‘INSIDE SLOB’: Fridays Are for Coming Up With Fake NY Post Headlines

On Thursday morning, Twitter users quickly noticed that the New York Post's tweets were even more awful than usual.

Initially, the Post was quick to claim that these posts were due to a "hack."

But savvy readers would have likely noticed that the links included in the tweets took you to actual stories on the Post's website, meaning whoever posted the tweets also had access to the outlet's content management system, pointing pretty clearly to an inside job. 

Later in the day, the Post acknowledged the obvious, writing in a statement: "The New York Post's investigation indicates that the unauthorized conduct was committed by an employee, and the employee has been terminated. This morning, we immediately removed the vile and reprehensible content from our website and social media accounts."

We spoke to a Post employee on Thursday, who told us that it was clear to them and other staffers from the outset that "it was likely somebody from the inside who was aggrieved, just from the posts themselves and how they did it." They added, "Clearly, it seemed like somebody who disagreed with the paper's editorial leaning and was trying and failing to parody it, or to make posts that people might think were real."

According to our source, while Post management hasn't officially confirmed the identity of the aggrieved, and now former, staffer, the consensus is that it was "someone who wasn’t a reporter."

While the incident was covered widely, it does not appear that the NY Post itself wrote about it. Hell Gate has generously provided some potential Post headlines for such a story if that changes:

RAGE RAG RANTS

INSIDE SLOB

CMS OR PMS? NY POST'S RAG POSTS ON THE RAG

FREE SPEECH FAIL: POST PATRIOT RUNS AFOUL OF CORPORATE WOKE POLICE

I HAD AN ORGASM DURING LABOR—I DIDN'T WANT IT TO STOP

We rounded up some actual links for you on this Friday:

• A nice reflection on Occupy Sandy and mutual aid. A not-so-nice story on how, ten years later, the City has done little to protect a vital food hub from a future storm. 
• If you too have been wondering why your mailbox isn't stuffed with mailers from Kathy Hochul's campaign, get ready—Dems are belatedly realizing, just days before early voting begins, that they need to actually…campaign. Good luck with that, truly!
• At a city council hearing on Tuesday, Correction Commissioner Louis Molina claimed that fentanyl is being smuggled into Rikers via "fentanyl-soaked children's drawings, love letters, prayer schedules, and T-shirts," using that claim as justification to crack down on the mail that people are allowed to receive. Just a reminder that we absolutely do know one tried and true way that contraband is getting into Rikers.
• More terrible news from NYC's most notorious jail: More than 1,000 people incarcerated at two jails on Rikers Island are without heat and hot water. Via the Daily News: "Just four days after the Correction Department certified to a federal judge that all heating systems at Rikers were fully functioning, a main steam line ruptured, knocking out service to two entire jails and a third facility."
• Who will play the MTA bus driver in this story when its IP is inevitably bought? 
• In a sign that we may live in a functioning society, the city council has to pass legislation to stop Adams administration officials, like his Chief Technology Officer Matt Fraser, from carrying guns into government buildings where guns are banned.
• Workers at a Trader Joe's in Williamsburg voted against unionization.

• RIP to the "Wolf of Airbnb," who has been indicted by federal prosecutors.
• There has been much discussion about safety on the subway but if Geraldo can hack it, then you probably can too.