Amazing Feats

As we’ve been quietly chanting here in the Fishbowl, if it’s Wednesday, it’s Wendy Wednesday, a chance to highlight the inexplicably wild photographs displayed by Washington publicist Wendy Gordon. This week we have Wendy swinging on an indoor wooden swing in a painted on Wilma Flintstone dress — because what else would she be doing? We’re calling this one Weee!!! Wendy.

Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

S.E. Cupp, a conservative commentator who works for GBTV, is in a bit of a pickle. She appears in Hustler, but not in the way you might think. The Blaze, a sister company to GBTV that is owned by Mercury Inc. which is owned by Glenn Beck, is reporting this morning that Cupp is part of a new Hustler graphic on celebrities. In the feature, they place a penis in the woman’s mouth. They’re calling it “Celebrity Fantasy.”

There is a “disclaimer” saying that “no such picture actually exists.” Still, Cupp is hopping mad and told Beck as much this morning when he interviewed her. They discussed how it would stick with her and affect her future (kids, etc…) and how it will make its way around the internet.

No word on whether she’ll take legal action, but Beck encouraged her to do so. He told his listening audience that if anyone wanted represent her, to contact his show.

Developing…

Politico‘s Playbook writer Mike Allen has been all over the map as of late. He’s been fishing off the grid. Taking days off. Absent from “Morning Joe” with Patrick Gavin making consecutive appearances in his place. Oh, and writing Playbook in Spanish.

This morning he filed Playbook on a red eye  from LAX to Dulles. As FBDC’s Peter Ogburn surmised over email this morning, “I picture them wheeling him onto the airplane just like they did with Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs. Too dangerous to mix in with regular passengers.”

“Good Wednesday morning! Sending Playbook for the first time from in-flight wi-fi, aboard an American Airlines 737 as we red-eye into Dulles from LAX”

Fred Karger, the kookiest of GOP Presidential hopefuls still in the race, has turned Mitt Romney into “Pee Wee” Romney.

According to a release, Karger, who was part of President Reagan’s senior political team for seven years, compares a “strong and decisive” Reagan with Romney in the spot.  The 30-second commercial begins running tomorrow for five days in the Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco markets.

Karger calls Romney “weak and indecisive,” referring to Romney’s refusal to stand up to Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association.  Fischer and other right-wing critics pressured Romney to let his newly appointed openly gay foreign policy spokesman Richard Grenell resign.

For all that, we have “Pee Wee” Romney. We’re sure he’s gonna love it.

Nothing says I hate you like a package of poop. A former CNN executive, Bob Furnad, left dog feces in his neighbor’s mailbox in Covington, Ga., calling it a prank. Funny, police aren’t laughing. CBS Atlanta broke the story late this morning. Authorities have video of Furnad putting the shit in the mailbox.

CBS Atlanta reported: “Mr. Furnad stated that he did place a bag containing dog feces in the victim’s mail box,” Covington Police Capt. Ken Malcom told WGCL-TV.

Furnad faces a fine, but really not all that much considering. Read the full story here. And no, this isn’t Washington media news, but we figure it’ll give people ideas if they need a creative way to seek revenge on their enemies.

Politico‘s Mike Allen took a shell shocking five consecutive days off last week. As we’ve reported ad nauseam, it was his first time off since the summer of 2009. He apparently spent the time fishing (and we imagine his time off looked something like this fisherman to your left). We’ve been hearing strong murmurings from inside Politico that he was forced to take the time off.

Then again, we were asked a number of questions throughout this awkward expanse of time — was he sick? Hasn’t he lost a lot of weight? Well, the weight loss has been coming. He’s been dieting for awhile.

Even CELEBRITY Playbooker Editor-in-Chief John Harris felt the need to acknowledge the rumors, writing on Saturday, “Judging by my e-mails, some of you are concerned about the whereabouts of Mike Allen (and, by implication, not entirely satisfied with this week’s substitutes). My question to you: Can’t the guy be allowed to take a freakin’ vacation? …I got numerous inquiries asking if he was sick, should we send flowers, bail money, etc. Rest assured: Mike does indeed take time off, and, based on my evidence, he goes pretty damn far off the grid when he does. He is presently at a secure, undisclosed location and the other day went fishing on the Penobscot River (if you have Google the location is no longer undisclosed.) A source reports: He caught a salmon. And, in a move that locavores will applaud, he promptly ate it. He’ll be back tomorrow, well-fed and well-rested.”

But whoops that wasn’t true! Harris had jumped the gun saying Allen would return Sunday. Were their special satellite phones not working?

Throughout the week, various “guest” and “celebrity” Playbookers filled in. First there was ABC’s Jonathan Karl (a guest) and TIME‘s Michael Crowley (guest). Even those inside Politico wondered why they didn’t find in-house replacement. Brass then swapped in Harris (obviously a celebrity) and Politico right-hand man extraordinaire James Hohmann (celebrity light).

On Sunday Hohmann had to walk back Allen’s supposed Sunday return and break the news that he wouldn’t return until Monday.

The Fisherman Returns…

Read more

What are the chances?

Those working at the offices of CQ Roll Call may want to bone up on their creative nicknaming skills, especially with the recent hire of Keith White as Managing Editor of daily news. This is the second Keith White at the publication. The first is Managing Director Keith White.

The new Keith White comes to CQ Roll Call from The Hill, where he was responsible for the Monday edition.

Whiles sources tell us they don’t really look alike, they are both white guys.

See the memo…

Read more

Yesterday afternoon WaPo Opinion Media writer Erik Wemple reported on TWT and UPI Columnist Arnaud de Borchgrave‘s questionable attribution habits. In other words, he doesn’t attribute necessarily, he gathers bits and pieces from the vast number of news sources he reads daily.

The best part of the story are the excuses de Borchgrave offers Wemple. Our favorite: “As I recall, it came from my Pakistani associate Ammar Turabi and from the Pakistani English-language papers I read daily. I assume the AP, which I seldom read online, picked it up originally from Pakistani news sources.” The AP disputes this, saying the interview was given directly to the AP, not other sources of which de Borchgrave speaks.

This whole thing could wind up being a fun parlor game to play with friends. For example, read this TWT story from April and Google the last graph. “It would take a military jet flying at the speed of sound, reeling out a roll of dollar bills behind it, 14 years before it reeled out one trillion dollar bills.” Results of the exact same sentence show up on a variety of sites two years earlier. That must have been an easy cut and paste for de Borchgrave.

So far, TWT Editor Ed Kelley isn’t talking. Speaking of Kelley, another great line from de Borchgrave: “I don’t have an editor.”



Good for Politico Playbook writer Mike Allen! It’s apparently been 990 long arduous days since he has taken a day off. This includes weekends and holidays. We fully blame that on Jim VandeHei, who has a relentless aversion to Allen sleeping. But for today Allen has disappeared and ABC’s Jonathan Karl is filling in as a “Guest Playbooker.” Karl has filled in for Allen on this front before. Strikes us as a little odd that Politico didn’t find an in-house substitute for Allen. As you can see from this picture, Allen really never takes a day off, not even when he has a bandage on his nose.

Enjoy the day, Mike. And we hope you really are fishing!

After 990 consecutive days writing Playbook (), @MikeAllen has Gone Fishin’, taking his first day off since August 30, 2009.

— Dylan Byers (@DylanByers) May 16, 2012

The Instagram smartphone application has become an indispensable tool for journalists who want to share high-quality photos on the go. Gone are the days of blurry pictures with bad lighting.

But not everyone is up to speed on the app.

Exhibit A: FNC’s Ed Henry snapped this grainy, kind of blasé photo on May 11 while in Reno, Nev. “President’s limo — The Beast — parked in driveway,” reads the caption.

There’s not much to be said about this, but an Instagram filter makes a nice difference.

Exhibit B: The Washington Examiner‘s David Freddoso tweeted this not even remotely artful sideways photo on Monday.

We took the liberty of spinning it right side up and ran it through an Instagram filter to give it purpose.

But not every photo works with Instagram… Read more