The media is in the process of wholly distorting a politician's comments, just because it's been a while. If you watch cable news or read Politico, you'll hear that, over the weekend in a CNN interview, future 2012 GOP candidate Mitt Romney demeaned Gov. Sarah Palin as being attractive but not really influential. Which, if he said that, would be accurate. But that's not what he said.
Here's the transcript via Politico:
KING: As you launch this effort, anyone who picks up Time magazine this week and sees the 100 most influential people, will see two Republicans in that magazine. They'll see Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh. Is that helpful, hurtful, indifferent?
CANTOR: You know, they are two individuals that have a lot of ideas, and our party should be about ideas. That's what this effort is about and the National Council for a New America, and that is what they're about. So I don't think any of us should have any monopoly on the ideas. And I know that there are some who like to make it all about personalities, but it's about ideas. It's about how we take this country forward.
ROMNEY: John, I'd like to have a lot more influential Republicans. I think there are a lot more influential Republicans than that would suggest. But was that the issue on the most beautiful people or the most influential people? I'm not sure. If it's the most beautiful, I understand. We're not real cute.
Notice John King's initial question was about Palin and Rush Limbaugh. If Romney was suggesting that Palin is good-looking and not influential, he would be by extension calling fat hog Limbaugh "beautiful" as well. And we know that's not what Romney meant. This is the lamest fake controversy since "lipstick on a pig."
Moving forward, I think I've heard Cantor's "monopoly on the ideas" comment used somewhere before. Here, for one.
Cross-posted at The New Argument.