Whitman campaign typo underscores the dangers of tweeting

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What a difference an ‘r’ makes. That’s the lesson to be learned from the retweeting adventures of a Meg Whitman spokeswoman Monday.

Whitman spokeswoman Sarah Pompei meant to pass along an earlier posting from Whitman adviser Mike Murphy, touting Whitman’s endorsement from the San Diego Deputy Sheriff’s association. ‘SD Cnty Sheriff Assoc says @Whitman2010 4 gov! RT: @Murphy4MegNews: CA Cops get it: Jerry Brown is too soft on crime,’ Pompei wrote. She then included a link: http://bit.ly/bNCAV.

The problem is, Murphy’s original link had an ‘r’ on the end of the Web address. And without that letter, the link went somewhere else entirely.

What did Pompei link to? Well, we watched the video, and we’re still not exactly sure, since we don’t speak Japanese. And although we do know our tutus and our bass guitars, we can’t quite articulate what it was that we saw. Intrigued? Well, you’ll just have to click for yourself. Words alone don’t do this video justice.

When asked for comment, Pompei laughed about the bad link, and offered a one-word reply. ‘Oopsie.’

-- Anthony York in Sacramento