Guckert/Gannon is NOT Johnny Gosch

You may recall the rather odd theory that Jim Guckert, a.k.a. Jeff Gannon, is actually Johnny Gosch, a famous kidnap victim of the 1980s. Aficionados of this theory often take it into even wilder realms. I've read extraordinary tales involving prostitutes, Satanists, CIA mind controllers, people who drink on Sundays, and even worse individuals.

This is all very droll, but where's the evidence? As I've previously noted, Guckert claims to be 47, while Gosch would be 35. However, as this site notes, one of Gannon's escort pages lists his age as 31 in 2001.

Golly. I can't imagine why a gay male prostitute would lie about his age...

Further points of interest: Johnny's mother, Noreen Gosch, claims that she was visited by her son in 1997, and that he is living under an assumed name. I've heard conflicting rumors about whether the person who contacted her was really the long-lost Johnny. (Some of you may recall the classic case of the Tichborne claimant.)

By an odd coincidence, a newspaper editor hostile to Noreen Gosch was named James Gannon.

And now we learn the following information, which appears to come from a rightward leaning conspiracist of the sort we came to know so well during the Clinton-hating 1990s:

Last evening I received a call from Ted Gunderson who is presently in Nebraska to interview a central figure in the Franklin Coverup case that is at the root of this "Jeff Gannon" story. A confidential source of Teds' has -- in a conversation with Ted yesterday afternoon-given a 100% confirmation that Jeff Gannon/Jim Guckert is very definitely Johnny Gosch. Ted has the full backing and authority of the mother of Johnny, Noreen Gosch, to handle this as only Ted would know how, along with the complete assistance of John DeCamp. Ted and John DeCamp are the investigators and exposers of the Franklin Coverup. Ted has given me the greenlight to write and post this much so far but for very obvious reasons, I cannot go into greater detail at this time, though I do know more than what I can add to this at this time. As I have been told, more information will soon be forthcoming with the authorization to post when I receive it.

Tim White, Viet Nam Vet(Air Force),Concerned Citizen

Well. That settles that.

I now feel confident that Jim Guckert is NOT Johnny Gosch. And how do I know? Because Ted Gunderson, the FBI's answer to Maxwell Smart, says he is.

I know Gunderson of old. The man is, in his way, 100% reliable: If Ted says the sky is blue, you can bet the rent money that the sky has changed to some other color.

Another conspiracist pushing the Gosch/Guckert line is -- but of course! -- Sherman Skolnick. Does he have proof? Well, consider the following:

The Special Prosecutor became aware that D.C. Escort Service operative, Jeff Gannon most likely alias Johnny Gosch, received the secret details directly from George W. Bush himself, either upstairs in the White House or across the street in an Executive office building.

Gannon trained in whorehouse services as a penetration agent for a super-secret U.S. agency, was an expert in torture techniques called S-M. Gannon alias Gosch became a top-level consultant on torture methods to Alberto Gonzales, who was soft-ball questioned about this when being affirmed as the new U.S. Attorney General.

And so on. This is the sort of thing that gives conspiracy theory a bad name: Proof-by-assertion, with nary a whiff of evidence.

Skolnick is a Chicago-based theorist who once conducted a noteworthy investigation into the 1972 airplane crash that killed the wife of E. Howard Hunt. In subsequent decades, Skolnick devolved into sub-tabloid sensationalism, offered to the public via his dial-a-conspiracy hotline -- (773) 731-1100. (Oddly, the number was being "checked for trouble" when I called it just now.)

His specialty is the grand assertion, qualified by adverbial weaseling. Here are three examples from the same brief article (all italics mine): "Monica Lewinsky was reportedly positioned from an early age to be a Mata Hari type," while her father "was ostensibly a sleeper agent for the Mossad" and "Plainly, [congressman Gary] Condit was reportedly in a position to know highly classified data about McVeigh."

Don't you love that conjunction of "plainly" and "reportedly"?

Skolnick is perhaps best known for his outrageous attempt to pin the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing on the Japanese. I, however, will always hold a special fondness for his series of 1992 reports that a "group of generals" were "on their way to Washington to arrest George Bush for treason" -- a word Skolnick tends to pronounce "TREEEEEEEE-zunnn." These stories continued week after week, yet the generals somehow never reached the nation's capitol; they remained forever "on their way." Perhaps they traveled underground, like Bugs and Daffy, always making that wrong turn at Albuquerque.

Reportedly, Skolnick can't understand why other writers allegedly don't trust his ostensibly accurate scoops.

Now, the disciples of Ted and Sherman tend to frown on those who, like me, have the temerity to ask for evidence. No doubt they will accuse me of being a gummint agent tasked to keep a cover on Bush's TREEEEEEE-zunnn. Before they fling such accusations, let me add two further comments:

1. Although I doubt the Gosch connection, I still think there is much more to the Guckert/Gannon story than we have been told.

2. If you are the sort of person inclined to accept the word of a Gunderson or a Skolnick, by all means continue to spread their "news" that Gosch and Guckert are one and the same. Encourage others to pursue this line of inquiry. Anything that might damage Bush's reputation within his right-wing fan base suits me just fine.