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Edward Klein deserves some credit. Not in any journalistic or academic sense, but the former New York Times Magazine editor-in-chief and longtime tabloid artist was certainly on the “fake news” trend well before President Trump turned media lies into an en vogue catchphrase.
In a 2005 biography of Hillary Clinton titled "The Truth About Hillary," Klein was roundly mocked and disregarded after a slew of news sources called out a number of blatant fabrications and seemingly made up anonymous sources.
The book was so bad that a review in the New York Post included the sentence, "Thirty pages into it, I wanted to take a shower. Sixty pages into it, I wanted to be decontaminated. And 200 pages into it, I wanted someone to drive stakes through my eyes so I wouldn't have to suffer through another word."
Now, with journalistic accountability all but out the window and social media carrying half-truths to the front of America’s newsfeed every hour, Klein is back to wallow in the mud, defending the Donald with his new book “All Out War: The Plot to Destroy Trump,” in which the tabloid-minded gossip hound gives some less than convincing claims as to what Barack Obama has been up to since leaving the White House.
“Barack Obama has adamantly refused to heed the pleas of his party to lead the “resistance” against Donald Trump and instead spends much of his time at his home just blocks from the White House playing video games, chatting on the phone with celebrity pals, smoking marijuana and popping cannabis-infused gummy bears,” Klein wrote in a self-aggrandizing article for conservative news site World Net Daily.
In the book, Klein says that an unnamed family friend let him in on Obama’s smoking secret, claiming that the 44th president put down the pot while in office, but has picked up the heady habit in the months since his retirement.
“He gets the weed from friends who visit him,” Klein quotes from his own anonymous source. “I was told he keeps a small stash in his bedroom. [The former president and first lady have separate bedrooms in their Kalorama mansion.] He has rolling papers and hasn’t forgotten how to roll a joint. Sometimes he’ll smoke in his bedroom, and sometimes in the backyard. But mostly he does it when he’s traveling.”
Similar to Klein’s stories about Clinton, the author gives no further proof for his allegations, instead hoping that readers will believe the unnamed tattle tale he says is lurking in Obama’s inner circle.
“At one point, he became so concerned about people smelling pot around Kalorama that he asked friends to get him some edible stuff,” Klein claims. “They got him brownies, cookies, and gummy bears infused with THC.”
Piggybacking off the fake news that’s been steadily circulating about Malia Obama’s supposed obsession with marijuana since she was photographed taking a toke at a music festival in 2016, Klein’s attempt to sully the Obama name appears to be just another tactic to try and sell books, and not an indication that Obama’s Edibles will be hitting California dispensary shelves anytime soon.
Still, Barry, if you are getting lit, drop us a line — we’ve got some fire you’ve gotta try and we’d be more than happy to share.
