Remember when Mitt Romney stated the obvious at a private fundraiser, that 47% of people want government handouts because of their life circumstances? And there was an unending media feeding frenzy that likely cost Romney the election?
The fact that the initial leaked tape was incomplete and left out context made no difference.
Well, Hillary Clinton just had such a moment in a private fundraiser, in wording (listen to audio later in post) eerily similar to Romney’s, but directed at younger people and Bernie supporters.
Politico reports:
Hacked audio of a conversation between Hillary Clinton and donors during a February fundraising event shows the Democrat nominee describing Bernie Sanders supporters as “children of the Great Recession” who are “living in their parents’ basement.”Speaking at a Virginia fundraiser hosted by former U.S. ambassador Beatrice Welters, Clinton says in a clip released by the Free Beacon that many of her former primary opponent’s supporters sought things like “free college, free health care,” saying that she preferred to occupy the space “from the center-left to the center-right” on the political spectrum.During the conversation, Clinton confesses to feeling “bewildered” by those to her far-left and far-right in the election.”There is a strain of, on the one hand, the kind of populist, nationalist, xenophobic, discriminatory kind of approach that we hear too much of from the Republican candidates,” she said. “And on the other side, there’s just a deep desire to believe that we can have free college, free healthcare, that what we’ve done hasn’t gone far enough, and that we just need to, you know, go as far as, you know, Scandinavia, whatever that means, and half the people don’t know what that means, but it’s something that they deeply feel.”
Needless to say, what elements in the mainstream media even are covering this story are downplaying it.
Politico’s own headline now is non-committal on the implications, Clinton gives her take on Sanders supporters in leaked fundraising recording. But that’s not how it started, the original headline (h/t Twitchy) was “Clinton mocks Sanders supporters in leaked fundraising recording.” Politico claims the change was to better reflect Hillary’s tone, but no such benefit was given to Romney:
Editor’s note: The headline and lede of this story have been changed to better reflect Clinton’s tone….
Here’s the key portion via The Intercept — you can hear the donors laugh along with Hillary:
Yet Hillary supporters immediately claimed that calling it “mocking” was unfair, her later wording makes it clear the young people wanting free stuff only do so because of their life circumstances of not having good jobs and living in their parents’ basements. And in compliance, those quasi-mainstream outlets even reporting on it have toned down the headlines.
The Hill calls it a critique, Clinton critiques Sanders fans in leaked audio. Business Insider says Clinton “muses,” Hillary Clinton muses over Bernie Sanders’ supporters in leaked audio recording. I don’t see any coverage among the large mainstream newspapers as of this writing.
This is part and parcel of what has become media collusion with the Clinton campaign, including the coordinated campaign and media rollout of the “fat-shaming” claim. (As to which Trump has completely taken the bait, as the Clinton campaign obviously hoped.)
But when Clinton talks about Machado, and runs conference calls for the media with her, and sets up photo shoots with her, and whatnot, everyone just complies and forgets to mention they’re taking marching orders from the campaign.How else to explain how everyone chose the same angle as the Clinton campaign asked them to? Media outlets could have noted that they themselves were calling Machado a fatty-boombaladdy at the exact same time Trump made his remarks. They could have noted that beauty pageant winners are generally judged by their … how do you say it … BEAUTY. Or they could have chosen entirely different angles.
Hillary’s mocking of Bernie supporters and young people wanting free stuff is unlikely to become Hillary’s 47% moment, because the media is on her side.
CLICK HERE FOR FULL VERSION OF THIS STORY