The NYT puts the ACORN story in context:
Conservative advocates and broadcasters were gleeful about the success of the tactics in exposing Acorn workers...
The Acorn controversy came a week after the resignation of Van Jones, a White House environmental official attacked by conservatives, led by Glenn Beck of Fox News Channel, for once signing a petition suggesting that Bush administration officials might have deliberately permitted the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
There was more than that to the Van Jones story!
Even before Mr. Jones stepped down, Mr. Beck had sent a message to supporters on Twitter urging them to “find everything you can” on three other Obama appointees.
Conservatives believe that they have hit upon a winning formula for such attacks: mobilizing people to dig up dirt, trumpeting it on talk radio and television, prompting Congress to weigh in and demanding action from the Obama administration.
Conservatives came up with that? It's almost as if they could come up with a list of tricky
rules for advancing their cause, something like
pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions. (This is cruel, but very effective. Direct, personalized criticism and ridicule works.)
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I guess the NYT doesn't seem to care that Van Jones actually did the things he was accused of and that ACORN was caught red-handed. As well, the administration threw both under the bus. Instead, it's all a nefarious plot by those evil conservatives who have seemed to figure out how to operate a video camera and use Google.
Imagine how little you would know if not for the Internet. It came a long just in time. Makes me believe God rather than Gore invented it.
In marginal fairness to the New York Times, this could as easily have arisen from ignorance as malice.
Of course it doesn't say much if their political reporter is so myopic as to not recognize Alinsky tactics when he sees them, and even more to believe that these tactics are somehow new.
I forget now, didn't a famous first lady write her senior thesis on Alinsky?
Oh yeah, that was Hillary- my bad.
So, the press has no problem being scooped, massively, by new start-ups?
I bet ignoring possible rivals is a solid plan. I mean, ignoring FNC worked out GREAT for CNN, didn't it?
WV: gotest --- a demand by Althouse for her students
“Digital gumshoe” doesn’t have the same élan as “digital brownshirt.”
It's almost like conservatives are doing investigative journalism.
Personally I'd rather have rational debate of issues, but show me a liberal public figure or publication who is willing to that in 2009.
Though the other characteristic of the liberal mode of discourse (ignor and snark) should still be avoided by conservatives.
It's reports like this which make the mainstream media sound naive. If they want to say they are producing premium content they need to be better informed on the issues. When a huge number of people read your article and immediately see glaring omissions there is obviously a systemic failure at your paper, from reporters to editors.
Let me fix this for the NY Times:
"the fecking conservatives have decided to play the same game that has been effective for liberals these past 40 years..."
Can one infer, then, that the NYT supports Trooferism and the whoring out of children?
WV: wingt--what the Times does daily.
@NewYork
I agree with you. No reason we can't start that trend here. My proposed edits:
Personally I'd rather have rational debate of issues, but show me a public figure or publication who is willing to that in 2009.
Though the other characteristic of the common mode of discourse (ignore and snark) should still be avoided.
My local paper ran an OPed today by R. Danielle Egan, Associate Professor of Gender and Sexuality Studies at St. Lawrence University.
Prof. Egan claimed "I reached my personal tipping point" when Joe Wilson yelled at Obama. Prof. Egan then "decided it's time that what I've been watching be called what it is:racism".
The country is woefully divided, no? The folks who want less govt vs. those who want more govt. and the NYT vs. blogs & Fox News.
It is okay when guys like Bill Ayers and Bernadette Dohrn promote such Alinsky tactics to their cronies in their Chicago salon...but not so much when conservatives start turning it against them.
We're all community organizers now.
The democrats have been doing this for years. don't pay attention to the conduct exposed, look at those evil republicans who exposed it. Linda Tripp was called a backstabber, etc. Ken Starr was a pervert.
And really? Like democrats haven't been doing the full alinsky (and Lewinsky) for years.
I don't know why trumpeting gets all the good press.
There's drumming and harping, just to name two I can think of in the orchestra of tropes.
"Prof. Egan then "decided it's time that what I've been watching be called what it is:racism"."
And of course this is all in conservative's imagination. No body is calling dissent racism, nope, nope, nope.
"It doesn't matter what I write on this sign. You'll call it racism." The sign at the rally was 100% right. We can not escape the color of Obama's skin. It is the MOST IMPORTANT THING ABOUT HIM.
"We're all community organizers now."
:-P
Why is it that when those on the left go down, it was "conservatives got them" - especially talk radio?
Did I miss the front page articles on how "liberals" were constantly behind the drumbeats and efforts to investigate and derail Republicans?
Start the list:
∙ "Torture" in the war on terror
∙ Albero Gonzalez and the firing of US Attorneys
. . . and a couple of hundred others where the "liberals" were the ones pushing the story.
I'd be totally surprised to find such an article on the front page of the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, Newsweek, Los Angeles Times, ABC News, CBS News, NBC News . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..
Now, why do you think that is?
Rush's line of attack is that Obama is not as stupid as he puts on.
Obama means to inflict the damage he's inflicting.
I don't know that conservatives have quite adopted the whole bag of liberal tricks.
But it's possible I just haven't heard of the government employees who dug through protected government records for the dirt on private *liberal* citizens who offended a public official.
The crack conservative investigative unit dressed like they were going to a "Pimps 'n' Hos" party. These getups might have accounted for the lack of outrage from the Acornians.
For those who want to run their own sting, I recommend this supplier:
http://pimpdaddy.com/
"The country is woefully divided, no? The folks who want less govt vs. those who want more govt. and the NYT vs. blogs & Fox News."
We can't even agree on what facts are. We spend far too much time fighting for it's own sake, rather than following the truth to it's conclusion. People would usually rather win than follow the truth where they don't want to go.
I'm not sure which came first, this common practice in discourse or the adversarial legal system, but they suffer from the same weakness, where we cannot admit being wrong, even when we know we are.
WV: restt, I wish we could.
The NYTimes is mightily miffed that the news is no longer shaped by the whim of it's Sulzberger Family but by everyday Americans telling other Americans what they think the news is, and what the NYTimes ignores these days to favor their Democrats, ACLU, and Black Messiah.
Only to be then scooped by the likes of the National Enquirer (the NYTimes John Edwards baby coverup), Glen Beck, and two 20-somethings posing as a prostitute and her pimp needing valuable ACORN advice on how to duck the law.
I think one of the reasons the NYT is getting so much criticism for this article, and others like it, is because Conservatives are the ones who broke the story; they feel ownership for it and want to see their version of it reported.
@New York, but snark is so much fun! I just don't see why liberals should be the only people allowed to have fun. I think that liberals should be encouraged to look into the abyss.
"Dissent is the highest form of racism." ~ Mark Steyn
Imagine how little you would know if not for the Internet. It came a long just in time. Makes me believe God rather than Gore invented it.
Amen.
How pathetic can the NTY get?
A supposedly journalistic entity complaining about good investigative journalism being practiced. Truly pathetic.
FLS
Ah, so you got your orders from above: pretend they were just playing along. Well, sure, but then... why did they fire 4 women from acorn if it was all bogus.
Mind you, I fully concede the point that you would have to be a blithering idiot to believe the guy was a real pimp if he was dressed in that getup during the actual sting videos. But just because the sting requires these acorn people to be stupid to work doesn’t mean it didn’t, you know, work. I mean has it occurred to you that these Acorn people are just stupid?
And its not clear from the videos I have seen that the guy really dressed that badly. I suspect from the images I have seen that is just them goofing around when posing, but when they do the hidden camera, they are wearing more believable outfits (i.e. not dressing like snoop dogg mated with Huggy Bear).
The fact is that these people don’t even blink or express doubt as the reporters’ stories become more and more appalling. I mean you would think liberals that even if liberals were okay with brothels, human trafficking, etc. that they would at least be made that Acorn doesn’t believe in the child labor laws. I mean that is new deal legislation which is supposed to be so sacred that Bruce Ackerman is claiming it is part of the “constitution” without formal amendment! And they openly give the advice how to skirt these laws, in the presence of others, which implies that they know that what they are saying and doing is perfectly okay.
Seriously, FLS, child prostitution, and you are defending them? Do you believe in anything at all, besides “the democratic party, right or wrong?” if only we could get you to love your country so much.
""... mobilizing people to dig up dirt, trumpeting it on talk radio and television, prompting Congress to weigh in and demanding action...""
What exactly is wrong with that? They are talking about exposing a disgusting criminal organization that is violating nearly all of everyone's principles and getting billions from our tax dollars to do it.
If there is not good cause to do this to ACORN, then who?
Oh yea, the Boy Scouts, never mind.
"Of course it doesn't say much if their political reporter is so myopic as to not recognize Alinsky tactics when he sees them, and even more to believe that these tactics are somehow new."
The article does mention Alinsky (in a quote from O'Keefe) but doesn't acknowledge that these tactics came from the left.
The medium is the message.
It's amazing what video will do. Acorn has been indicted all over the country, there have been numerous reports of there abuses and fraud, especially pertaining to elections, a supposedly sacred process. All to no effect whatsoever.
One video is all it took to send them into the crapper.
Note to self: Get Kodak Flip camera and carry it with me wherever I go.
Aaron,
I do not see fls as anti-American. Though I disagree with his stands on issues most of the time, I believe that writes sincerely. He also occasionally wittily skewers the left's silliness.
Though I can't speak for him, I sense that fls believes that the conservative viewpoint is pretty much always well enough represented in comments on Althouse, freeing him to make his points for the other side without the need to point out any items of agreement.
I will say though, that I would like to see fls acknowledge that ACORN - regardless of the intent or goodness of it's "mission" - is rife with morally challenged ideologues and incompetent top-level management.
is rife with morally challenged ideologues and incompetent top-level management.
I meant ACORN, not Congress.
"The country is woefully divided, no? The folks who want less govt vs. those who want more govt."
That should read, "Racists vs. those who want more govt."
Get with the narrative.
Yes, the NYT's context for a story like this is predictable. Glad we weren't disappointed.
The wonder of posts like this is the premise that the NYT is (or is supposed to be) something other than what it's always been. Of course its editors view the world from a lefty perspective; of course its reporters have internalized that perspective and consistently see the world that way. It has always been thus, and (until it folds or the Mexican zillionaire finally ousts Pinch & Friends) thus it will always be.
Not everything in the NYT is written with a political slant. But the pieces that are will invariably (OK, an occasional exception) always have the same slant. Lefty and Dem = centrist, smart and responsible (with a subtext of generosity and highmindedness); conservative and Rep = dumb, radical and retrograde (with a subtext of bigotry and smallmindedness). Since that reality is going to hit you in the face every time you look at the NYT, I don't get the tone of surprise and disappointment and a bit of aha! here.
Victim politics is being shown for what it really is: reverse racism. Obama and his allies have triggered events likely to set race relations in America back for at least a generation.
What they've done is quite effectively make African-American skin color a very convenient proxy for the most radical sort of America-hating, re-distributionist politics imaginable.
The deep cultural rot within the African-American community has been revealed. That's why conservative blacks -- Sowell, Williams, Parker et al. -- are called "oreos" and far worse. They reject the rot.
In my own business I'd hire a black from Africa or the Caribbean in a moment, but it's now highly unlikely I'd ever hire an African-American. I don't need the bad attitudes recently revealed in all their toxicity.
It's not about race, it's about culture, and it's gonna take us a depressingly long time to figure that one out, let alone correct it.
So thanks to Obama and his allies for clarifying the real problem.
"And its not clear from the videos I have seen that the guy really dressed that badly. I suspect from the images I have seen that is just them goofing around when posing, but when they do the hidden camera, they are wearing more believable outfits (i.e. not dressing like snoop dogg mated with Huggy Bear)."
I assumed that if they had that coat along it was "hers" even if he carried it for her. The cane maybe got left in the car?
I don't know where he had the camera.
Since he was presenting himself as a person with political ambitions at a couple of the places, he might have been wearing the suit.
Hannah was dressed like a television show prostitute but not *too* far over the top.
And really, isn't this what "investigative reporters" are supposed to be doing? Digging stuff up?
Most of the reaction I've seen to the last "I planned and shot my husband in cold blood" lady is that she's so over the top that she well might have been lying, as some people do, to make herself seem more interesting. There were people over at Ace of Spades trying to find out if she even had a husband and if he is dead. Last I saw, they found she has one ex who has a restraining order out on her and... yes... a dead ex... but no information on how he died. They found one arrest a couple of years after his death but no information on what it was for.
The information needs confirming, of course. But is this "digging dirt?" Or is it people not taking for granted what they're told and fact checking?
Isn't this what the NYT is supposed to be doing?
The New York Times is shocked - shocked! - that there is gamesmanship going on in big-time politics.
Apparently this was too much even for Jon Stewart. His clip on the sting was a pretty big indictment of the major media. As he put it "I'm a FAKE journalist and I'm embarrassed to be scooped by these guys! Wake up!"
It was a pretty good bit. It acknowledged the normal bias of the show, while conceding "okay, this time you've got a point!".
From the NYT article AA and her equally aware fans are complaining blatantly omitted referencing Alinsky as the originator of such methods through ignorance or deceit in "typical leftist media" fashion:
"In an account of their escapades on BigGovernment.com, Mr. O’Keefe delights in quoting Saul Alinsky, the Chicago leftist who was considered the father of community organizing of the kind that Acorn performs. He explains how he and Ms. Giles, a 20-year-old college student, chose their methods."
And I haven't even had my coffee yet.
For me, the big story about ACORN has always been that they receive huge amounts of government money, while engaging in partisan political activity (ie: their "voter registration drives" are targeted at overwhelmingly Democratic demographics).
Let me be the first to say it:
The CHICKENS have come HOME to ROOST!
From the NYT article AA and her equally aware fans are complaining blatantly omitted referencing Alinsky as the originator of such methods through ignorance or deceit in "typical leftist media" fashion:
Tonejunkie, Althouse actually pointed out, in her reply to me, that Althouse was mentioned. And neither of us said the words you have in quotation marks.
Addendum to above. The worst thing about this story is that, rather than being about the rather monstrous crime ACORN is shown to be willing to abet (repeatedly!), it's about Conservative glee in one-upmanship.
Partisanship aside, the world is better off knowing the kinds of things ACORN is willing to let slide, so we can quite funding them, quit pretending they are fair players in our political system. Those kinds of truths always get uncovered by people with an axe to grind. Your friends don't look that hard. The people who tirelessly pursured the K Street lobbyist connections were not doing it to help Republicans, they were doing it because they hated Republicans (which is also why they let Democratic ties slide). But even so, it was a truth that needed to get out.
As much as the New York Times would like it to be, this story is not about how a group of extremists have stopped a good organization that occasionally made a few missteps. This isn't about Conservative scalphunting. This is about a huge, government funded organization, that is willing to aid and abet in monstrous criminality.
The left's biggest problem is with rule number 4:
"Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules"
It appears that Republicans finally gave up and figured out that survival necessitates living by the Democrat's book of rules instead.
And addendum to above: "story" in the first paragraph refers to this specific news article. "story" in the third paragraph refers to the whole sting/ACORN debauchery activity as a whole, specifically how it relates to a journalistic narrative.
Chase
I wasn't saying he wasn't a patriot. i was saying that he probably doesn't take a "my country right or wrong" attitude about america, and wondering why he does seem to have this attitude when it comes to his party.
I personally don't devote myself to anything to that level "my country/party right or wrong." when i think america is doing wrong, i say it, and wouldn't impugn anyone's patriotism merely because they criticize it, although i am willing to call a person out when they are not fair to america and americans, especially our soldiers.
The best explanation of "my country, right or wrong" that I have seen was an analogy... how do you love your husband or wife or your child?
You love them even when they are wrong.
You don't spend all of your effort picking every single last thing to criticize and making sure it is rubbed in their face. You most especially do not constantly bring up past offenses.
You look for things to appreciate and praise, knowing that lifting them up will help them do more things well in the future.
If they're wrong, you tell them and try to make it right, but you love them and you don't sweat the small stuff.
And you're partisan. You don't view your spouse and kids as interchangeable with others or no better than others.
Synova, that is a wonderful analogy, and beautifully explained. Good on you.
the big story about ACORN has always been that they receive huge amounts of government money, while engaging in partisan political activity (ie: their "voter registration drives" are targeted at overwhelmingly Democratic demographics).
So your problem is that ACORN doesn't do enough outreach to the gated communities? They should set up voter registration programs at country clubs? What about equestrian competitions and polo matches?
FLS, that is a stupid analogy, and inelegantly explained. Bad on you.
Gosh, digging up dirt on your political opposition and using the partisan press to disseminate it.
What a novel idea; that's never been done in the history of multi-party democracy.
The left says, "Hey Conservatives, You Lie!!!" really? Do you need to see and hear the video/audio again?
FLS
Notice you can't defend your indefensible support for Acorn.
> So your problem is that ACORN doesn't do enough outreach to the gated communities? They should set up voter registration programs at country clubs? What about equestrian competitions and polo matches?
Mmm, i suspect you would find more liberals than conservatives there.
Would this be one of those times when "The chickens are coming home to roost." would be appropriate?
wv = badomi
Bad on me? ;-)
Salamandyr,
Althouse said:
The article does mention Alinsky (in a quote from O'Keefe) but doesn't acknowledge that these tactics came from the left.
Wrong. Maybe not explicitly, but implicitly it does acknowledge it because it shows O'Keefe to be the successful protaganist which lends truth and accuracy to his account of his tactics as well, including his appreciating the irony of quoting Alinsky whom the article clearly identified as a leftist. Here it is again:
"In an account of their escapades on BigGovernment.com, Mr. O’Keefe delights in quoting Saul Alinsky, the Chicago leftist who was considered the father of community organizing of the kind that Acorn performs. He explains how he and Ms. Giles, a 20-year-old college student, chose their methods."
Why else would he delight in quoting Alinsky and why would the NYT tell us that?
And you went on to say:
And neither of us said the words you have in quotation marks.
Please. True technically, but complete BS regarding the actual meaning. This whole thread is you guys whining about "typical leftist media." As if you're not. Come on.
fls wrote (12:37): So your problem is that ACORN ... should set up voter registration programs at country clubs? What about equestrian competitions and polo matches?
It only seems fair that they should do something to balance their registration drives among Disney characters and at cemeteries.
FLS,
Btw, the organization has just thrown you under the bus. they just suspended operations. that is at big government. So all you liberal weenies pretending they didn't have a serious problem, you have just been thrown under the bus.
[looks under the bus] wow it is pretty crowded there.
The New York Times opined:
"Conservatives believe that they have hit upon a winning formula for such attacks: mobilizing people to dig up dirt, trumpeting it on talk radio and television, prompting Congress to weigh in and demanding action from the Obama administration."
That's a pretty good definition of muckraking-style journalism, isn't it? So, what the New York Times is saying here, basically, is that Conservatives have discovered that, in the internet-age, that they can also become journalists.
Huh.
Alinsky wins, because everyone is doing it.
I don't think Beckis using Alinsky's rules. He's not simply calling someone a name. He's defining the true politics of a person by digging up their own words, and sketching in their affiliations. It's very different than Carter simply trying to humiliate Joe Wilson by labelling him a "racist."
The thing that Alinsky didn't say is that if someone uses these tactics on you, you might spend the rest of your life determined to pay them back a hundred fold, and then spit on their grave.
The tactics win a battle, but they start a tremendous grievance on the part of the person who has been thus used, and the payback is endless and unremitting. I hated this kind of tactic when I came across it in the countercultural milieu and it's one of the reasons I never go for anything they say, nor will I ever listen to anything they have to say. My idea is only to stymie them, and frustrate them in every possible way that I can so long as I live.
Tactics like those make implacable enemies. Not very farsighted.
Tone Junkie,
Whining, no.
Complaining, exasperatingly exclamating? Describing? Yes, to all of those things.
Whining is what happens when someone is unwilling to do something to rectify a situation that bothers them. We have done something to rectify the situation; we've turned to alternative news sources. And now we're commenting about the New York Times whining that we no longer pay attention to them.
We can't make the New York Times cover the things we think are important. But the New York Times can't force us to care about what they choose to think is important. And try as you might, you can't stop us from talking about it.
So quit your whining and join the discussion. Do you think ACORN is a legitimate organization? Do you support them now that you know they will abet child prostitution? Do you like your tax dollars going to them? Do you think this New York Times story is the proper angle from which to cover this story? If not, how would you cover it?
As for me. I would have covered it straight, and tried me darnedest to get an exclusive with the independent reporter who broke the story. Then I'd hire him, and the young lady who posed as his girlfriend, and give them a Woodward size paycheck and a book deal.
That's what I'd do if I was in charge of a major newspaper or network; if my job was uncovering news. I'm not sure what some of these guys think they are doing.
FLS said... "So your problem is that ACORN doesn't do enough outreach to the gated communities? ... country clubs? ... equestrian competitions and polo matches?"
Nice straw man there. Let's try it again without income as a factor: how many ACORN voter drives have been done at livestock shows? Drag races? VFW halls? Fishing tournaments?
I'm sure you consider those the "wrong" ACORN demographic, but there's no justification for excluding them from voter drives that does not amount to "they have the wrong politics".
Conservatives believe that they have hit upon a winning formula for such attacks: mobilizing people to dig up dirt, trumpeting it on talk radio and television, prompting Congress to weigh in and demanding action from the Obama administration.
The nerve of them! Everybody knows it's the job of the MSM to dig up dirt on the right and trumpet it on television and in the press. Maybe there's a case here for patent infringement?
FLS is a racist.
"Alinsky wins, because everyone is doing it."
The only winning move is not to play. How about a nice game of chess?
ACORN and the MSM have lost Jon Stewart on this one"
If it hasn't been mentioned earlier, here's the latest video, in which the ACORN worker lets on that she's done a few illegal things in the past, too.
Let a thousand flowers bloom. More of this stuff, please. With one caveat.
I'm sorely tempted to pull a page from Quayle and demand proof that the ACORN staffers caught in this sting are not, in fact, plants.
But that would be petty, and I'm trying so hard not to be petty.
There's no question in my mind that Giles and O’Keefe got legit fottage. That the upper management was aware of earlier instances of these two asking such questions only reinforces the notion that ACORN was incompetently run. Too big to not fail.
But here's the caveat about the next time, and it's tied to the failure of "Metlife" to fool anyone by attempting a Moby.
Soon enough, we'll see people volunteer to work for organizations -- or even get hired by organizations -- with the sole intent of "spilling the beans" when their buddy the aspiring documentarian shows up with the undercover camera.
That last Acorn lady seems to be one of those who likes to make her life sound more interesting than it probably was.
"Soon enough, we'll see people volunteer to work for organizations -- or even get hired by organizations -- with the sole intent of "spilling the beans" when their buddy the aspiring documentarian shows up with the undercover camera."
Peter, Unions do this already: it's called "salting." They have employees take jobs so they can organize companies from within. They've been doing it for years.
It's basically dishonest, but then again, so are Unions...
I'm a conservative. Why wasn't I invited to these strategy sessions?
Personally, I don't think the Republican party is as smart as Andrew Breitbart. This only shows how conspiracy-paranoid the Times is becoming.
What side you're on doesn't count. The truth should and does. It's a real free press again and they can't stand it. When Jon Stewart yells "Where were the media?" they should get a clue.
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