Politico Helps Right-Wing Echo Chamber Use Bill Cosby Allegations To Attack Hillary Clinton

With a new editorial team recently in placePolitico has published a news article comparing multiple allegations of rape and assault against Bill Cosby to Bill Clinton, accompanied by a warning that its own false analogy could be politically damaging to Hillary Clinton.

After making the comparison, Politico itself points out how it makes no sense. While “several women have come forward recently” to lodge new complaints against Cosby, in Clinton's case “there have been no new women to come forward in recent years or other scandals to propel it forward.”

This report comes after days of media conservatives pushing the Cosby-Clinton analogy through the media echo chamber.

“The hits just keep coming on with the Bill Cosby,” Rush Limbaugh claimed. “And you know, somewhere Bill Clinton has to be chuckling because, back in his day, these would just be called bimbo eruptions. And Hillary or somebody would deal with it.”

“I think the Bill Cosby issue, as it were, could be a real problem for Bill Clinton and, therefore, for Hillary Clinton,” former Nixon dirty trickster Roger Stone warned on Fox & Friends.  

While providing no evidence, Politico posits that Republican operatives may see social media as having the potential to dredge up old Clinton news and repackage it for a new audience.

“Social media is also forcing old events to be held to current moral standards,” Politico reported, adding that it remained “unclear if Republicans could successfully create a viral issue out of Clinton's past.”

The article then undercuts its own speculation.

“So far, Republicans outside groups say they aren't planning to engage in a smear campaign similar to what has happened to Cosby,” Politico reported.  

But those outside groups might not need to when they have the right-wing echo chamber doing their dirty tricks for them and Politico to amplify their smears.

 Zachary Pleat and Thomas Bishop contributed research to this post.