November 29, 2007

More CNN/YouTube Debate Plants

Michelle Malkin is exposing more of the planted Democrat questioners in the CNN/YouTube Republican Presidential Debate. The questioner who asked about abortion is a declared supporter of Democrat John Edwards. The "Log Cabin Republican" questioner is, it turns out, not a Republican at all but, rather, a declared supporter of Democrat Barack Obama. The questioner who asked about lead toys is a prominent union activist for the United Steelworkers, who have already endorsed Democrat John Edwards.

CNN portrayed all of them as undecided Republicans. Either CNN doesn't know how to do a basic web search or even click a few links to find out this kind of stuff, or they knew the YouTube questioners were announced supporters of Democrats and decided to lie to viewers. Neither speaks well of CNN's credibility.

If it's the former, CNN needs to upgrade its web research talent big-time. If it's the latter - if CNN really thinks it can still control the message in this age of grassroots media - then CNN is run by ignorant fools.

Update: Related commentary from Steven Green.

Update: Jay Bush - I haven't linked to him in too long a while - has a pretty good analysis of the debate.

Update: Bryan at Hot Air comments on the serial planting of questioners in the various presidential debates: "There’s one difference this time around. Last time, the debate was for Democrats and the plants were all Democrats. This time, the debate was for Republicans…but the plants were still all Democrats."