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Howard Gewirtz

Howard Gewirtz

Posted: September 9, 2008 02:16 AM

Palin Email Smears -- Think Before Forwarding

What's Your Reaction?

Earlier this evening I received a forwarded email from the same person who forwarded me the Sarah/Swimsuit/Rifle Photoshopped picture we all got in triplicate from our friends. I quote:

O M G ! ! !

This is unreal. Below are some actual quotes by Governor Palin during a series of interviews by the Anchorage Daily News in 2006 when she was running for Governor...

On Creationism:
The simple yet elegantly awkward moose proves God's creation and not evolution is the source of all life. How could something as oddly shaped and silly looking as a moose evolve through so-called "natural selection?"... I mean He made the platypus too.

On oil exploration and drilling in the ANWR:
God made dinosaurs 4,000 years ago as ultimately flawed creatures, lizards of Satan really, so when they died and became petroleum products we, made in his perfect image, could use them in our pickup trucks, snow machines and fishing boats.
Now, as to the ANWR, Todd and I often enjoying caribou hunting and one year we shot up a herd big time...

On Alaskans serving overseas in Iraq:
Well, God bless them, and I mean God and Jesus because without Jesus we'd be Muslims too or Jewish, which would be a little better because of the superior Israeli Air Force.


So I emailed Tom Kizzia, the reporter for the Anchorage Daily News who has been following Palin for the entire span of her career and here's what he quickly emailed back:

Kizzia, Tom to me
show details 8:42 PM (3 hours ago) Reply

false. somebody's satire. Can you send me what you received? I'd like to see the whole thing if it's attributed to us. Thanks

Snopes cleared it up: it originated in an August 30th blog and either someone lacking a sense of humor forwarded the quotes on as accurate or it was someone who would make Donald Segreti proud.

Now this morning in my email box is the Sarah Palin Book Club, the supposed list of books Sarah Palin tried to have banned. It includes everything from To Kill A Mockingbird to Webster's Ninth Dictionary. This is absolute dynamite to be used against her -- if it were true, which it is not.

It appears there is a new, disturbing, and ultimately very damaging Internet phenomenon happening -- people inventing stuff about Palin, then forwarding it and before you know it it's in your email.

This can only strengthen her. If I were a Conservative I could easily write the outraged blog, "Hysterical Liberal Palin Smear Campaign". I'm sure someone's writing it now, and they'd be correct (as well as Right). We can help make her Saint Sarah the Slandered by forwarding this garbage without thinking and passing it on as though they just came from our good friend Bob Woodward -- which it didn't, it came from your friend who got it from somebody who got it from somebody else who made this crap up.

I've got a better idea. Why don't we just borrow a gun from the Palin Family rifle case and shoot ourselves in the foot?

Earlier this evening I received a forwarded email from the same person who forwarded me the Sarah/Swimsuit/Rifle Photoshopped picture we all got in triplicate from our friends. I quote: O M G ! ! ...
Earlier this evening I received a forwarded email from the same person who forwarded me the Sarah/Swimsuit/Rifle Photoshopped picture we all got in triplicate from our friends. I quote: O M G ! ! ...
 
 
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03:55 PM on 09/11/2008
I have a question, and any serious input is welcome. I see the Republicans spinning off all sorts of lies and half truths, and I see folks just swallow them whole, no questions asked. And Republicans are pulling ahead by utilizing this sort of strategy. Why are their smears sticking and working, and the Democrats lies and smears causing them to lose the election? To sum it up, why are the Republicans so effective at selling themselves, and why do people buy it?
06:31 PM on 09/09/2008
Palin was put out as a red herring for McCain and you are following. Every attack on Palin only helps McCain by pushing over swing voters in swing states. Spend out time and effort on the failed policies of McCain.
All this false news at the front just gives cover for McCain. You could not recommend a stronger strategy for the Republicans than to have them falsely post attacks on Palin to disgust the independent voter. Maybe Rove is behind most of the negative emails on Palin?
08:44 PM on 09/09/2008
Well said. Remember that Rove claimed political opponents had bugged his office in 1986 when he was helping a GOP gubernatorial campaign, but the FBI concluded that the battery in the device was so small it would have to be changed every few hours. The suspicion was and remains that Rove planted it himself.
05:35 PM on 09/09/2008
Aren't lies and smears what we're all supposed to be fighting against? Come on people, the truth of this woman and the past twelve years of Republican shenanigans is far more damaging than any made-up stuff. If you must send emails, send the facts. That'll really scare the pants off of the undecideds!
05:18 PM on 09/09/2008
yea , but no one cares about barry. the country is sick of obama, and obameida. done. fed up. finished.

obama has lost, he lost the day he passed over clinton.
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Howard Gewirtz
05:48 PM on 09/09/2008
I haven't totally given up yet but I agree that if Hillary had been the VP choice we'd be sailing to an easy victory instead of clinging onto hope. Can you imagine that VP debate? The ref would have to step in and stop the fight.
12:30 AM on 09/10/2008
fact is the McCain camp would have picked someone else for VP if O bama picked Hillary. This was just a matter of playing a little chess.
05:11 PM on 09/09/2008
The same thing happened and continues to happen to Obama, hence the "fight the smears" website. These things ARE going to happen whether we like them or not.