The Left's Penchant for Selectively Editing Videos

Citizen media, with the internet and small video cameras, pose a threat to the left’s most sacred institutions. Something that began with James OKeefe bringing down ACORN and Lila Rose knocking on Planned Parenthood’s door has turned into a movement of everyday people questioning their elected officials with flip cams and using technology to change the world. Naturally, the left, coupled with the media, is out to put a stop to this.

As a blogger-videographer-citizen journalist, I have been accused of heavily editing my videos. As if I’m James Cameron and I some how created a C.G.I. version of Phil Hare and MADE him say “I don’t worry about the Constitution.”

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They accuse O’Keefe and Rose and many others in this new media movement of the same thing. “Selective Editing” and “Heavy Editing.” are the new buzzwords. The truth is, the left and the MSM are the worst offenders when it comes to intentionally deceptive edits. I should know, they’ve pilfered and deceptively edited MY video.

Just days after CrashTheTeaParty.Org made national news by encouraging people to wear racist garb and attempt to infiltrate Tea Parties, look who shows up at the April 15 2010 St. Louis Tax Day Tea Party Rally. A guy with a Swastika on his shirt. His goal, no doubt, was to slip in be photographed and get out, giving the media a great “Nazi at the Tea Party” narrative.

He didn’t count on myself and other members of the St. Louis Tea Party being ready for him. You’re not gonna come up on our turf and out maneuver us. Myself and other Tea Partiers called him out and eventually ran him off. All on video.

Here’s What happened:

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Even though this guy was completely rejected and discredited the “Nazi at the Tea Party” narrative was just too much to resist for Lee Fang and Think Progress. They “selectively edited” my video making it appear that swastika boy was just hanging out the Tea Party spouting his racist crap. Here’s Fan-Think Progress video in question.

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Deceptive Editing!! Where’s the outrage lefties? This wasn’t done for time abridgment, it was done to distort the original context of my video. Big difference between what they do and what they’ve cited as “selectively edited.”

Around the same time MSNBC aired a report about people openly-legally carrying fire arms to healthcare reform rallies. In that report they show a 3 second video clip of a man with an AR-15 Rifle over his shoulder, the clip is deceptively edited to conceal the man’s race.

Contessa Brewer goes on to say “Questions whether or not there racial overtones. Here you have a man of color in the Presidency and white people showing up with guns”. Brewer and two others talk for several minutes about racism and “hate groups” trying desperately paint the Tea Party as gun toting racists. All the while omitting the fact that the man in the video with the AR-15 was African American.

Even though the guy holding the gun didn’t fit MSNBC’s narrative, that shot of the big scary assault rifle was just too good to resist. So they cropped it to conceal his race and ran with it. The truth be damned.

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More recently the leftist bullshit factory known as Media Matters attacked John Stossel, claiming that Stossel’s recent report on the Pigford black farmer discrimination suit failed to recognize that actual discrimination took place.

The Pigford case went from a legitimate discrimination claim by legitimate farmers to a free for all for everyone who has ever owned a potted plant. The lawyers have broadened the standards for participation from actual farmers to people who “attempted to farm.” This of course is leading to massive fraud costing the government billions.

In the above linked attack article by Media Matters said this of Stossel’s report:

But just like the last time he did a segment on Pigford, Stossel refused to acknowledge that discrimination had occurred” and “Stossel’s refusal to acknowledge the discrimination against the black farmers makes him even more dishonest.

However, Stossel’s report clearly highlights the case of one actual victim, Jimmy Dismuke. Here’s the video:

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Yet Media Matters runs this selectively edited clip of Stossel’s report as if it’s some sort of proof.

More selective editing and lies. Where’s the righteous indignation Libs?

Finally, a new editing strategy has emerged on the left. I’m calling this “violent editing.” In this new tactic the exposed leftist will simply attack the citizen journalist and destroy the camera, violently editing out his own crime.

I have discovered this new tactic first hand in my encounter with controversial UMSL Professor Don Giljum. Giljum made news recently when video leaked from his labor studies class that exposed his radical curriculum. Ironically, Giljum complained to me that those videos were taken out of context and heavily edited. That was just before he did a little editing of his own by breaking my camera. Luckily I caught the aftermath with my back up cam:

Four rock solid examples of the left practicing the very deceptive editing tactics they accuse myself and others of doing – and those are just the ones I can think of right now. It’s clear that the Soros funded left, Media Matters, Think Progress, and MSNBC have zero regard for truth and have the market cornered on lies and “selective editing.”