Strictly Right

When the James O’Keefe story originally broke, it seemed pretty cut-and-dried that he was guilty of orchestrating a plot to tap the phone lines of Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA.) For those who don’t remember, O’Keefe was the fake pimp-turned-investigative journalist who, with the help of Hannah Giles, broke the famous ACORN story last year with hidden cameras. This current feat of his sounds a bit fishy though, regardless of what the truth is, that’s currently unknown.

O’Keefe released a statement via Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment this morning saying:

[...] I learned from a number of sources that many of Senator Landrieu’s constituents were having trouble getting through to her office to tell her that they didn’t want her taking millions of federal dollars in exchange for her vote on the healthcare bill.  When asked about this, Senator Landrieu’s explanation was that, “Our lines have been jammed for weeks.”  I decided to investigate why a representative of the people would be out of touch with her constituents for “weeks” because her phones were broken.  In investigating this matter, we decided to visit Senator Landrieu’s district office – the people’s office – to ask the staff if their phones were working. [...] The sole intent of our investigation was to determine whether or not Senator Landrieu was purposely trying to avoid constituents who were calling to register their views to her as their Senator.

Furthermore, he alleged that:

MSNBC falsely claimed that I violated a non-existent “gag order.”  The Associated Press incorrectly reported that I “broke in” to an office which is open to the public.  The Washington Post has now had to print corrections in two stories on me.  And these are just a few examples of inaccurate and false reporting.

Admittedly I’ve never been a fan of O’Keefe. I thought what he did with ACORN was great…but as a person I was never too fond of him for unknown reasons (just a hunch.) Regardless, this story still reeks of contradictions. In looking at the couple of hundred comments below his statement, the majority of people are pledging their support for him, wishing him the best in his defense, etc. One person even said: “Thanks for clearing this up James. It all makes sense now.” To me, this reeks of “blind followers” syndrome. I’m never one to defend a Democratic Senator or MSNBC for that matter, but I still think that O’Keefe’s version of the story is fairly farfetched, especially given the admissions made by he and his cohorts, and the testimony of the FBI spokesman.

I’ll be keeping a close eye on this and be keeping you updated here and via Twitter. But people, don’t feel you’re turning your back on the conservative cause by acknowledging that there’s a likely possibility that O’Keefe and friends are guilty. Don’t base your entire opinion of the story on his statement that was released after the evidence came out against him.