No Emptier Than all the Other Promises

NOT a "Deputy Special Assistant" to HUD Secretary Alphoso Jackson...

Rene Oswin he ain't:

Two members of the Yes Men, a group of environmental and corporate ethics activists, duped business executives and some news organizations earlier today when they posed as top HUD officials and announced the agency planned to renovate several housing developments now slated for demolition.

One of the men said they set up the hoax after receiving an e-mail solicitation from Equity International -- the group staging the conference -- in search of conference speakers. They responded by saying HUD secretary Alfonso Jackson would like to speak, after which Jackson was placed in the conference lineup after Gov. Kathleen Blanco and Mayor Ray Nagin.

The two men, one of whom posed as a HUD "deputy special assistant" Rene Oswin and the other as Oswin’s press secretary, showed up at the Pontchartrain Center in Kenner this morning and told organizers that Jackson couldn’t make the event, and that they would speak in his place, one said.

Then the man posing as Oswin gave a 15-minute speech saying that HUD was reversing its policy and would reopen all public housing in the city. While the speech was under way, the group e-mailed a bogus press release to major news outlets with the same announcement.

After the speech, the audience of several hundred people applauded, and the conference organizer thanked Oswin for his comments. A group of news reporters huddled around the fake HUD officials asking questions about the apparent policy reversal. Some news organizations sent out breaking news alerts to the major development before learning it was a fake.

Shortly after the speech concluded, another member of the Yes Men, standing outside the Lafitte housing development, said she had called numerous contractors and told them to gather at Lafitte at 1 p.m. to learn about millions in contracting opportunities that would spring from the policy reversal. She refused to give her name. The Lafitte complex is one of four slated for demolition.

You can look at the "press release" here. CNN has more, and the Yes Men themselves have a website that explains their motivation.

One thing that's interesting is that the ideas expressed by "Mr. Orwin" evidently were quite popular with all in attendence...and the numbers, in amounts of money to be spent and the source of funding, seemded quite reasonable, if you ask me. Certainly it was in keeping with the "promises" made in a generator-lit Jackson Square last year, when a certain chimp, I mean chief executive pledged to do whatever it took.

Maybe Mr. Orwin SHOULD be Jackson's Deputy Assistant...if not HUD secretary himself.