Charles Foster Johnson (born April 13, 1953) is an American

blog A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is an informational website consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries also known as posts. Posts are typically displayed in Reverse chronology, reverse chronologic ...

ger, software developer, and former

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...

guitarist. He has played on 30 albums, sometimes credited as Icarus Johnson. He started the political blog

Little Green Footballs Little Green Footballs (LGF) is an American political blog run by web designer Charles Foster Johnson. In its beginning years, the site had a Right-wing politics, right-wing orientation and was known for its advocacy of the War on Terrorism and t ...

in 2001.

Biography

Johnson was born in

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

and raised in

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

. He launched his first career (as a

guitarist A guitarist (or a guitar player) is a person who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of guitar family instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselve ...

) in the mid-1970s. Extensive recording credits include at least three albums that went gold: ''Reach For It'' by

George Duke George Martin Duke (January 12, 1946 – August 5, 2013) was an American keyboardist, composer, singer-songwriter and record producer. He worked with numerous artists as arranger, music director, writer and co-writer, record producer and as ...

, '' School Days'' by

Stanley Clarke Stanley Clarke (born June 30, 1951) is an American bassist, composer and founding member of Return to Forever, one of the first jazz fusion bands. Clarke gave the bass guitar a prominence it lacked in jazz-related music. He is the first jazz-fus ...

, and ''Live in London'' by

Al Jarreau Alwin Lopez Jarreau (March 12, 1940 – February 12, 2017) was an American singer and songwriter. His 1981 album '' Breakin' Away'' spent two years on the ''Billboard'' 200 and is considered one of the finest examples of the Los Angeles pop and ...

. He was a member of

Richard Page Richard Lewis Page (born 22 February 1941) is a former Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Member of Parliament (United Kingdom), Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom from 1976 to 1979, and from 1979 to 2005. Early life Born the so ...

and Steve George's pre- Mr. Mister band,

Pages Page most commonly refers to: * Page (paper), one side of a leaf of paper, as in a book Page, PAGE, pages, or paging may also refer to: Roles * Page (assistance occupation), a professional occupation * Page (servant), traditionally a young mal ...

and played on the band's biggest hit, "I Do Believe in You." He later co-founded CodeHead Technologies, which marketed productivity and

desktop publishing Desktop publishing (DTP) is the creation of documents using dedicated software on a personal ("desktop") computer. It was first used almost exclusively for print publications, but now it also assists in the creation of various forms of online co ...

software Software consists of computer programs that instruct the Execution (computing), execution of a computer. Software also includes design documents and specifications. The history of software is closely tied to the development of digital comput ...

(mostly written in

assembly language In computing, assembly language (alternatively assembler language or symbolic machine code), often referred to simply as assembly and commonly abbreviated as ASM or asm, is any low-level programming language with a very strong correspondence bet ...

) for the

Atari ST Atari ST is a line of personal computers from Atari Corporation and the successor to the company's Atari 8-bit computers, 8-bit computers. The initial model, the Atari 520ST, had limited release in April–June 1985, and was widely available i ...

personal computer. In 2001, Johnson founded a web design firm called "

" with his brother Michael. Little Green Footballs began as a testbed on the company's website. Johnson was raised

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

but now considers himself an

agnostic Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural is either unknowable in principle or unknown in fact. (page 56 in 1967 edition) It can also mean an apathy towards such religious belief and refer to ...

. Johnson is a co-founder of

Pajamas Media PJ Media, originally known as Pajamas Media, is an American right-wing subscription-based commentary website. It was founded in 2004, with its majority owner being software entrepreneur, billionaire and angel investor Aubrey Chernick, founder o ...

, selling his stake in 2007.

Killian memos

Johnson, and other bloggers, gained attention during the

2004 U.S. presidential election Presidential elections were held in the United States on November 2, 2004. Incumbent Republican President George W. Bush and his running mate, incumbent Vice President Dick Cheney, were re-elected to a second term. They narrowly defeated ...

for their role in questioning the authenticity of several memos purporting to document irregularities in George W. Bush's National Guard service record. (See Killian documents and

Killian documents authenticity issues During the Killian documents controversy in 2004, the authenticity of the documents themselves was disputed by a variety of individuals and groups. Proof of authenticity is not possible without original documents, and since CBS used only faxed and ...

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

news anchor

Dan Rather Daniel Irvin Rather Jr. (; born October 31, 1931) is an American journalist, commentator, and former national evening news anchor. He began his career in Texas, becoming a national name after his reporting saved thousands of lives during Hurrica ...

presented the memos as authentic in a September 8, 2004 report on '' 60 Minutes Wednesday'', two months before the vote. Days after the broadcast, Johnson alleged the documents, supposedly typewritten in 1973, could have been created easily on a modern computer using

Microsoft Word Microsoft Word is a word processor program, word processing program developed by Microsoft. It was first released on October 25, 1983, under the name Multi-Tool Word for Xenix systems. Subsequent versions were later written for several other platf ...

Discography

*1976 ''School Days'' with

*1977 ''I'm Fine, How Are You ''with

Airto Moreira Airto Guimorvan Moreira (born August 5, 1941) is a Brazilian jazz drummer, composer and percussionist. He is married to jazz singer Flora Purim, and their daughter Diana Moreira is also a singer. Coming to prominence in the late 1960s as a membe ...

*1977 ''Reach for It ''with

*1977 ''Easy Living'' with

Sonny Rollins Walter Theodore "Sonny" Rollins (born September 7, 1930) is an American retired jazz tenor saxophonist who is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential jazz musicians. In a seven-decade career, Rollins recorded over sixt ...

*1976 ''Garden of Love Light ''with

Narada Michael Walden Narada Michael Walden ( ; Michael Walden; born April 23, 1952) is an American musician, singer, songwriter and record producer. He acquired the nickname Narada from Sri Chinmoy. He began his career as a drummer, working primarily in the jazz ...

*1978 ''Don't Let Go ''with

*1978 ''Don't Ask My Neighbors ''with

Raul de Souza Raul de Souza (23 August 1934 -– 23 June 2021), also known as Raulzinho, was a Brazilian trombonist who recorded with Sérgio Mendes, Flora Purim, Airto Moreira, Milton Nascimento, Sonny Rollins, Hermeto Pascoal, Cal Tjader and the jazz/fusion ...

*1979 ''Follow the Rainbow ''with

*1979 ''Future Street ''with

*1980 ''Nielsen Pearson ''with Nielsen Pearson *1980 ''Rocks, Pebbles and Sand ''with

*1981 ''Pages

981 Year 981 ( CMLXXXI) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar. Events By place Europe * Spring – Emperor Otto II (the Red) leads the imperial court to Rome, making the city his imperial capital, and receiv ...

''with

*1982 ''Dream On ''with

*1983 ''Not the Boy Next Door ''with Peter Allen *1984 ''In London ''with

*1984 ''Live in London ''with

*1987 ''All In the Name of Love ''with

Atlantic Starr Atlantic Starr is an American R&B band based in White Plains, New York. They are best known for the hits " Always", " Secret Lovers", "Circles", " Silver Shadow", and "Masterpiece". History Atlantic Starr began in Greenburgh, New York, with tr ...

*1988 ''Guitar Workshop: Tribute to with

Otis Redding Otis Ray Redding Jr. (September 9, 1941 – December 10, 1967) was an American singer and songwriter. He is regarded as one of the greatest singers in the history of American popular music and a seminal artist in soul music and rhythm and blues. ...

'' *1989 ''One Passion ''with

Michael Paulo Michael Anthony Tatsuo Paulo (born May 19, 1956) is an American saxophonist. Biography Paulo was born and raised in Hawaii and is the son of pianist Rene Paulo. He is of Filipino and Japanese descent through his parents. He began playing the ...

*1993 ''Art & Survival ''with

Dianne Reeves Dianne Elizabeth Reeves (born October 23, 1956) is an American jazz singer, who has won five Grammy Awards for her albums. Early life and education Dianne Reeves was born in Detroit, Michigan, into a musical family. Her father sang, her mothe ...

*1994 ''L.A. ''with

Hiroshima is the capital of Hiroshima Prefecture in Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 1,199,391. The gross domestic product (GDP) in Greater Hiroshima, Hiroshima Urban Employment Area, was US$61.3 billion as of 2010. Kazumi Matsui has b ...

*1995 ''Piel Ajena ''with

Eduardo Capetillo Eduardo Capetillo Vázquez (born April 13, 1970) is a Mexican actor and singer. Life He was born in Mexico City, Mexico. He belongs to the Capetillo family, who have a long tradition of being bullfighters. While still very young, he particip ...

*1996 ''George Duke Greatest Hits ''with

*1996 ''Is That the Way to Your Heart ''with Kazu Matsui *1998 ''A Song a Day '' *2000 ''When I Hold You in My Heart ''with Clay Mortensen *2000 ''Rare Collection ''with

Jaco Pastorius John Francis Anthony Pastorius III, also known as Jaco Pastorius (; December 1, 1951 – September 21, 1987), was an American jazz bassist, composer, and producer. Widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential bassists of all time, ...

*2001 ''Pages 001''with

*2003 ''Punk Jazz: The Jaco Pastorius Anthology ''with

*2003 ''In Between the Heartaches ''with

Phyllis Hyman Phyllis Linda Hyman (July 6, 1949 – June 30, 1995) was an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Hyman's music career spanned the late 1970s through the early 1990s, and she was best known for her expansive contralto range. Some of her most ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Johnson, Charles Foster 1953 births 20th-century American guitarists American agnostics American alternative journalists American jazz guitarists American male bloggers American bloggers American male guitarists Guitarists from Hawaii Guitarists from New York (state) Killian documents controversy American lead guitarists Living people 21st-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century American male musicians American male jazz musicians