Translation: "But because you're white college grads and one of you is fortunate enough to the offspring of a U.S. Attorney, we'll just slap you on the wrists, send you to nuisance court and call it a day. Since I called this an 'extremely serious crime' and made an Extremely Serious Face, no one can accuse me of favorable treatment."

Doesn't seem quite enough, considering what we've seen from James O'Keefe to date:

NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- A federal judge had strong words for four conservative activists who initially were accused of trying to tamper with the phones in Sen. Mary Landrieu's New Orleans office, but ruled the misdemeanor charges against them can be resolved before a magistrate instead of a judge.

U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval Jr. said Wednesday he isn't exercising his right to hear the case even though the four defendants are charged with an "extremely serious" crime involving a security breach at a federal building.

"Deception is alleged to have been used by the defendants to achieve their purposes which in and of itself is unconscionable," Duval wrote. "Perceived righteousness of a cause does not justify nefarious and potentially dangerous actions."

James O'Keefe, Stan Dai, Joseph Basel and Robert Flanagan are scheduled to appear before Magistrate Daniel Knowles III on May 26 for arraignments on misdemeanor charges of entering a federal building under false pretenses. Duval said he has reviewed their plea agreements.

There's an interesting convergence of politics and law going on right now around the Pandora's box that is campaign finance. Round II of the Citizens United case will likely be SpeechNow vs. the FEC. In this round, the issue is the relationship between the law, 527 tax exempt organizations, and independent expenditures (money spent for direct mail, TV, radio and internet advertising).

The Players

SpeechNow.org is a group formed with the purpose to oppose candidates who, in their view, act to squelch free speech. The named principals are David Keating (Club for Growth Executive Director), Edward Crane (Cato Institute founder), Fred Young (Cato Institute board member), Brad Russo and Scott Burkhardt.

Their stated purpose and goal

The stated purpose of SpeechNow.org is as follows (from appellate court opinion here):

...to promote the First Amendment rights of free speech and freedom to assemble by expressly advocating for federal candidates whom it views as supporting those rights and against those whom it sees as insufficiently committed to those rights.

To illustrate how they proposed to carry out their purpose, SpeechNow.org supplied ad copy from ads they had planned to run in 2008 against Republican Congressman Dan Burton and Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu. Examples were carefully chosen to demonstrate their non-partisan bent. Sample copy for one television ad read this way:

[P]oliticians like Dan Burton don’t like free speech. Burton voted for a bill to restrict the speech of many public interest groups. Under this bill you could go to jail for criticizing politicians.

Hey Dan Burton. This is America, not Russia.

But we still have the right to vote. Say no to Burton for Congress. Say no to censorship.

And against Landrieu:

“Our founding fathers made free speech the First Amendment to the Constitution. Mary Landrieu is taking that right away. Don’t let her do it again.”

What's at stake

Non-profit groups organized as 527 organizations have some specific rules to limit the amounts an individual may contribute. Currently the annual maximum contribution from an individual is $5,000. SpeechNow argues that because contributions are being passed through the organization as "independent expenditures" (e.g., funds used to pay for direct mail campaigns, TV, radio and internet advertising) the limits shouldn't apply, just as they do not apply to corporate "persons" in the Citizens United case.

If SpeechNow.org is successful, any group who spends money on direct mail, TV, radio or internet advertising can use a non-profit entity to make unlimited contributions. They further object to the reporting requirements imposed on 527 organizations, and are seeking to have those abolished.

The political stakes

The line SpeechNow.org is walking is extraordinarily fine. They claim to be an issue-focused group (i.e., free speech), but it's clear they intend to target candidates and pour money into those targeted districts to influence the outcome of elections.

It's equally clear (to me, at least) that this particular group will be completely partisan about who they apply their "free speech" standards to, which raises this question for me: What bright-line standard could be applied to ad copy to distinguish one ad as an "issues ad" from another that's a "candidate ad"? The two are inextricably linked. I can't see where any group worth their salt would buy ads to say "Vote Candidate X out of office. That is all."

Ads generally wrap around an issue with the goal of defeating the candidate, while promoting the issue as a second outcome. If SpeechNow.org succeeds, what we will have here is direct advocacy for or against candidates by groups allowed unlimited donations for buying such advertising while eliminating all disclosure as to who the buyers are.

As one who spends a lot of time following campaign money, I see this as a disaster.

This case is also about to become a political football in the pending nomination of Elena Kagan.

SCOTUSblog:

The FEC and the U.S. Solicitor General’s office have not yet decided whether to take to the Supreme Court the FEC’s unanimous loss in the D.C. Circuit Court in the SpeechNow case. While the time to file a challenge before the Justices does not expire until late June, the motion filed Friday in U.S. District Court will put added pressure on government officials to make up their minds on the next step. They must respond to the new motion in 14 days, for example — that is, before the end of this month.

One of the issues surrounding Kagan's confirmation is the question of her recusal in cases where she has acted on behalf of the United States as Solicitor General. Forcing this case to the front seems to be pure politics to me. If she has acted on this case as Solicitor General, she will not be able to hear it as a Supreme Court Justice.

Given the decision of the appellate court and the Supreme Court in the Citizens United matter, it may not matter anyway. It could be that they've won this outright already, in which case we all lose.

Here's what concerns me the most. Even if we have publicly financed elections, this kind of activity will not stop. Voters will be barraged with ad after ad after ad for a candidate, against a candidate, via a known organization or via an astroturf group. While public financing will certainly separate candidates one degree or so from the money, the inarguable influence of these independent expenditures will still hold sway with the candidate and with the public and continue to subvert the process.

Really, the only hope we have for free and fair elections is an educated, engaged electorate with the ability to discern the difference between candidates without 30 second sound bites or propaganda films to promote or defeat them.

Disgusting. Remind me the next time I commit a crime to make sure at least one of my co-conspirators is the son of a U.S. Attorney:

The U.S. attorney's office in New Orleans has another month to decide what, if any, charges to bring against the four men arrested at the end of January in Sen. Mary Landrieu's New Orleans office, including conservative activist James O'Keefe.

Louis Moore, the magistrate judge for the federal district court in New Orleans, agreed Wednesday to motions on behalf of the four to extend the time by which the U.S. attorney's office for the Eastern District must seek a felony indictment, press misdemeanor charges or drop the case.

Moore said the extension, which was unopposed by prosecutors, would offer the parties "additional time to conduct informal discussions and discovery and avoid or lessen additional proceedings," suggesting the possibility of a plea deal that would likely spare the four from facing felony charges.

At the time of their arrest Jan. 25, O'Keefe, 25, Joseph Basel, 24, Stan Dai, 24, and Robert Flanagan, 24, were charged with entering federal property under false pretenses for the purposes of committing a felony, a crime that carries a maximum term of 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.

Isn't that special. How nice that the judicial system is always willing to give another chance to conservative white boys!

I believe that Carl Jung was a genius, and since he said the things that people attack are quite often a reflection of the things they despise and fear in themselves, I'm beginning to wonder if perhaps James O'Keefe is simply another self-loathing Republican closet case. I mean, look at his long track record of ridiculing the poor, ethnic minorities and otherwise marginalized groups - his choice of targets might be part of a larger picture.

Yesterday this interesting story ran in the Washington Independent. Could this be part of that picture?

Ben Wetmore, the 28-year-old conservative activist whom James O’Keefe called a “mentor,” has stayed out of the headlines since it was revealed that he housed O’Keefe and the other participants in the bungled sting of Sen. Mary Landrieu’s (D-La.) office. When I reached Wetmore by phone yesterday, he politely declined to talk about the situation until it settled down.

Still, the Wetmore-O’Keefe friendship was, in gonzo journalism terms, a productive one. In 2008, after O’Keefe had left the Leadership Institute, the two men recorded hidden camera video of themselves going to three state offices in Massachusetts, applying for marriage licenses, openly admitting that they were straight men who wanted to get married to take advantage of the benefits.

In the video, O'Keefe asks his friend if his girlfriend minds them getting married, and he says she doesn't. O'Keefe doesn't mention a girlfriend himself.

Then again, maybe he's just a shy, awkward sort who covers it up with bravado, the kind of socially-handicapped guy who's just trying to fit in any way he can - as evidenced by this picture showing O'Keefe at a performance by his Rutgers glee club at Carnegie Hall.

I guess that makes him a "Gleek" - only without the charm. Or the humanity.

Andrew Breitbart sounds like a whiny ass titty baby when he joined David Shuster and tried to promote the idiotic notion that the publicity O'Keefe is getting from the media is tainting the jury against him....LOL. The idiotic plot that O'Keefe concocted to smear Mary Landrieu is now smearing Breitbart, and for good reason.

Notice how he tries to change the subject of his pal who is a student of Nixon's dirty-trick political ideology.

Rick Perlstein explains this in his awesome book "Nixonland." This is a longstanding tradition in conservative politics: the dark art of political destruction at all costs. Karl Rove was one of these young conservative operatives back in 1970 who lied his way into Al Dixon's campaign and distributed phony invitations.

In the autumn election season of 1970, a cherubic, bespectacled teenager turned up at the Chicago campaign headquarters of Alan Dixon, a Democrat running for state treasurer in Illinois. No one paid the newcomer much attention when he arrived, or when he left soon afterwards. Nor did anyone in the office make the connection between the mystery volunteer and 1,000 invitations on campaign stationery that began circulating in Chicago's red-light district and soup kitchens, promising "free beer, free food, girls and a good time for nothing" for all-comers at Dixon's headquarters.

O'Keefe and his crew are only following in the footsteps of the worst of the worst. They are funded by a right wing outfit called The Leadership Institute.

Founded in 1979 by veteran Republican activist Morton Blackwell, the Leadership Institute has worked with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Karl Rove and Grover Norquist. The group raked in $6.6 million in 2008, according to its most recent publicly available IRS filings, which doesn’t list donors.

“What we teach is to use creative and imaginative ways to make your points, to reveal what we think is political correctness run amuck, liberal hypocrisy and double standards” on left-leaning college campuses, said Sutton, who supervised O’Keefe at the institute until O’Keefe was asked to leave because his investigative work could interfere with the Institute’s Internal Revenue Service standing...read on

Poor James is ordered to stay at mommy and daddy's house to keep him out of trouble.

James O'Keefe, the 25-year-old conservative filmmaker who was arrested this week in connection with a plot to tamper with phone lines in Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu's New Orleans office, is out of jail on $10,000 bond, Talking Points Memo reports. The judge ordered O'Keefe to live with his parents until a preliminary hearing set for Feb. 13.

And notice the high powered lawyer O'Keefe immediately received. He's backed by big conservative money.

Michael Madigan, O'Keefe's lawyer, said Wednesday that his client was not trying to wiretap or interfere with Landrieu's phones, but he would not explain why O'Keefe was there. He also would not say whether O'Keefe was working for someone or was on his own.

"The truth will come out," said Madigan, a Washington lawyer who represented Sen. Howard Baker, the Republican who famously asked during the Watergate investigation, "What did the President know and when did he know it?"

Watergate. Wow, it all fits, doesn't it?

Jonathan Turley explains all the charges here.

A lot of people also don't realize that O'Keefe doctored the tapes to make it look like he was actually dressed up as a pimp at ACORN.

ACORN spokesman Kevin Whelan said the arrest calls O'Keefe's credibility into question, and used the opportunity to point out that he "edited (ACORN videos) to make things look as bad as possible." He said, for instance, that O'Keefe actually wore a normal dress shirt when he was in the ACORN offices, but spliced in shots of him dressed as a pimp in the final videos.

.

Mike Stark did a big report on him.

These ratf*&kers are celebrated by FOX News and Andrew Breitbart, but this behavior is a core principle instilled in conservatives. And as for the Junior Watergaters, I don't believe their story, because as this story explains, they were trying to gain more access to Landrieu's phone system.

After being asked, the staffer gave Basel access to the main phone at the reception desk. The staffer told investigators that Basel manipulated the handset. He also tried to call the main office phone using his cell phone, and said the main line wasn't working. Flanagan did the same.

They then told the staffer they needed to perform repair work on the main phone system and asked where the telephone closet was located. The staffer showed the men to the main General Services Administration office on the 10th floor, and Flanagan and Basel went in. There, a GSA employee asked for the men's credentials. They said they left them in their vehicle.

The U.S. Marshal's Service apprehended all four men shortly thereafter.

If they had that type of access, I think they would have had a field day and committed many more crimes.

DOWNLOADS: (809)

PLAYS: (2822)

Embed

Don't you just love how, whenever a liberal figure or a non-Fox media outlet (also known as "the liberal media") is caught in any kind of screwup or criminal activity, it quickly becomes the No. 1 Topic of Discussion at Fox?

But when right-wingers are caught with their pants down (e.g., see John Cornyn) or in the criminal cookie jar, there's some minor mumbling, a few quick reports, and then silence at Fox.

So we watched Fox yesterday to see how they would handle the news that their beloved Hot Young Investigative Journalist, James O'Keefe, Slayer of ACORN, had been arrested by the FBI for attempting to wiretap the offices of Sen. Mary Landrieu.

There was a brief report on Shep Smith's news show (in which the reporter assured us that we would need to get some context first), followed by a similarly brief overview on Special Report with Bret Baier, and then wrapped up a short segment on Greta Van Susteren's show, in which she mentioned that O'Keefe had appeared on Fox "many times."

But on Fox's prime-time opinion shows, its big ratings drivers, the shows that had most avidly promoted O'Keefe and his brand of "investigative journalism" -- Glenn Beck, The O'Reilly Factor, and Hannity -- there was nothing. Not. A. Single. Word.

Color me surprised.

DOWNLOADS: (823)

PLAYS: (1986)

Embed

Well, looky here! Can't wait to hear how he tries to talk his way out of this one - and of course, his arrest will be prominently featured on every media outlet that cooperated in his ACORN smear:

Alleging a plot to tamper with phones in Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu's office in the Hale Boggs Federal Building in downtown New Orleans, the FBI arrested four people Monday, including James O'Keefe, 25, a conservative filmmaker whose undercover videos at ACORN field offices severely damaged the advocacy group's credibility.

Also arrested were Joseph Basel, Stan Dai and Robert Flanagan, all 24. Flanagan is the son of William Flanagan, who is the acting U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana, the office confirmed. All four were charged with entering federal property under false pretenses with the intent of committing a felony.

Flanagan is believed to be an employee of the Pelican Institute, a libertarian "faux" think tank where O'Keefe spoke this week. I wonder: how does a U.S. Attorney's son argue this was "poor judgment," as his attorney tried to spin it.

According to the FBI affidavit, Flanagan and Basel entered the federal building at 500 Poydras Street about 11 a.m. Monday, dressed as telephone company employees, wearing jeans, fluorescent green vests, tool belts, and hard hats. When they arrived at Landrieu's 10th floor office, O'Keefe was already in the office and had told a staffer he was waiting for someone to arrive.

When Flanagan and Basel entered the office, they told the staffer they were there to fix phone problems. At that time, the staffer, referred to only as Witness 1 in the affadavit, observed O'Keefe positioning his cell phone in his hand to videotape the operation. O'Keefe later admitted to agents that he recorded the event.

After being asked, the staffer gave Basel access to the main phone at the reception desk. The staffer told investigators that Basel manipulated the handset. He also tried to call the main office phone using his cell phone, and said the main line wasn't working. Flanagan did the same.

They then told the staffer they needed to perform repair work on the main phone system and asked where the telephone closet was located. The staffer showed the men to the main General Services Administration office on the 10th floor, and Flanagan and Basel went in. There, a GSA employee asked for the men's credentials, after which they stated they left them in their vehicle.

The U.S. Marshal's Service apprehended all four men shortly thereafter.

Dave N.: Hmmm. Wonder how Andrew Breitbart and Glenn Beck -- who have relied heavily on O'Keefe's work to smear ACORN -- will respond. One can only imagine the cries of persecution that will be erupting shortly.

One can't help but be impressed by O'Keefe's investigative-journalism technique. If only the rest of us poor schlubs had realized something O'Keefe obviously learned the first time around: You can get away with breaking the law if you can get it up on Fox News first.

I'm sure O'Keefe was banking on that this time around, too. Ooopsie.

Media Matters has a flashback: 31 House Republicans Supported Resolution Honoring Alleged Felon James O'Keefe.

UPDATE:

An official close to the investigation said one of the four was arrested with a listening device in a car blocks from the senator's offices. He spoke on condition of anonymity because that information was not included in official arresting documents.

Recently the Senate passed Sen. Barbara Mikulski's Women's Health Amendment, which requires health insurance companies to provide free mammograms and other preventive health services for women. Sounds good, doesn't it? Women's health needs have traditionally been underserved by the insurance system. But, ironically, the Senate's excise tax will force many women to pay indirectly for these "free" services.

Here's how: For one thing, the cost of the services mandated in the Mikulski Amendment will cause even more health plans to exceed the cost cap for the excise tax. And it's expected that 20% of plans will already be over the limit when the tax takes effect. In practical terms, any added costs for new services provided by these plans (like those mammograms) will be taxable. So, in one very real sense, the Senate plans to tax some of this preventive care for women - at a staggering 40% of cost.

The Mikulski Amendment looks like a step forward, but many women will pay for these services indirectly - in the form of higher premiums or increased out-of-pocket costs. One hand giveth and the other taketh away. And speaking of irony ...

Guess who voted for the Mikulski amendment? Some Senators who haven't even committed themselves to voting for the final bill, including Lieberman, Landrieu, and Snowe (who even cosponsored the amendment. Here's an idea: They can make sure these women's services really remain "free" by supporting the Sanders-Franken-Brown Amendment, which would replace the excise tax with a tax on the extremely wealthy (the way the house does it.)

That would remove the irony in the Senate's actions and replace it with fairness.

If Reid doesn't get this done, he won't be Majority Leader for long:

Talk about using budget reconciliation to pass healthcare reform in the Senate has faded from public view, but Democratic leaders continue to hang the threat over centrists in private.

FYI: They're not "centrists" - they're corporate conservatives.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) discussed reconciliation with wavering centrists before an important procedural vote to begin debate on healthcare reform.

On Saturday, Nov. 21, three centrists, Sens. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), voted to commence debate, despite heavy pressure from Republicans and conservative groups to oppose it.

Nelson wrote in an op-ed last week that he voted for the motion to avoid the prospect of Reid bringing healthcare legislation to the floor under budget reconciliation, a process with special procedural protections originally intended for legislation to reduce the deficit, such as tax increases or spending cuts.

[...] Under reconciliation, healthcare legislation could pass with a simple majority after a strictly limited floor debate. But lawmakers would have to carve up the bill to eliminate provisions that do not clearly raise revenue or cut spending and therefore would be subject to parliamentary objections. Reid has said that he could pass a government-run health insurance program, known as the public option, under reconciliation.

Really? Yes, Really. For reasons unknown, Time Magazine's Mark Halperin decided to post a photoshopped picture of Louisiana Senator, Mary Landrieu with semen in her hair, ala Cameron Diaz in the movie There's Something About Mary. One would think he could have come up with something a little more appropriate. Jason Linkins has more at HuffPo:

...There are lots of ways to serve up this news story! And there are lots of creative ways to put it together for web trawlers. How about, "Mary, Mary, quite contrary?" or, if you're old-school retro, "Mary, Mary, why you buggin'?" Or you could just decide that the best thing to do is be straight about it. Not Halperin, though! Here's the imaginative Photoshop that went along with his "story." Read on...

My thoughts exactly. Halperin is a hack, with little to no journalistic integrity, but this is low even by his standards. While I don't agree with Senator Landrieu on all her votes, the health care bill in particular, I think she has an apology coming from both Mark Halperin and Time.