I don't really care about ACORN or the controversy, but her conclusions are ridiculous. I don't have the full tapes so I can't state what really happens. First, the shot of the shirt sleeve. Really, a freeze frame of a pinstripe shirt sleeve is conclusive? He's clearly wearing a suit in the first shots? Why is it so outrageous to this he has shirt sleeves? Let's see the rest of the video. Second, how would the two people or Fox News know that the ACORN employee called the police? That information was in the AG's report that just came out? All the information they had was that the guy was basically giving them advice of how to do this. How the heck are they supposed to know he called the police afterward? Third, the bank loans for prostitutes part. I blame the two kids for this one, but really I don't see why they edited this part. She's telling the lady to keep on being a prostitute and some bank will give in and give her a loan. I'd like to see the entire context of this part. At the very least, Fox should have asked for the unedited video, but come on, Maddow's blowing this out of proportion in my opinion and editing just as much. Maybe she's right, but you certainly can't tell from this piece. Facts still remain that these people were told how to get people over the border, and to keep looking for a loan as a prostitute who had hopes of setting up an underage prostitution ring.
IIRC - he admitted that he changed clothes and was not in the get-up during the interview some time ago. Uh, I don't even think in the EDITED video these "facts" are established.
Like I said, I haven't followed this controversy at all. I just don't think a shirt sleeve is any sort of conclusive proof. Aren't they talking about taking a large group of people across the border illegally? At any rate, Maddow is playing fast and loose with the tape, which we are not privy to, and given all of the problems Maddow lists at the end of the tape, I don't think it's any real injustice that ACORN was defunded. Maddow makes it seem as if these tapes are the only reason it happened. All journalists edit material like this though, so it's ironic when they get mad at each other for it. Heck Colbert and Stewart just wouldn't be as funny if they didn't edit.
uh... great point. How insightful of you. Man you are so witty. Nobody has heard anything of the like before. What a great comment.
Um, there's no conclusive proof that he was ever wearing the costume in the meeting either, and further I dont believe he ever claimed to have been. So other than that - what is the evidence that he was? It's incredibly unclear becuase the conversation is a voiceover. But anyway - YOU'RE talking about "taking a large group of people across the border illegally" - YOu just said it. That's a fact, right? Yeah, but Colbert and Stewart are joking and their fake interviews are not portrayed as real, and they aren't mentioned in congress, and they aren't reported to law enforcement. WHy do you think Jerry Brown was investigating? Do you think he started investigating the congressman that Colbert got do his "Better Know a District series" He got one guy to say that he loved hookers and coke - but it was obviously satire/humor. This wasn't humor though, it was the typical Fox news righteous indignation. And if there's one thing Sean Hannity and Fox don't do, it's humor.
I agree with you, I would not have even included that had I been Maddow, because this is the silly **** that some people will use to discount the entire video. Yes, this was the part where the ACORN employee got as much information as he could and then called the police because of the contents of that conversation. This is a documented fact. The ACORN employee went above and beyond, he could have said "I can't talk to you about this, dude," and left it at that, but he tried to get phone numbers, dates, and locations for the transaction so that he could do the responsible thing and turn the criminals over to police. The guy was fired as a result of the Faux "News" 'reporting.' So, the really juicy stuff must be in the pile that was left after both the left wing and right wing editors cut it? People were smeared and fired because of a hit piece that wasn't even remotely accurate. An agency whose purpose is helping poor people vote was shut down over a lie. I guess you are OK with that.
That's fine, like I said, if he has come out and said that after the fact then great. I don't really see how Fox was supposed to have knowledge of it at the time the videos first aired based off of a shirt sleeve. Maddow, IIRC, doesn't really challenge what they are talking about, she just says it is out of context because he asked innocuous follow up questions with the intent of reporting this to the authorities later. He is still giving them advice (even if it is in a playing along haha I'm going to call the cops on you later fashion), and I don't think that the two kids or Fox News would be able to have knowledge that he called the cops afterward. According to Maddow that info came out from AG's office after the fact. How would Fox or the kids know that, and know that the innocuous questions they edited would be used for calling the police? It doesn't make sense to pin that as inaccurate editing on their part, especially if he is "playing along" as they originally reported and Maddow does not discredit. That's a fair enough critique, but I would argue, especially in my experience with all the Obama drama at Notre Dame last year and seeing how certain facts would get distorted by none other than Robert Gibbs, that both sides will play fast and loose with the facts. I've also seen this in news interviews, even if it is not being done on purpose. It's just a natural part of editing a story down to make it manageable in a time frame. Now did Hannity and Beck go to far? It's quite obvious they did and do quite often. But Maddow's own piece here shows that the other side does it as well. Let's not act like there are a lot of sets of clean hands and pure and pristine reporters in the journalism business. Even NPR, who I think makes a conscious effort to try and take out bias, is biased.
If people were fired and an agency defunded on the sole basis of an openly agendad guerrilla filmmaker's hit piece, then that doesn't speak well for the ones doing the firing, or who drafted and passed the defunding legislation. Or the president who signed it. I'm not the least bit surprised the video was misleading. But I'm not quite willing to embrace Maddow's version of it either.
twhy77, you're continued inability to acknowledge the fraud that was perpetrated by this guy and Fox only reinforces the perception that truth does not matter to Republicans.
You mean my attempt to say, let's see the whole tape because this hasn't proven anything too damning? She presents 3 pieces of evidence a) a shirt sleeve b) follow up questions that were edited and c) a line of questioning that did not correspond to answers given and is completely out of context even in Maddow's presentation of the facts. If anything c) is the most dishonest, but I'd really like to see the whole tape before stating that it is fraudulent and harmful. I've placed blame, if anywhere, on the two who made the videos, and I don't really see how Fox did anything purposely deceitful from this evidence. I'm sorry it doesn't match up with Maddow's interpretation, but go ahead and label me a Republican who doesn't care about truth. Heck all I'm trying to do in my post is get to the truth.
Are you saying that they should be able to basically grab any ole tape/etc from any old source and pump it up without doing any Due dilligence and fact checking? Rocket River
Not necessarily. I'm saying in this instance, the only evidence they had from the tape that he was not wearing the pimp suit is a pinstriped sleeve. There's no way from that little shred of evidence they could have known he was not wearing the suit. On the police call, there's no way either of them knew that the police were called, or that those questions were being used to report their activities to the police after the fact, that information came out only afterward. On the third one, they could have asked for the tapes to put the whole conversation in context, but even then I don't think they would have been crazy to show the unedited tapes to show an ACORN worker giving advice to a prostitute on how to keep fighting "the man" to obtain a loan when she is running an illegal operation. Based off of the evidence Maddow presents I don't think you can say they were up to anything malicious. It would be nice to see the whole tape though.
Well, as Fox's part goes, if you want to be taken seriously as a real news org, I'd demand to see the full tape and check it rather than run with the clearly edited video 24/7 from a dude like Breitbart. and blast it into the echo chamber for repeated public consumption as the right wing meme of the month. Reason #38923 why Fox doesn't comport with ordinary standards. Not that that's really the subject here. Actually that story came out rather quickly after the fact - evne the edited video was incredibly unclear what if anything the guy said at all. I mean it was obvious to me at least that the questions were in voiceover and there was no context provided, shouldn't that be a MASSSIVE read flag that there are probably something fuzzy going on? Don't ask me on this, ask Proskauer Rose: http://www.proskauer.com/files/uploads/report2.pdf I don't really see it at all here - can you identify one dubious fact? I mean her whole piece was pretty much a rebuttal based on the AG's report, rather than any positive claims on her part? I dont' really even watch/listen to Maddow btw. But anyway, if you're telling me the same systematic distortion occurs at other networks occurs at Fox, and occurs in the opposite direction, there's a difference of degree and kind here that is a discussion for another day. The "other side does it too" defense really doesn't make any sense in this context.
Here's the full, unedited tapes from California: San Diego, Los Angeles and San Bernardino, which Rachel Maddow based her piece on. http://ag.ca.gov/newsalerts/multimedia/index.php The biggest difference in how Maddow, Colbert or Stewart carefully take things out of context is that they base their findings on publicly available video, that can be fact checked by anyone with a laptop and the internet. Certainly ACORN was not blameless, but now that you have the real story, I would find it extremely hard that you would still defend Fox "News's" conduct regarding the edited tape.
Maddow doesn't bring up the encounter at the beginning of the below video, which I believe is the main one that was shown on Fox. I don't think a few seemingly wrongly or mistakenly edited video segments can or should explain away the entire ordeal. Too bad for Fox for any errors, intentional or otherwise, it's a shame either way. <object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/9UOL9Jh61S8&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/9UOL9Jh61S8&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>
