American Morning
Welcome to the world of hashtag politics - or #politics
Washington (CNN) - When a scuffle broke out at a candidate forum in Nevada last week between supporters of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Republican rival Sharron Angle, the fight didn't end after tempers cooled. It simply moved over to the social media website Twitter, where the war of words in this nasty race continued.
One of Angle's campaign managers, Jordan Gehrke, posted a tweet, a short message on Twitter, that accused Reid supporters of starting the fight. "Check out the video here of Reidbots screaming and heckling," the tweet said.
The message included a link to a video that appears to show audience members at the forum shouting down Angle. That same tweet also included a hashtag - #dumpreid - made by attaching the # symbol to the message "dumpreid." Twitter users who clicked on the #dumpreid link were taken to a feed of anti-Reid tweets.
Welcome to the new media world of hashtag politics, where the character attack is compressed into 140 characters - the website's limit for tweets - and instantly blasted out to a campaign's long list of "followers."
"It was inevitable that negative politics would transform itself into social media. That's exactly what's happened," said Larry Sabato, the director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.
"You don't even need a complete sentence to change a campaign - just a phrase can change a campaign," Sabato added.
Why pay for an attack ad when you can post a free attack tweet?
One recent Reid attack tweet - "Sharron Angle's mocks health coverage for 'autism'" - includes a link to a video that shows the Republican Senate candidate attacking mandates in the new health care law. Is it the tweet or the video that went viral? Answer: both.
Another Angle tweet, "Harry Reid's plan to save the Nevada economy: coked-up stimulus monkeys," was both acidic and inventive. Not only did it mock the real use of stimulus money to study the effects of illicit drugs on primates. The buzzworthy phrase "coked-up stimulus monkeys" was picked up by political writers across the country.
Campaign staffers are throwing mud via Twitter too. A tweet from an Angle campaign staffer refers to Reid's handlers as "13 y/o girls." And on it goes.
Michael Patrick Leahy, a Tea Party activist and co-creator of the hashtag #TCOT (or Top Conservatives on Twitter) said, "I think we're about to enter a new era of American political history."
Leahy's "Tweeps" (Twitter slang for his followers) who click on #TCOT are transported to a virtual Tea Party, a nonstop feed where visitors tweet back and forth on the latest news in the conservative movement.
Leary's website, tcotreport.com, ranks the top conservatives by number of followers on Twitter.
One of those "top conservatives," former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, has more than 250,000 followers on Twitter. Her tweets go out not only to her legions of fans, but also to the nation's top political journalists, who are following Palin's every tweet.
"She can just put out a tweet and generate headlines in the traditional media," Sabato said.
Those journalists, many of whom are also prolific Twitter users, often "retweet" or redistribute Palin's tweets to their own lists of followers.
"The retweeting is how it really gets out there," Sabato added, noting that last weekend marked the 50th anniversary of the first debate in the epic 1960 presidential race between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon.
#timeshavechanged
About this Show
Welcome to the American Morning blog where you can get daily news updates from American Morning's reporters and producers. Join us for "the most news in the morning," weekdays from 6-9 a.m. ET, only on CNN.
On Twitter
LET THE GAMES BEGIN
The parade in to the political gladiatorial arena has began, as Sen. Harry Reid attacks Sharron Angle, Senator Boxer stands against Carly Fiorina, and in the most dramatic race for the governor of California Brown battles Meg Whitman. The battle is not between swords and Retiarius Trident, but between issues and ideologies?In one month the citizen-crowds will descend on the voting booths, but the big difference is that a third party has emerged called the Tea Party. Under the banner of the Republican, this is a clash of the elites and the moderate conservatives. Although jobs is the main event in this Coliseum, second to this must be the economy that is still writhing from the downturn. Main street banks are reticent on loaning money for mortgages, even the Democrats bailed out these institutions with billions,
Questions have not been asked by Andrew Coumo in New York, who had some nefarious dealing with Freddie Mac/Mea over pushing hard to give mortgages to unqualified low income home buyers. Third in line of issues is illegal immigration that Democrats are the major contenders in forcing through a path to citizenship or Amnesty. Sen. Harry Reid has been consistent in trying to enact laws on allowing illegal aliens a right to stay here, after breaking the law. Each time the Reid has authored a bill for any immigration reform, his bills in the Senate has been shot down in flames. Yet when it comes to enforcement of the "rule of Law" he has interceded with law enforcement laws such as E-Verify and 287 (G). Both federal laws for local police to question suspicious persons, same as the Arizona law SB 1170.
Almost all Liberal-Democrats Senators like Reid, Boxer as incumbents must not remain in Washington, as they have completely ignored the 15 millions of Citizens-Residents out of work, and have not stop soliciting for more cheap labor from the other side of the border fence, or one way flight tickets from foreign lands. The Democratic Party and even many of the staunch Republicans have allowed the illegal invasion, get out of hand as thousand s are still slipping past the border fence and there is no real way to know who is a true tourist or student at the airport?
After November in the likely lame duck sessions or perhaps before, the Democrats are searching for more votes. Liberal-Dem’s are hoping that the potential of passing some kind of immigration reform will bring more major minorities into the party’s power. so not–only–must we be very observant of any secret sessions behind closed doors executive law, but be very aware that illegal aliens can and have violated the law in voting in these coming federal elections. Many states still have no strong security measures to check who is voting? Utility bills and other easy fraudulent paperwork are easy to produce. A small group of other states are showing federal picture ID and extensive checks must be performed, specifically where absentee ballots are concerned. Combat between Brown and Whitman in California has illustrated the reality in this Sanctuary State as only Meg Whitman said she would enforce immigration laws and attest that she is against any Amnesty.
Billions of dollars are being drained in California in illegal alien welfare, as in Reid’s Nevada. Instant baby citizenship is a major problem that must be solved, because pregnant Mothers are intentionally arriving here, as they can immediately get post natal care along with a wide range of freebies and cash payments. Once here the fertility of foreign mothers escalate bringing for each child born at least six hundred dollars,. Those with more than three or four children can move into low income housing, to which other family members–legal or illegal–move right in. Then Guess who is paying for this–California taxpayers and the federal government. Schools are another major problem–that is overwhelmed with illegal alien children–again the taxpayer pays for it all. Under the Democrats this give-away is only going to get worse. Nevada is not that better off, as now illegal aliens are collecting unemployment benefits from the slide of the building construction.
Nevada with all its entertainment industry under Reid is falling into financial red ink. All states need to reconsider the massive costs of illegal immigration and take a minute to GOOGLE–Illegal alien–costs. You will be stunned at the expenditure by the US government, county and city welfare and public services and with not enough monetary returns. Business use cheap labor and the farming industry, but leave all the costs of health care and education to the unaware taxpayer. But this is not just a uncontrolled problem in border states, as in the last thirty years the invasion has spread across this soil. It is time for a reevaluation of our laws, which make it a felony to enter America without permission. Mandatory prison terms for business who hire illegal labor, with a uniform Guest Worker program that has not been fraudulently used as it is today.
We should welcome the highest skilled professionals from other countries, but not mediocre job seekers from other countries, who become contingent on welfare and other social programs. Just Remember that reelecting Senator Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Barbara Boxer, or any Governor, Major and elected officers will relieve you of more taxes to pay for illegal immigrant households–will be a repeat performance. You can shadow your Senator or Congressman at the Washington switchboard at 202-224-3121 NumbersUSA can enlighten you about the reality and costs of illegal immigration.
I know that CNN makes every effort to be fair and balanced, but true integrity would demand that all reporting be accurate, first and foremost, and balanced if and only if 'balance' were merited by the facts. This does not seem to be one of those cases.
In the "scuffle" mentioned in this article, two female Reid supporters were pushed and punched in the head/face by a male Angle supporter, after they tried to leave the auditorium during Angle's closing remarks. One of the women punched back. Now Angle responds with the claim that the females were "looking for a fight".
As Reid's campaign said: “In addition to the extreme offensiveness of alleging the woman victimized by this assault was essentially ‘asking for it,’ this cruel and totally unsubstantiated allegation raises serious questions about Sharron Angle’s character,” said Reid campaign spokesman Kelly Steele.
And as Glenn Greenwald has written: "It's admirable to want to apply the same standards to both sides, but straining to manufacture false equivalencies doesn't accomplish that; sometimes, honestly applying the same standards to each side will result in a finding that one side, at least in that regard, is actually worse. When that's the case, a person engaged in truly independent, non-ideological inquiry - rather than the pretense of such - will expressly acknowledge the imbalance, not concoct an equivalency where it doesn't exist."