Someone decided to make a fake Twitter account for Cokie Roberts, and it's really good.
The world was delighted and stunned on Friday when, all of a sudden, what appeared to be the longtime NPR and ABC pundit started tweeting a ton of stuff about Applebee's. It appeared that she was trying to get to a nearby Applebee's, tweeting "washington dc" + "applebees" + "directions" and later wanted to replicate the chain's items at home when she wrote "applebees dessert shooters recipe."
Sadly, the @CokieRoberts account was outed as fake. Roberts told NPR that she didn't set the account up. Poynter reported that journalists were fooled by the hoax.
A closer examination shows that the account was fishy from its very beginnings on October 22. @CokieRoberts' first tweet was, "Wishing I could just rent Joyful Noise for the 10th time instead of watching the debate." It seems unlikely that one of America's longest-running political analysts would kick off her Twitter career with gushing praise for the gospel movie with Queen Latifah and Dolly Parton. (Though that movie is really good.)
The account proceeded to provide a fresh take on the third and final presidential debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney. Some examples of the live tweets:
and our personal favorite:
And when the debate was over, the Twitter feed indicated that Roberts was finally getting her "Joyful Noise" time in.
The real Cokie Roberts, of course, hates Twitter. In 2009, she said it was "rude" and "appalling."
Not everyone was initially fooled by the fake account. In response to one of @CokieRoberts' debate tweets, one person wrote, "this cant be you." Maybe that's the saddest thing of all.
Related
Before You Go
