The Niles Star

Editorial: Louisiana Watergate

Monday, Feb. 1, 2010

A conservative hero accused of trying to tamper with Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu’s phones said he and three others charged in the Jan. 25 incident wanted to investigate complaints that constituents calling her New Orleans office couldn’t get through.
“On reflection, I could have used a different approach to this investigation, particularly given the sensitivities that people understandably have about security in a federal building,” James O’Keefe, 25, wrote Friday on the Web site biggovernment.com.
O’Keefe believes it’s clear he and others weren’t trying to wiretap Landrieu’s phones.
Landrieu’s spokesman called his explanation “feeble.”
We’d say the situation for starters needs to be put in context.
It wasn’t so long ago that Fox was hailing O’Keefe as a national hero, a patriot in a pimp get-up, for hidden-camera videos targeting its despised liberal community-organizing group ACORN.
Fox didn’t dash into this fray to celebrate its former darling, but distanced itself.
In fact, Glenn Beck, who championed O’Keefe’s ACORN expose and made him a national phenomenon, said on his radio program that if the allegations stood up, he crossed the line.
Two of the four defendants posed as telephone repairmen in hard hats, fluorescent vests and tool belts to ask to see the phones at her office.
Political espionage or prank? One suspect, Robert Flanagan, is the son of Shreveport-based acting U.S. attorney Bill Flanagan. The other two were Stan Dai and Joseph Basel, both 24.
One had a tiny camera in his helmet. A third man allegedly waited outside in a car with a listening device to monitor transmissions. O’Keefe was already seated in the waiting room, recording the men on his cell phone when they entered, according to an FBI affidavit.
This incident followed by a month Landrieu’s support for the Senate health care bill.
As the vote approached, conservatives complained they could not register protests at her offices because calls were diverted to full voice mail boxes. Her staff denied any attempt to intentionally deflect critical calls.
All four men were charged weith entering federal property under false pretenses for the purpose of committing a felony.
They were not charged with wiretapping.
“You don’t do anything illegal,” Beck said. “That’s Watergate territory. You just don’t do that. But besides that, I don’t even think you go dressed up. I mean, it’s a senator. For the love of Pete, it’s a senator.”
And not just any senator, but one criticized for selling her vote for more Medicaid benefits for her state in exchange for her support of health care legislation.
ACORN was badly damaged by O’Keefe’s hidden video, giving CEO Bertha Lewis an opening to comment on his arrest being “further evidence of his disregard for the law in pursuit of his extremist agenda.”
As O’Keefe said Tuesday leaving jail, “Veritas.”
Latin for truth. We’d like the truth.
The Watergate break-in didn’t seem like much, either, until it brought down the Nixon administration.