James O’Keefe is either the sleaziest kind of journalist or the most respectable kind of con artist. His Project Veritas group uses lies, scams and hidden cameras to entrap his political adversaries. This week, Project Veritas released a video of its latest victim: Ron Schiller, a fundraising executive for National Public Radio. Mr Schiller and a colleague were lured to a Washington restaurant with promises of $5m in donations from the “Muslim Education Action Center”. Meac, supposedly set up by the Muslim Brotherhood to “spread the acceptance of sharia”, does not actually exist. It was an invention of Project Veritas. But Mr Schiller was voluble in assuring its leaders of his contempt for the kind of middle-class Americans who voted for the Tea Party last autumn. “They believe in white, middle America, gun-toting … it’s scary,” he said. “They’re seriously racist, racist people.” Of course, they also happen to elect the congressional majority that controls the fate of $450m in public broadcasting funding. Mr Schiller has resigned from NPR, as has its chief executive, Vivian Schiller (no relation).
Political pranksterism is all the rage. Sacha Baron Cohen practised a form of it in Borat and, more recently, the editor of the Buffalo Beast news website phoned Scott Walker, the embattled Wisconsin governor, passing himself off as the Republican donor David Koch.