Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), the decades-old media watchdog group whose condemnation of the NYTimes mis-reporting on the ACORN Pimp Hoax picked up on our detailed exposé here, and ultimately helped force the “paper of record” into a begrudging partial correction, has now picked up on our coverage earlier this week of ABC News’ Good Morning America host George Stephanopoulos’ and his near-verbatim use of the Times discredited reporting in his introduction to an interview with Rightwing hoaxsters James O’Keefe and Andrew Breitbart on Tuesday…
From FAIR’s Peter Hart last night:
James O’Keefe became a media sensation after he and a friend posed as a pimp and prostitute and secretly recoded ACORN workers giving them advice on how to cheat on their taxes.
As FAIR noted in an action alert to the New York Times, O’Keefe didn’t “pose” as a pimp–he didn’t wear his absurd “pimp” get-up when he went in to ACORN offices, and in almost every case he presented himself as a concerned boyfriend trying to get his girlfriend away from an abusive pimp. And he didn’t get any advice on how to “cheat” on his taxes. (Brad Friedman did the most thorough debunkings of these videos, and was on the case after the ABC interview).
What O’Keefe claimed happened during his visits to ACORN was not what actually happened…
…
Stephanopoulos later alluded to “critics” who argue that O’Keefe “revised reality for political gain.” The ABC host, on the other hand, said: “I have to give you credit for this, on ACORN, you did expose people doing things they shouldn’t do.”
Stephanopoulos was interrupted by Breitbart: “Is it legal to help set up a prostitution ring in every single office?”
That is also false.
But instead of challenging these inaccuracies, Stephanopoulos defended his own record: “I was one of the few, if not the only journalist, who actually asked President Obama about the ACORN case, so I hold no brief.”
And here’s FAIR’s key conclusion: “O’Keefe’s ACORN hoax lives on only because journalists like Stephanopoulos fail to challenge him.”
For the record, ABC has not responded to The BRAD BLOG’s request for comment or correction which we sent on Tuesday.
Good work Brad…you have almost single-handed busted this slander…against sloppy, lazy, unprofessional, biased MSM reporters with 1000s times more resources to research this.
Thank you, unconstested slander and lies lead to wrong actions and biasing of whole swaths of the country.
I would get annoyed when MSM would engage in the false equivalency of getting two people on either side of issue to talk, and do know research or fact checking of the claims of either side, like truth is unknowable. But now Stepha-no-brainos does not even bother to inteview any Acorn people were there…the EYE witnesses would not be hard to find, they are on youtube…including the Acorn staff that showed these yoyo’s the door, or staff who compassionately tried to help their fictionals sob story that did not include a pimp.
I used to think George was just plain stupid, which may be the case, but I think he is sincerely a conservative idiot or a paid shill. He probably suggest Dukakis get in that tank…he jumped ship on Clinton early etc…
Stephanopoulos is not a journalist. He is a TV personality and former political adviser with a BA in Political Science and a masters in theology.
In a way you are doing the same thing he does, you give him implied credibility as a journalist when he deserves none.
Maddow no, Olbermann no, Matthews no, Limbaugh, O’Reilly, Beck, Hannity, all no. None of the big talkers on TV are anything but opinionated loudmouths, even the ones you agree with.
Journalists are extinct and journalism is dead once Seymour Hersch and Matt Taibbi are gone. Who else is there from either side really getting us the story instead of just spinning it out on TV for our infotainment?
Gee, I wonder who is Stephenoupulos’s secret Santa Claus.
Sadly, even Taibbi caved, and did an anti-911-Truth hit piece on National Geographic, and guess who just bouht National Geographic? Yep, Murdoch. He sold his soul on that move, but I bet he got lots of money.
I totally agree that Stephanopoulos did a disservice by not telling the truth about the ACORN tapes. I am glad he is being held accountable for that, and I hope he offers a correction.
Also, Breitbart should not have been allowed to beat his chest and reassert what has proven to be a totally false narrative. He should have been checked on his pressing demand (and it was a demand) that the ACORN tapes show people assisting in funding a brothel.
That’s a cruel slander and clearly disproven lie.
Still, I do have to commend George and his team for airing the portion of the Census video which Okeefe had omitted from his own posting.
You could tell that papa smurf did NOT LIKE THAT AT ALL!!!!
And i did take a sort of satisfaction at watching james squirm around the issue of his own criminality.
(Those guys used to use the word “Criminal” like it was going out of style… But sadly, they cant say that anymore because james is… well, a convict. But it looks like they have opted for “corruption” as the new catch all.)
George also ought to be commended for hoisting out James’s own online diary regarding the incident at Rutgers. That kids was squirming like the like tape-worm he truly is!
None of this obviates the re-assertion of the proven lies regarding the ACORN tapes.
But the interview did piss James and Breitbart off… they didnt get the money-shot they had hoped for.
And (in terms of reaction) James and Andy themselves went up, down and all around the emotional fun-house. What Breitbart described as “a profile in media courage” that very morning became a hostile “sandbagging by MediaMatters” in less then a day!
Now that is absolutely precious. Karma can be a real artist sometimes.
Okeefe’s harangue about a great uprising of boring conservatives and angry wingers armed with cell-cameras and online video did intrigue me.
I mean, James and Breitbart advocate for a culture of perpetual serveillance… and not just of groups with government funding.
If his record is anything to go by, then its clear that James wants to target, monitor, record and subsequently malign any demographic he dislikes (gay people, minorities, teachers, nurses etc…)
He and Breitbart exhort fellow numb-skulls to join them in this task.
Here’s whats funny about that. Breitbart has become the very Big Brother he claims to fear.
He has become the mother on constant online surveillance and public smearing.
A nascent MiniTrue, to beat all the Orwellian cliches that plague our day and age.
A shame-based society more appropriate to Jonestown at its worst, and rediscovering all the grim tactics of the Witch Hammer.
Yes Andrew Breitbart… you ARE BIGGovernment.com.
Either the media can no longer tell it’s own lies from truth, or it just doesn’t care. The only thing it’s afraid of is dead air time. Any noise at all sells advertising time.
SreeBee said on 6/3/2010 @ 10:02 pm:
Yeah, but that’s what apes do, they beat their chest, and then throw poo.
wrt Stephanopolous:
He fit right in with the other tools present.
Jeebus H Rice! when is someone in MSM gonna call out these lying fools? They get on ABC for what? Being criminals, liars, reichwing chicken-little hate spewers? Freekin Snuffaluffagus has more connection to reality than Stephanopoulos. Stephacocculous infection now spreading thru the airwaves, Bradblog is the antibiotic that cures all…
Doesn’t he look like just like a ferret ?
The New Yorker’s Rebecca Mead recently repeated the anti-ACORN propaganda in her piece (“Rage Machine”) on Andrew Breitbart. She was more cautious and a bit more skeptical but the piece still stated:
Read more: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/05/24/100524fa_fact_mead#ixzz0q2HmSafC
More time and space the mass media are giving to the creep Breitbart.
Despicable. Do they undergo lobotomies before becoming public talking heads?