wrote in message
oups.com...
THE INVESTIGATION

Not so fast, Larry Parr! The List is completely partisan, eliminates
others
from consideration, and concentrates on Truong alone. Mike Murray says
this
is not so, but what he does is my measure, not what he says. -- Phil
Innes

Dear Phil,

I'm not so sure that the Murray list was tilted
against Paul Truong, and I agree that the question of
motive is paramount unless there is proof rather than
indications or easily faked circumstances that PT's
fingers were on the offending keyboard(s).

Thank you, Sir.

I must wait to see all the evidence before arriving at
a verdict. Truong's guilt is counter-intuitive if you know
Susan and have followed his career as a promoter. I've
always considered these two to be greedy in a positive
sense, which means they are eminently practical people.

For some, my knowledge of their character, their need to express themselves
in this proposed way, or whatever their motivation could possibly be, is
dismissed /because/ I know them, since any other sort of 'evidence' as it is
called here, has been [preemptively] dismissed already.

Like you, I have no idea what is true, since, like you, I have not seen any
duly processed evidence. All I have said is that what is sort-of presented
seems profoundly out of character. This is not to eliminate a possibility,
but to qualify one.

I have seen both under pressure. And certainly Paul is very verbal - unless
you talk, he does. In some 60 hours one week under some intense pressure to
get all together, I never heard a curse. Not even a euphemistic one, '...
the blessed so and so...' not even one bitten off short of saying it.

At least in this respect he is the same as Sam Sloan, who also does not
curse. (I do! I curse like Ramsey! But then, we are both uninhibited Scots.)

Faking thousands of messages over the course of
several years takes time away from making money out of
chess. I cannot imagine either of them sacrificing SO
MUCH financially productive time to such an unremunerative
exercise in identity-theft.

I rather feel that the obsession runs the other way. Sam cannot seem to go a
whole day without mention either of them at least 3 times.What any long-time
and reversed motivation could be is something I don't know.

I read one argument against PT and Susan from, I
believe, Stephen Jones. He has noticed they do not
appear to be hopping angry that someone has set
them up and do not seem to be pursuing the guilty
party vigorously.

Ah - well, what we got here is far from the whole story. Since other things
may depend on it which /are/ serious, besides any obligation to
confidentiality, it is not my part to say more.

What is general indecent to me, is that here in public we either declare
that by discussing the issue we are interested in finding out who it was
rather than pose one candidate for the dock, and that's all. We should also
declare that we cannot properly determine all that has gone on, and it is
conscious supposition.

I do understand people's anger about this deceit - but I am afraid things
are more involved and invested than what is currently displayed here.

Two points: 1. Different people react differently to
adversity; some of them collapse or grow depressed even
though they may be completely innocent; and 2. How do
any of us know what PT and Susan are doing about the charges?

As with Sam Sloan, if I felt he actually had something more to do with
chess, than with his own role in chess, I personally could be more
interested in the result. In effect, this has more to do with newsgroup
fakery than any chessic outcome.

Are they obligated o tell us they have hired an investigator or
enlisted close friends to help them in the search for an unknown
villain, if such they have done? Indeed, if I were they, I would keep
any such emdeavor as secret as possible.

It rather depends on what anyone thinks thay are doing. Just because you are
accused of something false, does not oblige you to refute the accusation.
That's a scene from Darkness at Noon. Obligation of proof lies elsewhere.
Have you noted how few people aver that, which is to say, respect the law
and people's rights withing the law.

So to turn the question; if there is sincere interest in finding out who the
false poster is, should that not be close, or privily kept, material? And
who should properly investigate it - in fact, who has said they were
interested? )

I agree that PT and Susan ought not to be the
only ones who are expected to answer questions
concerning Fake Sams and Gordons, though they would be
wise to provide their side of the story.

I think what underlies this 'event' should be sorted out, and that is
actually essential for this board to function. The surface factor we see
here is but the result of it. As you note above, notice of any determined
investigation is not going to appear here

There is an animus among several here against the
defense of being framed. Yet right up in your neck of
the woods there have been literally hundreds, perhaps
thousands, of drug convictions overturned because cops
planted drugs in cars to advance their own careers.

Actually, they are often interplanted in cornfields rather than in cars. As
for the cops, its hard not to pat them on the head and call them sonny.
Though they have been using their tasers rather too much of late. In our
town two environmentalists had chained themselves to a rock in a field as a
protest to development. Unfortunately the cops tased them. The Guvner is now
'looking into it'. A few years ago 2 cops shot a guy with a knife - he was
threatening his own life at about 25 feet from him, so to prevent his
suicide, they shot him dead.

I do not find the "framed" defense to be an
unlikely explanation, especially in the area of
computer messages.

Its one third of a good novel, no? A Who Dunnit Really Techno Thriller with
Intelligent People In It? A [cyber-] country replete with mischievous men...
roaming ...

Stephen Jones is right about one thing: the USCF
Forum should be open for intellectual firefighting
among the various parties involved -- PT and Susan,
Brian Lafferty, Hal Bogner, Mike Murray, Sam Sloan,
Randy Bauer and others.

Sorry to finish with an agreement since I thought we may have had a good
fight, but the only reason I can see for USCF to have its own forum at all
is to discuss chess politics, or chess management, if you like that title
better. How absurd that that is their quintessential function, and that is
the very taboo ishooooo!

And as we know, chess management is this country has failed because of an
excess of personality involvement [nice euphemism, eh?] to the degree that
donors all over the place think it the last place they will rest their
money. Eric Moskow just said it this morning in the NY Times. But what's a
million or two to the likes of us?

As the state of the evidence now stands, I think
PT and Susan would likely prevail in a raucous debate.
I think it was, in Barbara Tuchman's phrase a
"woodenheaded mistake" to shut down the Forum on this
and other issues. But what can you expect from a gaggle
of politicos who are so sensitive and fearful of exposure?

Its a pity that Randy Bauer has reverted to running on his record - poor
psychology these days - even if he were previously a saint. Unfortunately,
for every Saul who becomes a Paul, these days governmental ethics in the USA
has more going the other way.

What is needed is transparency, but on process, impartial procedure and
rules. That's the real business that Randy Bauer can do for USCF. In fact, I
would go so far as to say that no one else on the board could do this. It
ain't glamorous work, but more important than perhaps any other factor.

And he should do it. As a spokesperson he doesn't come off too well, and, [I
know you don't like him at all] I think even you agree that it is a waste of
all that government training money to tell us what time it is when we never
even asked.

The wise and the wiser have been saying this stuff for years, but the dear
old fellows who run the place keep putting it off, and are ever surprised
when things go west, once again.

People are so attached to weilding a very little power, they prefer it the
way it is down sleepy-hollow way, and the likes of Eric Moskow can go pound
sand.

Cordially, Phil Innes

Yours, Larry Parr