Another Blow for ACORN
November 9, 2009
Scandal-ridden ACORN suffered another blow late last week when officials from Louisiana’s Attorney General seized computers, hard drives and documents at the group’s New Orleans office as part of an embezzlement and tax fraud investigation. So if there’s an ACORN krewe at Mardi Gras, are the colors going to be pinstripe and orange jumpsuit?
More Trouble At ACORN
October 26, 2009
After a couple ACORN employees got caught advising two investigative reporters about how to avoid paying taxes on a brothel they wanted to start, ACORN’s leadership fired the employees and tried to chalk up it all to a few bad apples.
But a recent Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) report, as reported in USA Today demonstrates that the mismanagement at ACORN is a systemic problem, not an isolated scandal.
Between 2002 and 2008, federal funding for a HUD program to help people avoid foreclosure on their homes has more than tripled to $65 million – much of which is funneled to ACORN and other community groups. President Obama’s budget calls for increasing it to $100 million. There’s only one problem: HUD “has been unable to provide much proof the program works.” According to HUD:
- “At present there is limited evidence of the benefits of counseling in making homeownership more sustainable.
- “Despite not meeting its expectations, HUD continued to propose increases in funding.”
Following the now infamous videos, the House and Senate voted to end federal funding for ACORN. HUD’s reports confirm the wisdom of these votes.
Worth Reading: Blackwell On Voter Registration
October 5, 2009
Former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell has a good piece in today’s Washington Times on how to reform our voter registration process and keep corrupt organizations like ACORN at arms length. Money quote:
“By using technology to make voter registration more automated, we can save money and get rid of those groups that thrive by gaming the voter registration system.”
Seizing The Florida Legislature Through Sleaze And Corruption
October 5, 2009
What do you get when you cross two organizations - one sleazy, the other corrupt? Answer: A new redistricting scheme for Florida called FairDistrictsFlorida.org!
According to Sunday’s Orlando Sentinel, some of Florida’s top trial lawyers (whose lobby arm admitted to sending out a racist mailer) in a Florida senate race) and ACORN (enough said) have teamed up to try to seize the Florida legislature from the Republicans. Since they can’t seem to win at the ballot box, they’re spending big $$ to influence the redistricting process, hiding behind the veil of nonpartisanship of course. That act has grown so old even the mainstream media smirks these days, with the Sentinel reporting that “Democrats and left-leaning groups have done the heavy financial lifting so far.”
The goal is to put a constitutional amendment on the ballot to hamstring the legislature, which must draw up new state House and Senate districts once the 2010 Census is completed. ACORN was supposed to be a “partner” in collecting data for the 2010 Census, but that partnership was severed last month after ACORN employees were caught on tape advising investigators posing as a pimp and a prostitute how to dodge tax laws.
Census Director Robert Groves said ACORN’s participation “may even become a discouragement to public cooperation, negatively impacting 2010 Census efforts.” Looks like ACORN hasn’t given up on trying to influence the census and redistricting - they’re just attempting to do it through the back door.
ACORN and the Florida trial lawyers should slither back into the swamps where they belong.
Keeping An Eye On The Secretary Of State Project
October 1, 2009
The Secretary of State Project is rattling the tin cup for Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie and SOS challengers Debra Bowen in California and Jocelyn Benson in Michigan. The hope is that Bowen and Benson can do what Ritchie did in Minnesota: tip close elections, such as the Franken-Coleman race, in favor of their preferred candidate.
Ritchie, of course, was elected with SOS Project funding and quickly abandoned any pretense of running fair elections. According to Jeff Davis, president of the legislative watchdog group Minnesota Majority, Ritchie blocked an investigation of ACORN, which had endorsed him, despite evidence of “a number of irregularities” in Minnesota voter records - little things like dead people and convicted felons registering from prison. I guess the 2008 election was a two-fer for Ritchie as far as the SOS Project was concerned: He kept ACORN in the game and played a major role in tilting the election to Al Franken.
Like other groups funded by hedge fund billionaire George Soros - such as Justice at Stake - the SOS Project poses as a non-partisan, good government organization whose only ambition is to ensure clean elections. And, as with other Soros-bankrolled groups, this pose is used to shield the deeply partisan nature of the organization. I wonder if Bowen and Benson know that sweeping ACORN’s fraudulent activities under the rug is part of the job description for candidates taking $$ from the SOS Project.
More ACORN Allies Abandon Ship
September 30, 2009
Senator Al Franken - who once gushed that he was “more motivated than ever to work with ACORN” - has finally “got religion” according to Katherine Kersten, writing in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Franken joined 83 other Senators in voting to slash funds for the disgraced group, but President Obama has refused to say whether he’d sign legislation to remove ACORN from the federal trough.
Kersten alludes to ACORN’s role in helping Franken sneak into the Senate, nothing that ACORN “is best-known for its massive voter-registration campaigns, which focus relentlessly on getting Democrats elected in target states.” All true, but she neglects to mention allegations by the legislative watchdog group Minnesota Majority concerning “a number of irregularities” in Minnesota’s voter registration records - including the registration of dead people and convicted felons at a time when ACORN was bragging about registering 80,000 new voters in time for the 2008 elections.
Calls for an investigation were quickly quashed by Secretary of State Mark Ritchie, whose campaign was bankrolled in part by the Secretary of State Project - a political operation funded by hedge fund billionaire George Soros to help sway close elections to liberal Democrats.
Do ACORN and the Secretary of State Project have any formal working relationship? Can’t say - but they are certainly toiling in the same vineyards.
ACORN’s Unusual Severance Package
September 24, 2009
Acorn has filed a lawsuit (POLITICO has the complaint) on behalf of itself, plus two employees caught on video tape handing out advice on how to avoid paying taxes on a brothel and hush up the employment of underage sex workers. Acorn claims Tonja Thompson and Shera Williams “suffered extreme emotional distress with attendant physical symptoms and injury to their reputations.” I guess Acorn ought to know; the group’s chief, Bertha Lewis, fired the employees and trashed them on the TV talk shows last weekend.
Acorn’s lawsuit seeks $500,000 in damages for each of the employees they fired, plus $1 million for each in punitives, presumably due to the damage to their reputations inflicted by Acorn. Of course, the real goal here is to intimidate the heroic filmmakers, James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles, along with Andrew Breitbart who publicized the shocking footage, with harassing litigation designed to drain their wallets and publicly slime them.
This is how these corrupt thugs play. Break the rules, screw the taxpayers and sue the good guys. We need a big boot to squash this outfit of lawbreakers.
Let’s go good guys. Don’t back down. Keep up the pressure. More videos. Pictures say a thousand words and no slick trial lawyer can lie their way out of this. I wish taxpayers could sue this outfit.
Has a defense fund been set up yet for O’Keefe, Giles and Breitbart? I’ve got my checkbook ready.
The Last Man In America To Know
September 21, 2009
“Frankly it’s not really something I’ve followed closely. I didn’t even know that Acorn was getting - ah, ah - a whole lot of federal money.” That what President Obama told George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s This Week.
According to Congressman Darrell Issa, American taxpayers have given Acorn more than $53 million. President Obama refused to say if he’d sign legislation that passed the House 345-75 last week to cut off all federal funding of Acorn.
ACORN Scrambles For Survial
September 21, 2009
When the videos documenting Acorn’s corrupt and illegal activities first aired, Acorn chief executive Bertha Lewis labeled filmmaker James O’Keefe and his partner Hannah Giles criminals.
“… it is clear that the videos were doctored, edited, and in no way the result of the fabricated story being portrayed by conservative activist ‘filmmaker’ O’Keefe and his partner in crime. And, in fact, a crime it was - our lawyers believe a felony - and we will be taking legal action against Fox and their co-conspirators.”
The slap at Fox was pure bluster - a pathetic attempt to portray Acorn as the victim of some vast, right-wing conspiracy. Fox News had nothing to do with the production of the videos, as Chris Wallace made clear when he interviewed Lewis on Sunday. Lewis was more contrite, claiming she was actually “outraged” seeing Acorn employees advising O’Keefe and Giles on the most tax-advantaged way to set up a prostitution ring.
No word from Lewis on the status of Acorn’s “legal action” against O’Keefe, Giles or Fox.
Must Readings On ACORN’s Decline And Fall
September 21, 2009
Internet entrepreneur Andrew Breitbart has an absolute must-read article in today’s Washington Times giving the back story on how the Acorn videos exploded into public view and forced the group to fight for survival. Breitbart believed the mainstream media would “try to kill this important and illuminating expose … and that the well-funded political left would go into ‘war room’ mode, with the 25-year-old Mr. O’Keefe and 20-year-old cohort Miss Giles in the cross hairs.” So he and O’Keefe hatched a strategy to “force the media to see the evidence before they had enough time to destroy” the messengers by posting the footage on Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com. It’s a brilliant illustration of how the Internet is shaking the foundations of the modern media.