Posted on 11/03/2013 4:14:11 PM PST by tsowellfan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Besieged by unflattering stories about the launch of President Barack Obama's healthcare program, the White House saw a news report that it wanted to swiftly knock down.
It was from NBC, which said that Obama had overpromised when he said Americans who liked their insurance could keep it, and that the president knew that many people would see their coverage change.
White House officials quickly began firing off a barrage of tweets on Twitter, which has become one of the administration's most potent and relied-upon weapons in trying to shape public opinion and media reports.
Josh Earnest, the principal deputy press secretary to Obama, began the assault with a series of tweets that said the healthcare law did protect Americans against changes in their coverage - unless insurers altered such coverage.
"NBC 'scoop' cites normal turnover in the indiv insurance market," Earnest tweeted to his 9,500 followers on Twitter.
The message was retweeted 166 times, potentially reaching another 164,000 people, according to Twitonomy, a Twitter analytics tool.
During the next hour, White House staffers would tweet and retweet messages about the story more than a dozen times, including tweets directly to the NBC reporter.
The debate continues over whether Obama has been misleading about the healthcare law. But it's clear that in many ways, Twitter has become as important in the West Wing's communications arsenal as daily press briefings...
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
LOL His little twitter army is getting their butts kicked form one end of the twitterverse to the other.
“Josh Earnest, the principal deputy press secretary to Obama, began the assault with a series of tweets that said the healthcare law did protect Americans against changes in their coverage - unless insurers altered such coverage.”
Barack Obama himself said that the Cadillac coverage plans need to end.
If you want to keep one of those, then you are just wrong.
Barry’s Commie Twit Zombie Army has been turned loose to spread their lies to the unsuspecting low to no information types! Isn’t technology grand? Goebbels would have loved this stuff.
It's a little frightening, because you have to figure that the average age of a poster there is 12.
Joe Goebbels would be so proud.....
So, how many conservatives give a damn about twits and twitter? Never been there, assuming it is some sort of website?
Twitter? Never heard of it.
Obama is about as presidential as Stalin was.
It’s good to hear that.
I never knew Humpty Dumpty was a true story.
The NYT was trying to provide cover by claiming Obama ‘misspoke’ about the keeping plans.
Well, if Obama misspoke, he did so dozens of times, and many of his supporters in Congress and Administration misspoke, as well.
That was a heck of a lot of misspoking.
Sort of like the misspoking about an obscure video causing Egyptian unrest and Benghazi attacks.
with fake followers et al
panic yields despertion
desperation yields tweeting
...and don’t forget P.T. Barnum is probably LHAO.
The list, Ping
Let me know if you would like to be on or off the ping list
An army of liars commanded by the Liar in Chief.
Pretty damn weak, as the backlash on twitter can be worse.
Anyone remember his lame hash tag crap about “truth squads”?
Was not the first person to use the term "misspoke" Richard Nixon?
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