OOPS: Backfire: Project Veritas ‘sting’ of Washington Post only makes the paper look better. Well, good for the Post: This kind of source-vetting is what the press is supposed to do. (Compare with Sabrina Erdely on the made-up UVA rape story). I hope that the idea that people might be trying to sting them with phony stories will encourage other media to do as well, though I fear they’ll be vetting for O’Keefe connections as much as for accuracy. But maybe I’m too cynical.

As for O’Keefe, well, the ACORN sting was great, and some of his other work has been good, but ACORN was a soft target and the WaPo is a hard target. And ACORN was the first such sting, while now people know they’re at risk. The question is whether this sort of thing is the best use of resources, compared to straightforward journalism.