I proudly stood behind James O’Keefe on his groundbreaking ACORN investigation. I also defended him when the media, including CNN — during a previous regime, “the Rick Sanchez era” –  falsely reported the Sen. Mary Landrieu story as a “wiretapping” plot gone wrong.

In all these cases the left-leaning media exposed its obvious bias against James because of his contrarian point of view and because the targets of his investigations are protected institutions of the Democrat Media Complex.

However, in my dealings with Ms. Boudreau, she and her producer, Scott Zamost, conducted themselves professionally, and I believe James owes them a candid and public explanation.

From what I’ve read about this script, though not executed, it is patently gross and offensive. It’s not his detractors to whom he also owes this public airing. It’s to his legion of supporters.

UPDATE after the jump.

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The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Louisiana has filed a court document admitting that James O’Keefe did not intend to tamper with the phones at Mary Landrieu’s office, or commit any other felony.

Oh — and the good folks at the Department of Justice don’t particularly want you to know that. This post reveals that, at O’Keefe’s hearing, the Assistant U.S. Attorney tried not to read that part of the document in court. What’s more, the U.S. Attorney pointedly omitted this critical information from their press release.

The news of the Government’s admission broke yesterday, when Big Journalism’s Larry O’Connor reported that a court document filed in James O’Keefe’s criminal case bearing the title “Final Factual Basis” contains the following language:

In this case, further investigation did not uncover evidence that the defendants intended to commit any felony after the entry by false pretenses despite their initial statements to the staff of Senatorial office and GSA requesting access to the central phone system. Instead, the Government’s evidence would show that the defendants misrepresented themselves and their purpose for gaining access to the central phone system to orchestrate a conversation about phone calls to the Senator’s staff and capture the conversation on video, not to actually tamper with the phone system, or to commit any other felony.

This news, which O’Connor relayed at the end of a post about Media Matters’ dishonesty, is a significant piece of news that deserves its own post. It is especially noteworthy because this paragraph comes from a version of the facts that the Government has agreed to by way of stipulation. The document contains the following language showing the Government’s agreement: (more…)

Even in defeat, the hacks and non-entities at Media Matters — led by the embarrassingly humorless head hack, Eric Boehlert– just can’t write a story about James O’Keefe without letting their bias and contempt for him get in the way of the truth. But what else is new?

Just as in their original post on the affair in New Orleans: O’Keefe reportedly arrested by FBI in alleged “plot to wiretap” senator’s office, Media Matters and the rest of the left-wing media had been salivating over the prospect of seeing O’Keefe behind bars for a “wire-tapping” crime.  Of course, the facts of the case, publicly available from the moment Media Matters and their blood brothers at MSNBC began “reporting” the story, have never supported the fantasy that O’Keefe’s prank was some sort of Watergate style break-in or wiretapping, or bugging or anything resembling a serious felony.

But a perusal of the headlines at Media Matters gives us some great insight to how they’ve been desperate to make O’Keefe our generation’s Bernard Barker, and Breitbart his Richard Nixon.

Alleged wiretap plotter O’Keefe tweets “I am a journalist. The truth shall set me free”

TPM: Alleged phone bug crew came from conservative campus journalism world

FDL blogger: O’Keefe’s statement is riddled with falsehoods

Media Matters‘ Frisch: “What did Breitbart and Fox News know and when did they know it?”

In the three days following O’Keefe’s arrest, Media Matters posted no fewer than fifty-three separate articles about the arrest.  FIFTY-THREE! (more…)

James O’Keefe pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor today for his guerrilla-reporting stunt last January in the New Orleans offices of Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu.  The charge that he has admitted to, “entering federal property under false pretenses,” is a far cry from the phone-bugging and Watergate Jr. distortions first screamed by the MSM in high-octane hyperventilation mode when the story first broke in January.

MSNBC devoted the top slot in each of its prime time shows to the story and created a special “Watergate Jr.” graphic, and Ed Schultz, Rachel Maddow, Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann each took their turn at the James O’Keefe piñata, whacking away with full faith in the yummy morsels they expected to come tumbling out.

The big problem was that everything they “reported” to their viewers was based on pure conjecture and wishful thinking.  If they had spent ten minutes reading the initial report from the federal investigators they would have seen that there was never an allegation of wire-tapping or bugging.  But the facts, readily available to any journalist curious enough to find the truth, didn’t stand in their way of wall-to-wall “Watergate, Jr.” coverage. It was a typically disgraceful performance by the leftist American media.

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UPDATE: O’Keefe promises more undercover investigations. Full update after the jump.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) – Four conservative activists accused of trying to tamper with the phones in Sen. Mary Landrieu’s office have pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges of entering federal property under false pretenses. The most prominent activist, James O’Keefe, was sentenced to three years probation, 100 hours of community service and fined a $1,500 fine. The 25-year-old is known for wearing a pimp costume in a video that embarrassed ACORN.

Magistrate Daniel Knowles III sentenced the three others to two years probation, 75 hours of community service and fined them $1,500.

The FBI has said O’Keefe used his cell phone to try to capture video of two men who posed as telephone repairmen and asked to see the phones. O’Keefe spokesman Denis Calabrese disputed an earlier allegation that a fourth suspect waited in a car with a listening device, which was not mentioned in court records.

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FOUR MEN CHARGED WITH MISDEMEANOR OFFENSE OF ENTERING FEDERAL PROPERTY UNDER FALSE PRETENSES

NEW ORLEANS, March 26 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ – Joseph Basel, age 24, Stan Dai, age 24, Robert Flanagan, age 24, and James O’Keefe, age 25, were charged in a one-count bill of information with entering real property of the United States under false pretenses, a misdemeanor, announced the U. S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Louisiana.

According to the Bill of Information, between January 20, 2010, and January 25, 2010, Flanagan, Basel, O’Keefe, and Dai met on several occasions.  During their meetings, they discussed, among other things, possible scenarios in which they would talk with members of the staff of Senator Mary Landrieu inside of her New Orleans, Louisiana office, in the Hale Boggs Federal Building, and record the interaction using audio and visual equipment.  As a result of this planning, on January 25, 2010, Basel and Flanagan entered the Senator’s office dressed as telephone repairmen, said they were following up on reports of problems with the telephone system, engaged in conversation with the staff members, and pretended to test the phone system.  O’Keefe, who had also entered the office, recorded the interaction between Basel, Flanagan, and the staff members.

If convicted, Flanagan, Basel, O’Keefe, and Dai each face a maximum term of six (6) months in prison and a fine of $5,000.

The United States Attorney’s Office reiterated that the Bill of Information is merely a charge and that the guilt of each defendant must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.

The investigation of this matter was conducted by Special Agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Deputy Marshals with the United States Marshal’s Service.  The case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Jordan Ginsberg.

The New York Times’s Shaila Dewan, in her February 26 article “To Court Blacks, Foes of Abortion Make Racial Case,” put her foot in her mouth, metaphorically speaking, and illustrated years of MSM misinformation concerning blacks and abortion.

Her article starts out as a factual report on how “the largely white staff of Georgia Right to Life” – who cares what color they are, and what’s “largely” mean? – has enhanced its efforts to address the “high number of black women who undergo abortions.”

Then, at the 150-words mark, comes the first of her foot insertions.

Across the country, the anti-abortion movement, long viewed as almost exclusively white and Republican, is turning its attention to African-Americans and encouraging black abortion opponents across the country to become more active.

“Long-viewed” as a result of what image projection source?  Who has long promoted that view? (more…)

James O’Keefe still gets my vote for investigative journalist of the year.  Teaming with Hannah Giles to expose illegal and immoral tactics deep in the ACORN shakedown operation was brilliant.  Now, O’Keefe has one-upped himself with his exposure of an MSM drowning in its own leftist ideology.

American journalists once cheered for those among their own who were brave enough to risk jail in the quest of exposing corruption and malfeasance.  Yet when O’Keefe and his band of whippersnapper journalists went undercover, disguised as telephone repairmen in the hopes of exposing Senator Landrieu’s denying her own constituents phone access to her, the MSM fell all over themselves denouncing the young men.

Rush to judgment?  No.  It was a stampede.

From MSNBC, CBS, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, Talking Points Memo and others came shrill, utterly false headlines about “attempted bugging” and the “new Watergate,” which are now being corrected or retracted with but a faint whisper.  MSM “journalists” in high-and-mighty places haven’t had this much egg on their faces since their coffee-klatch therapy sessions over the misunderstood, “non-jihadist” Ft. Hood terror attack.

Bravo Mr. O’Keefe, honey! (more…)

Statement from Andrew Breitbart:

“We have no knowledge about or connection to any alleged acts and events involving James O’Keefe at Senator Mary Landrieu’s office.  We only just learned about the alleged incident this afternoon.  We have no information other than what has been reported publicly by the press.  Accordingly, we simply are not in a position to make any further comment.”

From the Associated Press:

A conservative activist who posed as a pimp to target the community-organizing group ACORN and the son of a federal prosecutor were among four people arrested by the FBI and accused of trying to interfere with phones at Sen. Mary Landrieu’s office.

Activist James O’Keefe, 25, was already in Landrieu’s New Orleans office Monday when Robert Flanagan and Joseph Basel, both 24, showed up claiming to be telephone repairmen, U.S. Attorney Jim Letten’s office said Tuesday. Letten says O’Keefe recorded the two with his cell phone.

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