Who’s running Anthony Weiner’s campaign? Al Gore?
The Twitter-failing former congressman became an online laughingstock yesterday after a report came out quoting him as taking credit for the term “ObamaCare.”
“[It’s] a term, by the way, that I coined and used proudly long before the administration decided it was a good idea,” he told The New York Times.
But the term has long been attributed to Mitt Romney, who is said to have used as early as 2007, and the gaffe prompted Twitter wags to take turns mocking the mayoral candidate.
“Anthony Weiner claims to have coined the term ‘Obamacare’; that his father is the inventor of the Toaster Strudel,” tweeted one, “@The_Sample_Life.”
Another tweeter, Russell Schaffer, a k a “@RussOnPolitics,” noted, “Anthony Weiner’s claim to have invented term ‘Obamacare’ is the new Al Gore ‘I invented the Internet’ legend, huh?” referring to claims reportedly made years ago by the former vice president.
After getting pilloried, Weiner’s camp backtracked.
“He did not mean that he was the first person ever to use the term, only the first on the left to embrace it unapologetically,” said spokeswoman Barbara Morgan.
She added that until Weiner got hold of it, the term was used only as a diss by Republicans.
It didn’t stop the guffaws.
“Well, no one said you get elected mayor on modesty,” Politico reporter Edward-Isaac Dovere tweeted.