A reasonable hypothesis

“http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/10/08/eveningnews/main577181.shtml

(CBS) It was the most sensational of all the suspect purchases made with government credit cards. A custom black Mustang, charged by Los Alamos National Laboratory employee Lillian Anaya. After a year-long investigation, the New Mexico lab exonerated her, and even claims she's the victim.

But a CBS News investigation casts serious doubt on that story.

FBI documents show Anaya "denied any knowledge or involvement" with the car and said she "never heard of" the car company. When the FBI showed her records of calls and faxes between her office and the Mustang dealer, Anaya "could not offer any explanation reasonable or not."

So, as CBS News Correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports, one was concocted for her by the University of California, which gets taxpayer money from the Energy Department to run the lab.

In a memo, a university attorney poses "a reasonable hypothesis ..." that Anaya was trying to buy lab equipment called "transducers," but dialed a wrong number and "did not realize she was actually speaking to ... the ... Mustang company," which then tricked her into ordering a car.

Upon hearing the explanation, former lab investigator Steve Doran says, "I literally started laughing. There's absolutely no way that their explanation holds water."

Steve Doran helped unearth the case then got fired because, he says, management wanted a cover-up, not the truth.

But no one was more surprised by the "wrong number" defense than the man who sold Anaya the Mustang.

"I talked to her probably on about five to seven occasions," says Tom Thompson, owner of AMP Performance.

He says Anaya knew exactly what she wanted, and it wasn't transducers.

"She wanted a late model Mustang black convertible, with like black leather interior," he says. "She wanted it loaded up with all the options and then she wanted to make it go fast."

CBS News has learned lab auditors flagged thousands more suspect purchases Anaya made as "attractive for personal use" or "unallowed."

Yet the lab declared her innocent and warmly welcomed her "back to the Los Alamos team."”

“What's not surprising is that the Bush Administration believed it. This being the same gullibity that gave us all the false reasons for the war in Iraq. Can you imagine how fat the republicans are getting on your tax dollars?”

“nonsequitur”

“I believe it.

Just yesterday I ordered take out pizza and a hooker showed up at the door. My wife came home in the meantime.

"Honest honey, I ordered a pizza!"”

“A University of California attorney also hypothesised that Dubya called a wrong number when trying to buy an airline ticket, and instead was tricked by the Pentagon into flying onto an aircraft carrier.

This same attorney will dangle a reasonable hypothesis at Rush Limbaugh's trial that Rush got a wrong number when praying to God to save America, and instead the Devil ~tricked~ him into buying drugs.”