WHAT DID KINGSTON WANT LAURIE TO RETRACT?
(confidentially, of course!)

Playwright Richard Laurie is a chess fan with no axe to grind. Here is
the item in Chess Life from Evans On Chess that Kingston tried to
persuade Laurie to retract in a series of emails Kingston marked
CONFIDENTIAL. Why the need for this topic, of public interest, to
remain confidential?

KERES & BOTVINNIK

Richard Laurie
Eric, Pennsylvania

Q. Finally, I don't know who Taylor Kingston is and I don't recall
much about his Chess Life article (in May 1998) except he denigrated
your ability to analyze five Keres-Botvinnik games to show that Keres
was coerced. I am always appalled by those who meet a solid argument
with a personal attack -- like Edward Winter (who called you
"shameless") and Kingston (who called you "dishonest"). Either Keres
threw the games or he did not. Nothing else matters. The 1919 Black
Sox
Scandal in baseball was uncovered because experts like Christy
Mathewson circled suspicious plays. This is basically what you did in
"The Tragedy of Paul Keres" (October 1996) to reopen an old scandal.

LAURIE ANSWERS KINGSTON'S REQUEST TO RETRACT THIS ITEM

[Mr. Laurie authorized me to issue this statement on his behalf.]

"Mr. Kingston's memory is extremely faulty. He contacted me on the
Net, then wanted to send me materials to try and win me over to his
side of the argument -- that Evans was wrong. After that he said HE
WOULD LIKE TO KEEP OUR CORRESPONDENCE QUIET [emphasis mine] just
between us. It sounded a little shaky, but so far I saw nothing
wrong.

"Then he said he contacted the editor and asked if it would be okay
for him to say I had changed my mind.. That's when I jumped on him in
my last letter, that I had not changed my mind and agreed to look at
his materials only to see what he had to offer.. I found nothing
substantial there and I told him that as far as secrecy went, he
already violated that by jumping the gun and contacting the editor.

"Mr. Kingston e-mailed me about half a dozen times. While I never
showed Evans any of his material, I told him I did feel perfectly free
to show Evans my own responses. All anyone has to do is read
Kingston's article in Chess Life to see that he denigrated Evans'
ability to analyze by saying Nunn was the better player.

"Kingston wanted me to retract my printed view of the situation as it
appeared in Evans On Chess. He wanted me to say that I was wrong and,
therefore, Evans was wrong ..I even wrote the editor saying I had not
changed my mind, and that ended the matter.

"Finally, I am troubled by your bald assertion that you are not aware
of the battle between Evans and Winter. I am troubled because I have
known for months that Larry Evans contacted you in preparing his
rebuttal to Mr.Winter's remarks as printed in Chess Life, October
2001. Further, it is my understanding and has been for months, that
you told Evans you sided with Winter on the whole. Please clear up
this seeming contradiction." -- Richard Laurie

THIS LETTER FROM ONE LAWRENCE ZIMMERMAN WAS BANNED FROM CHESSCAFE IN
2001 AT THE HEIGHT OT THE EVANS-WINTER DISPUTE

Mr. Kingston's six-page review of the evidence for Chess Life in May
1998 added nothing new to the debate and cited several Russian experts
who backed GM Evans. Since then a mountain of evidence has surfaced.
Botvinnik, for example, finally admitted that Stalin personally
intervened; and Keres told friends he was ordered to finish behind
Botvinnik. Can anyone who is intellectually honest still entertain
serious doubts? Yet, predictably, Mr. Winter endorses the claim that
there "isn't even a shred of actual evidence." And this is the guy --
I kid you not! -- that Mr. Kingston has anointed "to clean up the
mess and put chess history on a sound basis." I could go on and on.
Why bother? Nobody needs me to see through the slime.

KINGSTON TOOK NOT ONE BUT TWO MOVES BACK

Needless to add, Mr. Kingston retracted TWO letters that he wrote to
the editor of Chess Life praising GM Evans' article "The Tragedy of
Paul Keres."

Then Mr. Kingston changed his mind.

Then Mr. Kingston changed his mind again.

Finally, Mr. Kingston in a Further Review of the Evidence arrived at
the same conclusion as GM Evans about the Soviet fix in 1948: the
Commies did it.

On Nov 13, 1:05 pm, Larry Tapper wrote:

It seems to me that Evans' theory of forensic analysis was basically a
non-starter because of his criteria for fishiness ...
I think even Larry Parr must admit that if
"scholars" now resoundingly agree that the games were thrown, as he
claims, it can't possibly be because of Evans' game analysis. The best
we can say about that analysis is that GM opinion remains divided.
As I recall, Exhibit A in Evans' analysis was a rook endgame position
in which Keres unnecessarily placed his rook passively. A player of
Keres' caliber would never make a move like that, the argument went.
OK, but I have recent endgame books by Belyavsky and Dvoretsky that
feature dozens of examples of strong GMs making horrible mistakes in
fairly simple rook endgames. It is hard to say what a given GM would
never do --- remarkably bad things can happen to anyone who is tired
or nervous or short of time.

All very good points, Larry T. In the same vein, one point I'd like
to add here is that "forensic analysis" a la Evans is obviously
worthless without certain assumptions derived from context. Just given
raw game scores, with nothing about who played whom, when, where etc,
no one could possibly say with the least certainty that "34...Rd6
proves coercion." If Keres made a bad move in, say, a British
tournament where he was the only Soviet player, no one would dream of
saying he was throwing a game to let a Brit win. If Joe Smith made the
same move in the same position in a weekend Swiss, the notion of
conspiracy would be laughed at. But put the same move in Hague-Moscow
1948, and people are all too eager to say "You see, the fix is in!"
with no more factual basis than they have in the other contexts.
My point is that it takes far more than mere analysis to prove any
sort of fix. Evidence from sources other than the board is required.

On Nov 13, 8:08 pm, Taylor Kingston wrote:

All very good points, Larry T. In the same vein, one point I'd like
to add here is that "forensic analysis" a la Evans is obviously
worthless without certain assumptions derived from context. Just given
raw game scores, with nothing about who played whom, when, where etc,
no one could possibly say with the least certainty that "34...Rd6
proves coercion." If Keres made a bad move in, say, a British
tournament where he was the only Soviet player, no one would dream of
saying he was throwing a game to let a Brit win. If Joe Smith made the
same move in the same position in a weekend Swiss, the notion of
conspiracy would be laughed at. But put the same move in Hague-Moscow
1948, and people are all too eager to say "You see, the fix is in!"
with no more factual basis than they have in the other contexts.
My point is that it takes far more than mere analysis to prove any
sort of fix. Evidence from sources other than the board is required.


In the article by Hans Ree, it became necessary for
him to grossly distort the facts in order to fit the
conspiracy theory under examination.

In essence, HR made a case that no strong GM
would *ever* play a stupid Rook maneuver where he
retreats the Rook, and then places it behind a weak
pawn on the edge of the board. However, instead of
showing us that this in fact happened, he gives some
in-between moves that change everything, that show
it was not the "elementary maneuver" in question.
If this was not grossly dishonest, then it was
grotesquely incompetent, analysis.

I also found the analysis taken from S&L to be
very lame here. Instead of the obviously-correct
strategy adopted by GM Botvinnik, Hans Ree has
S&L -- endgame experts -- giving ridiculous moves
as supposed evidence of a draw. My guess is that
were it possible to enter such "theory" into any top
chess program, GMs Smyslov Levenfish, and Ree
would all three bite the dust here in short order.
One does not draw such endings by merely huffing
and puffing that it is a theoretical draw; it is
necessary for the inferior side to find the best move
or plan at every turn, and you must not avoid facing
the best tries for the opponent via self-deceit.

Mr. Kingston observed that a strategy for losing
believably might entail getting oneself into time
pressure. Well, in that same vein, the last thing
you would want to do is get into a simple Rook
ending before blundering intentionally, for this
could arouse suspicion. Also note the wasted
energy, which might well have been conserved by
erring early in the opening, like GM Reshevsky
did repeatedly.

For me, the final blow was when Mr. Ree quoted
"hapless victim" GM Bronstein making excuses for
his own fixing of games; you cannot have it both
ways -- whining of being cheated and yet being one
of the many cheaters yourself. The fact that the
Evans ratpackers have decided to support one
cheater over all other such cheaters does not
arouse my sympathy in the least; rather, I am just
disgusted.


-- help bot

Larry Parr wrote (Tue, 13 Nov 2007 17:07:03 -0800):

7 ... [Mr. Laurie authorized me to issue this statement on his
behalf.]
7
7 "...
7 ... All anyone has to do is read Kingston's article in Chess Life to
see
7 that he denigrated Evans' ability to analyze by saying Nunn was the
7 better player.
7 ..." -- Richard Laurie
_
_
Does Larry Parr disagree with the claim that Nunn was the better
player?
_
_
Larry Parr wrote (Tue, 13 Nov 2007 17:07:03 -0800):

7 ... LETTER FROM ONE LAWRENCE ZIMMERMAN ...
7
7 ... Since [Mr. Kingston's six-page review of the evidence for Chess
Life
7 in May 1998] a mountain of evidence has surfaced. Botvinnik, for
example,
7 finally admitted that Stalin personally intervened; and Keres told
friends
7 he was ordered to finish behind Botvinnik. Can anyone who is
intellectually
7 honest still entertain serious doubts? Yet, predictably, Mr. Winter
7 endorses the claim that there "isn't even a shred of actual
evidence. ..."
_
_
The 'shred' quote is from John Watson. Winter reproduced it while
telling
the story of how GM Evans used a quote of a 1997 Kingston letter. I
do
not think it can be claimed with certainty that Edward Winter endorsed
the
Watson 'shred' quote. In any event, the statement was in the past
tense:
_
"... Evans ... did dispute Watson's description of Taylor Kingston as
a
critic of Evans' claims (claims made, wrote Watson, without 'even a
shred
of actual evidence') ..."
_
http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/evans.html
_
It is somewhat misleading to transform the assertion to the present
tense
and give the impression that it was a comment on evidence that has
been presented in the years after GM Evans claims that were criticized
by Taylor Kingston in 1998.

Larry Parr wrote (Tue, 13 Nov 2007 17:07:03 -0800):

7 ... [Mr. Laurie authorized me to issue this statement on his
7 behalf.]
7
7 "...
7 ... All anyone has to do is read Kingston's article in Chess
7 Life to see that he denigrated Evans' ability to analyze by
7 saying Nunn was the better player.
7 ..." -- Richard Laurie
_
_
Does Larry Parr disagree with the claim that Nunn was the
better player?
_
_
Larry Parr wrote (Tue, 13 Nov 2007 17:07:03 -0800):

7 ... LETTER FROM ONE LAWRENCE ZIMMERMAN ...
7
7 ... Since [Mr. Kingston's six-page review of the evidence
7 for Chess Life in May 1998] a mountain of evidence has
7 surfaced. Botvinnik, for example, finally admitted that
7 Stalin personally intervened; and Keres told friends he
7 was ordered to finish behind Botvinnik. Can anyone who
7 is intellectually honest still entertain serious doubts?
7 Yet, predictably, Mr. Winter endorses the claim that
7 there "isn't even a shred of actual evidence. ..."
_
_
The 'shred' quote is from John Watson. Winter reproduced
it while telling the story of how GM Evans used a quote of a
1997 Kingston letter. I do not think it can be claimed with
certainty that Edward Winter endorsed the Watson 'shred'
quote. In any event, the statement was in the past tense:
_
"... Evans ... did dispute Watson's description of Taylor
Kingston as a critic of Evans' claims (claims made, wrote
Watson, without 'even a shred of actual evidence') ..."
_
http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/evans.html
_
It is somewhat misleading to transform the assertion to the
present tense and give the impression that it was a
comment on evidence that has been presented in the years
after GM Evans claims that were criticized by Taylor
Kingston in 1998.

On Nov 13, 8:07 pm, " wrote:


Q. Finally, I don't know who Taylor Kingston is and I don't recall
much about his Chess Life article (in May 1998) except he denigrated
your ability to analyze five Keres-Botvinnik games to show that Keres
was coerced. I am always appalled by those who meet a solid argument
with a personal attack -- like Edward Winter (who called you
"shameless") and Kingston (who called you "dishonest").


Or Larry Parr, who sets the bar in this event.

Or like Larry Evans -- who attacks those who
point out his many gaffes as peons who ought
not to attack their "vast superiors".

I am beginning to wonder about this fellow,
this myopic dolt, RL... .


Either Keres threw the games or he did not.
Nothing else matters.

Good. Then we can dispense with personal
commentaries and pretenses regarding who
might have the moral high ground, then. When
does RL plan to begin the project?


The 1919 Black Sox
Scandal in baseball was uncovered because experts like Christy
Mathewson circled suspicious plays. This is basically what you did in
"The Tragedy of Paul Keres" (October 1996) to reopen an old scandal.

Translation: Mr. Laurie does not wish to discuss
details regarding /how/ LE handled the matter; he
wants to focus on just the fact that LE reopened
an old "scandal". (This is precisely what I was
saying before, but which lousy PR-man Larry Parr
missed: don't go into the details!)



"Mr. Kingston's memory is extremely faulty.

That, we already knew. But we also know from
the above that RL is no recall-machine either; he
was not able to remember anything about an
article he discusses and denigrates above, except
that TK criticized LE. Sheesh. You would think
he could at least have done a bit of research,
rather than write in about something he can't even
recall.


"Then he said he contacted the editor and asked if it would be okay
for him to say I had changed my mind.. That's when I jumped on him in
my last letter, that I had not changed my mind and agreed to look at
his materials only to see what he had to offer.. I found nothing
substantial there

Is there any guarantee that had there been anything
substantial there, this dolt would have been able to find
it? I don't think so. He already missed things like LE's
*many* personal attacks on his critics, for instance --
things which were nearly impossible to miss.


and I told him that as far as secrecy went, he
already violated that by jumping the gun and contacting the editor.

"Mr. Kingston e-mailed me about half a dozen times. While I never
showed Evans any of his material, I told him I did feel perfectly free
to show Evans my own responses. All anyone has to do is read
Kingston's article in Chess Life to see that he denigrated Evans'
ability to analyze by saying Nunn was the better player.

Like I said, a dolt. GM Nunn *was* in fact the better
player, since LE was an old man and well past his prime
in chess when he penned that article.

Saying this denigrates LE is like observing that a
bird can fly faster than a fish can swim, and this is an
insult to the fish.


"Kingston wanted me to retract my printed view of the situation as it
appeared in Evans On Chess. He wanted me to say that I was wrong and,
therefore, Evans was wrong ..I even wrote the editor saying I had not
changed my mind, and that ended the matter.

Wrong! This matter may well not die until LP and/or
LE do.



KINGSTON TOOK NOT ONE BUT TWO MOVES BACK

That would make him even better than Gary Kasparov
(at cheating). In fact, it would make him better than
most skilled cheaters I have played -- and they were
pretty darned good!


Finally, Mr. Kingston in a Further Review of the Evidence arrived at
the same conclusion as GM Evans about the Soviet fix in 1948: the
Commies did it.

Don't kid yourself: even Capitalists could do this,
if they studied and prepared and trained.
It's like GM Tal: no one could play with us, if we
would only learn to program ourselves (to cheat)
properly.


A good red herring dinner. But we all know that
the real issue was the flawed GM Evans article, not
TK, EW, or RL's inane opinions. Anybody with a
mega-base can set up a Rook ending and find
similar gaffes by GMs which involved no hanky-
panky. A better approach would have been to
gather all relevant information, weed out the chaff,
and then coalesce the remainder into a logical
discussion of known facts, not speculations (and
certainly not arrogant claims to singular chess
abilities unique to LE). Too late now; you can't
go back in time -- not even with your clock of
silence.


-- help bot

"... of secrecy ..." - Larry Parr
(Tue, 13 Nov 2007 13:44:47 -0800)

LAURIE REBUTS KINGSTON'S VERSION OF EVENTS

[Playwright Richard Laurie just authorized me to post this message.]

"When I refused to retract my letter to Chess Life, Taylor Kingston
told me, in effect, that I was even more evil than Larry Evans. That
was the last I heard from him directly. I will keep looking for his e-
mails to me. It is largely a matter of time. I have them somewhere
and will keep searching." -- Richard Laurie

WHY DID KINGSTON TELL LAURIE TO KEEP IT CONFIDENTIAL?

One of NMnot Taylor Kingston's trademarks is to
explain away cowardice (his obvious horror of losing a
match to Sam Sloan) and rank intellectual dishonesty
(writing under false names IN PRAISE OF HIMSELF) with
a series of shifting or absurd explanations and justifications.

What follows is a bit of past history. NMnot Kingston
told us that he marked his correspondence with Richard
Laurie "Confidential" because ... well, here is his reason:

The reason should be obvious to anyone familiar with Mr. Parr's newsgroup
tactics, with which by then I was thoroughly familiar. I knew that if
Laurie told Evans, Evans would tell Parr, and Parr would mount a smear
campaign,
misrepresenting my correspondence with Mr. Laurie. -- Taylor
Kingston, May 23, 2005

NMnot Kingston feared a smear campaign; therefore, the gent
preferred to keep his pristine, totally innocent correspondence
private. Nonsense. He could defend innocence, but what he could not
defend was what playwright Laurie smelled.

Smelled? That was the excuse NMnot Kingston used to avoid
playing Sam Sloan. He jabbered to us that he feared his olfactory
senses would be offended by breathing the same air in the same room
with Sam. The actual reason why our self-proclaimed, 2300+ Elo NMnot
refused to play 1900-or-so rated Sam for four-figure money was obvious
to everyone else.

We continue with yet another NMnot excuse for trying to keep his
e-mails with Richard Laurie from ever seeing the light of day. Like a
good defense lawyer, he tailored his responses as the pressure
mounted.

[But] the first time around Mr. Kingston claimed he marked many of
his letters CONFIDENTIAL and that it had no special significance. --
Larry Parr

That is also true. I was trying to spare your feelings, Larry,
then I realized you have none. If you consider this condemnatory, I'm
sorry. ;-D -- Taylor Kingston

Readers will judge for themselves whether NMnot acted to spare
this writer's feelings. Yet another lie replete with the man's proud
contumely.

NMnot Kingston tells us he has "standards."

WE ASK ONCE AGAIN: Did our NMnot post under false names on this
forum (Xylothist, Paulie Graf) in PRAISE OF HIMSELF, for Pete's
sake? Does he regard self-praise using false monickers as an example
of his "standards."

He won't answer. Never has. Never will.

Finally, we ask that he make ALL of his e-mails with Richard
Laurie public, not just the "relevant" portions that he wants us to
see so we can compare them with the e-mails that Laurie actually
received. Let there be no gaps a la president Richard Nixon.

Yours, Larry Parr




wrote:
LAURIE REBUTS KINGSTON'S VERSION OF EVENTS

[Playwright Richard Laurie just authorized me to post this message.]

"When I refused to retract my letter to Chess Life, Taylor Kingston
told me, in effect, that I was even more evil than Larry Evans. That
was the last I heard from him directly. I will keep looking for his e-
mails to me. It is largely a matter of time. I have them somewhere
and will keep searching." -- Richard Laurie

FAST EDDIE'S ATTACKING METHODS

Over the past couple of days, I have been reprising several
essays that I wrote on Edward Winter's tactics when attacking GM Larry
Evans, his superior as a writer and, of course, his superlative as a
player and analyst.

Yesterday I present a portion of an essay dealing with how
Winter fabricated an error that Larry Evans never made. Readers may
recollect that Larry Evans reversed the identity of players in
Borochow-Fine. A CL reader pointed out such, and GM
Evans acknowledged the correction in his Chess Life. Enter Mr.
Winter's frosty, malevolent dishonesty: he quoted from a collection
of GM Evans' chess columns, a book that appeared in 1982. His point
was to make it appear that GM Evans was once again reversing the
players in Borochow-Fine after the correction made in 1978. He did
NOT tell readers that the 1982 volume contained photographic
reproductions of Evans' newspaper articles as they had appeared
during the 1970s. The column in question appeared in 1976 BEFORE the
correction was made in Chess Life.

That is the kind of stuff that NMnot Taylor Kingston regards as
honest polemical conduct. Nor will he tell us that it was deeply
dishonest. His response thus far has been the formulaic one for
Winter's disciples. NMnot Kingston told us he is not obligated to
comment on everything under the sun. The alternative explanation for
his silence is cowardice.

Here is a continuation of an essay presented earlier. We see
here yet another Winter technique of attack that apparently meets the
"standards" of his disciple Taylor Kingston.

MR. WINTER'S CONTUMELY

Was Mr. Winter really unaware that Teichmann was a
human 1/5-fraction at the great events of his prime
years? I don't think so. He knows his dates and
name-spellings well enough. But he could not restrain
his disdain for conventional wisdom, even when that
wisdom is evidently sound. He HAD to heap scorn on
what others have long thought. Such is Mr. Winter's contumely.

How does Mr. Winter's contumacious misrepresentation of
Teichmann's career compare with Larry Evans misremembering when one
Quesada died or with
misdentifying the winner of a game between Fine and Borochow, etc.?
The few errors that appear in the millions of words written by GM
Evans over the course of half a century were mistakes made in good
faith. They were not major misjudgments
motivated by scorn for the understanding and work of others.

On the subject of Mr. Winter's contumely, one of his favorite
devices is to affect obtuseness so as to score debater's points. A
typical snippet of nastiness is his "Horowitz philosophe" in the
"Gaffes" chapter of Chess Explorations. Writes Mr. Winter, "On page
24 of The Chess Beat [by GM Evans] Al Horowitz is quoted:

'Chess is a great game. No matter how good one is, there is always
somebody better. No matter how bad one is, there is always somebody
worse.'" To which
Mr. Winter responds tartly, "What other game can match that?"

Just awful. Even at the level of formal logic, Mr. Winter's
putdown falls flat. For, of course, there is at any given split
second one person who is the very best and one person who is the very
worst. So, in fact, there is not "always" somebody better or
"always" somebody worse. So, contrary to Mr. Winter's obtusely ironic
claim, no other game can match that does not really exist.

But forget the formal logic. Even most of his ratpackers
understand that Al Horowitz committed no gaffe. Horowitz was speaking
jocosely and, in truth, rather deeply. He was claiming that egos
among chess players are such that we have all seen club players
looking for some poor sucker to lord it over - some young kid or old
duffer to whom one can pose as the genius of the age. Horowitz was
speaking with a chuckle about the foibles of chess players and,
perhaps wrongly though interestingly, suggesting that the trait of
seeking out dragons to slay or schlumps
to dominate is stronger among chess players than among players of
other games.

The New York Times obituary of Horowitz included part of the
quotation that Mr. Winter calls a "gaffe" because the obit writers
understood that a point was being made about human nature not about
the mathematics of exceptions.

I am sure that Mr. Winter also understood orowitz's thrust. He
chose to take the man's words at face value so as to tar a great man
of chess with the ironic subhead, "Horowitz philosophe."

(A minor point of connotation: A rather tin-eared Mr. Winter
would have served his malign purpose better by titling the paragraph,
"Horowitz the Philosopher." I am sure that a few readers know that in
English the word "philosophe" [Mr. Winter did not italicize it to
suggest strictly a French connotation.] has a somewhat negative
connotation. "The philosophes" or "the philosophe party" occupy a
niche just above "artistes" with an "e." Kant was a philosopher,
Diderot a philosophe.)

Another example of Mr. Winter dishonestly playing straight man so
as to ignore jocose humility was his absurdly arch reaction in Chess
Notes to GM Evans'
admission of error re the game between Prins and Quesada. Wrote
Evans, "I recalled Prins winning a hopeless adjournment from Quesada,
who died before the
game could be finished. I no longer have the scoretable of Havana
1952 but if Prins says he resigned, far be it from me to quibble. I
stand corrected even though you must admit it makes a good story."

Responded Mr. Winter icily, "The Prins-Quesada episode is not a
'good story' once it is shown to be untrue."

Now, in Chess Explorations, Mr. Winter writes, "'It makes a good
story' was also the reply received from Fred Wilson after we
complained that he had published inaccuracies regarding Staunton's
background."

The point here is that "It makes a good story" s a standard way
to admit error and poke fun at oneself rather than to insist, in spite
of the literal meaning of the words, that what is untrue is a good
story. Most of us understand that the phrase is an idiomatic device
to concede a blunder just as the famous editorial advice, "Never let
the facts stand in the way of a good story," is an example of
journalists laying the lash on themselves rather than advocating
deliberate error.

Did Mr. Winter dishonestly play the part of an obtuse pedant to
administer a cranky putdown? The answer is obviously yes unless we
assume utter ignorance on his part of a well-known piece of ironic
idiom.

Deliberate obtuseness cuts both ways. Take Mr. Winter's
apparently absurd claim on page 95 of Chess Explorations: "As
recorded on page 27 of Dale
Brandreth's edition of the Kemeri-Riga, 1939 tournament book, the Ruy
Lopez was played in that event only once in the 120 games ....It will
be surprising if a reader can quote a comparable case concerning this
most popular of openings."

"This most popular of openings"? Certainly not by the number of
games played! The Sicilian utterly swamps this "most popular" of
openings. What a "gaffe"!

Whoa thar, Nelly! Isn't the phrase, "this most popular of
openings," an old-fashioned, rather constipated rhetorical device used
to indicate wide popularity or even merely limited popularity among
certain circles? Am I not being unfair to take Mr. Winter's words at
face value?

Of course I am being unfair. But no more unfair than Mr. Winter,
who dishonestly feigned obtuseness when taking potshots at Al
Horowitz, Larry Evans and
Fred Wilson.

Or there is Mr. Winter's absurd reference to recorded chess
games coming from the "pre-history" of chess. Ought we to take him
literally, as he does others, or ought we to say that the phrase was a
permissible idiomatic contradiction of what the word "history" - above
all else the study of written records - actually means?

MALICE AFORETHOUGHT

Mr. Winter often permits his canker to overcome cold calculation,
though not because, in my view, he is careless. The man HAD to tell
the lie in Kingpin of
attributing words to GM Evans written by another. He HAD to make a
historically illiterate claim in his "Richard the Fifth," though
knowing full well that his attempt to debunk a piece of conventional
wisdom was bunk itself. He HAD to splatter mud at Al Horowitz and GM
Evans by taking literally some words that were intended jocularly and
ironically. He HAD to do these things because his malign enterprise
of endeavoring to humiliate those who commit honest errors in dates
and spellings is a narrow, inadequate duct for his bile. He needs a
wider latitude than the narrow channel of dates and spellings.

Hence the lies. Hence the historically illiterate contumely.
Hence the feigned obtuseness. Hence the nitpicking.

"I Can't Get No Satisfaction" is the theme song for any career
based on cheap shots derived from the mistakes of others. How
barren. How vile, really.





wrote:
WHY DID KINGSTON TELL LAURIE TO KEEP IT CONFIDENTIAL?

One of NMnot Taylor Kingston's trademarks is to
explain away cowardice (his obvious horror of losing a
match to Sam Sloan) and rank intellectual dishonesty
(writing under false names IN PRAISE OF HIMSELF) with
a series of shifting or absurd explanations and justifications.

What follows is a bit of past history. NMnot Kingston
told us that he marked his correspondence with Richard
Laurie "Confidential" because ... well, here is his reason:

The reason should be obvious to anyone familiar with Mr. Parr's newsgroup
tactics, with which by then I was thoroughly familiar. I knew that if
Laurie told Evans, Evans would tell Parr, and Parr would mount a smear
campaign,
misrepresenting my correspondence with Mr. Laurie. -- Taylor
Kingston, May 23, 2005

NMnot Kingston feared a smear campaign; therefore, the gent
preferred to keep his pristine, totally innocent correspondence
private. Nonsense. He could defend innocence, but what he could not
defend was what playwright Laurie smelled.

Smelled? That was the excuse NMnot Kingston used to avoid
playing Sam Sloan. He jabbered to us that he feared his olfactory
senses would be offended by breathing the same air in the same room
with Sam. The actual reason why our self-proclaimed, 2300+ Elo NMnot
refused to play 1900-or-so rated Sam for four-figure money was obvious
to everyone else.

We continue with yet another NMnot excuse for trying to keep his
e-mails with Richard Laurie from ever seeing the light of day. Like a
good defense lawyer, he tailored his responses as the pressure
mounted.

[But] the first time around Mr. Kingston claimed he marked many of
his letters CONFIDENTIAL and that it had no special significance. --
Larry Parr

That is also true. I was trying to spare your feelings, Larry,
then I realized you have none. If you consider this condemnatory, I'm
sorry. ;-D -- Taylor Kingston

Readers will judge for themselves whether NMnot acted to spare
this writer's feelings. Yet another lie replete with the man's proud
contumely.

NMnot Kingston tells us he has "standards."

WE ASK ONCE AGAIN: Did our NMnot post under false names on this
forum (Xylothist, Paulie Graf) in PRAISE OF HIMSELF, for Pete's
sake? Does he regard self-praise using false monickers as an example
of his "standards."

He won't answer. Never has. Never will.

Finally, we ask that he make ALL of his e-mails with Richard
Laurie public, not just the "relevant" portions that he wants us to
see so we can compare them with the e-mails that Laurie actually
received. Let there be no gaps a la president Richard Nixon.

Yours, Larry Parr




wrote:
LAURIE REBUTS KINGSTON'S VERSION OF EVENTS

[Playwright Richard Laurie just authorized me to post this message.]

"When I refused to retract my letter to Chess Life, Taylor Kingston
told me, in effect, that I was even more evil than Larry Evans. That
was the last I heard from him directly. I will keep looking for his e-
mails to me. It is largely a matter of time. I have them somewhere
and will keep searching." -- Richard Laurie