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Keith Olbermann Is Sued

Mar 1, 2012  •  Post A Comment

Controversial cable talk show host Keith Olbermann has been sued — and it’s apparently political. The New York Post reports that Olbermann, the outspoken left-leaning host of Current TV’s “Countdown with Keith Olbermann,” was sued by conservative “video prankster” James O’Keefe.

The suit also names Current TV, the story reports.

O’Keefe is accusing Olbermann and Current of being responsible for stating that O’Keefe had been accused of rape and convicted of a felony, according to the report.

The story states: “On an Olbermann show last week, a guest, cable reporter David Schuster, characterized O’Keefe as ‘a convicted felon’ and the suspect in a rape allegation from a former co-worker. Turns out O’Keefe pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge and had been accused of harassment, but the charges were dropped for lack of evidence.”

O’Keefe reportedly tweeted about the situation, saying: “MSM [mainstream media] will say, do anything to stop a citizen journalist they cannot control.”

6 Comments

  1. What a slanted story. Apparently, the NY Post feels that if someone is falsely accused of rape and being convicted of a felony is fine, as long as the accuser is a liberal and the victim is a conservative. I have never heard of James O’Keefe but the NY Post had to tag him with the adjective “video prankster” to identify him. This is not a straight news story. This is an example of the reporter (or editor) inserting their opinion into a news story. Most readers of news articles only read the lead paragraph. The rest of the story is a news report but the author of the story has gotten their message across in the first paragraph and know most people won’t read further.

  2. Skeptical observer, your comment would make more sense if the New York Post were a left leaning publication. However, it is not. If anything, NYP skews right. I think this story is actually quite balanced. The words “left-leaning” is not necessarily a compliment in the Post.

  3. Skeptical – Yes, the New York Post is a VERY conservative newspaper, and was considered the American flagship of the Rupert Murdoch empire (at least until he bought the Wall Street Journal).
    As for O’Keefe, “video prankster” is a fairly benign description, and about as apt and accurate as referring to Olbermann as an “excitable news anchor.”
    Yes, David Schuster got some of his facts wrong on a live television broadcast. O’Keefew isn’t a convicted felon, but he IS a convicted criminal. Olbermann has since addressed the issue on-air at least twice, noting the errors.
    Frankly, this isn’t much of a case. And I’m still waiting for Fox News to apologize for all the errors they’ve NEVER corrected (like the current president is a secret Muslim, or a communist, or Kenyan).

  4. Let’s see, someone voicing an opinion that Obama may be a “secret” Muslim is comparable to stating that James O’Keefe is a convicted felon and rape suspect? And doesn’t the word “secret” connote concealment and lack of absolute proof? Our news media has become a joke. Just give the public the who, what, why, where, when and let them formulate an opinion. As to Fox News, if you haven’t figured out by now that a significant portion of their broadcast day is opinion, you are not very observant. As for most other, so called, news orgs. they have long ago crossed the line from reporting to simply propagandizing their viewpoint.

  5. Keith Olbermann and Current are main stream media?

  6. Personally, I don’t care it a “news” source is left leaning or right leaning. What I care about is getting news without the bias of the author injected into the story. In the first paragraph, the words, “…– and it’s apparently political.” are an opinion. The adjective, ““video prankster” is also an opinion. News stories should be totally objective, just reporting the facts, without the author’s opinions. Opinion columns and opinion stories should be labeled as such. There is (or should be) a higher journalistic standard for straight news stories than for opinion columns.

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