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James O'Keefe's videos aren't about editing openly shot video of electeds' meetings with constituents to highlight the worst parts. They're about secretly, maliciously recording private citizens, lying about what they say, and trying to destroy their lives and livelihoods.
I've seen a number of people suggest that last night's Feinstein video was akin to O'Keefe's work. No. Ew. No comparison. Even if you disagree with how the Feinstein vid was edited, they're fundamentally different things. Entirely different.
As @banditelli notes, James O'Keefe doesn't freaking livestream his hits, whereas here there was full and open disclosure throughout.
"Cherry-picking video highlights" isn't what O'Keefe does. It's what ESPN does. What O'Keefe does is fundamentally different.
O'Keefe tapes people without their knowledge, he lies about who he is, he uses deception to attempt to goad them into violating the law or their ethical obligations, and then when they don't, he deceptively edits the tape to make it look like they did. There's none of that here.
Getting a bit of "it doesn't matter if they used O'Keefe's tactics" pushback. No. Attempting to portray your adversaries in a bad light is universal in politics. Universal. What matters is the tactics you use, and the ethical constraints you abide by.
"They picked out the parts that were the strongest for their argument and edited out the other parts" isn't a claim of ethical malfeasance. That's literally how every adversarial political video works, and has ever worked, and will ever work.
