Activists Tap Senator's Phones

[The_Dude 1,142]

Senator's Phones Allegedly Targeted

By COREY DADE

Federal officials accused four men, including a conservative activist, of posing as telephone repairmen to tamper with phones at the New Orleans offices of Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu.

The four men, who also included the son of an acting U.S. attorney, were arrested Monday in the Hale Boggs Federal Building in downtown New Orleans and charged with entering a federal building under false pretenses with the intent of committing a felony, according to the U.S. attorney's office for the Eastern District of Louisiana.

One of the suspects, James O'Keefe, a 25-year-old filmmaker and conservative activist last year said his undercover videos at field offices of advocacy group Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or Acorn documented corruption.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation said Mr. O'Keefe, who had traveled to New Orleans and delivered a speech Thursday, admitted to helping plan and coordinate the scheme.

The other men arrested were identified as Joseph Basel, 24, Stan Dai, 24, and Robert Flanagan, 24, of New Orleans. Mr. Flanagan is the son of William J. Flanagan, the interim U.S. attorney for the Western District of Louisiana. The suspects are scheduled to appear in federal court in New Orleans on Feb. 12.

Each of the men was released Tuesday on $10,000 bond. Mr. Flanagan's attorney, J. Garrison Jordan, said his client exercised "poor judgment." "I don't think he intended to commit a crime. I think he just got caught up in this stunt," Mr. Jordan said.

Attorney Edward Castaing, who represented Messrs. O'Keefe, Basel and Dai at the bond hearing, declined to comment on the charges. "We will investigate the allegations," he said.

Late Monday morning, according to an FBI affidavit, Messrs. Flanagan and Basel, dressed in blue work shirts, fluorescent green vests and construction hard hats, entered Sen. Landrieu's offices and told a staffer they had come to fix the phone lines. By then, Mr. O'Keefe already had arrived at the offices, according to the FBI.

After Mr. Basel examined a phone in the office, he asked for access to the phone closet to work further, the FBI said. The men were sent to a federal General Services Administration office elsewhere in the building, where they were asked to produce identification. They said they left it in their vehicle, according to the affidavit.

They were arrested shortly thereafter by federal marshals. The U.S. attorney's office didn't say why the men allegedly sought to tamper with the phone lines. Authorities didn't specify Mr. Dai's alleged role but said he also helped conceive and execute the plan.

"I am as interested as everyone else about their motives and purpose, which I hope will become clear as the investigation moves forward," Ms. Landrieu said in a statement.

In Mr. O'Keefe's videos at Acorn offices, he and a partner, Hannah Giles, posed as a pimp and a prostitute, respectively, and secretly recorded receiving financial advice from Acorn workers about starting a brothel. Acorn spokesman Kevin Whalen said Mr. O'Keefe's arrest provided "further evidence of his disregard for the law in pursuit of his extremist agenda."

SOURCE

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A little over the top for activism in my opinion.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

These kids are lucky they don't have Arabic names.

[The_Dude 1,142]

These kids are lucky they don't have Arabic names.

I think that would be a determining factor in how these people will be charged.

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

I think that would be a determining factor in how these people will be charged.

but of course.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Pimp daddy got busted?

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

In addition to the phone tapping...

we find out today that Obama has been operating clandestine military operations in Yemen and expeanding the war into Yemen and Pakistan. I thought he was going to end the war but he continues to expand it, send more troops and involve more countries in our war on terror. Why is he such a liar? Now he is tappin phones of Senators that he had to BUY their vote for the health care bill to find out what they were going to do with the money, but instead the healthcare bill is dead because the people of Mass. could not be bought off by Obama the way their Democrat Senator could. When will this violation of our civil rights and war-mongering by Obama STOP??????????

[Danno 1,228]

In addition to the phone tapping...

we find out today that Obama has been operating clandestine military operations in Yemen and expeanding the war into Yemen and Pakistan. I thought he was going to end the war but he continues to expand it, send more troops and involve more countries in our war on terror. Why is he such a liar? Now he is tappin phones of Senators that he had to BUY their vote for the health care bill to find out what they were going to do with the money, but instead the healthcare bill is dead because the people of Mass. could not be bought off by Obama the way their Democrat Senator could. When will this violation of our civil rights and war-mongering by Obama STOP??????????

Perhaps there is a reason for all of this.

Americans hate a weak President.

Obamas War could be the one support mechanism he has which helps insulate him from the weak-liberal line of attack.

[The_Dude 1,142]

Obama approved secret operations in Yemen - report

Wed Jan 27, 2010 5:15am GMT

1 of 1Full SizeWASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama approved secret joint U.S. military and intelligence operations with Yemeni troops that began six weeks ago and killed six regional al Qaeda leaders, The Washington Post reported.

Obama approved a December 24 strike against a compound where a U.S. citizen, Anwar al-Aulaqi, was believed to be meeting with regional al Qaeda leaders, the newspaper said in its Wednesday editions.

He was not the target and was not killed but since has been added to a short list of U.S. citizens to be killed or captured by the U.S. military's clandestine Joint Special Operations Command, military officials told the Post.

The American advisers do not take part in raids in Yemen but help plan missions, develop tactics and provide weapons, the paper said.

The United States is also sharing highly sensitive intelligence with Yemeni forces, including electronic and video surveillance, three-dimensional terrain maps and analysis of the al Qaeda network, the Post said.

"We are very pleased with the direction this is going," a senior administration official was quoted as saying about the cooperation with Yemen.

A Yemeni official was quoted as saying the two countries maintained a "steadfast cooperation in combating AQAP (al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula), but there are clear limits to the U.S. involvement on the ground. Information sharing has been a key in carrying out recent successful counterterrorism operations."

In a newly built joint operations centre, the American advisers are acting as intermediaries between Yemeni forces and U.S. military and intelligence officers in the United States to collect and analyse intelligence, the Post said.

U.S. Special Operations forces and intelligence agencies have worked closely with Yemeni counterterrorism forces to target the leaders of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula over the last two months, U.S. officials have told Reuters.

source

I think the bolded part explains your tin foil hat analysis of this danno and gary. I do think that this is consistent with a battle with terrorists, and not a pretext to fight another war in a foreign country based on false pretenses. How your train of thought went from a conservative activist being caught in a criminal act to this is beyond me, but lets get back on topic please.

Whoever does charge these activists has a lot of ground in which to charge them. In the extreme, they could be tried federally, but I seriously doubt that. I think the activists would relish that role and would try to position themselves as some sort of martyrs.

Edited January 27, 2010 by Rob and Mel

[Peikko 1,575]

These are the same ones who posed as prostitutes and pimps to get Acorn, at least one of them is.

[The_Dude 1,142]

These are the same ones who posed as prostitutes and pimps to get Acorn, at least one of them is.

Thats him.

[Peikko 1,575]

Anyway, seems clear there could be some kind of political agenda at work here, perhaps under the guise of 'investigative journalism'.

[The_Dude 1,142]

Anyway, seems clear there could be some kind of political agenda at work here, perhaps under the guise of 'investigative journalism'.

Thats his entire MO. He was tapping the phone line in order to get some juicy nugget, or just some audio that he could edit into some sort of prurient clip.

[Dan J 277]

In addition to the phone tapping...

we find out today that Obama has been operating clandestine military operations in Yemen and expeanding the war into Yemen and Pakistan. I thought he was going to end the war but he continues to expand it, send more troops and involve more countries in our war on terror. Why is he such a liar? Now he is tappin phones of Senators that he had to BUY their vote for the health care bill to find out what they were going to do with the money, but instead the healthcare bill is dead because the people of Mass. could not be bought off by Obama the way their Democrat Senator could. When will this violation of our civil rights and war-mongering by Obama STOP??????????

Everything has to be so black and white for you doesn't it? Otherwise your brain will fry.

[SMR 368]

Everything has to be so black and white for you doesn't it? Otherwise your brain will fry.

Everything has to be so gray for you, doesn't it? Otherwise you couldn't just bend everything to mean whatever you want it to.

[Dan J 277]

Everything has to be so gray for you, doesn't it? Otherwise you couldn't just bend everything to mean whatever you want it to.

That's life dude. Things rarely fit into simple, easy to label boxes. Conservatism is built on moral certainty, which makes grey issues very uncomfortable for some.