Monthly Archives: May 2015

9

‘LOL — Dad, You Screwed Up Your Iraq Position’: Damage control through New Media playacting is becoming Team Jeb specialty: 1) Did Jeb list himself as “Hispanic” on an official form? His son tweets: “LOL — come on dad, think you checked the wrong box.” Ha ha ha. 2) He’s asked if he’d invade Iraq even “knowing what we know now,” and he answers yes. Whoops. Then an ally just happens to email him (‘Hey, I’m a little confused by this answer so I’m genuinely wondering did you mishear the question?”) and says he emailed back “I misheard the question.” … It’s all very Webby and savvy and Shakespearean (talking about what the King did offstage). I suppose it has the virtue of not generating too much news while giving friendly MSMers an excuse to drop the story. But at some point it becomes too savvy and too cute, no?. Why do they keep having to do this? Don’t they trust their candidate to man up and do his own damage control? (Jeb strategist Mike Murphy didn’t have an ex-aide to Arnold Schwarzenegger tweet “Where there’s smoke there’s fire.” Schwarzenegger said it himself.)  …

Update: Jeb has now gone on the Hannity radio show and attempted to re-answer Megyn Kelly’s actual question (“knowing what we know now”). His second-chance answer: “I don’t know.” Seems like he should! …

5

They tell you to answer the question you want to answer, not the one asked. OK! But then you don’t answer ‘Yes.’ You rephrase. #candidate101

| 10 years ago on Twitter

3

That 3 AM damage control call: “Listen, it’s too early in the morning, O.K., for me to be exchanging emails …” nyti.ms/1EAt16f

| 10 years ago on Twitter

8

Jeb: ‘Your question got in the way of my safe pre-canned Iraq answer so I misheard it’ thehill.com/blogs/ballot-b…

| 10 years ago on Twitter

4

THE WALKBACKMEN: Ah, yes. Jeb “misheard” the Iraq question. So what’s the answer to question that was actually asked? thehill.com/blogs/ballot-b…

| 10 years ago on Twitter

3

“KNOWING WHAT WE KNOW NOW”–@NPR, unlike @politico, gets the big problem with Jeb’s Iraq answer. Anybody else? n.pr/1PCQFFm

| 10 years ago on Twitter

4 ‘Jeb Can’t Be That Dumb’

Jeb’s Extra Layer of Protection: Fox‘s Megyn Kelly asked Jeb Bush, “Knowing what we know now, would you have authorized the invasion [of Iraq]?” Bush answered “I would’ve,” but then proceeded to defend the decision on the basis of what people thought they knew then. Bizarrely, Fox’s report on its own broadcast ignores the damning part of Kelly’s, question — the “knowing what we know now” part — and simply reports that Jeb “says that he would have authorized the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Politico‘s Mike Allen, linking to the Fox story in his widely read “Playbook,” ignores the hypothetical too — as does Politico‘s own report by Adam B. Lerner, until the very last paragraph, when it comes up in citing Laura Ingraham’s argument that Hillary wouldn’t have invaded “knowing what we know now.”

This is at least weird. Did Fox’s reporter not bother to listen to the first 15 seconds of the video that was embedded in his own story? I’m not saying there was a top-down Ailes-ordered conspiracy to protect Bush (not that this is inconceivable!). But I do think there is a reluctance in the professional press corps (which Allen epitomizes and champions) to believe that professionally prepped Jeb would say anything that dumb. So they reported the story as if Jeb had answered the question he would prefer to have been asked. The result was the same as if they’d been consciously covering for Jeb — much of the world does not know that he said he’d still invade Iraq given a) the absence of WMDs, b) the chaos now engulfing the region, etc.**

__________

** — That answer might be defensible, but politically it’s still a damaging thing to say running for President in 2015. Bush clearly was trying not to say it, even if that meant pretending Kelly didn’t ask what she asked.  Who knows if he thinks it? 

12

Slim Coverage! Last week, Mexican “regulators approved [AT&T’s] $1.9bn acquisition of Nextel.” With this acquisition (and others) AT&T plans to go “head-to-head with Carlos Slim,” who currently dominates the Mexican telecom market through his America Movil company, according to the FT.  … For some reason, I can’t find a story about this development in the New York Times. Is there a Tucker Carlsonesque rule Dean Baquet would like to tell us about? … [via Drudge] … Backfill:  Times Stays Slient on 2010 Slim-related story …

17

So Hillary’s supposed Hispandering masterstroke was really an attempt to distract from the Schweizer book. politico.com/story/2015/05/…

| 10 years ago on Twitter

1

Whoa if true/”She was supposed to be at the event for an hour-and-a-half, she stayed for almost two hours.” politico.com/story/2015/05/… #”almost”

| 10 years ago on Twitter

4

Old couple at restaurant, staring straight ahead, not talking. Was formulating Putnamesque lament–then noticed each was staring @ computer

| 10 years ago on Twitter

3

Tories to “merge quangos.” Sounds messy ind.pn/1FarI4w

| 10 years ago on Twitter

10

Welfare Reform as possible cause not even mentioned/”NYT-Out-of-Wedlock Births Are Falling, Except Among Older Women” nyti.ms/1IlSwPZ

| 10 years ago on Twitter

4

CW ON PARADE: @costareports Ed Rollins/Madden/Fitz–did you try anyone who would disagree w/ Beltway CW on immig? wpo.st/q_bG0

| 10 years ago on Twitter

30

THAT’S SPLIT?/”Public polling has shown split views on Obama’s immig actions” sez WaPo, then cites poll 56-41 against wpo.st/q_bG0

| 10 years ago on Twitter

8

While Hillary touches ero-zones of activists by pledging to avoid Congress, immig. controllers going on offense … twitter.com/MarkSKrikorian…

| 10 years ago on Twitter