Originally posted Tuesday, September 18, 2018 by RODNEY HO/rho@ajc.com on his AJC Radio & TV Talk blog
Plenty of conservatives hate Atlanta-based CNN, fueled by President Donald Trump and his regular Tweets calling the network "fake news."
Seeking to prove their point, some right-wing meme creators found a photo of Anderson Cooper in waist-deep flood water, claiming he was exaggerating and staging shots during Hurricane Florence. (This was on the heels of Mike Seidel of the Weather Channel fighting off winds while two men walked calmly behind him.
But the photo was from 2008 during Hurricane Ike in Texas. And Cooper was demonstrating the dangers of shifting depths of flood waters.
A lot of right wing loons are spreading a photo of Anderson Cooper waist deep in water during Hurricane Florence. They allege he was faking the extent of the flood.
— Danny Boy (@Care2much18) September 17, 2018
It was actually Hurricane Ike and Anderson was showing how deep the water was in places.
He even petted a dog. pic.twitter.com/mWcT1URVmw
Cooper himself on Monday night during his CNN show decided to address the issue in a nine-minute segment in part because Donald Trump Jr. used it as fodder to malign CNN on Twitter.
While many people on Twitter used the images and tied them to Florence, Trump Jr. merely implied that this was fakery and designed to make his dad “look bad.”
Cooper took umbrage to that, shading Trump Jr. by showing photos of him being an “outdoorsman” killing exotic wildlife but presuming he wasn’t in North Carolina helping in rescue efforts.
He then showed video of him in waist-deep water in Bridge City, Texas in a flooded area. He was demonstrating the various depths of water in a very small area. At one point, he even made fun of himself for doing this but he said he didn’t want to be on the dry part of the road interfering with rescue operations. He also wanted to show that water can go deep very quickly even just a few feet off a road and many people die in hurricanes via drowning.
He noted that his camera crew has to shoot on dry spots to keep the equipment from getting wet. And the tech person in the photo? He died last year, Cooper said.
It’s a shame that CNN’s ratings are down 41%. What’s worse is there’s a simple solution that they refuse to accept. Stop Lying to try to make @realDonaldTrump look bad. https://t.co/O3XyWchsJh pic.twitter.com/BCUCxKnOvO
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) September 16, 2018
"The idea I am kneeling in water to make it look deep is idiotic." @AndersonCooper debunks the lies being spread by Donald Trump Jr., and others who falsely claimed he and his team exaggerated the severity of Hurricane Florence. #KeepingThemHonest https://t.co/j2HptrYpe0 pic.twitter.com/zwfvIXCsIY
— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) September 18, 2018