How do we get from this standard (“It’s even more likely that they were humoring him…”) to “We know, for sure, that he fabricated his claims?”
Indeed, it seems to me that if we adopt the theory that the employees were humoring him, then both sides can be telling the truth: the tone-deaf O’Keefe says, “Look at this video – they said they’d help me manage the earnings of underage hookers!” and the ACORN folks say, “Yes, we said that, but we were obviously humoring him, since his story was patently ridiculous.”
I hate to keep returning to Michael Moore, but it seems to me that, in general, it’s fair to say the left wing in this country does not regard him as a dishonest hack. Since his tactics are similar to O’Keefe’s, I conclude that the standard for reaching “dishonest hack” includes evaluating the targets you have in your exposé work. If they are worthy organizations, like ACORN, you move closer to hackdom; if they are socially irresponsible, like the NRA, then you can’t be a dishonest hack, no matter your tactics.
And O’Keefe was not convicted of tampering with anyone’s phone system. He was convicted of entering a federal building under false pretenses. Here is the US Attorney’s statement (PDF) that says:
He wanted to get Landrieu’s staff on video saying there had never been any problems with the phones, and then contrast that with her claims that she didn’t get calls from angry constituents during the healthcare bill debate because, as she claimed then, there was a problem with the phone system.
Once someone figured out that there was a scam afoot, they notified others. That’s the “jig is up” moment – not days or weeks into the future, but more immediate.
Again, *this *thread is about O’Keefe. If you’d like, I can start a “Michael Moore is a dishonest hack” thread elsewhere for you, but this thread is about O’Keefe.
Michael Moore’s dishonest hackery doesn’t mean that O’Keefe’s dishonest hackery is suddenly okay, or that Liberals are hypocrites for not bashing Moore for his dishonest hackery. I mean, if we’re going to discuss hypocrisy, where’s *your *thread condemning O’Keefe for his actions? Why are we held to a higher standard than you are?
Personally, I’m not a fan of Moore. I’ve only seen one of his movies, Bowling for Columbine, and the only thing I really remember from it is that Canadians don’t lock their doors. Oh, and Moore totally ambushed Heston, and I thought that was a jerky thing to do.
So, anyway, now that we’ve gotten the “Liberal Hypocrisy” segment of the thread out of the way, would you care to discuss the matter at hand? Why are you willing to believe O’Keefe’s actions were appropriate, or that any of his findings can even be remotely true, given the fact that there was no papertrail of any sort, his tapes were misleadingly edited, and he went in with an obvious agenda (that of making Liberals look bad)?
I went ahead and made you a “Michael Moore is a Dishonest Hack” thread, Bricker, so if you feel like we’re being hypocrites, feel free to refer or respond to that thread.
I did, and as I said in it: I’m willing to bet you won’t get anywhere near the number of posts and the level of vitriol in that thread against Moore than we have against O’Keefe in this thread. You’ll get defenses of Moore too, from people that wouldn’t think of defending O’Keefe.
But you’ll notice that I’ve never said, of Moore, that I think his every conclusion is wrong, or that he’s incapable of telling the truth, or that his every claim should be assumed false.
Let me phrase this plainly: there are two questions I’d like answered.
(1) What standard should we hold a “hidden camera investigative reporter” to?
(2) Does the standard change based on the ideology of the reporter and/or the targets he chooses?
And I never said that about O’Keefe. I’m not sure anyone in this thread has. No, what I said was that, given O’Keefe’s track record, his agenda, and his apparent willingness to bend the law and the truth in service to that agenda, anything he says about Democrat impropriety should be given a *very *skeptical eye. He’s batting 0-3 at this point, and I suspect the only reason he’s viewed by Conservatives as anything other than a lying shitstain is that he targets Liberals.
To present the truth, even if it doesn’t support your agenda, is a good start. Maybe not breaking the law in pursuit of that agenda would be a good idea, as well.
No, not at all. Or, at least, it shouldn’t. However, we’re human. We pick sides. We ignore the bad stuff our guys do, and can’t help but notice the bad stuff the other side does. That said, eventually it’s time to realize that if your guy bends the rules often enough, then maybe he shouldn’t be your guy.
Well, hell. We agree. I certainly think anything he says deserves a very skeptical eye, and I said so here:
But you don’t see a difference between “We know that he misrepresented the scenarios on the tapes,” and “Because his credibility is shot, I don’t believe the scenarios he presented on the tapes?”
Agreed.
Agreed, also.
I don’t admire O’Keefe. I think he’s a smug punk more interested in creating a narrative to match his agenda than in telling a truthful story, but I also think that his videos at ACORN revealed that there was advice given by ACORN employees that was clearly inappropriate and unprofessional – but not illegal. They show that ACORN had no solid training, no solid procedures, and and spotty on-site supervision.
Against those reasonable conclusions from O’Keefe’s videos, we have a solid SDMB-chant of “ACORN did absolutely nothing wrong!” and “O’Keefe made it all up!”
So they “notified others”. Why did they do this? You have still not provided ANY evidence that any ACORN office tried to help him. It sounds more like they were warning others about this jerk who was asking stupid questions trying to embarass them with his idiocy.
Again, no ACORN office provided O’Keefe with any assistance. There was no “jig is up”.
You’re the one who cited the California report as evidence that he posed as a pimp. In fact, it says just the opposite. If you want to allege that he posed as a pimp in other states, then let’s see the evidence.
But what, in your mind, did ACORN do which was so wrong? Nobody was hurt as a result of the actions, and in many of the instances, ACORN apparently didn’t take him seriously and/or reported him. He didn’t receive the assistance that he wanted, and ended up having to misrepresent what actually happened in order to get the outcome he intended.
And was it sufficiently wrong that ACORN’s funding should’ve been cut, resulting in the organization going out of business?
O’Keefe gave the Right exactly what they needed to drive ACORN out of business- moral outrage. Only it turned out that the moral outrage was misplaced and inappropriate. And now he’s going after yet another Liberal target, in another attempt to drum up more moral outrage. At what point do you say, “Hey, maybe this guy’s going too far?”
The ACORN worker in the Baltimore office had an extended conversation with the pair concerning whether or not prostitution could qualify as a “performing artist” as a principle business for Schedule C purposes. Why is that not “assistance?” She also says, in reaction to the news that there will be 15-year-olds from El Salvador working, that “…if they don’t have Social Security numbers then you don’t have to worry about them because they can’t file taxes anyway.” Why is that not assistance?
Nobody was hurt. But that’s not the point. If an undercover officer sells fake heroin to someone and then arrests him, surely you can see that the accused cannot argue that no one got hurt and that the heroin was fake. The point of the undercover officer’s actions is to show the willingness to commit a crime, the attempt to commit a crime.
Here, the videos show the willingness to assist a person who is clearly talking about crimes. It’s true that no one got hurt, and no acts of prostitution happened, and no fifteen-year-old girls from Central America were harmed. So ACORN’s actions weren’t illegal. But they WERE inappropriate and unprofessional.
"The videographers initially spoke with a part-time ACORN employee. This employee had been a member of Baltimore ACORN for 10 years and, at the time, worked in the Baltimore office as a receptionist and greeter. The videographers represented that they needed help and had been turned down elsewhere, and that Ms. Giles was a dancer and Mr. O’Keefe was a college student trying to help her. Although Mr. O’Keefe appeared in all videos dressed as a pimp, in fact, when he appeared at each and every office, he was dressed like a college student – in slacks and a button down shirt. Ms. Giles, however, was dressed as she appears in the videos.
The ACORN employee reportedly was concerned for Ms. Giles’ safety because she knows people in her community with similar issues. She enlisted the assistance of another parttime employee who works in ACORN’s free tax clinic. The tax employee noted that she considered Ms. Giles to be her client, not Mr. O’Keefe, since Ms. Giles was the individual needing help. Ms. Giles represented that she is an exotic dancer. Mr. O’Keefe said she was a prostitute. The tax employee relied only upon the statements made by Ms. Giles. In addition, the tax employee noted that she did not intend to, nor did she, file any tax returns on Ms. Giles behalf.
The office’s supervisor reported that that no supervisor was present at the time of the visit. He said no one reported the incident to him and that he first heard about it when the media called to alert him that a video would be aired shortly. Both employees involved were immediately terminated and are quite contrite and apologetic."
So “talking about something”= “willingness to do that thing”?
Because that’s all that happened. ACORN talked to the guy. There was no paperwork filed, and there’s a hell of a lot of indication that they were just shining him on. If ACORN is culpable for talking to the guy about prostitution, then O’Keefe should also be held responsible for talking about it.