NJ Teacher Suspended After Comments on O'Keefe Tape

After James O'Keefe caught some New Jersey teachers on tape trashing Chris Christie and using vulgar language, we were told how O'Keefe supposedly had no credibility. Well, if that's the case why has this teacher been suspended?

An unflattering video made during a New Jersey Education Association leadership conference this summer has had repercussions for least one union member: A Passaic special education teacher was suspended for nine days and will be docked a pay raise after making crude comments to an undercover videographer.

Alissa Ploshnick’s unintentional starring performance in the "Teachers Unions Gone Wild" video included, among other things, using the "N" word and joking about how hard it is for tenured teachers to be fired. It was all caught on tape at a hotel bar during the weeklong conference in August.

Passaic Superintendent Robert Holster, who said he considered bringing harsher punishment of tenure charges, said the discipline was a "difficult decision," because "some people believe what’s said outside the school system is someone’s right."

But he said Ploshnick’s comments — which he called "professionally insulting" and not "the responsible behavior of a professional person employed by the Passaic Board of Education" — merited the response. He said the tape created "kind of an outrage" in Passaic.

"The character of an educator has to be beyond the school bell. It doesn’t take place only in school," Holster said.

The superintendent took particular offense to the racial epithet: on the video, Ploshnick is heard saying she knew of a teacher who had used the "N" word to a student and was not fired, an incident Holster said did not occur.

"Passaic is multi-cultural and everyone has to be extremely sensitive in their thinking if they’re on our payroll," he said.

Christie Goes Nuclear Following Release of 'Teachers Gone Wild' Video

He's reacting to videos filmed by James O'Keefe of ACORN video fame. The NJEA tries to dismiss it by claiming O'Keefe is discredited. Of course they say that. What other excuse do they have? Don't forget these are the same people who refused to fire one of their own for wishing Christie dead.

Here's Part I of O'Keefe's video. Language warning. The others are at the Star-Ledger link. One involves allegations of voter fraud in Jersey City, which should comes as no surprise to anyone familiar with that corrupt cesspool.

Jerry Brown: ACORN Engaged in 'Highly Inappropriate Behavior'

According to Attorney General Moonbeam, "highly inappropriate behavior" doesn't amount to criminal behavior. I guess the leftwing thugs who support the criminal enterprise formerly known as ACORN will consider this a victory or something.

Some members of the community organizing group ACORN engaged in "highly inappropriate behavior," but did not break any criminal laws, according to a report released Thursday by Attorney General Jerry Brown that includes newly obtained videotapes.

The report also uncovered "likely violations" of state civil laws designed to protect personal information, including dumping 500 pages of confidential records into a Dumpster, failure to file a 2007 tax return, and four instances of possible voter registration fraud by ACORN in San Diego in connection with the 2008 election, as well as other irregularities in the group's California operations.

So there are "likely violations" os state civil laws but nobody will be prosecuted?

Those irregularities have been referred to the appropriate authorities, Brown said.

"A few ACORN members exhibited terrible judgment and highly inappropriate behavior in videotapes obtained in the investigation, but they didn't commit prosecutable crimes in California," said Brown, the presumptive Democratic gubernatorial nominee.

I guess Brown doesn't want to alienate his future campaign workers.

Surprise! Brooklyn Prosecutors Clear ACORN

Imagine my shock to find out a hack New York prosecutor like Charles Hynes cleared the criminal enterprise ACORN. You don't suppose this could be politically motivated?

Brooklyn prosecutors on Monday cleared ACORN of criminal wrongdoing after a four-month probe that began when undercover conservative activists filmed workers giving what appeared to be illegal advice on how to hide money.

While the video by James O'Keefe and Hannah Giles seemed to show three ACORN workers advising a prostitute how to hide ill-gotten gains, the unedited version was not as clear, according to a law enforcement source.

"They edited the tape to meet their agenda," said the source.

O'Keefe and Giles - who visited ACORN offices in several cities, including its Brooklyn headquarters - stirred controversy when they posted the videos on their Web site.

They were hailed as heroes by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and their footage led several government agencies to temporarily cut funding for ACORN as the prosecutors opened an investigation.

"On Sept. 15, 2009, my office began an investigation into possible criminality on the part of three ACORN employees," Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes said in a one-paragraph statement issued Monday afternoon.

"That investigation is now concluded and no criminality has been found."

Of course there's editing in the process. Has Hynes seen all of O'Keefe's footage? It will be interesting to see O'Keefe's response. If there's video Hynes did not see he'll have some explaining to do. I don't see any reaction at Big Government as of yet.

ACORN is now talking tough. Let's see how long that lasts.

"Acorn is gratified that the DA has concluded something we knew all along," ACORN lawyer Arthur Schwartz said, adding it was "unfortunate" the O'Keefe and Giles used "subterfuge to convince congress and the media to vilify an organization that didn't deserve it."

A smug Media Matters thug currently feuding with Andrew Breitbart, among others, is gloating.

Update: More here with revelations about the DA's ties to WFP/ACORN.

James O'Keefe Arrested

This sure doesn't look good.

The independent filmmaker who brought ACORN to its knees last year with an undercover expose was arrested this week along with three others, including the son of a federal prosecutor, and accused of trying to interfere with the phones at Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu's office.

Activist James O'Keefe, 25, was already in Landrieu's New Orleans office Monday when Robert Flanagan and Joseph Basel, both 24, showed up claiming to be telephone repairmen, according to U.S. Attorney Jim Letten's office. Letten says O'Keefe recorded the two with his cell phone.

Once inside the reception area, Flanagan, the son of acting U.S. Attorney Bill Flanagan in Shreveport, and Basel asked for access to the main phone at the reception desk.

After handling the phone, "Flanagan and Basel next requested access to the telephone closet because they needed to perform work on the main telephone system," Letten's office said.

The men were directed to another office in the building, they're accused of again misrepresenting themselves as telephone repairmen.

They were arrested later by the U.S. Marshal's Service. Details of the arrest were not available. A fourth man, Stan Dai, 24, was also arrested, but Letten's office said only that he assisted the others in planning, coordinating and preparing the operation.

Affadavit here.

Prediction: By day's end more media outlets will mention O'Keefe for this story than ever even bothered to cover the ACORN scandal.

A look at it here. Assorted links here. The left will make this into Watergate before the night is over.

Legal Defense Fund Set Up for Hannah Giles

Well, that didn't take long.

ACORN's case against her, James O'Keefe and Andrew Breitbart is incredibly thin and likely meant to intimidate, but I suspect the coffers will fill up quickly.

Can't find one yet but I'm sure O'Keefe will have one soon if he doesn't already.

Here's the home page for the Legal Liberty Institute.

Dumbest Move Ever: ACORN Thugs Sue Giles and O'Keefe

To quote James O'Keefe: Bring. It. On.

ACORN and two former employees of its Baltimore office filed a multimillion-dollar lawsuit Wednesday against the makers of a hidden-camera video that showed the employees giving tax advice to a man posing as a pimp and a woman posing as a prostitute.

The liberal activist group contends that the audio portion of the video was obtained illegally because Maryland law requires the consent of both parties to record private conversations.

The employees seen in the video, Tonja Thompson and Shera Williams, were fired after it was posted online. Thompson and Williams are plaintiffs in the lawsuit, which says they suffered "extreme emotional distress with attendant physical symptoms and injury to their reputations."

The lawsuit names James O'Keefe III and Hannah Giles, who played the pimp and prostitute in the video, as defendants. It also names conservative columnist and blogger Andrew Breitbart of Los Angeles, who posted it on his Web site, biggovernment.com.

Brietbart said he would respond with his lawyer to a request for comment. He told The Associated Press in an interview Tuesday that he looked forward to a lawsuit because he expects unsavory details about ACORN to be unearthed in the discovery process.

O'Keefe and Giles could not immediately be reached. Asked by Fox News earlier this month about the possibility of a lawsuit, O'Keefe said, "Bring it on."

Extreme emotional distress.

Heh.

More on this craptastic stupidity here and here.

If the lawyers for the morons have a clue they'll pay a visit to Big Government and realize the futility of it all.

Pre-emptive congratulations to O'Keefe, Giles and Breitbart for laying waste to one of the Democrats' pet organizations. I can smell the smoldering ruins.

Jersey Boy Helps Bring Down Corrupt Liberal Crime Syndicate

Let's hear it for James O'Keefe, the best pimp to come out of North Jersey since Silvio Dante. He's the one on the left, in case you're a member of the antique media who hasn't heard of him yet (I'm looking at you, Charles Gibson).

It seems O'Keefe is the most upstanding Irishman from Jersey since, well, me. OK, enough with the humility.

Remarkably, the staunchly liberal rag known as the Star Ledger has a favorable write-up of the new Public Enemy No. 1 of the Democratic Party. O'Keefe honed his chops at the People's Republic of Piscataway, also known as Rutgers University. How he escaped there with his faculties intact is a mystery, so I'll chalk it up to good parenting.

Here's a link to the SL story and a snippet.

Back in 2004, when he was the editor of a conservative magazine at Rutgers University, James O'Keefe III mounted a satirical campaign to ban Lucky Charms cereal from campus dining halls on the premise the breakfast fare was offensive to Irish-Americans.

The operation, which included a hidden-camera video with a Rutgers dining services official, was intended to demonstrate what O'Keefe saw as the absurdity of political correctness.

Two years later, while a law student in California, the Bergen County native took on larger prey, using the same undercover tactics to expose crooked counselors at Planned Parenthood.

Now, with a string of shocking hidden-camera videos on the national group ACORN, O'Keefe has scored his biggest coup, stirring up a tempest that has resulted in a criminal investigation of ACORN employees, a denunciation of the group by the White House and congressional action to cut off millions of dollars in funding.

"The tone of my videos is unique," said O'Keefe in a telephone interview last night. "I'm not just reporting on something, I'm becoming something I'm reporting on."

And to think that, O'Keefe, 25, had planned to spend his year studying for an MBA at Fordham. Grad school will have to wait, said his father, James O'Keefe Jr.

"This has become his work full-time," the elder O'Keefe said yesterday in a telephone interview from the family's Westwood home. "He's an extremely conscientious, hard-working young man, and we're proud of him."

The younger O'Keefe, a former Eagle Scout who graduated from Westwood High School, and a friend, 20-year-old Hannah Giles, a journalism student at Florida International University, spent their summer traveling to ACORN offices across the nation. The group -- formally known as the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now -- helps the poor seek housing help from the government and conducts voter-registration drives.

The kid knows how to bust chops. My kind of guy.

A couple of points though: I don't recall the White House denouncing ACORN and it was the Senate that has voted to cut off funding for this criminal gang. The Queen of the House, we'll remind you, is supposedly unaware of attempts to cut off funding.

The notion that the White House has distance themselves from ACORN is, well, laughable.

'What Did They Do? They Defunded It?'

We're not laughing with you, we're laughing at you

Could this woman possibly be more out of touch?

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said yesterday she is clueless about an amendment to prohibit government funds for embattled ACORN, although it overwhelmingly passed the Senate Monday and the White House is calling for the group to be held accountable.

"I don't even know what they passed," Pelosi told The Post yesterday. "What did they do? They defunded it?"

The amendment to suspend housing grants was a stunning blow to the community-activist group -- and came as some Democrats and the White House have been backing away from the group.

The vote was preceded by the release of videos by conservative activists posing as a pimp and prostitute soliciting -- and receiving -- tips from ACORN employees about how to shield income, avoid taxes and set up a brothel.

Meanwhile, the latest bomb to drop on the thugs at ACORN was released last night.





Via Big Government.

Very classy of this ACORN goon, having no problem with smuggling underage girls across the border so they can become sex slaves.

Meanwhile, the boobs at the White House finally figured out it might be a good time to distance themselves from this criminal enterprise, which for some bizarre reason is still being called an "activist" group.

Democrats are starting to realize their water carriers in the antique media may no longer be able to hold off the dogs.

With more undercover videos allegedly on the way, expect more Democratic elected officials to follow the White House's lead and begin not only distancing themselves from ACORN but also siding with those who are calling for investigations into its conduct.

"Any Democrat who acts or votes to protect ACORN will have an impossible time justifying it, and it will almost be too easy for us to make them pay politically for doing so," predicted Republican strategist Kevin Madden.

No matter how much the former "mainstream media" wanted to ignore this story, it's now the top story in the country, thanks to two kids without formal journalistic training and layers upon layers of editors.

Those layers, of course, would have prevented this scandal from ever becoming news since they're essentially an adjunct of the Democratic Party.

That's now their problem.

Instapundit and Hot Air link. Thanks!

New Bombshell ACORN Video From San Bernardino

Can you say busted, boys and girls?

Via Big Government.

James O'Keefe poses as an upcoming politician. Heh. Special added bonus: The ACORN woman confesses to killing her husband. Lovely. Plus she threatens someone else's life. Nice. And she's got the ear of all the local Democrats!

Obama must be so proud of his pals at ACORN.

Devastating stuff. I wonder if any of the antique media will notice? They can't call it racist since I don't see any black people on here.

Important Question of the Day: Want to Know Who Hannah Giles Is?

A question many are asking, and Mark Tapscott dutifully lets us know. A public service for which we are eternally grateful.

Hannah Giles, the young woman who dressed up and posed as a whore in the BigGovernment.com ACORN child prostitution sting videos, is an aspiring investigative reporter and National Journalism Center intern. You can read her Townhall.com bio here. Not familiar with NJC? Go here.

Actually, I shouldn't say "aspiring," as she's already accomplished something nobody from 60 Minutes, The New York Times, or any other mainstrream media thought to do, and that is find a way to expose the dirty truth behind the closed doors of ACORN. She was able to do that because she asked the right question, unemcumbered by the liberal conventional wisdom that blinds so many Mainstream Media journalists.

Reminds me of the undercover video stories done by Diane Sawyer years ago. Remember the green meat stories?

I hope Giles and her partner in this daring enterprise, James O'Keefe, spark a mass movement of young conservatives who decide to become investigative journalists. As I've been telling such folks for years now, there is a target-rich environment out there just waiting to be exposed.

Now, if we could only find some more bikini shots of the lovely Ms. Giles (hey, someone's got to play the role of sexist pig).

Here's an idea: Let's get her and Sarah Palin out on the stump together. Can you imagine the exploding heads?

Just imagine if a 20-year-old liberal helped bring down a corrupt conservative organization. I suspect she'd be getting a lot more media attention.

Here she is on Fox News last night. Obviously her appearing on FNC will preclude any of the other jealous media from paying her any attention.

A Pimp Grows in Brooklyn

Can the humiliation for Barack Obama's pals from ACORN get any worse? Well, of course it could if the rest of the media actually reported the story outside of the New York Post and Big Government.

The scandal surrounding the left-wing activist organization ACORN has spread to New York, with employees at its Brooklyn office caught on video helping supposed ladies of the night get loans for their dream houses of ill repute.

Rather than reminding the women that prostitution is dangerous and illegal and advising them to change their careers, counselors at the social-services group shockingly offer suggestions on how they can launder their earnings.

"Honesty is not going to get you the house," a loan counselor at the offices told two activists posing as a mortgage-seeking pimp and prostitute.

"You can't say what you do for a living."

ACORN workers in two other cities, Baltimore and Washington, DC, had already fallen hooker, line and sinker for the hidden-camera sting operation by two conservative activists.

Four ACORN employees have been fired as a result of the earlier videos, and last Friday the Census Bureau severed its ties with the group, whose members had been hired to do canvassing during the 2010 census.

In an unrelated outrage, ACORN was accused of widespread voter fraud during the 2008 presidential election by helping unqualified voters to register.

As in prior videos released by the filmmaking team of James O'Keefe, 25, and Hannah Giles, 20, employees of the group -- which specializes in housing and voter activism -- were eager to dispense advice on gaming the system and skirting the law.

"You know, what goes on in the house we don't care," one counselor said. "We just help you with the mortgage."

Of course who could possibly be suspicious when you see these two show up?
Here's Part II of the video.

'We Are Looking Out For You'

Gee, those nice folks at ACORN are just so helpful.

One day after two ACORN officials in Baltimore were fired for offering to help a man and woman posing as a pimp and prostitute to engage in child prostitution and a series of tax crimes, another secretly shot videotape has surfaced that shows the same couple getting similar advice from ACORN officers in Washington.

The newly released videotape, shot on July 25, shows ACORN staffers explaining to the pair how they can hide the woman's professed work — prostitution — and get a loan that will help them establish a brothel.

James O'Keefe, a 25-year-old independent filmmaker, posed as the pimp while visiting the ACORN office, accompanied by 20-year-old Hannah Giles, who posed as the prostitute. On a videotape provided to FOXNews.com, they are seen receiving guidance to establish the woman as the sole proprietor of a bogus company to mask the nature of her business.

"She's not going to put on (the loan application) that she's doing prostitution ... she doesn't have to," the ACORN staffer says. "You don't have to sit back and tell people what you do."

The ACORN staffer is heard suggesting that O'Keefe can purchase a house, and as the landlord, if he is ever questioned by authorities, he can say he was unaware of the illegal business going on inside.

The ACORN employee later suggests that O'Keefe, who said he had a budding political career, not linger at the house in case people "put the dots together" and leave him "smeared and tarnished" by his association with his prostitute girlfriend. She should keep her business "low key," the employee said.

An ACORN spokesman told FOX News the group would need to look at the full tape and transcript before commenting.

ACORN is a criminal enterprise and needs to be shut down. Problem is they're so closely linked with the President of the United States that nothing will happen. After all, they helped teach Obama how to organize communities. The left will just accuse Fox News of setting them up and will look the other way.