I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry

Which do you think scares James O'Keefe more? Negroes, voting? Or gay people, just existing?

Still, the Wetmore-O’Keefe friendship was, in gonzo journalism terms, a productive one. In 2008, after O’Keefe had left the Leadership Institute, the two men recorded hidden camera video of themselves going to three state offices in Massachusetts, applying for marriage licenses, openly admitting that they were straight men who wanted to get married to take advantage of the benefits.

O’KEEFE: We probably plan on doing this for about a year and then..
CLERK: And then, divorcing.
O’KEEFE: Right.
CLERK: Yeah.
WETMORE: Yeah.

The closest thing O’Keefe and Wetmore got to an ACORN moment was a Worcester, Mass., clerk admitting that she wasn’t telling a supervisor about their meeting because she didn’t want to get in trouble. Because the gag didn’t go any further, the stunt got little media attention. Fourteen months later, it reveals just how close O’Keefe and Wetmore were.

Beyond the psychological problems they're trying to work out, what exactly do these pranksters expect to prove by playing "Gotcha!" w/ receptionists, clerks & other low-level employees? (Not even to mention the editing involved in the ACORN tapes.) There might be something to some of this crap if they, or their potential bureaucratic victims, had actually filed any paperwork w/ the gov't., for example. But rather than go on w/ these plots (And how likely is it any of these deceptions would have gone beyond the first review by an employee farther up in the organization?) submitting paperwork, & therefore having proof that an ACORN or Commonwealth of Massachusetts flunky was willing to help them commit fraud, these drive-by journalists (Thanks to Rush Limbaugh for "drive-by journalist." The ultimate in reactionary projection.) consider it proof that there is an organized plot to do, well, we don't know what. The mere fact that they were not immediately escorted from the premises after revealing their sekrit plan to defraud the American tax-payer is hardly proof that ACORN is a "criminal enterprise."

Bear in mind that two people marrying for the benefits of marriage, even if they aren't madly in love (or even "doing it") is hardly exclusive to the gay community. How many "opposite-sex" couples have married to get themselves benefits? As the states do not have actual "Madly in Love? Yes or No?" tests for couples wanting to marry, one might conclude that gay people are being deprived of rights available to the rest of us. Probably not what James & his lover Ben were trying to prove. (Note: It's difficult to "prove" that "homos are icky" to people who aren't homophobes, Jimbo. Better luck appealing to prejudice next time, fellas.)