Comparing Apples And Tuna

The arrest of James O’Keefe – the conservative new-media activist who stung several ACORN offices last year – on charges related to the completely unrelated allegations of tampering with Senator Landrieu’s phones has provided the left with much-needed grounds to try to equivocate and rationalize ACORN’s guilt away.

The dumbest rationalization?  “O’Keefe didn’t wear his [fanciful and exaggerated] pimp outfit into the actual neighborhoods where the ACORN offices were located”.  Gosh, d’ya think?  I’m told that Steven Colbert isn’t a real blowhard conservative pundit, either.  And it’s just possible that “Gunga” Dan Rather didn’t do a great job of passing as a Muj, either:

Cronkiteahu Akbar!

Slightly less dumb:  “O’Keefe edited his footage”.  Well, doy.  Everyone edits their footage.  Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric edited their interviews with Sarah Palin – allegedly to present her in the least flattering light possible (we won’t know until ABC and CBS release the raw footage of their interviews – which, of course, they will not, although they’ve rarely been shy about doing so to buttress whatever credibility they may actually have).  Did O’Keefe’s edits mislead anyone?  Well, ACORN seemed confident enough in the credibility of the footage, edited or not, to fire pretty much everyone busted in the sting. 

A little dumber:  “O’Keefe’s footage only showed the ones that got caught!”  Well, again, doyy.  The media doesn’t care about “dog bites man” stories; its when the man bites the dog that ears perk up.  How many ACORN officials fell for the sting?  Half a dozen?  If half a dozen GOP state chairpeople agreed with a cretinous proposal to spend taxpayer money on, say, polo ponies, do you think the mainstream media would dowse up a “climate of corruption” story or two?

The jury is still out on this next bit; is O’Keefe’s sting better or worse than this bit here, where Luke Hellier at Minnesota Democrats Exposed busted an Uptake “reporter” not only deliberately editing footage from the Capitol to create a story where none existed, actively misleading the public about the nature of an exchage between Rep. Mack and ..:

Click to view full size

Click to view full size

…but giggled about her ability to do it on Twitter?

Now, I’ve gone around a bit with the Uptake.  On the one hand, most of the people involved in leading the group strive to present a clear and accurate, if not unbiased, representation of the news.   On the other hand, they are committed to a “citizen journalism” model where virtually anyone can contribute, leading to some fairly ethically decrepit “reporting” (which the Uptake management, to their credit, have endeavored to fix).

The rationalization came from Charlie Quimby, who on the one hand writes/wrote for one lefty think tank or another and thus gets/has gotten some liveihood out of rationalizing the left’s behavior, but on the other hand is usually a fairly rational guy:

Kid needs supervision, like some other young videographers I could name

Now, I am not a news reporter – but I tried my hand at it, and never (allow me to brag a bit) lost a gig for breaching whatever passes for “ethics” in the business.  Someone tell me again – did O’Keefe’s editing actually put words in peoples’ mouths they did not say?  Did it imbue them with thoughts they did not think?  Did it present a misleading impression of the ACORN employees’ malfeasance (that would have made firing them, as ACORN did, a mistake?)

Because it’d seem Ms. Maye did.

Where’s the equivalence?

And if the Uptake hires people (Ms. May was, according to Hellier’s copy and paste of Uptake’s posting on Ms. May, at the capitol more or less full-time), has the Uptake’s commitment to covering the news fairly and honestly passed its “sell by” date?

40 thoughts on “Comparing Apples And Tuna

  1. O’Keefe and Giles showed you could walk into multiple ACORN offices, bizarrely disguised as a pimp & whore, and ACORN counselors would give you advice on getting a mortgage and the best way to deal with the tax liability of your ‘business’.
    That’s it.
    ACORN is financed in part by the tax dollars of Americans who work hard & play by the rules. The backlash against ACORN by these taxpayers is entirely justified. If ACORN’s internal procedures require their counselors to do this, they need to change their internal procedures. If they don’t like it, they can get money from private grants.

  2. Mitch,
    You make some fair comments here. Let me expand my comment, which you call a rationalization, beyond tweet length.

    Maye is green and clearly needs some guidance in writing headlines. But her main infraction was making a stupid comment on Twitter, not in how she edited the piece. The video makes clear that Morrow came off the floor to hear constituents and was not coerced. She listened politely, and made a reasonable response. In other words, Morrow comes off well — and to my eye, not manipulated.

    My “other young videographers” reference named no reporter, issues or stories. So why did O’Keefe and ACORN immediately come to your mind?

    Actually, I was thinking of a lot of young writers I’ve mentored as well as O’Keefe, who recently showed questionable judgment trying to infiltrate a federal office building’s phone system and got himself arrested.

    As for my other affiliations, I fail to see how they might color my opinion that a stupid tweet and an arrest are both signs of a need for supervision.

  3. Chahlie, Chahlie, Chahlie (yes, I did just see On The Waterfront again):

    My “other young videographers” reference named no reporter, issues or stories. So why did O’Keefe and ACORN immediately come to your mind?

    He’s been in all the papers?

    Actually, I was thinking of a lot of young writers I’ve mentored as well as O’Keefe, who recently showed questionable judgment trying to infiltrate a federal office building’s phone system and got himself arrested.

    OK, and true as far as it goes – although I’m unaware of O’Keefe wrapping himself in the “journalist” flag.

    As for my other affiliations, I fail to see how they might color my opinion that a stupid tweet and an arrest are both signs of a need for supervision.

    Fair enough.

  4. “Terry Says:
    February 10th, 2010 at 3:29 pm
    “O’Keefe and Giles showed you could walk into multiple ACORN offices, bizarrely disguised as a pimp & whore, and ACORN counselors would give you advice on getting a mortgage and the best way to deal with the tax liability of your ‘business’.
    That’s it.”

    O’Keefe never walked into an ACORN office dressed as a pimp, in some of the instances he apparently was not even present in the ACORN offices at all.

    Giles variously claimed to be an exotic dancer, or gave no occupation, as well as claiming to be a prostitute on at least one occasion.

    There is considerable disagreement as to whether ACORN employees actually gave any advice to act illegally that you claim they gave.

    And yes, Mitch, I’m asserting that there is significant reason to believe that O’Keefe and Giles do not appear to reflect accurately what was actually done or said in ACORN offices in their videos.

    http://www.proskauer.com/files/uploads/report2.pdf

    Just one of the many sources I looked at while researching this – see pages 42 through 47, for the ‘other side of the story’. What is reported here makes a heckuva lot more sense than the ACORN videos you are endorsing. This is consistent with a variety of other sources, including news interviews with O’Keefe, and with the current CEO of ACORN.

    None of us will have the absolute last word on this until after the raw and unedited video is made available.

    O’Keefe has wrapped himself in the ‘journalist’ flag in many interviews given in connection with setting up conservative campus newspapers Mitch. It is how he defines himself and his activities.

    I encourage you to review as many O’Keefe print interviews and other original source documents as you can find, not just the second hand stuff that is more widely available.

    As to the federal office building – I’m still waiting for someone somewhere to present a reason for O’Keefe and the others to go to the main phone equipment area of the federal office building in New Orleans. There is nothing they could accomplish at that location that is consistent with simply observing how Landrieu’s staff responded to a heavy phone load.

  5. Terry – the tax entity of ACORN and the mortgage entities are two totaly different organizations; different offices, etc. No, you can’t walk into ACORN and get help in one office for both – contrary to the impression given in the video. It is one of the aspects of the videos that argues persuasively against the content being original and accurate.

  6. From DG’s source

    “Proskauer was retained by the leadership of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (“ACORN”) on September 21, 2009 to:”

    ’nuff said.

    except for this

    “We did not speak directly with those employees who were captured on video in part because we were satisfied there was no question that the visits occurred and the comments were made.

  7. >>He’s been in all the papers?

    Exactly, and with reason.

    An ill-advised tweet by an intern hardly rises to the same level, but is apparently being taken seriously by her uptake supervisors.

  8. Exactly, and with reason.

    And I suspect we disagree as to the “reason”, at least before the alleged Landrieu caper.

  9. Doggone, there is no amount of video editing that can overcome the reality that, yes, O’Keefe was dressed as a pimp and Giles as a lady of the night in some of those videos. All you need is a frame or two.

    My goodness, if you’re that disconnected from reality, may I suggest some other sources for information besides “Proskauer” or whatever?

  10. Dog Gone, you do realize that the pdf you link to is a political document, and not the result of an independent investigation, don’t you?

  11. So MoN, did you happen to read not just the last five pages, but the entire document?

    Did you bother to check any number of other sources than what Mr. O’Keefe himself says?

    As Mitch can no doubt tell you from his own journalistic experiences, more than single sourcing is important, and the more quality sources the better.

    The investigators were retained by new management to do an overview of the entire organization, not just the problems suggested by the videos. Like “Propose short- and long-term recommendations regarding ACORN management, oversight and governance.”

    You seem to leave out that while the investigators chose not to speak with the individuals appearing on camera, they did a pretty thorough investigation corroborating what happened with the other people present, including people who were not employees. For example, in the Baltimore Office, O’Keefe and Giles represented he was a student and she was a dancer, and that O’Keefe appeared in slacks and a button down shirt, which he wore (not the pimp outfit) to those offices he actually visited. In Miami, Giles visited both the ACORN and the ACORN Housing offices without O’Keefe along at all. The video version of events leaves out things like Giles being advised to get out of prostitution, and being given a list of shelters to help her do so. Wnat was left out of the videos says far more than what was included – or more precisely – added later.

    I would refer you to the bottom of page 11 and the top of page 12 of the report :”including the insertion of a substitute voiceover for significant portions of Mr. O’Keefe’s and Ms. Giles’s comments, which makes it difficult to determine the questions to which ACORN employees are responding.

    But people will believe what they want to believe. This is just one source of multiple sources.

    I’m guessing that after the Landrieu fiasco, Republicans will be generally fleeing O’Keefe in droves, and repudiating any associations with him if and when it comes out he faked his ACORN video.

    Faked, as in “substantially falsified”.

  12. Harshberger is about as independent an investigator as Karl Rove would be.
    Harshberger prosecuted the Amirault case in MA. That’s the where Marcia Coakley (remember her?) tried to make a deal with the Amiraults that she would not oppose parole for Gerald Amirault if his family would agree not to to sue the state for prosecutorial misconduct.
    You really know how to pick your authorities, Dog Gone.

  13. The report says:
    “We did not speak directly with those employees who were captured on video in part because we were satisfied there was no question that the visits occurred and the comments were made. “

    Dog Gone says:
    Faked, as in “substantially falsified”

  14. “Doggone, there is no amount of video editing that can overcome the reality that, yes, O’Keefe was dressed as a pimp and Giles as a lady of the night in some of those videos. All you need is a frame or two.”

    Bubbasan, O’Keefe himself has admitted in interviews that he was videod outside in his pimp costume, and that he edited in views of himself in that costume to look as if he were wearing it inside the ACORN offices when he was not. I’m sure you’re not so gullible that you don’t believe that is technically possible?

    Proskauer was brought in to do a complete review after the problems with embezzlement came to light, because of – to use their own words – “drawing upon an extensive document review, interviews with a broad range of people” and their “deep experience in criminal and civil litigation, investigations, independent inquiries, ethics and governance.”

    Being hired by ACORN for a much needed review is a long way from making them a political entity. I read the whole document – it’s a typical boring organizational analysis by a consultant; it’s not a political document. Sheesh, do you assume plumbers hired to fix an office bathroom faucet are political too, just because ACORN pays them for the work? (I’m not referring to Nixon-style plumbers, but the real kind.)

  15. Terry, Harshbarger is not the only person who did the review of ACORN, and Proskauer is one of the largest and most prestigious law firms in the country. This was a straightforward legal consultation, not a political action.

    Good grief – did you READ this at all??? Or is your response just reflexive?

  16. I read the entire pdf, Dog Gone.
    You seem to have some difficulty determining what is and what is not a political document.The lead author of the pdf is a politician. That should be your first clue that what you are going to read is a political document with political goals.
    Proskauer is one of the largest and most prestigious law firms in the country.
    I don’t care. You shouldn’t care either.

  17. “Republicans will be generally fleeing O’Keefe in droves,”

    DG, just because a person refuses to worship ACORN (use a mirror for a good example of ACORN worship) does not mean they support O’Keefe.

    Why must you refuse to acknowledge the fraud and investigations against ACORN?
    At some point, a logical person will see the trend and blame the organization instead of compartmentalizing and placing all the blame on just one or two “bad” employees. Where does the buck stop in your world, only at Booosh’s desk?

    ….

    Bottom line:
    “there was no question that the visits occurred and the comments were made. “

  18. Gentlemen, may I refer you to my earlier statement about multiple sources? Don’t rely ONLY on this statement from the Proskauer law firm, and certainly don’t rely ONLY on O’Keefe or Giles either.

    Look at as many sources, original source documents, as you can find to inform your conclusions. I did. With all due respect, you seem to be relying directly or indirectly pretty much just on O’Keefe and Giles version of events. With respect, that is not terribly objective, regardless of how much you might want to see ACORN in the worst possible light (which is what most people consider bias).

  19. Dog Gone, when I was reading the pdf what stuck out the most was that it found no fault with the current leadership of ACORN, AKA “the paymasters”.
    The inability to evaluate evidence in a dispassionate manner is a real problem with the modern left. Your inability to tell a political document prepared by lawyers from a legal document is indicative of this.
    For what it is worth, the ACORN videos were political documents as well. They were not intended to result in a criminal prosecution or a legal finding, they were intended to achieve the public policy goal of defunding ACORN. They were moderately successful.

  20. Dog Gone, ACORN is using my tax dollars to finance its political agenda. Of course I view them with great suspicion. Any tax payer should. The investigation they paid for showed that ACORN has numerous problems in the behavior of its employees and its financial operations apart from anything depicted in the videos.

  21. Dog,

    Proskauer is a very good law firm. O’Keefe could hire another very good New York law firm (Skadden Arps, Cravath Swaine & Moore, Weil Gotshal & Manges, pick your favorite), conduct a similar “consultation” and they would be able to present a very different set of findings. Terry is correct — it is a political document, meant to be exculpatory based on the points of law that Proskauer chose to consider in order to satisfy its client.

    And it’s hardly suprising that ACORN would have access to one of the largest and most prestigious law firms in the country — ACORN has a lot of money and is litigious as hell. ACORN is a great client.

    One thing you say is especially risible:

    Harshbarger is not the only person who did the review of ACORN

    Well, yeah. He’s a senior lawyer at Proskauer — he has a fleet of associates at his disposal who do the grunt work. Work that he requests. They’ll get the result he asks for, which is the result that’s most favorable to his client.

    This wasn’t a disinterested group of lawyers gathered at random or as part of a 3rd party investigation. ACORN was paying them. You can throw up all the fairy dust and monkey poo you want about it, but that doesn’t change the reality of why the Proskauer document exists, or its purpose. And Terry stands unchallenged on that point.

  22. Doggie continues to ignore the FACT that O’Keefe and Giles were telling ACORN employees that they wanted to smuggle children from Central America to employ in federally subsidized brothels. And those employees were more than willing to help.
    I don’t know how they sleep at night, Doggie, but I have to wonder hoe you manage.

  23. Gentlemen, may I refer you to my earlier statement about multiple sources? Don’t rely ONLY on this statement from the Proskauer law firm, and certainly don’t rely ONLY on O’Keefe or Giles either.

    Then show us some of the other sources you’re touting. Let’s see them.

  24. Mitch,

    I believe you, from time to time, present yourself as ‘alternative media’, and in the use of the term alternate, mean in the context of being an alternative to broadcast news and newspapers.

    I believe at other times you have said without shyness or embarrasment, that you are unabashedly biased, present things in the worst possible light for your opposition, and in a spun up and best possible light for conservatives.

    In that context – what do you define as:

    ” leading to some fairly ethically decrepit “reporting” (which the Uptake management, to their credit, have endeavored to fix).”

    I mean, how would you define ethically decrepit? Does it apply to you too?

    The Uptake, on their worst day, doesn’t present the level of spin you normally do, in my opinion. Of course, that’s opinion, and everyone has one, but this is a case in point. You’ve presented O’Keefe as merely doing ‘what everyone else does’ by editing his story, or by not ACTUALLY wearing his outfit into ACORN offices, but that’s sophistry – Rather WORE his Mujahadeen garb in country, and didn’t pretend to be doing so when he wasn’t, and Couric may edit stories, but she didn’t cobble together different words to make it sound as if someone said something they didn’t say. Further, as DG has pointed out by doing actual RESEARCH, the claims made by O’Keefe, i.e. those which you and the vast majority of those on the far right believed, many many of those claims are being refuted by actual fact. A little fact checking would have uncovered it at the time, and certainly since, but rather than admitting O’Keefe is a tweedle-dum to Breitbart’s tweedle-dee – you further this farce by attempting to spin his increadible dishonesty (and a dishonesty FAR in excess of anything Rather did) as something simply par for the course for ‘journalism’ or whatever you’d want to equate Couric as doing (and remember please, you likened him to Couric first – so the use of the term journalism, since that is what Couric IS, is fair). Is that the kind of ethical forthright ‘journalism’ you stand for, in say, contrast to The Uptake?

  25. Kermie,

    If we interviewed employees of Goldman Sachs, or maybe, Dick Aremy’s ‘Liberty Foundation’ (iirc), about doing things which were underhanded to either manage the market or undermine Democrats (in the case of the latter), and we interviewed 500 people, do you think we might find one or five who would agree, especially if we took their comments out of context, spliced together words, and ONLY presented the five who even tangentially agreed to the act? Tempest in a Teapot doesn’t begin to describe this idiocy. What does is ginned up BULLSH$*# – If you write off Abu Ghraib as the act of a few malcontents, then you live in a glass house when you complain about ACORN. ACORN’s staffers didn’t evince a pattern of conduct like the actions in Abu Ghraib did aroudn the world, and represented a bare handful of people.

    Once again with you righties it’s do as I say, but not as I do.

  26. I believe you, from time to time, present yourself as ‘alternative media’, and in the use of the term alternate, mean in the context of being an alternative to broadcast news and newspapers.

    So far, so good.

    I believe at other times you have said without shyness or embarrasment, that you are unabashedly biased, present things in the worst possible light for your opposition

    No, I tell the truth about the opposition – which in most cases happens to be the worst possible light.

    , and in a spun up and best possible light for conservatives.

    It’s not “spin”; that’s what you people call every view of facts that doesn’t comport with yur prejudices.

    ” leading to some fairly ethically decrepit “reporting” (which the Uptake management, to their credit, have endeavored to fix).”

    I mean, how would you define ethically decrepit? Does it apply to you too?

    Pen, did you actually read the piece?

    The lady said “Mwahahahaha, I get to edit things to make people look like they said what they didn’t!”. I’ve never done this. I’ve never come within a million miles of this.

    You’ve presented O’Keefe as merely doing ‘what everyone else does’ by editing his story,

    Ever worked in broadcast news? No? Things get edited. Not just in news, either; think Michael Moore doesn’t edit his “documentaries” in such a way as to demonize his opponents and make him look better ? That was the subject of one of the links I put into my reply to DG, above.

    Couric may edit stories,

    And, in this case, allegedly edit them to present her subject in the least-flattering possible light.

    but she didn’t cobble together different words to make it sound as if someone said something they didn’t say.

    Either did O’Keefe. That’d be according to ACORN, which threw the workers involved under the bus, saying the video was accurate enough as re what the workers did.

    Further, as DG has pointed out by doing actual RESEARCH, the claims made by O’Keefe, i.e. those which you and the vast majority of those on the far right believed, many many of those claims are being refuted by actual fact.

    Really? Which ones?

    The ones that involve ACORN workers telling someone who said he was a pimp (however he was dressed)?

    No refutation exists.

    A little fact checking would have uncovered it at the time, and certainly since, but rather than admitting O’Keefe is a tweedle-dum to Breitbart’s tweedle-dee

    That would be the current lefty ad-hominem shrieking point; “they are teh dummies, don’t believe them!”

    – you further this farce by attempting to spin his increadible dishonesty (and a dishonesty FAR in excess of anything Rather did)

    Pen, that is just plain head-in-the-sand, no-idea-how-journalism-is-supposed-to-work BS. Rather, to be extremely charitable, uncritically accepted obvious fabrications as legitimate based on the word of a producer whose politically-motivated biases were a matter of record. These fabricated documents presented no facts and were 100% untrue, fabricating communications and situations from the whole cloth. Rather (and Mapes) broadcast them because they comported with what they wished to be true.

    O’Keefe stung some ACORN workers, who did in fact say what they said. What he wore, what he put into the cutaways – all of that is the kind of thing that’d get him fired from a TV station, but would get him a job with Michael Moore, if he were politically correct enough.

    You can wish it were different, but it’s really not.

  27. Peev,
    Kermir? Really? You gotta buy me a beer before you get to call me that. But seriously, I don’t think I would like to sit down with someone who defends people that want to sponsor and support illegal alien child prostitution. Seriously.
    Don’t you feel the least bit icky?

  28. Kermit Says:
    “February 10th, 2010 at 7:34 pm
    Doggie continues to ignore the FACT that O’Keefe and Giles were telling ACORN employees that they wanted to smuggle children from Central America to employ in federally subsidized brothels. And those employees were more than willing to help.
    I don’t know how they sleep at night, Doggie, but I have to wonder hoe you manage.”

    Actually Kermit, that is one of the areas where there is considerable disagreement. O’Keefe and Giles claim in the video they wanted to smuggle underaged illegal immigrants from Central America to be prostitutes – essentially sex slaves. From the independent investigation of ACORN, and other sources, what she told ACORN was that Giles wanted to use the proceeds of her job as a prostitute (an instance where she claimed to be a prostitute and not an exotic dancer) to purchase a house so that Giles could help the illegal kids escape prostitution and provide protection for them. What ACORN claims they advised Giles was 1. to get out of prostitution, including providing a list of shelters, etc. to assist her to do that; 2. that she clear up any outstanding issues with tax filings with the IRS about illegal income, as a requisite to purchasing a house; 3. that it was improper to finance a home purchase with income earned illegally, but that ACORN Housing could advise further about home purchase.

    There was also a police report filed immediately afterwards about possible prostitution and illegal immigrant children being involved in prostitution which supports the ACORN version of events.

    In this exchange, the ACORN employees are suppoed to have clarified that ACORN handles tax issues, and ACORN Housing, a different 501c3 with different office and staff, handles home buying issues, something which is absent in the O’Keefe video.

    While the independent investigation did not interview any of the individuals appearing in the released video, they did speak to other people in the office and adjoining areas to confirm what took place, information which supports the ACORN employees version.

    These are the same individuals who were interviewed, along with checking the same supporting evidence, where several state Attorney Generals exonerated ACORN as having not done anything improper or illegal. One more set of investigating sources that seems to be supporting ACORNs version, over OKeefe and Giles

    Another assertion made repeatedly by O’Keefe has been that every – EVERY – ACORN office that was visited was willing to cooperate with them in illegal activity. This is contradicted by a number of emails, phone calls to security and the police, and so on. I’ve seen at least one report that suggests internal video security supports the ACORN assertions – that Giles and O’Keefe show up and are immediately asked to leave by reception, and again reports / calls to the police are on file about them as suspicious individuals.

    As to the supposed comments made by ACORN part time seasonal employees shown in the video who are supposed to have said the damning statements, it is claimed that what they said taken in context does not represent serious statements. In that same kind of not a serious statement was what was said by another ACORN employee, covered in the independent investigation I linked, in the San Bernadino office, where there was a single woman employee present, when O’Keefe and Giles and apparently another male entered the office. That employee was suspicious and frightened, and in freely admits that she said wild things in the course of trying to get them to leave, including that she had murdered her ex-husbands and that she ran an escort service – statements she didn’t mean, and which are untrue. She finally got them to leave the office, locked it and left because she didn’t want to be there alone if they came back. We haven’t seen that video footage, but just because someone said something wild doesn’t present the whole story without the unedited footage.

    Clearly only the unedited, unaltered with insert visuals and subsequently recorded voice overs that altered what was said by Giles and O’Keefe will provide that.

    Let me be clear – I don’t particularly think ACORN is squeaky clean. However, that is very different from believing that what is wrong with the organization is anything remotely like what O’Keefe and Giles have claimed is wrong.

    I have more sources Mitch, from previous research. I’d be happy to share them with you here if you want me to…….as a guest author, not commenter. With the caveat that I have a few prior commitments to finish up including a three part piece I’m writing with Pen on the Affinity scam, on which I’m behind on my share, as well as commitments for writing and editing to my other two editors. Right now I wouldn’t blame Pen in the slightest if he were cross with me for spending time commenting on this instead of finishing what I’m working on.

    So – if you can wait a few days, I’d be happy to oblige you with more detail and more sources, on those terms.

    There is lots more Mitch – so…how come you haven’t found it yourself? If I can find it, so can any reference librarian, if you haven’t the time to do it yourself.

  29. Mr. D.”Terry is correct — it is a political document, meant to be exculpatory based on the points of law that Proskauer chose to consider in order to satisfy its client.”

    Having read the entire document, I would respectfully disagree. It seems very clearly to be a consultation on changes the new officers of this entity have sought to make changes to their organization. Given the things that the organization is criticized over, it is a heckuva stretch to see this as intended to be exculpatory.

    It is my understanding that those kinds of legal services in litigation against Giles, O’Keefe, et al is being provided by other representation. Had something from their legal representation against O’Keefe, Giles etc been used for this, I would tend to agree with you. This is not that kind of document.

    So, Mr. D — how willing are you to entertain the idea that just maybe what Giles and O’Keefe did was making a fictional movie for the consumption of uncritical individuals who WANT to hear what they are saying?

    Have you checked out the criticism of them from the right for instance?

    Where are your sources other than heavily altered – not just edited – video and audio to support what Giles and O’Keefe claim? You are aware, I assume, that this was Giles’s idea, her project, not O’Keefe’s?

  30. I wish you would stop referring to the Harshbarger document as an ‘independent investigation’, Dog Gone. It was paid for by ACORN. They chose the investigator. They own the results. If it had concluded that current ACORN management had been at fault or committed any illegal act, it would never have seen the light of day.
    It would be far more accurate to call Proskauer a consulting firm rather than an independent investigator. Accuracy does not suit your argument, so out it goes.

  31. Terry, you may wish to consider the Proskauer document, which was prepared by a number of individuals not just Harshbarger, as political, but that is a position at odds with certain facts.

    Proskauer was hired for this independent consult and investigation because they are a firm known for their expertise in white collar crime, and because ACORN needed that expertise coming out of the discovery of massive embezzlement. That is clearly the focus of the report, as well as the memo that accompanied it where two of the three stated purposes of the consultation are outlined as:

    “Evaluate the management and governance reforms that ACORN’s new leadership (the “reform leadership”) has developed since June of 2008 (when news surfaced of the embezzlement by a relative of ACORN’s founder, Wade Rathke) and the effectiveness of the ongoing efforts to implement those reforms; and

    Propose short- and long-term recommendations regarding ACORN management, oversight and governance.”

    While Proskauer DID investigate the videos, the substance of that investigation in their report is relating their findings to the management, oversight and governance of ACORN operations – such as :

    “…the videos represent….ACORN’s longstanding weakness, including a lack of training, a lack of procedures, and a lack of on-site supervision.”

    I counted a total of 9 paragraphs in the body of the investigation that relate all or in part to the videos – out of 41 pages of organizational recommendations and some pretty harsh criticism of some of their management practices; in addition to that are the brief summaries – only summaries – of the video investigation in the 4 and 1/2 pages of Appendix D, at the very end.

    That doesn’t track very logically with this as a primarily political document to spin the results to their credit. Is there some incidental benefit? Sure. But the primary focus seems to me to be to demonstrate how their organization is making changes in response to the embezzlement in a transparent (pardon my using that overused term) manner for other purposes than spinning the videos.

    An independent investigation is what they were contracted to do in the course of consulting. That ACORN relied on their results, benefitted from the results, or paid for the results doesn’t change that, or make it innately political, any more than if they were contracting with a plumber, or a computer service.

    I would look at the investigation and any representations from the firm they hire to litigate the suits against O’Keefe and Giles a good deal differently.

    But I don’t rely ONLY on this document for my conclusions; it simply contains many of the same findings in one place, in shorter format, making it a good link as a starting place.

    I would particularly enjoy addressing the aspect of misrepresentation of information in connection with what the ACORN employees actually said, and falsification of audio.

    However, this hodge podge of comments does not present the information as clearly as it could and should be presented. I doubt that I will be given the opportunity to do so, but it is the basis of an amusing side bet.

    Heck, I’d even happily make it a two-fer, covering why ACORN isn’t squeaky clean from a more factual basis, versus the inaccuracies about the organization embraced by the right.

  32. Dog Gone, your post is very long, and mostly repeats your previous assertions regarding the Proskauer document.
    You should be asking yourself “in what way can the document be described most accurately”?
    It is not an “independent investigation”. Proskauer was paid by ACORN & ACORN owned the findings. It would be extremely interesting to see the contract between ACORN and Proskauer, but we never will.
    It could possibly be considered an “external investigation”, but it includes recommendations as well as findings, and in any case most people believe that an external investigation is the same as an independent investigation so to call it an “external investigation” would be border-line deceptive.
    I submit that the document most closely resembles a report prepared by a paid corporate consultant.
    I have read the entire PDF, Dog Gone. I know what it says. In fact on re-reading the doc I became convinced that the reason that Harshbarger & Co. did not interview the ACORN employees & others in the O’Keefe/Giles tapes was to cover themselves legally. By not interviewing them, they could not be called as witnesses in any discovery motion involving the civil suits by the ex ACORN employees. They are savvy lawyers!

    An independent investigation is what they were contracted to do in the course of consulting. That ACORN relied on their results, benefitted from the results, or paid for the results doesn’t change that, or make it innately political, any more than if they were contracting with a plumber, or a computer service.

    It’s worth repeating, Dog Gone, what a political document is.
    A political document is a document designed and produced in order to define or to influence public policy. It doesn’t matter what its topic is or who prepares it.

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