as "cheese-eating surrender monkeys," tries to peddle the canard that Sudan offered Osama to Clinton, and...well, why go on? You know the type.

Nota bene: MacDougald refused to tell the Los Angeles Times how he knew so much about the documents so quickly. Odd, isn't it? Guys like Harry usually scramble for attention. Another blogger, after quoting a MacDougald rant in an Atlanta paper, made this observation:

Look, the point is that this guy is not usually shy. He's practically a local media whore. So why would he previously seek attention in "Lawyer's quest for good government bittersweet" and write letters to the editor, be in the AJC Political Insider earlier this year filing a complaint about electronic voting machines and now all of a sudden on what will be the biggest story of his life he wishes to remain anonymous and not comment on it.

2. CBS gave the documents to the White House before the broadcast, and asked for comments. If the WH had questioned the documents' authenticity, the story (or at least that part of the story) would not have aired. True, document authentication is not the job of the Bush forces. Still, you would think that any White House would raise a note of caution if faced with phonies. To the contrary -- the WH press office was happy to pass out the questioned pages to all interested newsmen, thereby insuring that the press corps devoted their attentions to a tale which ultimately favored Bush.

3. Burkett, the conduit for the documents, claims that he was handed these pages by a woman in Houston named Lucy Ramirez. Since Burkett has told more than one story, one scarcely knows what to make of this claim. There are two women named Lucy Ramirez listed in the Houston phone book; if either one has political connections, they run beneath the notice of the web. (One of these Lucys is a musician in a group called Anal Drill. I think we can count her out -- although she sounds kind of cool!)

4. As noted in an earlier post, Bush strategist Karl Rove once won a gubernatorial election by placing a listening device in his candidate's office and falsely claiming that the opposition was responsible.

A theory slowly coalesces. But we need more proof. We need some evidence (something beyond Burkett's word) as to the origins of the documents. And we need to know how MacDougald appears to have received advance word of their contents.