October 6, 2013

Fox News mistakenly airs parody of Obama offering to personally fund Muslim museum

Source: Yahoo News - (with video of the Fox News segment)

In a story about the monument closure, Fox News host Anna Kooiman fell prey to a false report from a parody site, which claimed that President Obama had offered to keep the International Museum of Muslim Cultures open with cash from his own pocket.

Kooiman was referencing a quote from the National Report, a parody news site that ran the fake story on Obama. The key quote from the story reads:

“The International Museum of Muslim Cultures is sacred. That is why I have taken it upon myself to use my own personal funds to re-open this historic piece of American culture.”




Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/fox-news-mistakenly-airs-parody-of-obama-offering-to-personally-fund-muslim-museum-233837793.html

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Its a 2:21 m:s video. The first 1:30 m:s of the video is about how war memorials are being shut down, even though it doesn't cost anything to keep them open, just to make the shutdown as painful as possible.

Then at 1:30 it gets more interesting and at 1:58 is when they claim Obama is offering to pay out of pocket to keep the International Musuem of Muslim Cultures open.

Yes, I know Yahoo! News, The Sideshow is not a mainstream source, I did look for something more mainstreamy. (Yahoo News did post it as the 3rd main story on its news.yahoo.com home page). But I trust the video is real, and I trust Media Matters. Media Matters packaged the video segment.

Other sources:
http://gawker.com/fox-news-falls-for-fake-story-claiming-obama-is-funding-1441573171
Media Matters http://mediamatters.org/blog/2013/10/05/fox-falls-for-fake-story-about-obama-personally/196304

[font color = red]On Edit 10/6 1023 pm Central (after 26 replies) -- there are several comments directed at this OP about how Fox's "mistake" was intentional. I agree. However, one of the rules of Late Breaking News is that we must use the original title of the article. And also any excerpts we use (above the "Read More:" line) must be unaltered. [/font] Yes, I think a more apt title is one with quotes and a spelling change: [font color = blue]Faux "News" "mistakenly" airs parody of Obama offering to personally fund Muslim museum[/font]

[font color = green]On Edit 10/7 939 am Central[/font] - On October 6, Kooiman issued the following statement via Twitter: "Just met w producers- I made a mistake yday after receiving flawed research abt a museum possibly closing. My apologies. Won't happen again."
Source: http://mediamatters.org/blog/2013/10/05/fox-falls-for-fake-story-about-obama-personally/196304
I know "mistake" "flawed research" "apologies" "again"
"a museum possibly closing"
I heard about this update on the Stephanie Miller show.