Journos, Pranksters, Criminals

The NYT has a new piece tonight on the 4 men, including anti-ACORN video star James O'Keefe, charged with illegal activities inside Sen. Mary Landrieu's office this week, which may or may not involved attempted wiretapping. But as we did yesterday, the Times focuses on their past "journalism" efforts, partly on campus. Excerpt:

At least three of the men charged in the episode have backgrounds in campus journalism. Both Mr. O’Keefe, 25, a graduate of Rutgers, and Joseph Basel, 24, a graduate of the University of Minnesota-Morris, started conservative newspapers on their campuses, which they saw as counterweights in a liberal campus environment. (Mr. Basel actually called his paper The Counterweight.) Stan Dai, 24, was editor in chief of The GW Patriot, a conservative campus newspaper at George Washington University....

Former students and alumni of the student publications remembered Mr. O’Keefe and Mr. Dai, especially, for their aggressive, often prank-filled brand of journalism. At Rutgers and George Washington, both publications have taken a less confrontational approach.

“James always said, ‘Journalism is putting a camera in someone’s face until they do something stupid,’ ” said Cain Barry, who worked with Mr. O’Keefe at The Centurion, a conservative publication at Rutgers, until Mr. O’Keefe graduated in 2006. “A lot of people wanted to follow what he did.”