WHO IS LYING: LAURIE OR KINGSTON?

All you have proven is that Mr. Laurie has definite deficiencies in
reading comprehension and factual reporting. -- Taylor Kingston

First, we ask Taylor Kingston once again whether he adopted false
names such as Paulie Graf and Xylothist and posted
messages IN PRASIE OF HIMSELF, for Pete's sake?

Does this standard accord with what our NMnot meant when claiming he
has "standards"? He ain't gonna answer.
Nevvah has. Nevvah will.

But in any reckoning of who is lying, NMnot or Richard Laurie,
testimony about respective character,
would be relevant in both a courtroom and in the court of public
opinion.

Readers may recollect that we published a letter written by
Richard Laurie to NMnot Kingston in 2002. In that letter, among other
points made, playwright
Laurie stated that our NMnot denied knowledge of a dispute between GM
Larry Evans and Eddie Winter.

Before discussing how those versed in evidence -- both lawyers
and historians -- would deem this letter, we have to deal with a few
handfuls of intellectual sand being tossed by Greg Kennedy and, in his
latest message, by the increasingly unspeakable NMnot, who unlike his
unread confrere knows better. The two are
trying mightily to change the subject. Yet the issue is not whether
the Laurie letter, in itself, "proves" anything. It does not. It is
a just one piece of evidence (see further discussion below).

The relevance of Richard Laurie's capacity for expression is not
that a man
with a refined capacity for expression necessarily tells the truth
(the imbecilic strawman attributed to me by Greg and, now, by NMnot).
The issue is that when
examining written evidence those who approach it objectively must
determine the likelihood that its author expressed his intended
meaning accurately.

For example, we saw an example on this forum last year when Bill
Brock, an accountant from Chicago who suffers syntactical limitations,
unwittingly accused himself of being a child molester during a spat
with Sam Sloan. Indeed, Mr. Brock offered an implied confession that
would carry weight in a court of law, if a victim were also to be
found. This writer jumped on the lapse, though noting repeatedly
that we were sure that Mr. Brock had not intended to convey the
meaning that emanated from his fevered brow and bruised keyboard.

Those versed in weighing evidence -- both lawyers and historians
-- would deem the Laurie letter as probative, though not determinative
evidence. They would want to know whether Mr. Laurie, as discussed
above, could convey his thoughts with precision. They would examine
the circumstances of the letter -- the fact that it was written by
someone uninvolved in chess political spats, the fact that it was
written by someone with little knowledge of the personalities
involved, the fact that it was written as a private communication
without any definite expectation that it would ever see the light of
day in a partisan dispute, the fact that it was a friendly
letter in overall tone, the fact that concerns were expressed with
civility rather than any partisan rancor, and the like.

NMnot Kingston's response to the letter has been that Mr. Laurie
was lying, befuddled, muddled and evil. He denied the Laurie claim.

Contrary to the nonsense written by our NMnot, the discussion is
not about what the Laurie letter proves. In itself, it proves
nothing. It is a form of evidence that carries weight. One adds to
this evidence, the practice of our NMnot in PRAISING HIMSELF under
false names. We still have no proof that NMnot lied to Mr. Laurie
(that may be forthcoming). We only have evidence on paper and
indications of NMnot's character.

That's all we have. Judgment, for we will all make a judgment,
even if not to judge at all, comes down to probability. What weighs
more heavily on an
evidentiary scale? NMnot's denial, or Mr. Laurie's letter that popped
up in a dispute many years later, which its author could never
possibly have envisaged?

My judgment tells me that Mr. Laurie, a man versed in the
niceties of language, was not likely to have misunderstood NMnot's
meaning and that he had no motive at that time to misrepresent NMnot's
meaning. Further, the letter per se is a form of evidence which is
probative. It has appreciable value. Against this concatenation of
meanings, we have the denial of NMnot, whom we know to
possess an ego so vast and fragile as to require him to post under
false names on this forum IN PRAISE OF HIMSELF, for Pete's sake.

Who is the more likely liar? Laurie or NMnot? I entertain not
the scantest doubt that the liar is our NMnot, the man who also
inflated his rating by 500
points during a hot dispute with Sam Sloan.

Yours, Larry Parr