Limbaugh fell for it

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zsdersw

zsdersw

Lifer
Oct 29, 2003
10,505
2
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http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/16/u...=th&adxnnlx=1284645497-Bh8x844qpIv6lxfW8d9SAg

PENSACOLA, Fla. — Anyone listening to Rush Limbaugh’s radio show Tuesday could be forgiven for thinking that Judge Roger Vinson has the federal government dead in his sights.

Mr. Limbaugh spent some time profiling Judge Vinson, a senior judge on the Federal District Court in Pensacola, who had just announced he would allow a legal challenge to the new health care law to advance to a full hearing. The conservative radio host informed his listeners that the judge was an avid hunter and amateur taxidermist who once killed three brown bears and mounted their heads over his courtroom door to “instill the fear of God into the accused.”

“This,” Mr. Limbaugh said, “would not be good news” for liberal supporters of the health law.

But, in fact, Judge Vinson has never shot anything other than a water moccasin (last Saturday, at his weekend cabin), is not a taxidermist and, as president of the American Camellia Society, is far more familiar with Camellia reticulata than with Ursus arctos.

Apparently, Mr. Limbaugh had fallen prey to an Internet hoax.

On Sunday night, and again Monday morning, someone identified only as “Pensacolian” edited Judge Vinson’s Wikipedia entry to include the invented material. The prankster footnoted the entry to a supposed story in The Pensacola News Journal. The article — like its stated publication date of June 31, 2003 — does not exist. The same person who posted the information removed it on Tuesday afternoon, Wikipedia logs show.

As calls flooded in about Mr. Limbaugh’s depiction, Judge Vinson, 70, took it all in stride. “I’ve never killed a bear,” he said Wednesday, “and I’m not Davy Crockett.”

His wife, Ellen, was less amused. “It offended me,” she said, “because I don’t think you should be able to broadcast something nationally if you can’t verify it.”

Kit Carson, a spokesman for Mr. Limbaugh, said a staff researcher had found the information in an article on the Pensacola newspaper’s Web site, and not on Wikipedia. But Ginny Graybiel, the paper’s managing editor, said it had never published such material.

Ms. Vinson acknowledged that she had bought two stuffed animal trophies — a deer and a goat — at a garage sale to decorate their cabin. But she said the portrait of her husband’s ferocity was comical.

“Can you imagine the president of the American Camellia Society having three stuffed bears in the courthouse?” she asked.
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Hahaha... what an idiot.
 
Red Dawn

Red Dawn

Elite Member
Jun 4, 2001
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Fatass.gif
 
S

spidey07

No Lifer
Aug 4, 2000
65,469
5
76
Wow. A slander piece of Rush by the NYT about nothing. This is news?

oooooh! You edited a wiki page and "got" him. oooooh! I would hazzard a guess the NYT was behind the whole thing.
 
zsdersw

zsdersw

Lifer
Oct 29, 2003
10,505
2
0
spidey07 said:
Wow. A slander piece of Rush by the NYT about nothing. This is news?

oooooh! You edited a wiki page and "got" him. oooooh! I would hazzard a guess the NYT was behind the whole thing.
Click to expand...

Wow.. spidey only thinks things important to him and things that are of a bent with which he agrees are news. This is news?

And besides, it reads like the wiki edit was to place the info Rush was talking about into the judge's page; to give credibility to what Rush was saying... not to trap Rush.
 
cganesh75

cganesh75

Elite Member | For Sale/Trade
Super Moderator
Oct 8, 2005
9,545
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spidey07 said:
Wow. A slander piece of Rush by the NYT about nothing. This is news?

oooooh! You edited a wiki page and "got" him. oooooh! I would hazzard a guess the NYT was behind the whole thing.
Click to expand...


blaming NYT? you disappoint me spidey.. i thought you would say Obama did it
 
Atreus21

Atreus21

Lifer
Aug 21, 2007
12,001
571
126
Last edited:
Thump553

Thump553

Lifer
Jun 2, 2000
12,839
2,625
136
It's downright scary how low the journalistic standards are for some of the US's major news sources. Relying solely upon a wiki page without any sort of verification-I imagine that is below the objective journalistic standards of a high school newspaper.
 
zsdersw

zsdersw

Lifer
Oct 29, 2003
10,505
2
0
Atreus21 said:
You know this sounds so strangely familiar...

Now I remember!

Remember the time the entire media quoted him as saying things propagated by an internet hoax? Remember that whole schpiel about him saying that the streets were safer during slavery or whatever the hell it was? Boy, was that ever fun.
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I don't remember that, actually. I didn't think it was very important.. nor do I think this is. It is funny, though.
 
V

Vette73

Lifer
Jul 5, 2000
21,503
9
0
Yea Al Frankin in one of his books pointed out all the BS form his show and even made fun of the "fact checkers" for Limbaughs show.

So this is just SOP for limbaugh.
 
V

Vette73

Lifer
Jul 5, 2000
21,503
9
0
Yea Al Frankin in one of his books pointed out all the BS form his show and even made fun of the "fact checkers" for Limbaughs show.
 
Lemon law

Lemon law

Lifer
Nov 6, 2005
20,984
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In terms of Journalistic standards, the gold standard is at least three sources. But no one ever accused Rush Limbaugh of being a journalist or having any standards.

But still, the tendency is to believe WIKI and so big deal, Rush got fooled. Sadly, IMHO, it will not be fatal to Limbaugh cred. And in another few weeks few will even remember the incident.
 
Atreus21

Atreus21

Lifer
Aug 21, 2007
12,001
571
126
Lemon law said:
In terms of Journalistic standards, the gold standard is at least three sources. But no one ever accused Rush Limbaugh of being a journalist or having any standards.

But still, the tendency is to believe WIKI and so big deal, Rush got fooled. Sadly, IMHO, it will not be fatal to Limbaugh cred. And in another few weeks few will even remember the incident.
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Ironic, considering that it wasn't fatal to the cred of those in the media who attributed the racist quotes to Limbaugh, and then when most people forgot it ever happened.

It's all politics. You'd be in my shoes if Olbermann had made this mistake.
 
M

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
74,772
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Rush is a dangerous fascist who, with the help of billions of corporate dollars and many other psychopaths, is creating a brown shirt army of self milking morons whose real function is to keep money flowing from the bottom to the top. If these morons ever figured out what was really happening to them they would likely kill him. People who hate themselves are easy to manipulate, but they don't like it when the see they've been used. Hate can be a two edged sword.
 
BoomerD

BoomerD

No Lifer
Feb 26, 2006
66,353
14,761
146
Rush supporters seem to be blaming the NYT for this and attributing NO blame to Rush, yet when Dan Rather got led down the garden path with Bush's National Guard papers...they all cried foul...and Rather got sacked.
 
S

spidey07

No Lifer
Aug 4, 2000
65,469
5
76
BoomerD said:
Rush supporters seem to be blaming the NYT for this and attributing NO blame to Rush, yet when Dan Rather got led down the garden path with Bush's National Guard papers...they all cried foul...and Rather got sacked.
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Are you kidding me? They are not even remotely related or similar in impact.
 
Linflas

Linflas

Lifer
Jan 30, 2001
15,395
78
91
BoomerD said:
Rush supporters seem to be blaming the NYT for this and attributing NO blame to Rush, yet when Dan Rather got led down the garden path with Bush's National Guard papers...they all cried foul...and Rather got sacked.
Click to expand...

If Limbaugh called himself a journalist rather than an opinion driven talk show host that might actually be relevant.
 
BoomerD

BoomerD

No Lifer
Feb 26, 2006
66,353
14,761
146
Originally Posted by BoomerD
Rush supporters seem to be blaming the NYT for this and attributing NO blame to Rush, yet when Dan Rather got led down the garden path with Bush's National Guard papers...they all cried foul...and Rather got sacked.
Click to expand...


spidey07 said:
Are you kidding me? They are not even remotely related or similar in impact.
Click to expand...

Linflas said:
If Limbaugh called himself a journalist rather than an opinion driven talk show host that might actually be relevant.
Click to expand...

How quickly they jump in to help me make my point...:p
 
Fern

Fern

Elite Member
Sep 30, 2003
26,907
174
106
Thump553 said:
It's downright scary how low the journalistic standards are for some of the US's major news sources. Relying solely upon a wiki page without any sort of verification-I imagine that is below the objective journalistic standards of a high school newspaper.
Click to expand...

Rush isn't a "major news source", at most he's just a political commentator expressing his own views.

Fern
 
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