Dem
47
GOP
53
A statement and a photograph have been issued in the name of Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and his wife Elaine Chao; both purport to prove that the Senator is still alive and functional. We wrote about the statement yesterday; here's the photo:
Note that the newspaper in the photo is the sports page from the Sunday Washington Post; presumably its appearance in the image is not an accident. The photo was posted to eX-Twitter, with an explanation that the Senator suffered a fall, and then developed pneumonia.
Needless to say, many people on the Internet immediately called shenanigans. Here's a non-exhaustive list of some of the conspiratorial questions being raised:
Naturally, the folks who aren't buying it believe the photo is AI-generated. And among the folks casting doubt on the veracity of the image are McConnell's colleague, Ron Johnson, and TMZ, which undoubtedly knows a thing or two about separating real photos from fakes.
For our part, we have no idea what the truth is. The conspiratorial version of events doesn't pass the smell test. But the McConnell version of events doesn't really pass the smell test, either. And yet, one side has to be basically correct, right? Either he's alive and functional or he's not.
At this point, the story interests us for two main reasons. The first is that as long as McConnell is holding the seat, but is unable to be in Washington, the harder things are for John Thune and other Republicans on the Hill. The Senate Appropriations Committee will be deadlocked without McConnell's vote, and anything that gets to the floor of the Senate will have a smaller margin of error if he's not there.
Meanwhile, there has been much talk in the last year or so about the harm that motivated political operators will be able to do with AI-generated content. We have wondered if that might be a short-term phenomenon, and that the real impact might be to call everything into doubt, even stuff that might be real. For example, that "James Talarico is trans" video from a month ago—are there really that many people left who can believe it's real, and who have NO IDEA that it could be fake? Probably not. Meanwhile, whether the McConnell photo is real or not, lots of people are saying "AI!" Maybe that tool won't be so efficacious for political operatives, after all. (Z)