Dr. Wright and Ms. Cross's work is appreciated as a qualified effort in the interest of furthering one of the significant anthropologic/forensic efforts of our time - certainly for those of us who wish to know the fate of Earhart.
Dr. Kar Burns is highly respected by myself and many far more qualified than myself, of course - and she was in fact a local to my area (Georgia), so I am very proud of her work and hold her in great esteem. For my part, I do not take this latest work to be an attack on her effort at all, but as the kind of effort that she herself would respect: it is science at its best when the challenge is taken up for further refinement of findings.
That said, 'further refinements' have limits - and the major take-away for me from this latest report is that Hoodless is clearly established as having been quite able for this task and as observant in his time - with the actual bones before his own eyes. Further, his direct observations emerge as probably more valuable than any latter-day re-analysis of his notes might be: I am left impressed that for reasons of key dimensions and weathering/aging, etc. the bones are not likely Earhart's, as earnestly as I'd like them to be; his observations of a stocky male is very likely more the case.
I further am left believing this poor castaway pre-dated Earhart's time of loss. The lack of hair found in the area and lack of more directly observable personal artifacts, such as remnants of clothing, etc. seem to add to this IMHO, judging by what the well-qualified observers have shared with us. What is suggested to me now is that this wretched castaway had been there quite a long time before Earhart's time of loss - as supported by references in the report to taphonomic observations elsewhere in the region: surival of hair for 80 months, etc.
No, the skeleton being apparently not Earhart's (as I see it now) does not be mean absence of Earhart on Niku; but it doesn't support her presence, either. It is admirable that TIGHAR has attempted to locate the lost bones for further analysis. That also supports two important points for me: that no matter the latter-day analysis in-hand, there's no substitute for direct observation (as Hoodless was able to do), and that TIGHAR herself is willing to test the Burns' theory in the interest of knowing the truth of what these bones could tell us.
While this is admirable, we also should see that considerable effort has gone into finding these bones. That perhaps should cause us to also carefully consider whether significantly more effort should go into the bones pursuit, given that we now have three qualified analyses of the bones on hand, two of which essentially disqualify the bones as being those of Earhart - all based on Hoodless' original hands-on analysis. 'Attack' need not be sensed in any of this, it is pure scientific analysis and programmatic common sense, IMO. Others MMV, of course.