BEHIND THE CURTAIN - NYTimes.com posted a real holy-cow story last night: "Obama Advisers Weigh Ad Assault Against the G.O.P." The lead: "President Obama's political advisers, looking for ways to help Democrats and alter the course of the midterm elections in the final weeks, are considering a national advertising campaign that would cast the Republican Party as all but taken over by Tea Party extremists, people involved in the discussion said." It was the lead story of the paper, and Drudge broke out a two-line banner: "OBAMA ADVISERS WEIGH AD ASSAULT AGAINST 'TEA PARTY.'"
--Before we had even seen the article, the White House told us in unusually specific terms that it was "100 percent inaccurate." We were even give a sampling of the top Obama advisers who said they had never heard of the idea of a national ad buy. Lo and behold, the story morphed overnight into "Obama Aides Weigh Bid to Tie the G.O.P. to the Tea Party,' with the lead: "President Obama's political advisers, looking for ways to help Democrats and alter the course of the midterm elections in the final weeks, are considering a range of ideas, including national advertisements, to cast the Republican Party as all but taken over by Tea Party extremists, people involved in the discussion said." http://nyti.ms/bscWbV
--The West Wing remains unsatisfied. A White House official: "The Times is just flat-out, 100 percent wrong. The first time Obama's advisers heard about a national ad campaign is when the story showed up on The Times' website last night."
--Times Washington Bureau Chief Dean Baquet responds: 'The piece is accurate.'