Maddow: O’Keefe HID Important Facts About ACORN!!!! (Patterico Responds: Except That He Didn’t)
Apparently Rachel Maddow has jumped on the pimp hoax bandwagon. Here is the beginning of Raw Story’s wildly misleading summary of Maddow’s wildly pointless diatribe:
When conservative activists James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles released tapes last fall purporting to show ACORN employees advising them on how to set up a child prostitution ring, it resulted in widespread praise for their intrepid journalism and a Congressional defunding of the anti-poverty group. But it is now becoming clear to all but their most fervent supporters that the O’Keefe “expose” was deliberately misleading.
“If you were a member of Congress and you voted to defund ACORN because of the outrage portrayed in these tapes,” MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow proclaimed on Tuesday, “you were had.”
Last week, California Attorney Gerneral Jerry Brown released some of O’Keefe’s raw footage, which he obtained as part of an agreement not to prosecute O’Keefe for violating state privacy laws. Maddow reviewed several of the most severe distortions revealed by the footage, starting with O’Keefe’s claim that he was wearing his outrageous pimp outfit when he visited the ACORN offices.
I am unaware of any such claim. I know O’Keefe has been faulted, with some justice, for failing to contradict a Fox News yakker who made that claim in his presence. I’m inclined to go easy on him for that, because I think it’s easy to criticize people for on-the-fly decisions (especially decisions not to act) made while facing a nationwide audience on TV. In any event, a failure to contradict is not a “claim.”
Now, some yahoos like Maddow have tried to argue that O’Keefe tried to hide the fact that he was wearing normal clothes in ACORN offices. Here is a screenshot from the very seconds of the very first video O’Keefe ever released:
The accompanying voiceover:
Scenario: a young woman pretending to be a prostitute and a man pretending to run for Congress one day walk into ACORN’s Baltimore Headquarters . . .
Remember, the Rachel Maddows of the world maintain that O’Keefe hid the fact that was actually wearing normal clothing, and pretended to be someone running for Congress. Click the link, watch the first 20 seconds of the ACORN video, and marvel at the fact that Rachel Maddow claims O’Keefe was trying to hide these facts. He hid his normal mode of dress and his character’s future Congressional campaign about as well as Maddow hides her leftism.
About as well as Jackie Mason hides his Jewish heritage.
About as well as [give us your comparison below in the comments].
As for the other Big Revelations from Maddow and company, I have but one question: what is revealed on the unedited videos released by Jerry Brown that we didn’t know from the unedited audio that has been available since Day One?
If you need me, I’ll be over here . . . listening to the crickets chirping.
Maddow claimed O’Keefe and Fox did not reveal that the ACORN employee in San Diego IMMEDIATELY!!!! called the police after O’Keefe and Giles left his office. Well shoot, how the heck would they be in a position to know that Rachel? Two, AG Brown’s report said contact with the police was finally made nine days after the office visit.
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/7/2010 @ 9:15 pmIf that ACORN San Diego employee was just trying to do the right thing and glean enough information about James and Hannah to turn them over to the police to bust an illegal alien child prostitution business, why did ACORN fire him? Does not compute.
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/7/2010 @ 9:22 pm“When filmmaker and provocateur James O’Keefe came to my office to show me the video of him and his friend, Hannah Giles, going to the Baltimore offices of ACORN – the nation’s foremost “community organizers” – dressed as a pimp and a prostitute and asking for – and getting – help for various illegal activities, he sought my advice. ”
-O’Keefe’s pimp Andrew Breitbart
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/sep/21/breitbart-the-politicized-art-behind-the-acorn-pla/
locke (35e724) — 4/7/2010 @ 9:23 pmLet the deluge of leftists begin …
JD (5a42d0) — 4/7/2010 @ 9:37 pmlocke,
So O’Keefe is liable for Breitbart writing “dressed” instead of “posing” (a rather menaingless distinction in this context, as Pat has shown many times over)? Maybe you’re liable for whatever Breitbart writes, too. Makes about as much sense.
Karl (e1a6ae) — 4/7/2010 @ 9:48 pmKarl – You put more thought into typing your name than locke did in copying and pasting that from some leftist cesspool.
JD (5a42d0) — 4/7/2010 @ 9:52 pmMadcow does a poor job of hiding her insanity.
Scrapiron (996c34) — 4/7/2010 @ 10:14 pmO’Keefe is Breitbart’s monkey, Karl.
He has no meaning outside of what the blowhard says he means (or does).
locke (35e724) — 4/7/2010 @ 10:14 pmlocke, why is it that you feel a need to make an ass of yourself by coming here and repeating false talking points that were rebutted here months ago?
SPQR (26be8b) — 4/7/2010 @ 10:19 pmUm, maybe because they weren’t, SPORK?
locke (35e724) — 4/7/2010 @ 10:21 pmlocke – Were you duped as well or just stupid? If the O’Keefe couture was so critical to the story, why didn’t ACORN expose that right away? Why did they wait for Boehlert to begin rewriting history five months later?
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/7/2010 @ 10:23 pmThat Fox in the morning show is the most popular program on TV. O’Keefe’s appearance on that drove the entire story. LULZ!
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/7/2010 @ 10:27 pmFor a guy who constantly expresses outrage at various new outlets burying facts or distorting complex stories, you are very defensive about O’Keefe’s misleading pimp getup that he put in his own video.
I read through the California AG’s analysis and the inescapable conclusion is that while O’Keefe exposed very shady behavior in a number of ACORN offices, he did his best to make ACORN look even worse through misleading editing and omissions. Did he do the public a service in focusing critical attention on ACORN? I’d say yes, given the many other problems identified in just one state; no one should cry for ACORN. Is O’Keefe a journalistic hero? Not in the slightest. He’s a dishonest lawbreaker who exposed an organization of opposite ideological bent but staffed with similarly low characters.
That does not mean, btw, that ACORN’s defenders are any better that you. That whole dispute about O”Keefe identifying himself as a pimp or not was nicely settled in the AG’s report: while O’Keefe never said “I am a pimp” he represented that he wanted to run a brothel (which actually makes him more of a madam). Thus there is no question that O’Keefe put himself out as someone who wanted to profit from prostitution, and people who hang their defense of ACORN on his failure to call himself a mack daddy are doubling down on O’Keefe’s mendacity in dressing up like a pimp.
One might contend that it takes an O’Keefe to expose an ACORN. But that’s not a position you can credibly hold given your fulminations on matters such as disclosures of interest.
Cyrus Sanai (311cd8) — 4/7/2010 @ 10:28 pmDaley,
Does it make you right wing extremists sad that all you’ve got left now is defending punk ass freaks like O’Keefe and you’re even failing miserably at that insignificant task?
locke (35e724) — 4/7/2010 @ 10:32 pmlocke – I guess I am as extremist as the Census Bureau, the IRS and both Houses of Congress when it comes to Congress when it comes to ACORN. Folks like you who defend an organization the employees of which advised walk-ins on how to commit tax and mortgage fraud and run a child prostitution business are those I would call real extremists. I can’t get enough of liberals taking that moral high ground.
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/7/2010 @ 11:11 pm“I read through the California AG’s analysis and the inescapable conclusion is that while O’Keefe exposed very shady behavior in a number of ACORN offices, he did his best to make ACORN look even worse through misleading editing and omissions.”
Cyrus – To reach that conclusion you would have to demonstrate that O’Keefe edited out information which would otherwise made the videos not misleading. Neither you, nor Maddow, noe Brown have provided that evidence.
Thanks for playing and bloviating once again.
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/7/2010 @ 11:14 pmHey, you guys did the Democrats a favor by getting ACORN to rename itself and clean up its act a little.
And in the process wingnut savior Breitbart got exposed as a liar and a fraud.
Quite a victory for you neutered Republicans.
locke (35e724) — 4/7/2010 @ 11:17 pm“One might contend that it takes an O’Keefe to expose an ACORN. But that’s not a position you can credibly hold given your fulminations on matters such as disclosures of interest.”
Cyrus – If anyone had raised this point it might be worth discussing. Erecting and knocking down your own strawmen is not a particularly useful intellectual exercise in my opinion.
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/7/2010 @ 11:18 pm“Quite a victory for you neutered Republicans.”
Good one, locke.
That’s why the Dems are feeling so threatened they’re breaking out the old reliable race card everywhere, right? Can’t you even get your talking points straight?
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/7/2010 @ 11:28 pmABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC and the most politically motivated propaganda glory hole CNN, have no interest in honest thought or debate.
Every time you click on their websites or view them on your television set you give them revenue.
Revenue is money and money is speech.
Delete them from your television set. Check the instructions for your set.
The only honest forum, we the people have, is the internet. The seeds of change are here. Provide no economic support to those who activily seek to destroy this nation.
Freedom– the only change that matters.
highpockets (c5de3a) — 4/7/2010 @ 11:28 pmFor a guy who constantly expresses outrage at various new outlets burying facts or distorting complex stories, you are very defensive about O’Keefe’s misleading pimp getup that he put in his own video.
Didja read the post, Cyrus?
There’s this screenshot I took special care to put up. In your lawyerly way you didn’t address it.
We noticed.
Patterico (c218bd) — 4/7/2010 @ 11:57 pmWho is Rachel Maddow, and why would I be concerned of the views of someone who is watched by fewer people than who comment here?
AD - RtR/OS! (a87d65) — 4/8/2010 @ 12:48 am#13- The party that gifted America with the crines of Watergate still operates by two basic rules: Rule 1 – the ends justify the means. Rule 2- when applying rule 1, don’t get caught.
DCSCA (9d1bb3) — 4/8/2010 @ 3:46 amBFD.
Lazarus Long (a4f63e) — 4/8/2010 @ 4:30 am““When filmmaker and provocateur James O’Keefe came to my office to show me the video of him and his friend, Hannah Giles, going to the Baltimore offices of ACORN – the nation’s foremost “community organizers” – dressed as a pimp and a prostitute and asking for – and getting – help for various illegal activities, he sought my advice. ”
-O’Keefe’s pimp Andrew Breitbart
Comment by locke — 4/7/2010 @ 9:23 pm”
BFD
Lazarus Long (a4f63e) — 4/8/2010 @ 4:32 am“And in the process wingnut savior Breitbart got exposed as a liar and a fraud.”
Where? Where?
Lazarus Long (a4f63e) — 4/8/2010 @ 4:33 am“The party that gifted America with the crines of Watergate…”
“On October 10, 1963, U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy committed what is widely viewed as one of the most ignominious acts in modern American history: he authorized the Federal Bureau of Investigation to begin wiretapping the telephones of the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr….”
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/07/the-fbi-and-martin-luther-king/2537/
Dropping a wiretap on a bunch of traitors (like Danny Ellsberg, and the Dems who were helping him) is one thing. Dropping a wiretap on a harmless civil rights activist…well, that’s something Dems do.
Needless to say, in an America where EVERYONE has been thouroughly brainwashed by the liberal controlled government, schools and media…Nixon is a villain, and the Kennedys are great heroes.
It’s pretty funny, actually.
Same general thing with O’Keefe. The guilty walk…O’Keefe is in trouble. Not because he actually did anything wrong…but just because the liberals run this country (and have since the 1930s…unfortunately for America).
Dave Surls (95735b) — 4/8/2010 @ 4:52 amRachel Maddow’s also the one who scolded John Boehner for saying there was a Preamble to the Constitution.
Facts don’t matter.
Hawkins (1fc204) — 4/8/2010 @ 6:13 amAny Comment by locke
Seems like he tries to send the discussion off on tangents. Or maybe that’s the way his mind works.
Any Comment by DCSCA
Seems like he tries to send the discussion off on tangents. Or maybe that’s the way his mind works.
Gerald A (138c50) — 4/8/2010 @ 6:15 amI posted this to my blog and the Brad blog.
Paul L. (ca50ee) — 4/8/2010 @ 7:01 amIn the report it looks like Rachel Maddow did some dishonest “editing” at 6:56 in her report to distort the CA AG report to make it look like Vera reported the “human smuggling” to the police immediately instead of 9 Days later.
Yeah, except that both “Locke” and Dggcrpp are one and the same person, demonstrated by the following wording:
Um, maybe because they weren’t, SPORK?
Only Von Braun uses that nicety. Nice try, Dggcrpp.
Dmac (21311c) — 4/8/2010 @ 7:05 amI had hoped to see a number of “About as well as…” comments, instead some misanthrope liberals hijack the thread (and do a rather poor job.)
In that vein (and they are lame, but I got bogged down in the “poetic conception of truth” (see locke, et al.) above:
About as well as Cheney avoids shooting his hunting buddies (that’s the cheap shot for you liberals)
About as well as Obama hides his contempt for America .
About as well as Lui fills out disclosure forms.
About as well as Souter protects property rights.
Dudeman (b50a96) — 4/8/2010 @ 7:35 amGoing back to 1972 to slam the GOP as the quintessential example of “ends justify the means” activity is hilarious, seeing that ObamaCare has been law for less than two weeks.
L.N. Smithee (32b147) — 4/8/2010 @ 7:39 amlocke, we’ve seen your talking points repeated over and over again, and shown to be false over and over again. The exact same line about O’Keefe, shown to be a lie by the simple exercise of looking at the videos themselves.
DCSCA, your incoherent interjections only show your wilful blindness. “the ends justify the means” ? Pelosi and Reid just nauseated the entire nation demonstrated that lack of ethics and you whine about the GOP? Clown.
SPQR (26be8b) — 4/8/2010 @ 7:49 amYou can tell from the sudden reappearance of trolls that O’Keefe has really hurt the lefties where they live.
Mike K (2cf494) — 4/8/2010 @ 8:08 amAbout as well as the Pope denying his Catholicism or members of the Ursidae family refusing to defecate in a wooded area.
About as well as IMDEEDOUBLEDOO and Myroon can posit a winning argument.
GeneralMalaise (139767) — 4/8/2010 @ 8:29 amAbout as well as Democrats protect and defend the Constitution.
ropelight (d5d30d) — 4/8/2010 @ 8:57 amAbout as well as Democrats defend the rights of TEA Party protesters.
About as well as Trolls add to informed debate.
About as well as Democrats support our troops.
About as well as Democrats listen to their constituents.
About as well as Black Democrats in Congress suddenly develop amnesia when Senator Byrd starts talking.
About as well as Democrats reduce taxes.
About as well as the LA Times demonstrates objective news reporting.
About as well as Barack Obama keeps his promises.
About as well as Pro-Life Democrats protect the unborn.
About as well as Democrats count votes from troops deployed overseas.
About as well as Islam is a religion of peace.
Zoltan (aa0da2) — 4/8/2010 @ 10:20 amAbout as well as MSNBC traffics is the truth.
JD (d55760) — 4/8/2010 @ 10:28 am[…] Offices? Mayrant&Rave: Breitbart’s O’Keefe Arrested Patterico’s Pontifications: Maddow: O’Keefe HID Important Facts About ACORN!!!! (Patterico Responds: Except That He Didn’t) and Retracto, Call Your Office! and Should James O’Keefe Be Prosecuted? Should Ellie Light? and […]
Chuckle: Left-Wing Zealot Hack David Shuster in Boiling Hot Water with MSNBC for Shooting CNN Pilot Without Notifying His Bosses (video) « Frugal Café Blog Zone (a66042) — 4/8/2010 @ 11:01 am[…] at Big Government: ACORN’s Maryland Chapter Shuttered. Patterico’s Pontifications: Maddow: O’Keefe HID Important Facts About ACORN!!!! (Patterico Responds: Except That He Didn’t) and Brad Friedman Combines a Brand-New Lie with Some Old Familiar Lies HillBuzz: Another head of […]
No Worries Now in Maryland for James O’Keefe, Hannah Giles: ACORN’s Lawsuit Dismissed by Baltimore Court, Plus ACORN Kicked Out of Ohio for Voter Registration Fraud « Frugal Café Blog Zone (a66042) — 4/8/2010 @ 11:04 am[…] at Big Government: ACORN’s Maryland Chapter Shuttered. Patterico’s Pontifications: Maddow: O’Keefe HID Important Facts About ACORN!!!! (Patterico Responds: Except That He Didn’t) and Brad Friedman Combines a Brand-New Lie with Some Old Familiar Lies HillBuzz: Another head of […]
No Worries Now in Maryland for James O’Keefe, Hannah Giles: ACORN’s Lawsuit Dismissed by Baltimore Court, Plus ACORN Kicked Out of Ohio for Voter Registration Fraud « Frugal Café Blog Zone (a66042) — 4/8/2010 @ 11:05 am[…] at Big Government: ACORN’s Maryland Chapter Shuttered. Patterico’s Pontifications: Maddow: O’Keefe HID Important Facts About ACORN!!!! (Patterico Responds: Except That He Didn’t) and Brad Friedman Combines a Brand-New Lie with Some Old Familiar Lies HillBuzz: Another head of […]
No Worries Now in Maryland for James O’Keefe, Hannah Giles: ACORN’s Lawsuit Dismissed by Baltimore Court, Plus ACORN Kicked Out of Ohio for Voter Registration Fraud « Frugal Café Blog Zone (a66042) — 4/8/2010 @ 11:05 amHas Breitbart been indicted yet?
JD (18e145) — 4/8/2010 @ 1:25 pm[…] up on the same day with this post from New Media conservative blogger […]
Follow Up on ACORN « Politics and the New Media (078229) — 4/8/2010 @ 1:41 pmNo, JD, and you notice that EricPWJohnson is hiding in another thread.
SPQR (9ec863) — 4/8/2010 @ 2:09 pmSomeone lost a bet.
JD (18e145) — 4/8/2010 @ 3:34 pmAbout as well as Brad Friedman hides his dishonesty.
daleyrocks (718861) — 4/8/2010 @ 5:31 pm[…] — but don’t think for a minute it’s not reforming elsewhere Patterico’s Pontifications: Maddow: O’Keefe HID Important Facts About ACORN!!!! (Patterico Responds: Except That He Didn’t) and ACORN on the Verge of […]
Democrat Voter Fraud? Sen. Al Franken in Minnesota May Have Benefited from Voter Fraud, Findings Show Convicted Felons Voted in Election « Frugal Café Blog Zone (a66042) — 7/12/2010 @ 2:10 pm