Fake Photo Alert: Barack, Hillary And Che

A fake photo of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in front of an image of Ché Guevara is making its rounds on the Internet.

It showed up today on the liberal blog BAGnewsNotes, which found it on display as a news photo on an obscure site called Alaska Report. BAG blogger Michael Shaw writes, "Unless this was a photoshop job, if that really even mattered, here were BHO and HRC in front of our man, Ché."

It was a Photoshop job, and it does matter.

I found the original photo, which is by Reuters photographer Eric Thayer. It shows Obama and Clinton in front of a red, textured background at a debate last August. It is captioned as follows on the Reuters Web site:

"Democratic presidential candidates U.S. Senators Barack Obama (D-IL) (L) and Hillary Clinton (D-NY) speak during a break in a Democratic debate at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa August 19, 2007. REUTERS/Eric Thayer (UNITED STATES)"

Just to be clear: I have no idea who altered this image and there's no reason to think any reputable news organization has published it. If I find out more, I'll add it here.

Comments

[Michael Shaw]

Hi Dary: The "maybe it doesn't matter" comment was made as part of a post lamenting how the liberal blogosphere is fracturing over the Hillary vs. Obama question. Unfortunately, in the current atmosphere, the tendency now -- in approaching an image such as this -- is to necessarily decide if the photo is more advantageous to one candidate versus the other. My point, as a result, is that the veracity of the photo itself -- which otherwise matters 100%, as you point out, and which would otherwise guide my visual analysis at BAGnewsNotes -- has, from a political standpoint, almost become a peripheral issue.

Just thought I'd clarify.

--Michael