Sticker shock! "Obama-Bayh 08" lulu oversold by KMBC's Mahoney; backpedaling ensues; he meant to say "Bayh...DEN"

This is the problem with TV news sometimes. You get a hot tip, it's juicier than the prime rib at Jack Stack Barbecue and you can't wait to break the news on the air. But wait! You're a Seasoned Newsman and you know it's better to be right than first. So you hold the story until the giddiness clears and you can think a little more sensibly about the potential idiot you're about to make of yourself.

Right?

Well, not always. Dan Rather wound up on HDNet after he aired some hot memos about the president on CBS before nailing down their veracity. Micheal Mahoney, political reporter for KMBC-9 News, isn't going to lose his job, but as I write this early on Friday evening, his news judgment sure isn't looking very good, as he and his station are trying to back away from his original, breathless, over-the-top "scoop" that he had learned the identity of Barack Obama's running mate from ... a bumper sticker.

It was a day when any journalist on the political beat would have given a week's salary to have the scoop on the Democratic vice presidential nominee. A day when the entire domestic news media was riveted on one story and one story only. Given such intense exposure, Mahoney's breaking news gambit could have had only two outcomes: either spectacular or ...

Well, here is the original report that KMBC-9 interrupted its programming for. I have taken it from this YouTube user because, by the time I got to a computer, KMBC had already replaced Mahoney's report with a later, backpedaling one.

And here is the transcript of Mahoney's first report:

"KMBC-9 News has every indication that Barack Obama is about to announce his running mate will be the Indiana senator Evan Bayh. This is based on sources very close to the situation and based also on this. Let's take a picture of this political piece that is been produced here at Gill Studios in Lenexa, Kansas, it says Obama and-- or Evan Bayh on it, I believe -- I actually don't have a monitor in front of me -- and Gill Studios is one of the leading manufacturers of political material in the nation. They do more than $60 million worth of business. They are non-partisan. They do stuff for the McCain campaign. They do stuff for the Obama campaign. They do material for all sorts of political campaigns and initiatives throughout the nation. They are very well-respected organization when it comes to political literature. Our sources are telling me that these Obama-Bayh pieces are going to be shipped to Denver in anticipation of the Denver Democratic Convention. They may also end up showing up in Springfield, Illinois, tomorrow -- that's where we believe that the Obama campaign will announce that it is Evan Bayh and is confirmed at least by the fact that this political piece is now being manufactured here in Gill Studios in Kansas City."

Yes, he said "confirmed." And "every indication."

Now, when you visit the Bumper Sticker Could Indicate Bayh Is Obama's Veep story at KMBC's website, you'll find the video report toned down considerably (and I wouldn't be surprised if the headline has changed).

That's because someone back at the newsroom, I'm guessing, was using the google and in the hours after Mike's original report had learned that (a) the typeface on the Obama-Bayh stickers was totally generic and did not reflect the official fontage of Obama '08 campaign, (b) it's almost as easy to order up speculative T shirts and bumper stickers as it is to make a fake website, (c) there were no "sources very close to the situation," if by "situation" you meant the Obama campaign and not the dudes at the sticker plant, (d) ... A BUMPER STICKER?

But it was too late. The story had circled the globe more times than Christopher Reeve in the original "Superman" movie. (And when we reported on it at our Prime Buzz blog, we got roped into it, too.) Andrea Mitchell was on MSNBC reporting that Sen. Bayh had already been told he hadn't been selected. And then, she added with a twinkle in her eye, it seems some people had "got all excited" about Bayh based on some "fake bumper stickers printed in Kansas."

And speaking of fake bumper stickers, a reader sends us this ...

Comments

[anon e. mouse]

LOL! Even Drudge ran with it based on Mahoney's breathless scoop. It was all the talk on the Huffington Post blog yesterday...nobody there believed it. Another step forward for Kansas!

[Aaron Barnhart]

Note to "Stones": I enjoyed reading your drunken, rambling ad hominem screed in the comments here. I won't be posting it but I am reassured that members of the KC media old guard are still out there unleashing their venom, as they have always done, behind a veil of anonymity.

[Agnostick]

WAMEGO, Kansas -- A trio of Pottawatomie county hunters called a press conference this morning to announce a startling discovery.

Standing on the steps of the Columbian theater, they displayed pictures of a large, limp-looking object--looking a lot like the remains of Micheal Mahoney's journalistic integrity--stuffed into a white deep freeze unit.

[moose & squirrel]

Good for you Aaron. I smelt something funny from the get go when this story broke yesterday especially after Drudge jumped all over it. A lot egg on a lot of faces was washed off this morning.

[Agnostick]

Of course "Drudge ran with it."

Matt Drudge would run with a leaky gas can if he had a lit cigarette in his mouth.

http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/politics/national/features/9221/

[Boston Corbett]

Hasn't Mahoney ever watch a Final-4 Basketball game?

If so, did he not wonder how T-shirts are distributed at the buzzer with the winner's name?

Please keep him away from the apparel manufacturers in March. He would really screw stuff up for the Sports boys.

[Stones]

Aaron, I know you will not air my comments on here, but Mahoney gave better reporting this week than any other hack (including you) counld ever dream of. Get used to it. Putting a Letterman FAQ gives you no credibility to be a critic. Deep inside you know it.

["A Letterman FAQ"?? Dude, that was 1994. You really are stuck in another time. And the booze is affecting your critical judgment, if you had any. I will give Gary Lezak this much: Unlike you, he has the nads to take responsibility for his opinions.--AB]