According to The New York Times, one of the most blogged about tidbits leaked from the McCain campaign in the aftermath of the election was nothing more than a piece of an elaborate hoax. When FoxNews quoted an unnamed McCain advisor as stating that Palin did not know that Africa was a continent, the blogosphere exploded with bellowing laughter, and the traditional media followed suit. This blog took the bait as well.
On Monday, MSNBC's David Shuster revealed that the unnamed McCain advisor was none other than Martin Eisenstadt. Trouble is, Martin Eisenstadt doesn't exist.
Look, I'm not going to bore you with all the details (which you can read here), but this is awesome, hilarious and somewhat embarrassing. The guys who perpetrated this hoax created a fake think tank for "Eisenstadt" to work at as a senior fellow, the Harding Institute, created a blog for him to blog on, created youtube videos purporting to show him being interviewed on Iraqi tv, and the list goes on and on. This was elaborate. This was genius. And this was a load of bullshit. Well played.
***UPDATE*** In the most-meta moment we can recall, the hoaxy Martin Eisenstadt, who doesn't actually exist, claims on his blog that yesterday's expose in the NY Times (link above) was the actual hoax, perpetrated by the group Yes Men, who put out a very realistic uber-liberal faux NY Times from the future yesterday. To sum up, the hoax is suggesting that the hoax is reality and the real expose is the actual hoax. Get all that? Check it out here. See Valley Wag's take on the story here.
