NEW ORLEANS – The four men accused of trying to tamper with Democratic U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu's office phones share a common experience as young ideologues writing for conservative publications.
Federal authorities said two of the men posed as telephone workers wearing hard hats, tool belts and flourescent vests when they walked into the senator's office inside a federal building in New Orleans on Monday. The other two were accused of helping to organize the plan. (“4 men accused of phone plot had conservative ties”).
On its face this seems like a terrifically bad idea by O’Keefe and his pals. But all the facts aren’t out on this one yet.
That aside, even I was surprised at how many time the AP story used the term “conservative”: 11 times in a thousand-word story. The story reminds me of articles and blog posts I read all the time, and sometimes write myself, whose object is to explain how individual X, or organization Y, have ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, or Iran or Hamas, or organizations funding global jihadists.
This AP thing reminds me of those stories, but that doesn’t mean the shoe is on the other foot. It’s a legitimate approach to clarify an individual’s associations with groups involved in wrongdoing. But, there is no consensus that being a conservative is, ipso facto, wrongdoing. even though it seemed pretty obvious the AP writers assume it to be so.
I remember how some years back a conservative coworker marveled at an article in the local entertainment paper, (edited by Marxists, naturally), that described a local public figure as “a known Republican,” as if his party affiliation was comparable to being a business partner with John Gotti.
The difference is that being “conservative” is not illegal, although many liberals believe it ought to be. Having “conservative ties” is not comparable to contributing to Islamic groups that support suicide bombers and rocket attacks on Israel. Being conservative doesn’t mean, in fact, it could never mean, that you’re associated with radicals who publicly call for the destruction of the American Constitution and its replacement with a an idolatrous tyranny.
The AP’s thoroughness in identifying -- 11 times -- O’Keefe’s poor judgment with “conservatism” can be compared with the Pentagon report on the attack by Nidal Hasan at Fort Hood, which uses the term “Islam” or “Islamic”-- 0 times.
I have read that the young men were not 'tampering' with the phones, but were checking out the US Rep's statement that her phones were not working. She offered that statement as a reason she wasn't taking calls about the blatant 'sale' of her vote. The non-working phones excuse is why the men dressed as they did. They supposedly only videotaped the phones, working as usual, to prove a point about the congresswoman being a liar. That is a far cry from 'tampering' with the phones.
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