The propaganda machine in motion - UPDATE

The liberal Brit rag "The Telegraph" is claiming that someone on Romney's team made a statement about restoring "Anglo Saxon Relations." And David Axelrod puts out the word. Of course, CBS, also liberal, jumps on it. So starts the snowball. Using the term "Anglo-Saxon" is apparently not a historical thing. It's RAAACIST!


But lets look at how the Obama team works:

On its face, the story isn’t credible. The Romney campaign doesn’t make a practice of talking to foreign press. I’ve never heard Mitt Romney, his policy adviser, his foreign policy adviser or any foreign policy briefer or staffer use the term “Anglo-Saxon heritage.” 

But that doesn’t matter. The pack journalists begin tweeting it out. The cable news people begin to chatter about it. The Romney team puts out a statement: “It’s not true. If anyone said that, they weren’t reflecting the views of Governor Romney or anyone inside the campaign.”
Some mainstream reporters confess to the Romney campaign that their editors tell them they have to write on it. (Have to? What if it’s not true?) Well, if one of them writes on it, others will follow. 

And how did the Telegraph quote magically get to so many reporters? The Obama team sent it to them. Nothing wrong with that, if the press would be honest about the origin of the story.

Jennifer Rubin of WaPo goes on to say:

It is so blatant that sometimes the reporters forget to hide their trail. Every once in a while a journalist neglects to delete the part of the e-mail string from the Democratic National Committee prompting him or her to ask certain questions before they route it over to the Romney camp. Yeah, major “oops.”

So we'll see how far this thing goes. I'd wager that this thing is a made up quote from an fictional source. The old media will be all over it and spread the meme as quickly as possible before it's debunked.

update: WaPo:

The Telegraph in particular prints many rumors, often infuriating Democrats . “They use anonymous sources to a degree that makes you wonder if they actually have them,” consultant Bob Shrum told Dave Weigel in 2009.

update from The Other McCain:

Democrats can engage in routine corruption, enact ruinous policies and leave campaign aides to die in submerged Oldsmobiles and nobody in the media ever blinks an eye, but anything done by any Republican is automatically a controversial scandal.

Go read the whole thing. As always Robert Stacy McCain is good at pointing out the hypocrisy of the old media.


more updates:


Check out what Kevin Drum has to say. He's a lib, and yet sees the possibility for fraud. Amazing.

Legal Insurrection responds to the race card. Lots of great links. It's where I found the Drum link.


The Lid: 
Romney Aide's Anglo-Saxon Quote a FRAUD