On Wednesday evening, the Wall Street Journal published a story that would seem to have major implications for U.S.-Iranian relations and the “narrative” the Obama administration has been spinning to the America public via gullible journalists.
The U.S. sent a planeload of $400 million in cash to Iran in January as Americans held prisoner there were freed https://t.co/sPXoB6wFTz
— Gerard Baker (@gerardtbaker) August 3, 2016
The Obama administration’s efforts to spin the U.S. media on Iran were detailed in an extensive New York Times profile of senior White House adviser and failed novelist Ben Rhodes, which described how “handpicked Beltway insiders like Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic and Laura Rozen of Al-Monitor helped retail the administration’s narrative” on Iran.
Neither Goldberg nor Rozen had much to say last night about the Journal‘s story on the planeload of cash we delivered just as four American prisoners were freed. They didn’t even bother to dismiss it as a non-story. But they did do a fair amount of nasty tweeting about Donald Trump and the Republican Party.
This is amazing. "Republican lawmakers and strategists have begun to entertain abandoning him en masse." https://t.co/ZOnTg39e12
— Jeffrey Goldberg (@JeffreyGoldberg) August 3, 2016
This is just so embarrassing:https://t.co/SXt7zCepDI
— Jeffrey Goldberg (@JeffreyGoldberg) August 3, 2016
This Paul Ryan controversy is a perfect example of the "Don't disrespect the Bing" rule in action.
— Jeffrey Goldberg (@JeffreyGoldberg) August 3, 2016
Trump/Manafort staff "suicidal." https://t.co/jRXkErNth2 hm
— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) August 3, 2016
so, do we date trump implosion to late july or early august? #pt
— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) August 3, 2016
Hewlett exec, Republican politician and fundraiser Meg Whitman, bails from Trump ship, says will vote for Hillary https://t.co/3LXBOQIBSA
— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) August 3, 2016
Has Trump weighed in on flossing?
— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) August 3, 2016
Vox dot com has yet to explain what this new Iran story really means, but has written on a number of other interesting stories.
Watch Will Smith charm the pants off a crowd with an impromptu "Summertime" sing-along https://t.co/Qfnd8cQQyV
— Vox (@voxdotcom) August 3, 2016
These tweets show why it's wrong to say Hillary Clinton has a "problem" with white men https://t.co/a2Bi3eu9ES
— Vox (@voxdotcom) August 3, 2016
Why medicine is failing obese people: https://t.co/rkQartHW5W
— Vox (@voxdotcom) August 3, 2016
It would that appear that Ben Rhodes started blasting out some emails on Wednesday morning, around the same time that journalists started collectively tweeting about how the Journal’s story was no big deal and the public should have already known about it.
This $400M to Iran has been around since January. https://t.co/zUqOQQF1yn
— Brian Moore (@BriTheWebGuy) August 3, 2016
New York Times' @SangerNYT in January vs. @WSJ "scoop" today. Hmmm. Is that really a secret ransom payment? pic.twitter.com/nyHPElPKlc
— Jonathan Weisman (@jonathanweisman) August 3, 2016
The cash payment to Iran that is causing such commotion today was reported on at the time of the hostage release https://t.co/Q403RuygR7
— Sam Stein (@samsteinhp) August 3, 2016
re $400 million and Iran, worth highlighting this @Newsweek story from January re affecting victims of Iran terror https://t.co/BHPunas90K
— Glenn Kessler (@GlennKesslerWP) August 3, 2016
The Obama administration denies that the cash payments to Iran, to settle a long-standing debt over an arms deal that predates the Iranian revolution, had anything to do with the release of the four American prisoners. They have, however, acknowledged that the Iranian officials negotiating the prisoner exchange wanted the cash to in order to show a tangible benefit to Iran from the exchange.
GOP Sen. Tom Cotton accused the Obama administration of paying a “ransom” for U.S. hostages.
