Much of America discovered James O'Keefe III and Hannah Giles through their hidden-camera, make-believe pimp and prostitute videos of ACORN employees giving advice about establishing a brothel with underage hookers.

But as far back as 2006—well before the videos became a national sensation and conservative rallying cry—the fresh-faced O'Keefe and Giles connected with a pair of Washington conservative institutions that boast programs training ideological journalists.

Now, due to coordinated promotion of the undercover sting footage by influential players in the conservative media, Giles and O'Keefe have gone from part of the pack to movement superstars.

Giles, a 20-year-old sophomore at Florida International University, spent the summer on a $1,200-a-month internship with the National Journalism Center, a training organization whose alumni include conservative commentator Ann Coulter. Immediately after graduating Rutgers University in 2006, O'Keefe, 25, was paid to set up magazines and newspapers on university campuses for the Leadership Institute, which recruits potential conservative public policy and media stars.

Each has other credentials that place them squarely in the network of activists who believe liberal-leaning mainstream media willfully ignore stories that illustrate the failings of the political left and its leaders.

O'Keefe and Giles insist that no one helped them conceive, execute or finance their video project, which with remarkable speed has devastated the activist community service group Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, commonly known as ACORN.

They have said a shoestring $1,300 budget was all it took to shoot video in at least five ACORN offices. (more...)

"Frankly, it's not something I've followed closely," Mr. Obama claimed, adding he wasn't even aware the group had been the recipient of significant federal funding. "This is not the biggest issue facing the country. It's not something I'm paying a lot of attention to," he said.
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* Engaged in tax evasion, obstruction of justice and aiding and abetting a cover-up of nearly $1 million embezzled by Dale Rathke, brother of group founder Wade Rathke;
* Committed investment fraud, depriving the public of the right to "honest services," and engaging in a racketeering enterprise affecting interstate commerce;
* Conspired to defraud the United States by using taxpayer dollars for partisan political activities;
* Submitted false filings to the Internal Revenue Service, and the U.S. Department of Labor; and,
* Violated the U.S. Fair Labor Standards Act.

Any one of these is a serious allegation. Taken together, they give ACORN most every appearance of being some sort of massive criminal enterprise worthy of a federal investigation of the sort made under the terms of the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act—or RICO. In fact the group and its affiliates are currently the target of more than a dozen lawsuits related to voter fraud in the 2008 election alone.