I probably should have checked my brain for hidden recording devices when I started having this thought.
It was Tuesday morning and I was trying to wrap my head around a column topic for the week. My internal dialogue went something like this:
“Gee, the New Canaan Board of Education members who managed to erase ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ from the school district’s goals really is column catnip,” I pondered. “If only a Democrat would do something that absurd so I can have some balance.”
Maybe hidden camera maestro James O’Keefe can read minds now. By the next morning, O’Keefe’s Project Veritas had delivered videos of Cos Cob Elementary School Assistant Principal Jeremy Boland apparently spilling secret discriminatory hiring practices to a mystery woman (identified by O’Keefe’s camp only as “Veritas Journalist”).
The man identified as Boland says he doesn’t even bother interviewing anyone over 30 (“sometimes the older you get, the more set in your ways, the more conservative you get”) and won’t hire anyone raised Catholic (“it’s like they’re brainwashed. You can never change their mindset,” he said).
I went to Catholic schools for 17 years, and my mindset has changed a lot since then (I no longer listen to Wang Chung, for example). I also tend to believe minds can change, but that’s also part of the job description.
As soon as the Veritas video hit the web, my email and phone started dinging with accusations that we were covering up the story. “Cos Cob Asst Principle (sic) not worth reporting?” read a sample gripe.
By day’s end, more insults came from O’Keefe himself, who literally waggled his finger at journalists during a rally hosted by Leora Levy, who is seeking to unseat U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal.
“This is real investigative reporting. If all of you guys were doing your jobs there wouldn’t be a need for people like me,” O’Keefe chided.
Traditional journalists, of course, tend to want to vet a video using jump cut techniques like Wang Chung’s fabled 1986 “Everybody Have Fun Tonight” video, which was banned by the BBC for fears it would cause seizures (see Colin McEnroe’s column next door if you hanker for even more Wang Chung trivia).
Levy’s rally was like T-ball batting practice for Republicans. She invited other candidates to the mic to take swings, including state Rep. Kimberly Fiorello, state Rep. Ryan Fazio, former Darien First Selectman Jayme Stevenson (who is challenging U.S. Rep. Jim Himes), House District 151 candidate Peter Sherr and District 25 state Senate candidate Daniel Miressi.
It was a grand moment for the old party, an opportunity to unite during a divisive year. Greenwich First Selectman Fred Camillo remained on the sidelines during the event after officially calling for an independent investigation earlier in the day. That he choose not to take some swings could simply be because he is not a candidate this political cycle. But his distance seemed noteworthy given that even O’Keefe spoke.
Back in March 2020, I was giving thought to writing a different column. O’Keefe was slated to be the keynote speaker at the Stamford Republican Town Committee’s Lincoln Dinner, which would also have honored Camillo. It seemed like bad optics for Camillo, given O’Keefe’s controversial methods. I never wrote that column, as COVID canceled the event.
“I don’t know much about him,” Camillo said about O’Keefe at the time.
He certainly knows about O’Keefe now. But dodging the news conference would have been even worse optics for the party.
At Wednesday’s event, Fazio did me the favor of tying a knot…
Read More: A good day for GOP in Greenwich, a bad one in New Canaan