Elements Of NPR Gotcha Video Taken Out Of Context

[G_j]

http://m.npr.org/programs/all/3/134525412

Elements Of NPR Gotcha Video Taken Out Of Context
Published: March 14, 2011

by David Folkenflik

Footage posted online last week by conservative activist James O'Keefe III captured NPR's chief fundraising official, Ron Schiller, disparaging conservatives and the Tea Party and saying NPR would be better off without federal funding.

Fueled in part by the attention given the video by the conservative Daily Caller website, an 11 1/2-minute version of O'Keefe's hidden camera video ricocheted around the blogosphere Tuesday.

It mortified NPR, which swiftly repudiated Schiller's remarks and in short order triggered his ouster along with that of his boss, NPR CEO Vivian Schiller, who is no relation to Ron Schiller.

A closer review of those tapes, however, shows that many of Ron Schiller's most provocative remarks were presented in a misleading way.

'There Are Two Ways To Lie'

O'Keefe's tapes show Ron Schiller and his deputy, Betsy Liley, at an upscale cafe in Georgetown for lunch in February. They meet with two men posing as officials with an Islamic trust. The men are actually O'Keefe's associates — citizen journalists, he calls them.

O'Keefe also posted a two-hour tape that he said was the

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[Botany]

1. How many times will the media play up an O'Keefe / Breitbart scam?

They are crooks who get Koch type money to stir up shit.

[gratuitous]

3. How many times will this boy cry "Wolf" and laugh?

Where does ACORN go to get restarted? Where do Shirley Sherrod, Ron Schiller, and Vivian Schiller go to get back their jobs and reputations? Is attempting to tamper with a Senator's phone lines now considered just part of playing the political game? In what realm is it acceptable to try to lure a reporter (Abbie Boudreau) into a compromising situation that would have cost her her job had it been successful?

James O'Keefe and his sugar daddy Andrew Breitbart are admitted and proven liars. Yet, every time they raise a stink, media people who should know better rush to congregate and pronounce the aroma the most pleasing they've ever inhaled. I sent an e-mail to Weekend Edition's Liane Hansen. She had a segment this weekend with some more of the information, and admitted in her introduction that hers was one of the voices raised against Ron Schiller. She stopped short, however, of a full admission that she had been fooled and had rushed to judgment based on O'Keefe's word. I scolded her for that, did a brief recap of Mr. O'Keefe's illustrious career of prevaricating for fun and profit, and finished by asking when O'Keefe will finally lose credibility.

[Botany]

5. In what world does James O'Keefe think he can seduce Abbie Boudreau?

I have little doubt that O'Keefe had some kind of date rape drug on the boat he wanted to
bring CNN's Abbie Boudreau to ...... I am living for the day when both Breitbart and O'Keefe
face civil and criminal sanctions.

BTW even out of context the NPR comments were spot on some of the teabaggers are racist gun nuts
because they (t-baggers) never lined up to cheer Bill Clinton when he left a surplus but now they
are all upset about "Obama's debt" (even though he did not cause it) ..... please.

Nice note to NPR.

[G_j]

10. ZERO credibility

but hey.....

:shrug:

[bullwinkle428]

2. It's become increasingly apparent that this entire set-up was just "Shirley Sherrod Part Deux"!

Can't believe how many otherwise intelligent people got sucked into buying into this hook, line, and sinker! :banghead:

[KharmaTrain]

4. It Still Doesn't Matter...NPR Is Its Own Worst Enemy

The right wing and its corporate media toadies were looking for something/anything to make NPR look both "librul" and arrogant and they got exactly what they wanted. Be damned if it was another O'Queef hatchet job...the others were and they still were played to serve its masters purposes. The Mighty Wurlitzer has been fine-tuned and knows that a lie makes it around the world while the truth is putting on its pants. The fact that this was a fundraiser who spoke freely (I guess opinions aren't permitted) and not either an NPR official or something that was said publicly or on the air means nothing...the deed was done with an able assist from a highly defensive NPR.

The Breitbarts and O'Keefes will continue to pull this shit as they know there's an audience (and television network) out there that will run with it like its real news. It will take someone pressing a big dollar lawsuit against these shitstains or O'Keefe once again "feeling his oats" and doing something stupid that ends him up in the grey bar hotel.

In the meantime NPR has done itself little good by "catering" to those who seek its destruction. This is about grabbing those big signals and "privitizing" them to GOTB-friendly religious broadcasters...

[Blue Owl]

6. Koch-ie Roberts, tell us again how strong the Republicans are...

n/t

[G_j]

11. I agree

kissing RW ass seems to be the norm these days.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

7. I'm shocked. SHOCKED!

You mean an O'Keefe/Breitbart video is intententionally skewed out of context, and people overreact before learning the actual context of the statements?

I personally don't believe it.

Never would happen. Never. Not in a million years.

**Cough Cough ACORN Cough Cough Shirley Sherrod Cough Cough**

Sorry, I had a fraud stuck in my throat.

Although to be honest, even in the originally understood context, I don't think there was anything out there that didn't actually reflect the truth regarding the tea partiers.

[cordelia]

8. rec

[Godhumor]

9. I take comfort from the fact that people have been expressing regret in airing his crap without

vetting it.

Sounds like he didn't just edit but butcher the 2 hour meeting with moving dialogue around, leaving parts of exchanges out, etc.

His pony is quickly dying though. He'll still get attention, but every release brings with it more criticism and more people looking at his work with a jaundiced eye. It is only a matter of time before someone hits him with a hefty libel suit.

[Aerows]

12. Say it isn't so! ::Clutches pearls::

[G_j]

13. more:

http://m.npr.org/story/134528545

Published: March 14, 2011

by Mark Memmott

One "big warning flag" Tompkins saw in the shorter tape was the way it made it appear that Schiller had laughed and commented "really, that's what they said?" after being told that the fake Muslim group advocates for sharia law. In fact, the longer tape shows that Schiller made that comment during an "innocuous exchange" that had nothing to do with the supposed group's position on sharia law, David reports.

Tompkins also says that O'Keefe's edited tape ignores the fact that Schiller said "six times ... over and over and over again" that donors cannot buy the kind of coverage they want on NPR.

Scott Baker, editor in chief of the conservative news site The Blaze, tells David that after watching the two-hour video he came away with the impression that the NPR executives "seem to be fairly balanced people."

NPR spokeswoman Dana Davis Rehm told David late yesterday that O'Keefe "inappropriately edited the videos with an intent to discredit" NPR. Still, she added, Schiller made some "egregious statements."

As we said yesterday, those included Schiller calling the Tea Party a "weird evangelical" movement that has helped push the "current Republican Party" to become "fanatically involved in people's personal lives."

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