[Rhodes22-list] Election 08 - Welcome to Chicago

[Brad Haslett]

Remember 'Rathergate' in 04?  An internet blogger produces a fake
letter, CBS and Dan Rather pick it up as real news and run with it
with very little investigation, the letter is proven fake, but CBS
producer Mary Mapes makes a statement to the effect, "well, the source
was fake but the story is true".  Rather loses his credibility and his
job.  The letter and CBS was busted by a conservative blogger that
posts as littlegreenfootballs.com.  They are still on the job.

This election cycle has seen some interesting things in cyberspace.
It started against the Hillary campaign.  Sites supporting Hillary
would be flooded with trolls and sockpuppets.  Trolls make a quick
appearance in a discussion thread, attempt to highjack the
conversation, and move on.  Sockpuppets use a fake name (or several
fake names) and try to build a consensus of opinion. Some members of
the MSM have been busted using sockpuppetry to hype their articles.
First it was Hillary, now pro McCain/Palin sites are being hacked,
infected (as Ed noted), and inundated with trolls and sockpuppets.

Then there's 'astroturfing', the technique of building what looks like
a grass roots effort for a cause when really there's a professional PR
firm behind the movement.  David Axlerod (Obama campaign manager) is
the the inventor and master of astroturfing.  His bread-n-butter
business is working for major corporations building astroturf
campaigns for things like utility hikes or sympathy for telephone rate
increases.  Lately, a lot of conservative websites have been inundated
with comments from "a concerned Christian against Palin" and " a
concerned Conservative against Palin" with a familiar tone and similar
content. Suddenly, there's been an increase in the number of
"homemade" videos on YouTube spreading rumors against Palin (most of
which have already been debunked even by the MSM) with comments like
"this will go viral" and "e-mail this to all your friends".

Yesterday, a conservative blogspot, http://www.mypetjawa.mu.nu/, which
is owned by Dr. Rusty Shackleford, sprung a trap and announced it in
advance for all to watch.  Last night at midnight ET, he published a
story that an anti-Palin video was a little too professional to be
"homemade" and the voice over sounded suspiciously like the same voice
in official Obama ads.  He speculated that they were actually  by
Winner & Associates, a left-leaning Los Angeles PR firm (which would
be in violation of FEC rules). BOOM!  Within 15 minutes after
midnight, the YouTube videos were removed and the accounts closed.  Of
course they saved screen shots and the investigation continues.  I'm
guessing it will take the MSM a week or so to get to the story if at
all.  Remember, the hacking into Palin's e-mail account was reported
on the internet long before it was by the MSM but that story was just
too big to be ignored (you heard about it here first (and BTW, the
hacker son of a very liberal TN politician had his party broken-up
this weekend by the FBI).

Welcome to Chicago style politics!  Stay tuned for more fun and games.

Brad