***UPDATE: The Romney campaign responds to VP Biden’s statement (see that below):
“Today, the race for the highest office in our land was diminished to a sad level when the Vice President of the United States used an anonymous and false quote from a foreign newspaper to prop up their flailing campaign. The President’s own press secretary has repeatedly discredited anonymous sources, yet his political advisors saw fit to advance a falsehood. We have very serious problems confronting our nation and American families are hurting, yet the Obama campaign continues to try to divert voters’ attention with specious shiny objects. We have more faith in American voters, and know they will see this latest desperate ploy for what it is.” – Ryan Williams, Romney Spokesman
Obama’s desperate Media Palace Guards don’t want to talk about the flood of bad economic news we’ve been hit with this week, and they surely don’t want to talk about Obama’s revealing “you didn’t build that” comment for another day. So, ever in search of a new distraction-narrative, what we are now witnessing before our very eyes is the media ginning up a coordinated attack against Romney based on an unsourced quote that the Romney campaign has already denied.
In an email the Romney campaign just told me: “Flat out. Wasn’t our campaign.”
Won’t matter though; the media has a failed president to save.
It all started last night in Britain’s Telegraph:
As the Republican presidential challenger accused Barack Obama of appeasing America’s enemies in his first foreign policy speech of the US general election campaign, advisers told The Daily Telegraph that he would abandon Mr Obama’s “Left-wing” coolness towards London.
In remarks that may prompt accusations of racial insensitivity, one suggested that Mr Romney was better placed to understand the depth of ties between the two countries than Mr Obama, whose father was from Africa.
“We are part of an Anglo-Saxon heritage, and he feels that the special relationship is special,” the adviser said of Mr Romney, adding: “The White House didn’t fully appreciate the shared history we have”.
Noel Sheppard at NewsBusters has already detailed how the narrative seeds of this story have been planted in the left-wing media and Jennifer Rubin at The Washington Post explains that this is how the Obama campaign works (I would add that this is how the Obama campaign coordinates with its corrupt media allies):
On its face, the story isn’t credible. The Romney campaign doesn’t make a practice of talking to foreign press. I’ve never heard Mitt Romney, his policy adviser, his foreign policy adviser or any foreign policy briefer or staffer use the term “Anglo-Saxon heritage.”
But that doesn’t matter. The pack journalists begin tweeting it out. The cable news people begin to chatter about it. The Romney team puts out a statement: “It’s not true. If anyone said that, they weren’t reflecting the views of Governor Romney or anyone inside the campaign.”
Some mainstream reporters confess to the Romney campaign that their editors tell them they have to write on it. (Have to? What if it’s not true?) Well, if one of them writes on it, others will follow.
And how did the Telegraph quote magically get to so many reporters? The Obama team sent it to them. Nothing wrong with that, if the press would be honest about the origin of the story.
Truth doesn’t matter to the media. All that matters is The Narrative. And this brewing and completely coordinated narrative-smear benefits Obama in almost too many ways to count — but I’ll try:
1. The unsourced, disputed remark has already been portrayed as racist.
2. The unsourced, disputed remark will be used to haunt Romney throughout his trip overseas and to diminish it as amateur hour.
3. The unsourced, disputed remark will be used to portray Romney as a hypocrite after saying he would not criticize Obama overseas.
4. The unsourced, disputed remark will work as yet another distraction from the horrible economic news facing this country right now.
In keeping with the coordinated gameplan, Vice President Joe — “Articulate” and “Clean” — Biden has already issued a statement.
The media doesn’t care about the truth and, over the past few days, as they’ve tried to pull Obama out of the “you didn’t build that” fire, this is the exact kind of lifeline they’ve been waiting for in order to talk about everything but Obama and his failed record.
It’s just a fact that when the media can’t find something to rescue Obama with, they have a well-documented history of simply making something up.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC