The power of Twitter to disrupt cannot be overstated.
Earlier this week, an unhappy juror tweeted at least four times about the murder trial of Erickson Dimas-Martinez, forcing the Arkansas Supreme Court to call for a mistrial.
On Thursday the micro-blogging platform was yet again a source of controversy after Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) tweeted something negative about Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) while she was speaking.
“We are debating the Stop Online Piracy Act and Shiela Jackson-Lee (sic) has so bored me that I’m killing time by surfing the Internet,” tweeted King.
The message was retweeted more than 100 times and landed King in the doghouse with Jackson-Lee who stopped the SOPA meeting to address the tweet.
“It’s inappropriate ‘to have a member of the Judiciary committee be so offensive,’” said Jackson-Lee said, according to CNET.
Jackson-Lee also demanded an apology from King regarding the tweet, but by the time she had discovered it, he had already stepped out of the meeting, reported CBS News.
King’s tweet also did not go over well with a handful of tweeters who lashed out against the 62-year-old politician from Storm Lake, Iowa.
“Way to respect to comity of the chamber and the your collegiate duties, asshole,” tweeted Clarence Johnson (@cjohnson319).
“You are an asshole, coming from a fellow Iowan who knows,” tweeted @dreamweaver43.
“[T]hat’s classy,” tweeted Bill Wetzel (@billthebutcher2). “Maybe your dumbass should listen, you might learn something, like how to spell her name right.”
King has not formally respond to the committee or Jackson-Lee regarding the message, but did send this tweet about nine hours later:
“Judging from the many responses of my critics, they’ve never heard of multitasking and need to, in the words of Cain, get a sense of humor.”
Image by Gage Skidmore
