The Markey campaign's YouTube video shows Gomez side-by-side with an anti-Obama swiftboating video. Gomez had appeared on MSNBC to defend the video, which included images of bin Laden and the president.
Put out a statement on Ed Markey's shameful attack ad where he juxtaposed a pic of Bin Laden with Gomez. Time to take it down.
— @Reince via Twitter for iPhone
Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus wants Massachusetts Democratic Senate nominee Ed Markey to take down
a YouTube video criticizing GOP nominee Gabriel Gomez for attempting to swiftboat President Obama during the 2012 election.
Priebus is pretending that Markey's video smears Gomez by showing an image of him side-by-side with Osama bin Laden, but the real story is that Markey's video showed an image of Gomez appearing on MSNBC alongside a clip from an anti-Obama swiftboating video that Gomez was defending. The video, produced by a right-wing Super PAC called OpSec in support of Mitt Romney during the 2012 president campaign, accused President Obama of leaking classified information to take more credit than he deserved for the killing of bin Laden.
As it turns out, the video Gomez was defending included images of both bin Laden and President Obama. So it's true that there was a fleeting split screen image of Gomez and bin Laden, but as you can see above, there was also an image Gomez and President Obama. It makes as much sense for Priebus to claim that Markey was trying to link Gomez with bin Laden as it would for him to claim that Markey was trying to suggest President Obama supports Gomez—or vice versa.
Despite all that, Priebus would have you believe that Markey's campaign was doing what Saxby Chambliss did to Max Cleland or what the swiftboaters did to John Kerry. But the truth is the exact opposite: Markey's video reveals Gomez's past as a spokesman for swiftboaters. It's baffling that Priebus would follow the National Republican Senatorial Committee's lead by calling attention to a video revealing Gomez to be a typical Republican hack, but the fact that he would try to distort it is not surprising at all.
Stand up to the swiftboater: Please donate $3 to Ed Markey for Senate.