Obama adultery story is obvious nonsense

Note, May 1, 1:10 p.m.: this entry, with its characterization of the Enquirer article as “patent nonsense,” was written and posted by me at 8 a.m. this morning in response to the Enquirer’s original story as it existed this morning. The Enquirer has since then changed the article in key respects. See update below.

The National Enquirer’s story of an affair that Obama has had during his presidency (linked through Mediaite at Lucianne.com) is patent nonsense:

[After picking up Vera Baker at a hotel] The driver said he then picked up Obama at the airport and drove both he and Baker to various locations while he was campaigning for funds. Vera accompanied him to each meeting.

“About 10:30 PM, I drove them to the hotel and they went in together!”

“My services for the evening were done—and there was no indication she was going to leave the hotel that night.”

We’re supposed to believe that the President of the United States was standing alone at an airport, without staff or Secret Service, and that, alone, he got into a limo, and that the limo then drove him, accompanied by Vera Baker, to “various locations” in D.C. where Obama, unaccompanied by staff or Secret Service, walked with Baker into a series of events where he raised money. Then he left each event, with Baker but without any staff or Secred Service, and got back into the limo which took him to the next location. Then, unaccompanied by Secret Service, Obama walked openly into a hotel with Vera Baker at his side and the two went upstairs to a room.

The Enquirer has gone off the deep end. This is a rough time for traditionalists. Is there no intact and dependable institution left in American life?

* * *

UPDATE, May 1, 1:00 p.m.: Some readers have said that that the alleged affair did not take place when Obama was president, and that’s why there were no secret service agents. That possibility occurred to me when I was preparing the entry this morning, so before posting it I took a second look at the Enquirer story to make sure that it was referring to the present.

First, the lead sentence says:

PRESIDENT OBAMA has been caught in a shocking cheating scandal after being caught in a Washington, DC hotel with a former campaign aide, sources say.

The unambiguous meaning is that President Obama has been caught in a hotel with a former campaign aide. If a newspaper is referring to what Obama was doing when he was a community organizer or a state senator, it does not speak of him as “President” Obama.

Note again: it says that “President” Obama has been caught with a “former” campaign aide.

Next, the article says:

A confidential investigation has learned that Obama first became close to gorgeous 35 year-old VERA BAKER in 2004 when she worked tirelessly to get him elected to the US Senate, raising millions in campaign contributions.

If she was a campaign aide for him in 2004, and if, as the lead sentence states, she was his “former” campaign aide at the time “President” Obama was “caught” with her in the D.C. hotel, then the affair did not take place in 2004. In light of the unambiguous statement in the lead sentence that the adulterous incident took place while Obama was president, this sentence seems to be saying that 2004 was when he first met her, not when he was “caught” with her in a hotel. However, the phrase “became close … in 2004” could also be suggesting an affair back then as well. A possible interpretation is that an affair began between them in 2004 and has continued into his presidency.

Next, the article says:

Among those being offered money is a limo driver who says that he took Vera to a secret hotel rendezvous where the President was staying.

It says that “the President” was staying at the hotel. It doesn’t say that the “senator” or the “senate candidate” or the “future president” was staying there.

On the basis of the above, the story is clearly stating that the alleged affair took place in the recent past, during Obama’s presidency. And therefore the tale of Obama gallivanting around Washington in a limo without Secret Servce protection was, as I said, patent nonsense.

However, the Enquirer article as of noon today has been updated and shortened, and a key sentence has been changed.

Here is the sentence as it existed this morning and as it is quoted by me above:

Among those being offered money is a limo driver who says that he took Vera to a secret hotel rendezvous where the President was staying.

But in the updated version of the article it says:

Among those being offered money is a limo driver who says in 2004 that he took Vera to a secret hotel rendezvous in where Obama was staying.

While the added words “in 2004” result in a badly written phrase (the driver “says in 2004 that he took Vera”), the change makes it clear that the alleged incident took place in 2004. However, the lead sentence of the updated article, which has not been changed (see below), still makes it sound as if the incident occurred recently, during his presidency.

If the alleged affair took place in 2004, Obama wasn’t even a U.S. senator then, but an Illinois state senator running for the U.S. Senate.

In any case, the writing of the original article was outrageously irresponsible and sensationalistic, stating that both the affair and the discovery of the affair (“PRESIDENT OBAMA has been caught”) took place recently, not six years ago when he was a state senator; and the unchanged lead of the updated version is still saying that the incident took place during his presidency. Welcome back to the “old” Enquirer, as it was before the recent “respectability” and “credibility” it gained as a result of being ahead of the mainstream media on the John Edwards affair.

Below is the text of the Enquirer article as it existed online at 8 a.m. this morning, followed by the updated version as of noon today. Also, here is a saved version of the original web page of the article as it existed this morning.

Enquirer article as of 8 a.m., May 1:

PRESIDENT OBAMA has been caught in a shocking cheating scandal after being caught in a Washington, DC hotel with a former campaign aide, sources say.

And now, a hush-hush security video that shows everything could topple both Obama’s presidency and marriage to Michelle!

A confidential investigation has learned that Obama first became close to gorgeous 35 year-old VERA BAKER in 2004 when she worked tirelessly to get him elected to the US Senate, raising millions in campaign contributions.

While Baker has insisted in the past that “nothing happened” between them, the ENQUIRER has learned that top anti-Obama operatives are offering more than $1 million to witnesses to reveal what they know about the alleged hush-hush affair.

Among those being offered money is a limo driver who says that he took Vera to a secret hotel rendezvous where the President was staying.

On the condition of anonymity, the limo driver said he took Baker “from a friend’s home in the DC area to the Hotel George where I learned later that Obama would be spending the night.”

The driver recalled that he “waited in the lobby while she went to change her outfit.

“But to the best of my knowledge she did not have a room at the hotel and she was not staying there so I thought that it was a bit odd.”

The driver said he then picked up Obama at the airport and drove both he and Baker to various locations while he was campaigning for funds. Vera accompanied him to each meeting.

“About 10:30 PM, I drove them to the hotel and they went in together!”

“My services for the evening were done—and there was no indication she was going to leave the hotel that night.”

A top DC source told The ENQUIRER exclusively that the driver’s account had been independently corroborated by investigators who believe the couple spent the night together at the hotel.

The ENQUIRER has also learned that on-site hotel surveillance video camera footage could provide indisputable evidence.

“Investigators are attempting to obtain a tape from the hotel (that) shows Vera and Barack together,” the DC insider confided.

“If the tape surfaces, it will explode the scandal.”

Updated Enquirer article, as of 12 noon, May 1:

UPDATED: Reports out of Washington, DC:

PRESIDENT OBAMA has been caught in a shocking cheating scandal after being caught in a Washington, DC Hotel with a former campaign aide.

A confidential investigation has learned that Obama first became close to gorgeous 35 year-old VERA BAKER in 2004 when she worked tirelessly to get him elected to the US Senate, raising millions in campaign contributions.

While Baker has insisted in the past that “nothing happened” between them, reports reveal that top anti-Obama operatives are offering more than $1 million to witnesses to reveal what they know about the alleged hush-hush affair.

Among those being offered money is a limo driver who says in 2004 that he took Vera to a secret hotel rendezvous in where Obama was staying.

An ENQUIRER reporter has confirmed the limo’s driver account of the secret 2004 rendezvous.

N. writes:

Perhaps Kitty Kelly is now writing for the “Enquirer”?

The breathless tone of the Obama adultery claim reminds me of excerpts from her biography of Frank Sinatra, in which she claimed adultery between Sinatra and Nancy Reagan, in the White House.

LA replies:

Not only that, but the illustrious New York Times quoted Kelly’s adultery-in-the-White-House claim in a front page article written by Maureen Dowd.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 01, 2010 08:08 AM | Send