Some people here may be aware of Cory Booker, mayor of Newark, New Jersey. He’s a rising young Democrat star, well-liked in his city, and has gotten quite a bit of press and praise for his use of social media to get people together and personal touch when actually helping voters. Even the BBC knows about Booker. They’ve reported, for example, about how he personally helped to save a neighbor from a burning house (including an end note about his shoveling snow for residents during an earlier winter storm). Booker also got a special mention in the op-ed piece they commissioned (or licensed for reprint, it doesn’t say so I can’t be sure) to praise the President’s “historic” endorsement of homosexual marriage rights. That wasn’t written by a Beeboid, but there’s no way the BBC can claim never to have heard of him before as a progressive rising star. You can read some background on Booker here.
The reason I bring this up is that Mayor Booker has been all over the US news media in the last couple of days for criticizing the President’s attack on Romney’s professional history as a venture capitalist. There have been further developments, making it an even bigger deal than it was originally, but the BBC has so far decided to censor the story entirely. Why? Because it makes the President look bad, and makes Him look less like the same alleged superhero who supposedly ran the perfect Presidential campaign in 2008.
Last week, DB posted about the BBC’s one-sided reporting on the President’s attack ad on Romney. The ad was an attempt to mislead the public into thinking Romney earned money from personally destroying a business and putting hundreds of people out of work. The President’s campaign – or rather, a Super-PAC which supports Him – put out a second ad taking the same line of attack to another level. The US mainstream media, still being in the tank for Him, added fuel to the fire of attacking Romney for his business success. The ads backfired somewhat, because the US is not Europe or Britain, and class war and wealth hatred doesn’t sell quite so well with the voters.
The President continued that attack theme in other speeches, and Cory Booker, mayor of what some see as a suburb of New York City, criticized Him for it on MSNBC’s “Meet the Press”. He called the attacks on venture capitalism “nauseating”.
Needless to say, Booker was immediately vilified by most of the media, and the President’s own man, David Axelrod, publicly called him out on it. The President’s supporters at MSNBC also went on the attack, as did the usual suspects (next time someone complains to you about how biased Fox News is, show them that link). Booker apparently also got a lot of pressure from both the White House and the Democratic Party national bosses, and quickly had to re-emphasize his ultimate support for the President and His Party. This was all over Twitter, the HuffingtonPost, the Washington Post, and Politico. The New York Times called Booker a “surrogate” for the President. So we know the BBC staff in the US is well aware of the situation.
Things got so bad for Booker, in fact, that he made a special video statement to “clarify” his point. Politico’s headline on this could almost qualify for a typical BBC job: “Booker walks back ‘nauseating’ comments”. But the story doesn’t end there.
First, the President came under fire Himself because people started pointing out that He raised huge amounts of cash from venture capitalists. The most of any other candidate in 2008, in fact. Worse still, one of His current top bundlers not only worked for Bain, but actually did take over and shut down a company, sending workers to the unemployment line, and made a nice fat profit doing exactly what the President’s campaign tried to accuse Romney of doing by dubious association. If this had been done by a Republican, Mark Mardell or some other well-paid Beeboid in Washington would be lashing such hypocrisy with the usual sarcasm and sneering.
As for Booker’s own video, the White House tried to use this as a campaign tool. But, being the inept group of amateurs who added silly boasts about the current President to the official biographies on the White House website of a number of past Presidents (in the 20th Century, from Coolidge onward), the recent attack on Romney and that dog story, which backfired spectacularly, and all those failed hashtags, the campaign geniuses couldn’t leave well enough alone. So they heavily doctored Booker’s video to slant his words differently (something the BBC is also wont to do), and started promoting it.
First, here’s the full video:
Now here’s the White House version:
Ridicule ensued, and even someone at the Washington Post not named Jennifer Rubin admitted something was wrong. Leading Democrats have suggested the White House abandon this strategy and move on. Basically, this has been a big story, a possible early turning point in the election year, the kind of thing the BBC’s US President editor usually rushes to explain to you. But it’s really just another disaster that makes Him look bad, and the BBC censored it, as usual.
Come on, the BBC is very, very busy and despite having, as the DG told us, ‘the largest number of journalists of any news organisation outside of China’ they just haven’t got the people to cover stories like this.
Marvel Comics has a gay marriage, that they cover, but trivial stuff like Presidential hypocrisy and media manipulation, it’s hardly worth cranking up the iPad for.
And come on, don’t you know Obama is ‘Black(ish)’….he can do no wrong….and give Mardell a break, he’s an honest hack doing a difficult job …..trying to keep the evil Republicans out of Office.
You’re right. I should stop thinking that the BBC is meant to be a source for serious journalism and just be grateful for all those “bespoke” video magazine pieces, like the one about the President’s “Irish home” being opened for tourism, the “rich black heritage” of Nova Scotia, or those human interest features on the website which give us all a closer look and better understanding of the quirky individualism in the US, like that piece on how some Amish view smoke alarms as the work of the devil. A far better use of money. They win awards for this stuff so it must be that I’m wrong and just a crank.
Please be careful with the youtubes you put up. This political anorak found the ‘Meet the Press’ so engrossing that he stayed up later than is wise to watch all of it.
I remember you giving a positive shout out for Mayor Booker a couple of weeks ago, and he’s shown he’s a guy with a moral compass that justifies it, as much as I dont share his perceptions on President Obama’s character.
People do like Obama – I like Obama – but do they like him as President? I’m not terribly enthused by Romney, I get the impression, possibly wildly unfair as its based more on gut instinct than anything too concrete, that Romney just wants to be President for ego reasons. Still, of the Republican field he was up against, he was imho, clearly the guy who stands the most chance of beating Obama – even though he’s not going too! Will be fascinating to see who he chooses as his Veep. If
Congressman West is offered, I hope he doesn’t accept. He’ll be tainted by the association with an ego driven candidate I fear.
I dont see anything wrong with what Obama’s people chose to put up on its site from what Booker said. Only to be expected from any campaign that they’ll use the excerpt that serves them best. One fears though, that Mayor Booker is going to find that the Democratic Party of today isn’t a Party that an honest man can suceed in, or he’ll be corrupted by it. Personally, if I had to choose between him and Romney for Pres, I’d choose him.
Oh, and the BBC’s studied silence on this major Presidential race story? How extremely Orwellian. The Ministry of Truth strikes again.
If you see Romney as being driven solely by ego, I can’t imagine what you must think of the President Himself. There is no bigger ego in the country.
I also think you’re missing the point of my post. The issue isn’t so much the specifics of the White House’s edit job, but the overall reaction from the White House geniuses when Booker strayed off the plantation. Plus the clear evidence of how much of the US media is working on the President’s behalf, as I’ve been saying all along.
Next time someone tells you how bad Fox News is, and how much its bias is misleading the country, remember how the rest of the US media has behaved here.
Is Romney a candidate that you ‘believe in’?
I believe he’ll be better than the current Occupant, no question. Sometimes that’s all it needs to be.
Yeah, not a very inspiring reason to vote for someone, but inspiration isn’t a right I guess, it’s a privilege.
If we all wallow in idealism and wait for pure inspiration, we’ll be stuck with another four years of The Community-Organizer-in-Chief. That’s too high a price to pay. I don’t give a damn about inspiration or some emotional attachment to a candidate at this point.
I think it was Milton Friedman who said that one shouldn’t wait for the perfect candidate to come along…there is no such thing. It is, however, important that when an imperfect man is voted into office, conditions around him should be so as to make him/her do the right thing.
(If anyone knows the exact quote I’d be grateful – can’t seem to find it at the moment)
‘but the BBC has so far decided to censor the story entirely”
Isn’t that in their ‘Editorial Guidelines (Unique Edition)’?
OT, but on the subject of BBC censorship, given the quietly swept under the carpet matter of one hand running the show and the other hand ambushing the UK entrant invited by the previous hand, I thought this was interesting, pot bubbling wise..
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Yes, host nation Azerbaijan is authoritarian, but boycotting the Eurovision won’t fix that. So go crazy and sing… http://fb.me/1qewXBFf2
Not sure how Dr Scezandy from Oslo feels?
Seems like Mardell is sort of preparing us for an Obama defeat at the November election. Nothing to do with his dismal record, aloof style or lack of vision beyond the class warfare. Nope.
Mardell says when his hero falls we should blame Europe!!!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-18185164
It’s never His fault, is it? Mardell is really showing his bias here when he tells us that the President has been right all along, He’s the one who has been warning us all that we must follow His plan.
Mr Obama must be pacing the Oval Office carpet in frustration. Time and time again he has delivered the same message. Time and time again, nothing happens.
What a shill. As if all of the President’s ideas have been great, and as if Europe’s problem isn’t that they’ve been borrowing and spending too much, which is exactly what He’d do. Once again we see Mardell portraying the President as a heroic figure, trapped in a world He never made. He’s the only one who can save Europe now?
Louis, I understand that Romney is just about shaving it in the opinion polls now. When we hit E Day -7 the howitzer propaganda barrage of the leftist MSM will swing it for Obama if things remain that way.
The only Republican who I think could beat Romney is Guiliani, but he was anything but tactically astute in the primaries for 2008 and sadly he didn’t enter the field for ’12.
I think Allen West has made a good decision to keep his Presidential powder dry for (I hope) 2016, but strewth, the way the world’s heading now, I seriously wonder if we’ll be seeing any elections *anywhere* come that time.
Hippiepooter, I fear you may be right. However, if Romney doesn’t take the gloves off and fight, the result of a defeat on the “moderate” Republicans will be terrible. Revenge will be taken. It’s all nail biting stuff and if it wasn’t so important it might even be fun.