Exclusive: NYTimes Editor 'Stands Behind' Contested 'Pimp' Reporting on O'Keefe, Cites Fox as Source

[BradBlog]

Exclusive: New York Times Editor 'Stands Behind' Contested 'Pimp' Reporting on James O'Keefe
Times Sr. Editor for Standards cites Fox News, accused felon as sources for paper's ACORN report; refuses to back up additional claims made in contradiction of former state Attorney General
'No comment', assertions of privacy, bizarre obfuscation, backtracking offered when asked by The BRAD BLOG to share alleged evidence...

"There is nothing for us to correct ... We stand by our reporting." That was the innocuous enough position from Greg Brock, New York Times "Senior Editor/Standards", in reply to a Letter to the Editor sent to the Times by a reader of The BRAD BLOG requesting a correction to recent reportage from the "paper of record" concerning rightwing activist James O'Keefe, on the heels of his federal felony arrest late last month. O'Keefe was arrested in New Orleans as an alleged ringleader in a conspiracy with three others, attempting to gain access, for reasons still unknown, to the phone system of Louisiana's Democratic U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu.

Incredibly, Brock originally cited claims by Fox News and O'Keefe himself as sources for why the New York Times stood by their apparently unverified and apparently incorrect report. "We believe him," Brock wrote, because he said as much on Fox News, apparently.

But the matter went from the absurd to the ridiculous in fairly short order, as Brock then seemed to contradict himself by claiming their source wasn't actually Fox or O'Keefe, but that the Times stood by their reporting because of a mysterious, unpublished video said to back up the claim, along with mysterious testimony from ACORN employees.

Unfortunately, he refused to provide evidence of any of it to me throughout a long chain of bizarre emails, even as an independent report -- never covered in the NYTimes -- from the former MA Attorney General on O'Keefe's ACORN hit videos, directly contradicts their coverage, on one of the most infamous elements: O'Keefe's pimp outfit, which, according to both the report and the videos -- and in contradiction of multiple stories by the Times -- O'Keefe never actually wore the pimp outfit in the ACORN offices!...

FULL STORY, COMPLETE CHAIN OF BIZARRE EMAILS: http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7689

[MisterP]

1. why is there a picture of David Byrne at the bottom of the page? nt

[BradBlog]

5. You may ask yourself. nt

[Loudmxr]

12. This is not my beautiful wife...

[gratuitous]

2. I'm so old, I remember when the Times used to corroborate shit

Just taking someone's word for it. On Fox. Yeah, that's a credible statement. I fully expect the exoneration of Scott Roeder to follow in the pages of the Times.

[emilyg]

3. I'm so old I remember

when the Times was respected.

[Joe Bacon]

4. I remember when the New York Times was a newspaper!

It hasn't been a newspaper since the advent of Reagan.

[frylock]

22. i remember when the ny times helped lie us into an illegal war..

fuck the ny times. the enquirer is more reputable than this fishwrap.

[donquijoterocket]

23. And that was not the first time

I presume you're speaking of the gray rag and their Judy Miller and the iraqnam fiasco.If you go further back the Times was roundly despised by most of my fellow participants in our walking tour through the sun and fun capitol of southeast Asia because they were one of the chief cheerleaders for that debacle.Unfortunately the wingers who constantly cite the gray rag as a prime example of the "liberal biased press" will ignore this example and not have long or deep enough memories for the previous.

[Blue_Tires]

24. our own local paper got the score for the stupor bowl wrong

on the FRONT PAGE!!

I'm not that old, but I remember a time in the industry when 6 people would have been out of a job the next morning...of course, they have cut so many jobs that the final edit probably only went through two reads by college intern freelancers before going to print...

[Selena Harris]

6. Does NYT and Fox have some of the same investors?

I know that a chunk of the NYT is owned by a billionaire from Mexico,Carlos Slim.

And Prince Talaweed of Saudi Arabia is reportedly intersting in investing $$$ in Fox.

Anybody know if any of the Murdoch enterprises have $$ in NYT?

[immoderate]

7. Some time during the 70s the Times stopped covering environmental disasters...

which had come to comprise about 50% of their stories on a daily basis. Then -- it all disappeared. Times hasn't been worth shit since then.

--imm

[SoCalDem]

8. "...Cites Fox as Source..." ..like a madam swearing that all her girls are virgins

:rofl:

[bleever]

9. That's definitely a short-circuit. If this Greg Brock doesn't remember a certain "Judy",

maybe he's too young to get the NYT through this successfully.

[winstars]

10. JUDY,WHO WE SEE ON FOX

and Friends frequently. If she did not have so much of our boys blood on her hands, I might almost feel a millionth of billionth percent of pity for this murder of innocents when the only gig she can get is with fucking Brian, Steve, and Gretchen the pretend stupid chick who went actually to Stanford OR was it Oxford like Rachel or something smart; whatever...

Anyway, to me, it's like in 'The Princess Bride' when our hero explains to the King how he is going to only maim him horribly, not kill him so he can live a long, painfull, awful life!!!! ( not like Zed in "Pulp Fiction" who when retribution was enacted, unfortunately had a very short ass life)

She is the King personified for us in real life and she can rot in hell IMHO!!! Along with Zed...

[TexasObserver]

11. Tim McVeigh in a Fedora.

[Monk06]

13. More like Ralphy Wiggum

How many times did this self confessed skinny nurd get wedgies and
was forced to smell the farts of high school football players?



And why was he abused in high school? Because he was a sneaky little
prick and the Principals favorite rat.

[SpiralHawk]

14. The Times is sinking lower and lower

The Judith Miller mess was so shameful.

The Times needs to snap out of its propaganda trance...

[nyc 4 Biden]

17. +1. NYTimes is a joke. I read it every day...

...and I'm disappointed in it at least once a day. It has a heavy RW angle on most stories.

[Richardo]

15. BradBlog could use a Senior Editor of its own - this OP is completely incomprehensible

Provide some background, learn to punctuate, and enough with the exclamation points and random italics.

And no, I'm not going to the link to read even more convoluted poorly-written "reportage".

[sendero]

16. Y'all see..

... why I don't give two shits if every major newspaper in the country folds tomorrow?

For every bit of actual news you get two bits of bullshit.

And once again, could anyone actually believe that pencil-necked tool is a pimp? LOLOLOL

[MinM]

18. Free O'Keefe

:sarcasm:

[BetterThanNoSN]

19. I smell a Rove, errr, rat

This is right out of the Karl Rove playbook and would love to know if O'keefe spent anytime with with him. These douches learn so well from the most disgusting human ever to foist himself on our political system. Win at ALL costs, damn America and Americans. Ooops, that remark taken out of context could land me in hot water with the Rev Wrights detractor. Now im scared!

[gulfcoastliberal]

20. All the MSM are Mockingbirds

Unfortunately the idea we have a free press is just not true.

[marmar]

21. The downfalls of the NYT and WaPo are sad to watch.....

nt

[MiddleRiverRefugee]

25. One thing has fascinated me about the whole James O'Keefe story

Namely, when is he gonna release the rest of the footage of himself and Hannah Giles?

If he did that I might take him a bit more seriously. <sarc>

C'mon James - we know its there.

[BradBlog]

26. Marcy Wheeler and MediaMatters ring in on this story...

Marcy's thought's at emptywheel here:
http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2010/02/09/nyt-thinks-teabugger-james-okeefe-entitled-to-own-set-of-facts/

Eric Boehlert at Media Matters here:
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201002090029

[BradBlog]

27. PLEASE REC UP THIS STORY, GUYS! AN IMPORTANT ONE!

I realize there's a lotta stuff in this story to digest, but for the careful reader, you'll glean there is a LOT in this thing, and a LOT of reasons to make a LOT of noise about it!

Please rec here, and/or DIGG, REDDIT, RE-TWEET the original version over at The BRAD BLOG if you haven't already! http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7689

Brad