Bret Schundler took time out from the campaign trail Sunday to discuss and poke fun at a blunder discovered on his Web site last week.
Before facing his six GOP primary opponents in a debate, Schundler made a morning appearance on the Fox News Channel's "Fox and Friends" program, where he answered questions about a doctored photo that appeared on his gubernatorial campaign's site.
"It was the wrong thing to do," Schundler said.
The photo, which was used to market Schundler campaign gear such as hats and T-shirts, showed the candidate in front of a cheering crowd. But the crowd shot, it turned out, was taken last year at a rally for Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean.
The photo was digitally altered to show Schundler in the foreground, where Dean had stood in the original. Dean signs were modified to become Schundler signs.
The campaign removed the photo from the site as soon as officials became aware of it. Big Fish, a Washington, D.C., marketing firm that was hired to run the Schundler Web site, had also worked for Dean.
The company's creative director apologized for the mishap and said the campaign had no knowledge that the photo was from a Democratic rally.
On the Fox show, Schundler said Big Fish should have used one of his own crowd shots.
The former Jersey City mayor also showed that he has a sense of humor.
Schundler told the interviewers that his campaign was able to stop other doctored photos from going up.
"It was an embarrassment, but it ended up having a very positive result," Schundler said of the mistake.
With that, images of Schundler superimposed on various historic photos flashed on the screen.
One included Schundler holding up a newspaper with the famous headline, "Dewey defeats Truman." Another showed Schundler superimposed on a painting of George Washington crossing the Delaware River. A third showed Schundler's head on the body of Muhammad Ali after knocking out Sonny Liston.
"That's supposed to be Jon Corzine," Schundler joked.
