According to a host of political blogs and other media outlets, before Louisiana Republican Congressman John Fleming removed The Onion’s piece headlined “Planned Parenthood Opens $8 Billion Abortionplex” and his comments, “More on Planned Parenthood, abortion by the wholesale,” from his Facebook page, it had gone nearly viral.
Fleming’s opposition to abortion and Planned Parenthood is old news, (psst ... so is The Onion’s story; it initially ran May 2011). The Minden physician has voted against federal funding of Planned Parenthood and has spoken out against abortion. So no doubt he was tickled pink with The Onion story and in his zeal self-righteously posted it on his Facebook page.
Oops!
Anyway, one of the obvious issues here is that for some unknown reason Fleming, one of The Ind’s Pooyie! 2011 winners, is not aware that The Onion is but one big spoof on the news. Seems he took the bait verbatim. That is not a good sign considering the Republican is a learned man, a medical doctor, in fact. He is also chair of the Natural Resources Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, Oceans and Insular Affairs.
Then again, did the Minden Republican really fall for The Onion’s story?
Perhaps Fleming is fully aware of The Onion but chose to use the story to his own ends and causes to fire-up his pro-life base. It wouldn’t be the first time in this day of willful content misinformation and incendiary political advertisements that a known inaccuracy was allowed to grow legs to further an ideology.
If that’s the case, then Winston Churchill’s saying, “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on,” works in Fleming’s favor. Let’s hope the congressman is one to let the facts get in the way of a good story and comes back with a face-saving explanation for his initial reaction on his Facebook page.
It’s a Gotcha moment to be sure – but exactly for whom does the joke toll?
Sure, Fleming’s blunder put Louisiana politicians in a bad light yet again. It also reflects negatively on Louisiana residents as a whole because the congressman, after all, was voted into office. And to the nation, it doesn’t matter whether you voted for him or not; we’re all painted with the same brush.
The Onion re-ran its Abortionplex piece to coincide with the hoopla over the Susan G. Komen for the Cure’s recent defunding (reversed last week) of Planned Parenthood. By the way, Karen Handel, an official with Komen and former Republican candidate for governor of Georgia with a platform that included defunding the Peach State’s Planned Parenthood, resigned today in the wake of the fiasco.
JUNE 19 Former Saint Steve Gleason, who is paralyzed by ALS, released a statement Tuesday in response to the Atlanta radio station's skit making fun of him and the disease, this Picayune post reports. What did he say? He said he'd accepted the apology of the DJs who did it, notes that at least the incident has got people talking about ALS, and asks anyone who is burning to take action about it to do so -- by helping him fight ALS.
JUNE 19 Blogger Ian McGibboney takes a look at the Gleason incident in this post. He makes a good argument about the difference between having free speech and being free from consequences for your speech (which none of us is). He also admits that many of us got upset before we listened to the skit -- but lets us know that the reality is far worse than we can imagine. It was the incredibly bad judgment, even more than the actual speech, that probably got those DJs fired, he opines.
JUNE 19 Washington Post blogger Aaron Blake writes about Sen. Guillory's switch to the GOP in this post. He writes what most political watchers in Louisiana know: Guillory was a Republican before he decided to run for the senate seat in a mostly-D St. Landry district, and has switched back now that he plans to run for Lt. Gov. in a mostly-R state. But how come Blake missed Guillory's appearance on a TLC pageant show? Now that is a video we'd like to see. (Again).
JUNE 19 Here's another Washington Post blog post about a Louisiana politician, and it's just plain scathing. Ezra Klein says Jindal's Politico post was "insulting" to the intelligence of voters, and adds that Jindal is personifying the "stupid" he's railed against, by being an "elite" who convinces GOP activists of "things that aren't true." Me-ow.
JUNE 19 Here's Gov. Jindal's post in Politico, in which he asks the GOP to get over losing to Obama (again) and stop "the bedwetting." (Uh, what?) He gives his Republican buddies what is probably a nerd's idea of a coach's motivational talk, which starts with a list of accomplishments that they can't seem to exploit and ending with an absurd description of liberals that sounds like a character treatment for a Fox "News" movie scripted by Gordon Liddy. Sure, he's preaching to the choir, but even the choir's not this gullible.
JUNE 19 Lamar Parmentel read Gov. Jindal's post on Politico, but thinks it was so dumb it probably was published in the wrong paper. This post by Lamar on the Daily Kingfish opines that possibly Jindal's post was destined for the Onion -- because the governor couldn't possibly be serious here. If you listen closely, you can hear the staff of the Kingfish giggling.
JUNE 19 Blogger Robert Mann posts from Turkey, a country he has visited several times in the past few years. Mann gives an interesting overview of the current political and societal climate of the country, which -- if you're living under a rock and don't know -- is experiencing protests and turmoil these days. Mann promises to post as much as he can during his trip, which should be fascinating reading.
JUNE 19 Blogger CB Forgotston says the legislature is keeping the vicious cycle going with its funding of new buildings for the community college/technical college system. Universities across the state need maintenance and improvement on existing buildings, and the solution is to build new buildings at other schools? By the time the bonds are paid off, those buildings will be falling down, too, CB says.
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