Breitbart's Big Government concedes ACORN broke no laws
December 08, 2009 10:24 am ET by Eric Boehlert
Yikes, talk about veering off-message from the right-wing ACORN crusade.
Monday's agreed response to the internal investigation released by ACORN, which found no pattern of intentional lawbreaking in the wake of the pimp-and-prostitute ring, was to openly mock it as being absurd. ACORN obsessed Andrew Breirtbart (aka, Capt. Ahab) once again declared that, "ACORN is a corrupt and criminal organization, and anyone with open eyes can see this."
But check out this from Big Government's Michael Volpe [emphasis added]:
ACORN did in fact engage in no criminal wrongdoing by offering advice to a “pimp” and “prostitute” about how to hide assets and their business practices. Simply offering such advice is not illegal.
I'm glad Breitbart's Big Government finally agrees that ACORN broke no laws in the pimp-and-prostitute videos. Now that that's been settled, maybe Breirtbart can remind us what all the right-wing hysteria is about.
UPDATED: Very interesting note from TPM's Josh Marshall:
You may have heard that an independent report found that there was "no pattern of intentional, illegal conduct by ACORN." But what they also found was that not only were the videos substantially edited but that the editing also involved substitute voiceovers of the faux pimp and hooker who made the videos. So it's not really possible to see what the ACORN staffers were responding to.
Question: Why won't Breitbart, in the name of transparency and full disclosure, force his undercover video makers to post all their ACORN film online, unedited? What is Breitbart hiding? And why won't he detail how much of the ACORN tapes were edited and doctored?
The Van Jones episode and the ACORN episode just shows the weakness of libs in this country and how conservatives feel they can just continue to bully and falsify their way back to power.
Talk about silly questions. Why do you think they won't post all the undedited videos, etc?
You don't think it would be because the whole "helping set up an underage, illegal alien, prositution ring" meme would turn out to be possibly false?
Maybe the fact that they probably broke the law in the first place, by video taping without consent, and also edited the tapes might look bad?
Naw, that couldn't be it.
"It's the end of the world, as we know it."
Boehlert was too busy editing the quotes to read the article he links to...or he would have found the answer to his question.
-- It's not about whether or not the behavior on the videos is or is not technically legal. It's about what it says about an organization when a "pimp" and "prostitute" can so routinely walk into just about any office and be offered advice that the advisor knows is illegal if implemented. That reality is barely acknowledged and not really addressed. --
This is really weak chili.
So, let me see if I understand this.
If someone were to walk up to you and present you with a situation that you may, or may not, believe, and you gave them advice, of some kind. Later, you find out that not only did they video tape you, without your knowledge but; they also edited the tape to make you look bad, regardless of your actual response, that it would be OK because it shows what kind of person you are???
This is not about a generic situation...it's specifically about pimps and prostitutes...and the willingness of ACORN to give them an audience rather than promptly show them the door...but I digress.
My point is not about the actions of Acorn...it's about the clipping of quotes by Boehlert. He knew darn well what the rest of the quote said...but he chose to act like it wasn't there to take a snarky and dishonest poke at his political enemy.
Proving that mmfa is no better than those that they rail against for shabby partisan quote-mining...when they pull a Hannityesque attempt at journalism.
Is it? Until I see some tapes that were not clearly edited in Daily Show fasion to be a joke I refuse to accept this nonsense as fact. It is obvious to any discerning viewer that all the worst questions are asked off camera. This may just be a coincidence, but I will only believe that when I see some tapes that were not edited into a joke. Until then, this is all just nonsense for the nutjobs.
This is the same issue with "Cimategate". Someone stole the emails, and now they are being used to discredit the people at CRU.
What is someone decides they don't like you or your business/oranization. Is it OK then for them to misrepresent themselves or the hack your email. Just because the shoe is on the other foot doesn't make it any different.
I mean, who are you to judge? Have you ever worked in a homeless shelter or a food bank? Do you know that prostitutes DO come in? Do you know that you cant judge them, even if you want to? Whether you are helping in a church soup-kitchen, or an NSO, or a community service organization, you cant judge people who's lives might be far more desperate than yours. You cant say they deserve less.
I think Mike Stark put it best in his article for the Huffington Post (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mike-stark/all-you-need-to-know-abou_b_330643.html):
"Look, the ACORN personnel aren't blameless. Some did and said some pretty stupid things and deserved to be fired. But the world in which they work is vastly different from the world most readers of this blog post recognize. CNN, Desperate Housewives, even The Wire aren't going to begin to convey the social chaos that defines the neighborhoods ACORN often serves.
Breitbart and his crew would have you believe that the ACORN staffers should have called the police when confronted with a prostitute.
I hope the staffers, at first, were celebrating. It's not often you see a prostitute assert control over her life and try to break free from a pimp. The idea that this one was trying to take a whole crew of vulnerable underage women with her must have been amazing"
Stark is making a very solid point here. Have some humility for goodness sakes!
And, since the tape was so edited with voiceovers that "it's not really possible to see what the ACORN staffers were responding to", how do we know what they really spoke to the ACORN staffers about?
Let's see the complete unedited tapes and then decide if the right-wing hysteria was justified.
I'll wait patiently.