Further Adventures Down the Rabbit Hole

The "Michelle Obama tape" rumor mill started churning a lot more slowly this weekend, a development that, I'm sure, had nothing to do with Hillary Clinton's exit from the race. It would be odd if Clinton supporters were only spreading the rumor to keep superdelegates on the fence before it was too late, wouldn't it?

Never fear: The thickly-populated Hillary diehard fever swamps are ready to keep this going. Ex-Hillary Supporters for John McCain, a site apparently designed by people who went into cryogenic freeze in 1994, has a new version of the story.

I heard about 2 minutes of her ranting at Bill Clinton and Hillary over the phone… it is a DVD, I only heard the audio part, they would not send me a sample. I understand that it is over 30 minutes long some of it had been edited. From what I was told, this will make every white American angry.

This is pretty convenient, as the last rumor revolved around a "30-minute rant" at a two-hour event where Obama wasn't even a speaker. But if it's edited for length? Sure!

The tape was made at the conference in June or July of 2004. It was of a conference at the Trinty church. Louis Farrahkan wife was there as was her body guards, who taped the event.

Another departure from Larry Johnson's "breaking news" from one week ago, that Louis Farrakhan himself was on the tape. Commenters are led to ask when this tape is being limited to VP listening sessions over the phone, instead of a confetti-and-fireworks rollout. The answer, of course, is that black people are terrifying.

Doug Wilder, former governor of Va or WV, I cannot remember [ed- it was Virginia], said on more than one occasion, "If Obama does not get the nomination, then all blacks will consider it stole from Obama, and the riots of 1968 will be nothing compared to those of 2008." More than just this leader has made those statements. The person that has the DVD is afraid to release it before the date they have set. They do not want to be the person that started the riots. This person feels that all the thugs are waiting on is a reason to start and destroy this country.

Robert George has established the long provenance of the "proof of a Democrat's wife hating America" rumor, but the "black people getting ready to riot" rumor has an even more storied history. It's at least as old as pre-Jacksonian America. And it pops up in all sorts of modern contexts, like the popular "blacks ready to start race war when Nelson Mandela dies" trope. It is also an example of pure, lizard-brained, slope-browed racism. That's where this rumor is ending up.

Meanwhile, Larry Johnson is slowly spinning away his previous rumors. On Saturday, he wrote an update:

I have not spoken directly with the people who have seen the tape, but I have spoken to two of my friends who are friends with those who watched the tape/dvd.

This was five days after he claimed contact with "five separate sources who have spoken directly with people who have seen the tape." Two, five, whatever. He explains that the two friends "live on opposite sides of the United States geographically and politically," which makes sense, since it's incredibly difficult to pass information from one part of the country to another part. Have you seen the Pony Express rates these days? And at the height of the rumor, I was hearing it bandied about from a liberal blogger in Chicago and conservative movement worthy Richard Viguerie. Anyone with cable news heard it from Florida-based Republican Roger Stone and D.C.-based Democrat Bob Beckel.

Johnson also admits that one of his previous updates might be, uh, totally wrong.

We made the mistake of putting up the claims from Hillbuzz, but have no way of verifying Hillbuzz's claim that it is a recording that features Michelle Obama with the wife of Louis Farrakhan. That is not what the sources who have seen the "tape" have reported to me.

At the time, Johnson claimed that Hillbuzz was "breaking important news." I'm not sure what "no way of verifying" means from a guy who defines "verification" as "two friends who are friends with those who watched" the evidence.