Of Beanpoles, Chuckybutts, and Onlinebeerbellygirls: The WSJ Issues a Correction
With just over 90 days until the election it’s getting close to silly time — one imagines last week’s McCain/Paris Hilton/Britney Spears debacle may have been the season’s unofficial starting gun. Along those same lines, you may have read the WSJ story, also from last week, that basically said there were people who wouldn’t vote for Barack Obama because he was too skinny (inevitably at least one person found racial undertones in the piece). The article quoted a “Clinton supporter” from a “Yahoo politics message board” who said “I won’t vote for any beanpole guy.” Really? Actually, not so much. Turns out the writer of the piece, Amy Chozick, actually started the message board in question. As for the beanpole quote, seems that Choznik thinned it out a bit. Here’s what commeneter “onlinebeerbellygirl” had to say in full:
Yes I think He is to skinny to be President.Hillary has a potbelly and chuckybutt I’d of Voted for Her.I won’t vote for any beanpole guy.Ah, the old potbelly and chuckybutt argument. At the time Choznik responded: “Love your response and your username (onlinebeerbellygirl). Would you mind shooting me an email so I can ask you a few more quesitons? My email is [redacted] Thanks so much!” The WSJ has since issued a somewhat limited correction saying:
This article about Barack Obama’s weight included a quote from a Yahoo bulletin board that was posted in response to a question from a Journal reporter who initiated the discussion. The article should have disclosed that the reporter used the bulletin board to elicit the comment, “I won’t vote for any beanpole guy.”As with so much else in this campaign season, we feel like someone has accidentally taken a page out of the Onion, or at least the New York Post, maybe Rupe got confused.
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