fwiw, snopes.com about Franken

[steve2470]

https://www.snopes.com/photographer-said-franken-image-was-staged/

It's really long and quoting 4 paragraphs doesn't do it justice. Simply posting for critique and comment. I really like Senator Franken and I'd really hate for him to quit the Senate. He's one of our very best there.

[Mike Nelson]

1. Franken...

...did not say the photo was staged with her permission. He said he was ashamed, and he apologized. Doesn't make it any less deplorable, but important to remember.

[question everything]

2. So what if it was "staged?"

Why would he agreed to it? And if you are going to "revive" her, you don't do this by going after her breasts.

It is really sad how so many here defending this action,

[doc03]

6. He was a comedian back then. She was pretending to be dead and he

was pretending to revive her, it was a f---g gag and she was part of it. He could have given her mouth to mouth instead of pretending to touch her with a flack jacket over her breasts. I don't care if it was McTurtle how can anyone make this into an assult.

[moriah]

12. IF she was awake and pretending, sure, everything you say is right.

If she was asleep, it was the male-on-female equivalent of drawing a dick on the first person to fall asleep's face at a sleepover.

Juvenile. Something that people should outgrow when they hit high school. Something that was never truly funny, and as a comedian Franken himself admitted he may himself need to re-evaluate whether something that's "funny" in the moment could hurt the person who was the butt of the gag.

But maybe he didn't have to scrub marker off his face ever, or get throttled for doing it.

[Demsrule86]

7. Add me to the list...of defending his actions. This is so much bullshit.

[BannonsLiver]

11. Ridiculous.

But as the other poster said, feel free to add me to the list of people you think are defending his actions because I think she's full of shit.

[Roland99]

3. Ignores how Roger Stone and InfoWars knew at 1am. Before it was public

[mucifer]

4. If it did happen she has the right to tell who she wants when she wants.

[Roland99]

10. But she should tell the truth, too, eh?

Something is awry with this whole story

Different than with Weinstein, Spacey, Moore, et al

[mucifer]

13. I'm waiting on the investigation to see what they find or don't find.

[brush]

5. With the Moore situtation and the timing of it, it seems an obvious hit job on Franken.

Not to mention the Roger Stone and Hannity involvement.

[Denzil_DC]

8. Thanks.

I'm glad Snopes has picked this up as I was getting fed up having to link to my own post about this - https://www.democraticunderground.com/10029852049 - every time I saw somebody bring it up over the last couple of days.

I believe I can quote four paras from Snopes without falling foul of DU's fair usage rules:

This image was not staged (at least not to Tweeden’s knowledge or consent), nor was it taken during the rehearsal of the USO skit. Tweeden stated that this picture was taken “without my consent” and “while I was asleep.”

It is highly unlikely that a genuine quote from the person who took this photograph is currently available, as the photographer’s identity is unknown at the time of this writing. It was initially reported (in a since deleted Link to tweet
" target="_blank">tweet) that Franken’s brother may have been the one who took the picture, but Owen Franken denied this.

It should also be noted that the Twitter account that posted this fake quote has pushed misinformation before. And while we can’t definitively say what motivated them to spread this fake quote, we can say that pointing to a woman’s sexual history or clothing choices (which this account did by including an unrelated picture of Tweeden in a bikini), is a common tactic used to prevent women from coming forward with stories of sexual abuse by laying the blame on the victim and saying, without saying, that the victim “deserved” to be assaulted.

The person who took the picture of Al Franken and Leeann Tweeden has not been identified, nor have they issued a statement regarding the incident. Which means there is no credible claim the image was staged, that Tweeden was “playing dead,” or that “she wanted him to ‘revive’ her” in the picture. This quote was made up out of the whole cloth in an apparent attempt to discredit Tweeden and her account.

[califootman]

9. More about the idiot providing the fake quote than about Franken

The guy provides a "quote" from an anonymous photographer without source.

When asked to provide the source, he cites Franken's apology to show that the photo was staged because it was part of a skit.

Except the kiss in the skit and the "air groping" on the plane are two widely separated events, which anyone who had actually read the accuser's story would understand.

This guy did Franken no favors.