RAW STORY cites dismissive MSNBC coverage
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OLBERMANN RESPONSE TO PROGRAMMER's AFFIDAVIT FAILS TO ASK TOUGH QUESTIONS, NOTE FEENEY TIES.
This from Keith Olbermann, the lone `reporter' on the voting irregularity beat. Olbermann gets responses from Feeney, who seems to laugh at Curtis' claims and gently threaten NBC with legal action.
Olbermann, however, gets some facts wrong - that Curtis was a `disgruntled' employee is certainly in the eye of the beholder; on his departure, he was thrown a party and the company, Yang Enterprises, is said to have asked him to stay on. It's certainly possible, however, that Curtis became a disgruntled employee long after he left.
Olbermann fails to note that Yang Enterprises has already lied about employing an illegal alien who later tried to export sensitive missile technology to China. He's also failed to ask the FBI about an alleged investigation into Yang's dealings about knowingly employing an illegal alien and falsifying his employment status to get him security clearances at NASA.
Also curious is that Olbermann takes Yang's lawyer at his word - who was previously Rep. Feeney's law partner and gave $1,500 to Feeney's 2002 congressional campaign. Additionally, Olbermann does not actually confirm a police report exists on Curtis.
Meanwhile, he failed to interview Curtis entirely.
RAW STORY does not claim-nor has it ever claimed-that there is evidence to show that Curtis' program was ever used or even existed. It has, however, confirmed numerous elements of Curtis' affidavit.
Here's an excerpt from his entry (linked above), for what it's worth.
I've refrained from reporting any of this here because there are a lot of questions about the nature of the interactions between Mr. Curtis and Congressman Feeney. But at my request, a very reliable member of the NBC News Investigative Unit tracked down some of the headlines, and we also spoke to Congressman Feeney. Given that the story has hit the newspapers, even in a small way, it's now appropriate to report what we've learned.
Firstly, the attorney for the firm for whom Mr. Curtis worked at the time of the purported skullduggery request, Yang Enterprises of Oviedo, Florida, insists that the company has never sold any voting software. Its lawyer claims Curtis has previously threatened the firm and its top officers, in writing, and that they were sufficiently concerned to file a police report as a result. Though the term "disgruntled employee" is too easily thrown around (I can attest to that), if somebody has put it in writing, it's a tough climb back to full credibility.
There are also a couple of logical disconnects contained in Curtis's story. As our investigator notes, if Curtis is correct, Feeney made an illegal request to a group of employees who might have tacitly committed a felony just by listening to it and not reporting it to authorities. Additionally, Curtis made no reference to any of this until he had left Yang's employ, and by the time he did tell anybody, it was four years after the fact.
For his part, Congressman Feeney answered seven questions from one of our producers and in six of them made gentle hints about reporters
getting legal counsel before they ran with the story (this was before the Florida paper ran what it did-- one wonders what things are like in their office this week). In short, Feeney says he doesn't remember meeting Mr. Curtis; that his only connection to Yang Enterprises was as an attorney prior to 2002; that because Mr. Curtis had "slandered and defamed a lot of people" he would not reply to specific questions, only general ones; and that as to the story on the whole, "I'm very amused by it. I wish I had some of the power that he suggests."