How quickly things seem to fall apart when James O’Keefe is the person who put them together.
O’Keefe’s incriminating ACORN video was shown to have been heavily edited—neither he nor Hannah Giles were actually in pimp and prostitute get-up when they spoke to ACORN employees, for example—and no criminal prosecutions of ACORN followed. While not letting ACORN off the hook for showing “terrible judgment” in the video, California’s then-attorney general Jerry Brown noted after an investigation into the tapes and the organization that “sometimes a fuller truth is found on the cutting room floor.”
Those same words now seem applicable to the latest O’Keefe sting, which further tarnished NPR’s reputation and took down its CEO. As we noted last week, Glenn Beck’s conservative website, The Blaze, was first to report on discrepancies between the first edited eleven-and-a-half minute video released on the Project Veritas website and a later, unedited two-hour version.
Ron Schiller, one of the fundraisers who lunched with two people from Veritas’s fictional Muslim Education Action Center (MEAC), is hardly saved by The Blaze’s reporting. He still said what he said and he still comes across as a right fool in some ways. But crucial context was left on that cutting room floor (or at least in some Final Cut folders).
In the report, as noted last week, The Blaze addresses “whether the donors-in-disguise had made their fake Muslim Brotherhood connections clear to Schiller and Liley, contextualizes Schiller’s ‘attacks’ on Republicans (he actually ‘expresses pride in his Republican heritage’), and shows that Schiller was echoing the opinion of two top Republicans he had spoken to when describing the Tea Party as ‘racist people.’” Here’s an excerpt:
NPR exec Ron Schiller does describe Tea Party members as “xenophobic…seriously racist people.”
This is one of the reasons why he no longer has a job!
But the clip in the edited video implies Schiller is giving simply his own analysis of the Tea Party. He does do that in part, but the raw video reveals that he is largely recounting the views expressed to him by two top Republicans, one a former ambassador, who admitted to him that they voted for Obama.
At the end, he signals his agreement. The larger context does not excuse his comments, or his judgment in sharing the account, but would a full context edit have been more fair?
There is a video accompaniment on The Blaze’s site.
Yesterday, NPR media reporter David Folkenflik addressed the dubious editing on Morning Edition and in a written report for NPR’s website. Folkenflik reviewed the two tapes himself, along with some NPR colleagues and outsiders like The Blaze’s editor-in-chief Scott Baker and Poynter’s Al Tompkins. They home in on many of the same problems The Blaze pointed out. And they basically come to the same conclusion: the tape is still a problem, but the impression it leaves is different.
Tompkins, initially outraged by the first video, had a change of heart after examining the second, longer version.
“I tell my children there are two ways to lie,” Tompkins said. “One is to tell me something that didn’t happen, and the other is not to tell me something that did happen. I think they employed both techniques in this.”
Sacramento, Calif.-based digital forensic consultant Mark Menz also reviewed both tapes at my request. He has done extensive video analyses for federal agencies and corporations.
“From my personal opinion, the short one is definitely edited in a form and fashion to lead you to a certain conclusion—you might say it’s looking only at the dirty laundry,” Menz said. He drew a distinction between that and a compressed news story.
Folkenflik’s report is worth a full read and listen, and his early reporting on the subject was equally measured and unflinching.
What does O’Keefe say? On CNN’s Reliable Sources, O’Keefe defended himself by claiming he’s in the company of your Sinclairs and your Blys. “Journalists have been doing this for a long time,” he argued. “It’s a form of investigative reporting that you use to seek and find the truth.”
In this case: Seek. Find. And then mold.
Read the comments at The Blaze, which is most a conservative paper. The vast majority say "don't defend NPR, I don't care about the truth I just want to take them down." I think that is why so much of the media accepts this type of reporting.
#1 Posted by Thalia, CJR on Tue 15 Mar 2011 at 04:15 PM
You guys are serious?
O'Keefe's mission in life is take down liberal institutions, and it takes Glenn Beck to figure that O'Keefe is editing his work to accomplish that mission?
CJR does precisely the same thing here - for example criticism of perceived leftist bias as NPR becomes a "right wing attack" upon the institution. A violent metaphor misused to describe nonviolent criticism. This kind of mischaracterization is business at usual here and in the leftist MSM outlets.
The video in question is what it is... and the unedited video doesn't help NPR's cause. The "context" argument falls flat in the face of plain video imagery and audio of a guy sticking his liberal foot in his mouth.
Just in case you guys are still asleep at the switch the next time O'Keefe gets to work... I'll clue you in on his M.O.
He sets traps and springs them smartly in escalating releases of edited video - timing the releases for maximum effect. If any of his subjects tries to wriggle out of the first (and least lethal) trap, there is another more lethal trap waiting. O'Keefe's good at what he does, and he's getting better at it all the time. If you take him down, there are fifty guys in the wings that will take his place.
If you're biggest complaint is that he doesn't play nice, or that he doesn't follow your selective ethical rules, you had better get therapy and get over it. That's just how he rolls. Deal with it.
Your real problem, however, is that this kind of undercover hit job won't work on the right - there is not generally the same hypocrisy on the right that exists on the left - and these videos are intended to root out hypocrisy and double-dealing about all else. This type of undercover work will destroy the left, but it won't really harm the right, and this realization drives you nice.
#2 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Tue 15 Mar 2011 at 05:01 PM
Why would anyone calling themselves journalists accept an edited video from someone with a history of releasing deceptively edited videos? It's just mind-boggling.
The new political correctness forbids anyone from having an opinion of the Tea Party which conflicts with the right wings storyline. Not only that, it's also politically incorrect to mention someone else has such views of the Tea Party, appears to be all that Ron Schiller did.
#3 Posted by Bob Gardner, CJR on Tue 15 Mar 2011 at 08:03 PM
Actually, our biggest complaint is that he lies, regularly, and that many people take him seriously in spite of that.
In the many many CJR posts that have been made about O'Keefe, the major complaints that I raised is that he lied about planned parenthood (that was his first "sting"), he lied about ACORN, his patron then lied about Shirley Sherrod, and he lied about NPR.
In fact, Joel's latest series on O'Keefe is the first on CJR to bring up these misrepresentations of the past. (Previous cjr "retracto alpaca" coverage was embarrassing)
Kudos to him on that count.
Media Matters has also been on this story:
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201103150021
The question we should be asking is why is Breitbart and O'keefe doing this.
The right learned something during the 2nd term of the Bush Administration. Control is not enough.
The Bush Administration went after Acorn for 3 straight elections, fired their own prosecutors for not busting them up fast enough nor close enough to an election based on hollow allegations, drummed up 24 hour propaganda on Fox, and it wasn't enough. The bushies and the Republicans were perceived as bullies abusing their power.
Bill Moyers was attacked by republican appointees to PBS such as Kenneth Tomlinson which only lead to Kenneth resigning over the money he appropriated to pay his buddy to watch Bill Moyers and "document his bias".
Both of these ran into heavy public resistance.
Power isn't enough, but if the individual incriminates himself, then power isn't needed. The public will applaud as the victim is dismembered and exiled with a gesture. Democrats will even assist, and those who don't can be attacked for defending the rascals and for being corrupt. Often the subjects will resign of their own accord.
This is what worked on Eliot Spitzer, but Eliot Spitzer was conducting dubious activities he was accused of. You can't always catch a target doing the dubious activities you require to catch unless you can create the circumstances to do so.
This has been done through invasions of privacy - such as in Eliot Spitzer's case and that of the East Anglia climatologists - and through fake documentation - such as the edited videos of ACORN, NPR, the NAACP. They use words and footage out of context to soften the target up and break up public support, then they break the target out of their desire to "execute the public's will".
O'keefe tried to do that to the teacher's unions
http://thinkprogress.org/2010/11/15/okeefe-video-smears-teacher/
and it failed because people know teachers and are less willing to believe the lies of a propagandist when their own experiences say otherwise. Other targets aren't so lucky.
#4 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Tue 15 Mar 2011 at 08:24 PM
It doesn't matter what "self-proclaimed" journalists do, or do not do, anymore.
These kind of videos are self-authenticating. They will be published, whether "journalists" want them to be or not.
The left (and its MSM water-bearers) have a real problem here. You aren't going to see any of these videos break bad on conservatives. You aren't going to see the executives from NPR (or Fannie Mae, or NEA (National Endowment for the Arts), or any other government funded boondoggle organization disparaging Democrats on hidden camera, or badmouthing the Green party. You aren't going to see these guys clinking glasses with fraudulent "Big Oil" donors, conspiring to keep donations secret.
The Elephant in the Room here is the Truth... Namely that the reason you will never see this happen is that these government-funded agencies are pervasively leftist. O'Keefe knows it. I know it. You know it. EVERYBODY knows it.
And it is this Truth that gnaws at the souls of the "watchdogs" here. When the liberals got as close as they could to O'Keefe's score - a crank call to Gov. Walker - you saw unbridled glee here. Not a peep of discontent from any of the "watchdogs". Not a single question about the ethics (or lack of them) in the hit job. But despite this premature orgasm, the lame prank accomplished virtually nothing and proved absolutely nothing - fundamentally because Walker isn't a hypocrite - he says in private pretty much the same things he said in public, like it or not.
Not so on the left side of the equation, as O'Keefe has shown time and time again, where hypocrisy rules the day. Americans can tolerate and even respect a bastard, but they will not suffer a two-faced hypocrite lightly.
And O'Keefe has this figured out.
#5 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Tue 15 Mar 2011 at 08:49 PM
O'Keefe figured out that there are a lot of gullible people in the world who will listen to his evidence because it confirms their beliefs. It doesn't matter that it's fabricated, all that matters is that it's effective.
Fabricated... I could have sworn I heard someone whine about fabricated evidence and journalistic standards before. A lying bastard if I recall.
http://www.cjr.org/the_audit/wall_street_running_out_the_cl.php#comments
Good thing he's not a two faced hypocrite.
#6 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Tue 15 Mar 2011 at 11:39 PM
I was once interviewed by a local reporter about a project I was working on. Went on about half an hour. One sentence was used. It was harmless, but, yes, there are editors who do editing. The subtext of the O'Keefe story is that O'Keefe gets liberal panties in a twist, and thus gets a degree of scrutiny that very few mainstream journalists could survive.
NPR itself questioned Schiller, who confirmed that he was in the essence of the story, quoted accurately. That's why he apologized. He knew what his intentions were. It's weird that so many people are trying to prove a guy innocent who concedes he was guilty. Same story with O'Keefe's other videos. If he doesn't post all the raw footage, then nothing in the video must be true. A standard CJR supports?
Right now, ABC is sending actors around for stories (John Quinones is the reporter) to try to provoke 'racist' quotes from NASCAR crowds, for instance. I doubt if they make available all their raw footage. NPR itself sent a female reporter to go through a Canadian border crossing within the last week or two, though the reporter was not a Moslem, to try to play 'gotcha' with border guards in line with the liberal that most Americans, like themselves, are obsessed with race, but on the 'bad' side. CJR has not called into question these practices, because their intent is to promote a left-leaning narrative. Go the other way (O'Keefe has to do it because the MSM will not), and listen to the huffiness and 'heavy' irony.
#7 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Wed 16 Mar 2011 at 01:11 PM
+1 Thimbles (Tue 15 Mar 2011 at 08:24 PM)
#8 Posted by Anna Haynes, CJR on Wed 16 Mar 2011 at 01:51 PM
O'Keefe isn't a journalist... And, personally, I don't like his M.O.
But there is a HUGE difference between selective editing (dishonest enough whether done by O'Keefe or anyone else) and creating fiction (as Ryan did to cover his ass when he was busted).
There is no hypocrisy on my part in making this distinction.
The simple truth is that, like him or not, O'Keefe is running the show here. The kid is on fire - he's probably done more to change public perceptions in politics in this country in the last two years than anyone, including Obama.
That's just how it is.
All the gnashing of teeth among the self-proclaimed "professional journalists" amounts to pointless, juvenile whining.
Video is what it is. It is self-authenticating and devastatingly persuasive. It is the way things are now, and with a camera in every cell phone and MP3 player, the use of these videos will only increase. All the bitching and analyzing by the "watchdogs" here isn't going to change this reality.
As I noted above, the real problem here for liberals is that this type of hit job exposes the leftist hypocrisy. Liberal leaders preach tolerance and openmindedness in public, but in reality, as O'Keefe demonstrates, many of them are extremely arrogant and every bit as bigoted as anyone on the right.
This kind of hypocrisy won't fly with Joe Sixpack. In the day, the MSM could have taken care of O'Keefe by burning the tape or by burying the story, but Youtube has changed things.
#9 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Thu 17 Mar 2011 at 10:10 AM
Tell us more about hypocrisy and the left.. I wanna hear more.
The difference between right and left is that the left cares about hypocrisy and lies, which is why video demonstrating such is so devastating to liberal figures.
The right can be prostitute seeking, diaper wearing, family values in support of contractor rape, scumbag and he will still get a standing ovation from his peers and ticks by his name from his electorate.
When Limbaugh is your leader, it doesnt matter whether your side does no wrong or not, what matters is that you can pretend that it's so.
Legislative evidence? "Who cares." Hideous quotes to the media? "They're biased." Video evidence depicting sodomy of a chicken? "Democrats do it too, but you NEVER hear the media call them out on it. Ain't that right CJR?"
"When did a democrat sodomize a chicken?" -Hands a Media Matters reports debunking "democrats sodomize chickens claim-
"Okay, it's true. It wasn't a chicken, but it was a woman who sounds like a chicken! Chicken, woman, what's the difference!? Why do democrats love chicken!? Huh?!"
*sigh*
#10 Posted by Thimbles, CJR on Thu 17 Mar 2011 at 12:10 PM
Thimbles, you're getting kind of incoherent. Time for the meds.
You are of course correct that bad personal behavior knows no partisan bounds. I question your assertion that Republicans are more forgiving of it. Mark Foley was punished for sending sexually suggestive e-mails to pages. Garry Studds actually seduced an underage page and suffered no opprobrium from his party or from the media. (A representative from a Republican district named in the same investigation, Daniel Crane, was quickly dismissed by the district's voters.) Vitter used a prostitute and was re-elected. Barney Frank actually had a prostitution ring being run out of his home. That was quickly down the media/Democratic memory hole. There's no near Republican equivalent to the appalling idolization of the frequently badly-behaved Kennedy clan.
Beyond that, there is the unexplored ocean of hypocrisy in regard to money, environment, etc. The NY Times actually broke down and did a story that it has ignored for years - the sudden opposition of left-minded people to 'green' programs when they are plonked right down in their own back yards.
I could go on - and, as you know, I have. I'll leave it at that - unless you want more.
Are you really Eric Boehlert? You've been quoting Media Matters a lot lately. I can't believe MM doesn't have staffers trolling CJR.
#11 Posted by Mark Richard, CJR on Thu 17 Mar 2011 at 12:48 PM
Garry Studds actually seduced an underage page and suffered no opprobrium from his party or from the media.
In fact, they gave Studds a standing ovation. Perhaps the democrats and press where just ahead of their time on issue of pedastery.
#12 Posted by Mike H, CJR on Thu 17 Mar 2011 at 12:58 PM
Of course there are hypocrites among Rebublicans (as there are among any group). It's certainly possible to HandyCam a particular Republican into disgrace.
But there is no systemic hypocrisy - when a Republican goes of the reservation, he needs to worry a whole more about his GOP people than he needs to worry about the criticism of the opposition.
When a Dem breaks bad, the liberals circle the wagons and devolve into a "blame the messenger" defense that doesn't play well in the general public.
#13 Posted by padikiller, CJR on Thu 17 Mar 2011 at 05:28 PM