PBS sting video next?

It looks like a few executives at PBS might be getting ready for they YouTube moment.

Media Decoder: NPR was not the only media organization duped by the Republican provocateur James O’Keefe.

PBS confirmed Wednesday that like NPR, one of its executives attended a lunch with people who posed as members of the Muslim Education Action Center Trust, a fictional group. When those people had lunch with NPR executives, they falsely claimed that they wanted to donate up to $5 million to public media. The NPR executives were secretly videotaped at the lunch.

Anne Bentley, a PBS spokeswoman, said PBS’ senior vice president for development, Brian Reddington, attended a lunch with the fake donors in February. She said she had “no sense at all” of whether Mr. Reddington was taped during that lunch; when asked if PBS was concerned about a possible tape surfacing, she declined to comment.

Ms. Bentley said that Mr. Reddington came back from the lunch with “profound concerns about the organization” and began what she called a routine vetting process “when there is an appearance of a conflict of interest and to ensure they meet requirements of transparency and openness.”

“Attempts to confirm the credentials of the organization proved unsatisfactory and communication was halted by PBS,” she said.

I will not be the least bit surprised if James O'Keefe drops a PBS Sting video tomorrow. It would certainly fit his method of operation. One of the reasons why the ACORN sting was so successful was because there were several videos O'Keefe was able to establish a pervasive problem within the organization rather than a singular problem at one office. So, if O'Keefe's goal is to prove that public broadcasting is biased and not worth funding, then you have to show more than NPR's problem.

Also, I noticed that PBS also speaks of finding vetting issues with the fake organization O'Keefe sets up, but they found these vetting issues after they met with the guys. That certainly doesn't sound like an intellectually superior thing to do.

Via: Memeorandum
Via: Media Decoder

Video: James O’Keefe’s Census Fraud Investigation

Try as I might I really could not get excited about this James O’Keefe investigation. I have worked in the private sector all my life. I have gone through tons of training programs and even in the private sector they are rather flippant with trainee’s hours. Granted these Census supervisors are being flippant with money that we must borrow from China, but in the end I still would not call this hardcore corruption.

After O’Keefe and Giles’ stunning success with the ACORN tape, I think we are all looking for O’Keefe to top that act and bring down some big fish. I was expecting O’Keefe to catch these guys cooking the actual enumeration. Now that would have been BIG news.

What was rather enlightening (or perhaps dismaying) is that O’Keefe used his real name and no disguise here. After the ACORN video, you might have expected someone to recognize his face or name.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: Big Government

US Attorney steps down from James O’Keefe’s case himself

Jim Letten the US Attorney handling James O’Keefe’s case has stepped down from the case. Letten did not give a reason why he was stepping down, but it did come hours after Andrew Breitbart stated that James O’Keefe sat in jail for 28 hours without access to an attorney.

Jan Maselli Mann, the first assistant U.S. District Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana, has picked up the case.

Something tells me that there are going to be many more ups and downs to this case. The left is looking for serious payback for getting caught with their pants down on the ACORN scandal. On the right, people will not tolerate the heavy hand approach now that the charges are looking so much more minor [see the FBI’s affidavit here]

James O’Keefe made his first public appearance today on the Sean Hannity show. Video of the interview is below.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: Fox News

Video H/T: Hot Air

James O’Keefe issues a statement

James O’Keefe has released a statement at Big Government, explaining why he was at Mary Landrieu’s office. His explanation was that he was trying to see why Landrieu’s constituents were unable to reach her office by phone to voice their displeasure.

From Big Government: 

I learned from a number of sources that many of Senator Landrieu’s constituents were having trouble getting through to her office to tell her that they didn’t want her taking millions of federal dollars in exchange for her vote on the healthcare bill.  When asked about this, Senator Landrieu’s explanation was that, “Our lines have been jammed for weeks.”  I decided to investigate why a representative of the people would be out of touch with her constituents for “weeks” because her phones were broken.  In investigating this matter, we decided to visit Senator Landrieu’s district office – the people’s office – to ask the staff if their phones were working. 

In essence he was checking out the phone lines and not bugging them, as was the assumed case when the story broke. Since the authorities have the tape he made, we will have to wait to see his findings.

I for one was hoping for something a little juicier.  Did Landrieu shut down her phone lines rather than listen to her angry constituents? Probably, but was that story really worth the risk O’Keefe took?  Methinks not.

On the bright side, O’Keefe’s arrest had the side benefit of once again exposing the media’s bias. From MSNBC to the Washington Post, many of the mainstream media rushed to paint this story in the worst possible light. To a certain degree they were successful, even I allowed myself to pick up the false claim that O’Keefe was arresting for “bugging” Landrieu’s phone system [sorry, James].

Click here to read O’Keefe’s full statement.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: Big Government

Via: Politico

Via: The Jawa Report

UPDATED: James O’Keefe arrested for attempting to bug Mary Landrieu’s office

Holy Crap!  The FBI has arrested James O’Keefe, the ACORN slayer, and three other men for attempting to plant a bug in Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu’s office!

O’Keefe and the three other men were dressed up as telephone repairmen and actually gained access to the office and the main phone closet before being asked to show credentials and then the jig was up.

My mind is reeling thinking of what O’Keefe might have been on to that prompted him to attempt this act?  I also wonder if, like the ACORN sting, O’Keefe had already bugged other Democratic senator’s offices. If so, what did he learn? Paging Andrew Breitbart!

Read the full report here.


UPDATE 1:
One of the fellows arrested with O'Keefe was Robert Flanagan. Robert Flanagan is the son of a US Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana.  Again I have to ask the question, what did O'Keefe know that led him to do such a reckless thing?  Do O'Keefe and Flanagan have something on Mary Landrieu and were in her office to get the goods on her?


UPDATE 2:
Michelle Malkin has the FBI affidavit containing the charges against O'Keefe. O'Keefe admits to planning the operation. The guys were picked up in a car a short distance away from Landrieu's office.  They were in possession of a listening device. Upon leaving the jail, O'Keefe said "vertias" - truth. 

O’Keefe said “veritas,” Latin for truth, as he left a suburban jail Tuesday with suspects Stan Dai and Joseph Basel, both 24. All declined to comment.

“There will be a time for that,” Dai said.

As he got into a cab outside the jail, O’Keefe said, “The truth shall set me free.” His biography on a Web site where he blogs says he works at VeritasVisuals.com, though that Web site does not currently work.

Again, I am thinking O'Keefe knows something about Landrieu. What can it be?  Andrew Brietbart do you know something?  Will this lead to a Watergate type story broken in Big Government or Big Journalism?

UPDATE 3:

Allah Pundit at Hot Air has the legal ramifications for O'Keefe's actions and a brief statement from Brietbart.


UPDATE 4: 
1/29/2010: Correction, O'Keefe and gang were NOT arrested for "bugging" the phone lines. You can read O'Keefe's full statement here.

Via: Memeorandum

Via: NOLA.com
Via: Michelle Malkin
Via: Hot Air