And now, a word from Obama for America -- UPDATE

That was Fake Stephanie Cutter



This is Real Stephanie Cutter



I have no idea why "Raw Story" failed to get this distinction right.

Twice.

Then again, I'm still waiting for the soon/imminent/Any!Second!Now indictment of Karl Rove, so what do I know?

UPDATE:  Commentor Coldtype gently chided me because "...the Raw Dogs make it clear that the video is satire".

I disagree, but only mildly, so rather than bore your ass off with some windy musing longer than a tiny disagreement deserves, instead I offer this mini-writer's workshop, which all you non-ink-stained wretches should feel free to scroll right on past and for which I would normally charge staggering sums of money :-)

Question:  As an exercise for the group, what easily-fixable technical error did the "Raw Story" author(s) commit that caused their concept(s) to fail?

Background:

I found the video by following Mr. Hal Sparks' (Professional Comedian) chatroom link to this latest ad, which was commended by Mr. Sparks' to his listeners with assurance that "This really is Stephanie Cutter. No kidding!"

I was dubious, having only a vague after-image memory of what Ms. Cutter looked like, but since no American profession is currently more trustworthy than a Professional Comedian, I went for a look.

And it is a funny ad, but it was the accompanied by this text:

"The campaign to re-elect President Barack Obama, in conjunction with Andy Cobb and Second City Television, has produced a new 90-second web ad that offers presumptive Republican nominee and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney..."

and this

"Obama spokesperson Stephanie Cutter, who starred in the campaign’s previous collaboration with Second City, implied recently that Romney’s failure to come clean about the ties he still had to Bain after he left in February of 1999..."

and this

"'In the spirit of the Romney campaign,' said Cutter in the new ad, 'I’d like to announce that I have retroactively retired from the Obama campaign, and retroactively apologized, years ago, for those statements that I hadn’t yet made because I’m just that sorry.'”

Which -- let me reiterate -- is very funny and all, but at no point in the article does it say or imply that this is satire. Instead the article cracks out of turn (h/t David Mamet) and crumbs the play (h/t David Mamet) by telling me that Ms. Cutter -- who is a real person and presumably a good sport -- had teamed up with the very funny (and real) Andy Cobb and the very funny (and real) Second City to do a kooky ad!

And there in front of me I find...the very real Second City and the very funny Andy Cobb teamed up with someone who looks a helluva lot like Ms. Cutter in a kooky ad!

I then obligingly click on the link for the previous "ad" and read this (emphasis not added):

Meet Obama for America Deputy Campaign Manager Stephanie Cutter (really!) as she hilariously and depressingly rolls out in a new video by comedian Andy Cobb how fucked the campaign is when it comes to fundraising.

And this:

“You’ve got me and a green screen against a firehouse of Citizens United money from the richest bastards in the world,” she said...

Under the Onion-esqu headline:

Drunk Obama campaign staffer challenges ‘cheap bastard’ billionaires to donate

Caveat:

Anxious as I was to see the second video, I freely admit to scrolling right past this -- "Editor’s note: Just to be super clear, this video is a satire." -- at the bottom of the article on my way to the pot 'o gold.  

Answer:

The authors committed an error when they that they did not follow through on their own premise.  

This happens most frequently when a writer abruptly (and almost always accidentally) changes their tense or point-of-view mid-stride, which breaks the continuity of the piece and knocks the reader out of the story.  In this case, the authors' needed to either go with the joke -- "Drunk Obama campaign staffer challenges..." -- or sort of halfway explain and let people in on the joke -- "Meet Obama for America Deputy Campaign Manager Stephanie Cutter (really!) as she hilariously and depressingly rolls out in a new video by comedian Andy Cobb...". 

The videos themselves are terrific (and self-evidently) satire, so the authors either needed to commit to that satiric narrative  (Yes!) ... or pull the curtain back in introduce us to the players and organizations behind the scenes by their real names and explain what they were trying to accomplish (No!)

Instead, they tried to do both and so failed to adequately do either.

Conclusion:

Andy Cobb and Second City are very funny.

"Raw Story"  really needs to hire me.