Former FBI Director James Comey’s written remarks to the Senate Intelligence Committee arrived on Wednesday afternoon, causing a stir all over Politics Twitter, but the best take on the revelations was that Comey is a very good writer. His account of his meetings with Donald Trump was clear and concise, and people immediately started pulling the juiciest quotes from it. And some juicy quotes that absolutely did not appear in Comey’s writing.
This happens every time a bombshell document or statement comes across Twitter: jokesters, purporting to share some vital quote from the author, actually bamboozle you and post something funny instead.
It can mock the author or the subject of the piece, or it can be completely unrelated.
I tend to believe Comey here. You can't fake the way Trump speaks, it's too specific. pic.twitter.com/tByb8wEjxH
— Justin Halpern (@justin_halpern) June 7, 2017
https://twitter.com/crushingbort/status/872518849362624515
It can be the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise from Star Wars:
More people should be talking about this part of Comey's testimony. Just wow. pic.twitter.com/s0PthoUgpK
— Eric Geller (@ericgeller) June 7, 2017
It can be the ending of James Joyce’s Ulysses:
https://twitter.com/MattZeitlin/status/872528101158289409
Or Shangela’s glorious “sugar daddy” rant from season 3 of RuPaul’s Drag Race:
https://twitter.com/ira/status/872531423776751616
Or a creepy H.P. Lovecraft passage:
These Comey statements keep getting more insane pic.twitter.com/tCHbFvToKa
— Tatered (@tatered) June 7, 2017
or the opening narration from Jerry Seinfeld’s Bee Movie:
https://twitter.com/bakedinapie/status/872519415421652993
Topical jokes, the kind people race to post because they’ll expire before the end of the day, are Twitter’s stock-in-trade. They don’t age well, but they’re actually pretty good.
And hey, if we’re going to live in a world where the former FBI director says the president fired him for refusing to take a loyalty oath, we may as well have some fun with it.