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ACORN: Which Is Most Corrupt-ACORN or The Democrat Party?

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It is truly insane, to send hundreds of billions of dollars to D.C. for the sake of politicians' advancing their careers.

Nanny-State Media Barely Covered One of the Most Corrupt Scandals by one of the most Corrupt Entities in America--But It is giving front page, distorted coverage to James O'Keefe, the investigative reporter who did the nation a huge favor by exposing ACORN. O'Keefe has not yet been charged with anything.

Wisconsin Attorney General J. B. Van Hollen has charged five members of the ACORN with felony voter fraud

Full article Uncoverage.net

Judicial Watch Files Two New FOIA Lawsuits to Obtain Information on ACORN Scandals

The Newest ACORN Scandal Will Air Tonight on Sean Hannity

6PM Eastern Standard Time (EST)

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Did $215,000 "Loan" to ACORN Founder's Brother Violate Federal Law? Why Did Government Continue to Fund ACORN & Affiliates after Discovering Previous Alleged Abuses Involving Federal Grants?

Contact Information:

Press Office 202-646-5172, ext 305

Washington, DC -- September 30, 2009

Excerpts:

Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it filed two new Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits on September 28th to obtain government records related to the activities of the controversial "community organization" Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN). These lawsuits were filed against the Department of Labor's Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) and the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS).

Judicial Watch's EBSA lawsuit involves monies embezzled by Dale Rathke, the brother of ACORN founder Wade Rathke. The New York Times has reported that, overall, Dale Rathke allegedly embezzled $948,607.50 in 1999 and 2000. According to a report by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, a portion of these funds, $215,000, allegedly came in the form of a "loan." The manner in which this "loan" was handled and concealed by ACORN internally may have violated the Employee Income Retirement Security Act (ERISA).

Judicial Watch filed its original FOIA request on August 4th, but the EBSA failed to respond within the statutory allotted 20 day period. The request seeks the following records: "All records concerning the following entities' misconduct and/or violations of laws and/or policies, including but not limited to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act ('ERISA'): Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now ('ACORN'), ACORN Housing, Citizen's Consulting, Inc., Citizen's Services, Inc., Communities Voting Together, Project Vote, Services Employees International Union (SEIU), SEIU Local 100, SEIU Local 880."

Full article Judicial Watch

MinnPost.Com

By Joe Kimball

Friday, Sept. 19, 2009

Excerpts:

The Minnesota ACORN office is on the second floor of a nondescript St. Paul brick office building that also houses the Green Party of Minnesota.

When I climbed the steps there at University and Raymond avenues and passed by one of the ACORN Housing Office doors, I heard an employee say: "The media will probably be coming soon."

That was my cue. "The media's here," I said.

With all the flurry of action in Washington over the recent national ACORN scandal, and Gov. Tim Pawlenty's quick executive decision to end all state funding for the group (although there's apparently been none since May, 2008), we wanted to look at what the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now does here in Minnesota.

Full article Joe Kimball MinnPost.Com

HYSCIENCE.COM

October 6, 2009

More ACORN Scandals

Topics: Political News and commentaries

Two big stories this morning:

Excerpts:

First, Pamela Geller has an exclusive story on a Black Republican in Jacksonville, Florida that had heard in February of 2009 that ACORN was paying three dollars for each vote you could register, and subsequently registered voters for Acorn there, but that the group threw out her votes and fired her when she brought them GOP registrations.

Next, Big Government reports that according to the Louisiana Attorney General - Dale Rathke embezzled $5 million from the Organization:

According to the new subpoena issued by the Louisiana Attorney General, it seems ACORN leadership was aware of the full extent of the embezzlement. That they have covered up the true figure cast doubt on their ability to truely reform the organization. In other words, they will only admit to what they get caught at.

Full article HYSCIENCE.COM

Now will Congress investigate ACORN?

Washington Examiner

Examiner Editorial

October 4, 2009

Excerpts:

Evidence continues to accumulate from far and wide that the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now is lousy with corruption. The latest revelations come from Louisiana and Oklahoma. In the former, the local ACORN Housing Corp. office received contracts worth a combined $625,000 from the City of New Orleans for repairing existing low-income housing and developing new units in poor neighborhoods. The contracts were paid for with funds from federal Community Development Block Grants from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. An investigation by the Pelican Institute think tank of New Orleans, however, found that no work was actually performed to fulfill the contracts. Worse, Pelican couldn't talk to the ACORN official managing the contracts because he had left the organization months ago. One more thing: The office address listed on the contracts for ACORN turned out to be a vacant lot, although new plumbing connections indicated a trailer had recently been located on the site.

Meanwhile, in Oklahoma City, documents found in a recently vacated ACORN office included a detailed memo titled "Power Plan" for a five-year effort to elect supportive legislators and transform Oklahoma to a progressive state "in the way it was 100 years ago." The man in charge of the office left town without paying back rent or utility bills, according to OklahmaWatchdog.org. Also found in the documents was a script for a Houston ACORN-directed recruiting campaign for "hiring Outreach Workers to remind people to get out and vote for Barack Obama in the upcoming election." As a tax-exempt nonprofit, ACORN is barred from participating in partisan election activities, and its national spokesmen have insisted throughout the 2008 presidential race that their organization was not working to elect Obama.

Full article Washington Examiner

Congress Targets ACORN in a Bipartisan Way

Congressional Republicans are clearly united against funneling federal dollars to the community organizing group ACORN. But surprisingly, so are many Democrats.

By Trish Turner, John Brandt and Chad Pergram

FOXNews.com

Friday, September 18, 2009

Excerpts:

Congressional Republicans are clearly united against funneling federal dollars to the community organizing group ACORN. But surprisingly, so are many Democrats.

In a legislative surprise Thursday, the House overwhelmingly voted to withhold all funding for ACORN. Later in the day, a Republican senator succeeded in targeting funds away from the group through yet another spending bill.

The House measure came as a parliamentary maneuver during debate on a higher education bill. Many expected the anti-ACORN effort would be ruled out of order because it didn't pertain to education. But in a stunning turn of events, House Education Committee Chairman George Miller, D-Calif., not only accepted the ACORN provision, but also encouraged Democrats to vote for it.

As a result, 172 Democrats joined 173 Republicans to pass the motion 345-75. Two lawmakers voted present.

Full article By Trish Turner, John Brandt and Chad Pergram Fox News

Rampant Corruption of Association of Community Organizations For Reform has now been caught on two tapes, illegally helping a pimp and a prostitute, lie on different government forms to order to get government money.

Thursday, September 10, 2009

An employee at ACORN's Baltimore office advises a couple posing as a pimp and a prostitute during a videotaped meeting in July.

Officials with the controversial community organizing group ACORN were secretly videotaped offering to assist two individuals posing as a pimp and a prostitute, encouraging them to lie to the Internal Revenue Service and providing guidance on how to claim underage girls from South America as dependents.

The videotape was made public Thursday on BigGovernment.com, a political blog launched by Andrew Breitbart as a companion site to his BigHollywood.breitbart.com blog.

In the videotape, made on July 24, James O'Keefe, a 25-year-old independent filmmaker, posed as a pimp with a 20-year-old woman named "Kenya" who posed as a prostitute while visiting ACORN's office in Baltimore. The couple told ACORN staffers they wanted to secure housing where the woman could continue to maintain a prostitution business.

ACORN scandals blow-up

Union-backed, voter fraud group and Rathke brothers attract increasing scrutiny

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, is a network of nonprofit community groups formed nearly 40 years ago on the premise that banks, corporations and insurance companies, immersed in greed, have kept poor and predominantly minority neighborhoods desperate. Within the past couple months, however, its leaders have been engaged in the more mundane task of spinning a scandal that already has claimed its most visible leader. To longtime ACORN critics, it’s a case of belated just deserts.

At the center of this storm are ACORN co-founder and chief organizer Wade Rathke and his brother, Dale. Wade Rathke is an almost legendary figure in progressive Left circles. Beginning in the Sixties as an SDS activist, he would go on to apply his talents to the National Welfare Rights Organization, whose principle legacy during its years of existence was a large expansion of welfare eligibility and dependency. Out of this experience came ACORN in 1970. Initially based in Little Rock and eventually in New Orleans, ACORN has become a giant oak tree. The group’s early agitprop rhetoric, as expressed in its People’s Platform, made clear its intent for the years ahead:

We are the majority, forged from all minorities. We are the masses of many, not the forces of few. Enough is enough. We will wait no longer for the crumbs at America’s door. We will not be meek, but mighty. We will not starve on past promises, but feast on future dreams.

From the start, ACORN has been unapologetically radical in both worldview and tactics. Taking its inspiration from Saul Alinsky-style neighborhood confrontation politics, the organization, now claiming about 1,200 chapters with some 400,000 households in the U.S. and abroad, prides itself in its ability to mobilize local residents into demanding and getting their fair share – regardless of whether the donations are voluntary. Right now, ACORN hopes to mobilize someone into replacing Wade Rathke.

Full article The Union News Blogspot

WORLD NET DAILY

Insider: ACORN 'always been Democrat operation'

'They've never made any secrets about who they support'

Posted: June 18, 2009

7:30 pm Eastern

By Chelsea Schilling

© 2009 WorldNetDaily

Anita Moncrief, former ACORN insider

Excerpts:

While the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, remains under investigation for voter registration fraud and related allegations in at least 14 states, one former insider told WND the organization acted as unofficial arm of the Democratic Party during the recent election and used cash operations to keep some financial transactions under wraps.

In 2005, Anita Moncrief began working in the Strategic Writing and Research Department of ACORN Political Operations and its affiliate Project Vote. She said she conducted voter fraud research and census research and worked with political organizers. Moncrief left the organization in January 2008.

"It has always been a Democrat operation," she told WND. "They've never made any secrets about who they support. Their political action committees are usually set up to support these Democratic candidates."

Full article Chelsea Schilling World Net Daily

Nation Review Online

Inside Obama’s Acorn

By their fruits ye shall know them.

By Stanley Kurtz

May 29, 2008

Excerpts:

What if Barack Obama’s most important radical connection has been hiding in plain sight all along? Obama has had an intimate and long-term association with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (Acorn), the largest radical group in America. If I told you Obama had close ties with MoveOn.org or Code Pink, you’d know what I was talking about. Acorn is at least as radical as these better-known groups, arguably more so. Yet because Acorn works locally, in carefully selected urban areas, its national profile is lower. Acorn likes it that way. And so, I’d wager, does Barack Obama.

This is a story we’ve largely missed. While Obama’s Acorn connection has not gone entirely unreported, its depth, extent, and significance have been poorly understood. Typically, media background pieces note that, on behalf of Acorn, Obama and a team of Chicago attorneys won a 1995 suit forcing the state of Illinois to implement the federal “motor-voter” bill. In fact, Obama’s Acorn connection is far more extensive. In the few stories where Obama’s role as an Acorn “leadership trainer” is noted, or his seats on the boards of foundations that may have supported Acorn are discussed, there is little follow-up. Even these more extensive reports miss many aspects of Obama’s ties to Acorn.

An Anti-Capitalism AgendaTo understand the nature and extent of Acorn’s radicalism, an excellent place to begin is Sol Stern’s 2003 City Journal article, “ACORN’s Nutty Regime for Cities.” (For a shorter but helpful piece, try Steven Malanga’s “Acorn Squash.”)

Sol Stern explains that Acorn is the key modern successor of the radical 1960’s “New Left,” with a “1960’s-bred agenda of anti-capitalism” to match. Acorn, says Stern, grew out of “one of the New Left’s silliest and most destructive groups, the National Welfare Rights Organization.” In the 1960’s, NWRO launched a campaign of sit-ins and disruptions at welfare offices. The goal was to remove eligibility restrictions, and thus effectively flood welfare rolls with so many clients that the system would burst. The theory, explains Stern, was that an impossibly overburdened welfare system would force “a radical reconstruction of America’s unjust capitalist economy.” Instead of a socialist utopia, however, we got the culture of dependency and family breakdown that ate away at America’s inner cities — until welfare reform began to turn the tide.

Full article Stanley Kurtz National Review Online

WORLD NET DAILY

Insider: ACORN 'always been Democrat operation'

'They've never made any secrets about who they support'

Posted: June 18, 2009

7:30 pm Eastern

By Chelsea Schilling

© 2009 WorldNetDaily

Anita Moncrief, former ACORN insider

Excerpts:

While the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, remains under investigation for voter registration fraud and related allegations in at least 14 states, one former insider told WND the organization acted as unofficial arm of the Democratic Party during the recent election and used cash operations to keep some financial transactions under wraps.

In 2005, Anita Moncrief began working in the Strategic Writing and Research Department of ACORN Political Operations and its affiliate Project Vote. She said she conducted voter fraud research and census research and worked with political organizers. Moncrief left the organization in January 2008.

"It has always been a Democrat operation," she told WND. "They've never made any secrets about who they support. Their political action committees are usually set up to support these Democratic candidates."

Full article Chelsea Schilling World Net Daily

MICHELEMALKIN.COM

Who’s funding the Obamacare Astroturf campaign?

By Michelle Malkin

June 24, 2009 01:40 AM

Excerpts:

My syndicated column today investigates the deep pockets behind the “grass-roots” campaign for Obamacare. Chicago crony/White House senior adviser David Axelrod is, of course, the master of astroturfing. So it certainly comes as no surprise that left-wing puppetmasters are behind the government health care takeover lobby. But an informed citizenry needs to know the nitty gritty details.

Will the ABC “All Barack Channel” News health care infomercial tell viewers about the cabal at 1825 K Street (a far Left office complex/headquarters that is the Washington DC analogue of the 1024 Elysian Fields ACORN headquarters in New Orleans, which I first reported on in August 2008)?

Will they tell viewers about the First Lady’s patient-dumping scheme?

Full article Michelle Malkin.com

The Liberal Housing Crash

American Thinker

By Christopher Chantrill

July 7, 2009

Excerpts:

The American people are pretty well convinced that the mortgage meltdown was the fault of greedy bankers, stupid borrowers, and the odd Friend of Angelo Mozilo like Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-CT). That's hardly surprising, since the mainstream media has shown a vivid lack of interest in getting to the bottom of it all.

That's why we have Thomas Sowell. His latest book, The Housing Boom and Bust, is a workmanlike analysis of the housing crisis. It's short enough, at about 50,000 words, for anyone to get through on a weekend.

Needless to say, Dr. Sowell does not find that the meltdown was all the fault of greedy bankers -- or even foolish borrowers. He puts most of the blame on politicians and activists that insisted that the US had an "affordable housing" crisis when it didn't. The government agencies that implemented the will of the political sector -- the Federal Reserve System, Fannie and Freddie, and the US Department of Housing and Urban Development -- they were the guilty suspects with actual fingerprints on the victim.

When analyzing a political scandal, our liberal friends usually like to expose the "myths" that the stupid American people were in thrall to. Dr. Sowell does not descend to such oversimplification, but we will.

Myth #1: The Housing Boom was Nationwide. No it wasn't. It was concentrated in just a a few places. News reports and scholarly research have found that even during the boom affordable housing "has been the norm across most of the country, but with glaring exceptions[.]" Writes Dr. Sowell:

Full article Christopher Chantrill American Thinker

California to investigate ACORN videos

Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown's office plans to look into circumstances surrounding both the making of the videos and any possible misdeeds by ACORN employees in California caught on tape.

By Eric Bailey

October 2, 2009

Excerpts:

Reporting from Sacramento - Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown has launched an investigation into the brouhaha over videotapes of a conservative group's sting operation against ACORN, the community organizing group credited with helping push Barack Obama to the presidency.

Brown's office plans to look into circumstances surrounding both the making of the videos and any possible misdeeds by ACORN employees in California caught on tape.

In what has become a staple of TV and radio talk shows in recent weeks, ACORN workers in several states were shown allegedly offering advice on tax evasion, human smuggling and child prostitution. Undercover videotapes, shot surreptitiously by a pair posing as a pimp and prostitute, were shot of ACORN workers in Maryland, California, New York and Washington, D.C.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger asked Brown to investigate the videos in a letter two weeks ago. Chief Deputy Atty. Gen. James M. Humes replied that an investigation has been opened "of both ACORN and the circumstances under which ACORN employees were videotaped."

Full article Eric BaileyLos Angeles Times

In one of her very first votes just days after being elected, SP cast a vote against Nick Carney the councilman who urged her to run.

His company stood to benefit but it would add a new tax to the citizens of Wasilla.

This violated her goal in running, which as SP stated herself, "I focused on reducing property taxes and redefining government’s appropriate role."

Almost immediately after that vote, the same Mr. Carney, who was friends with the Mayor, Mayor Stein, wanted to raise the Mayor's pay, favored most decidedly and unsurprisingly, by the Mayor himself.

SP thought road paving, among other projects, needed a higher priority; she again voted no.

After serving on council for 3 years, Sarah Palin won reelection to serve 3 more years.

The Mayor, John Stein, came up for relection.

Mayor Stein's background was in public management.

Mayor Stein was for bigger government especially involving the annexation of various entities of government (boroughs, cities, etc.) then under self-rule; SP was strongly in favor of local control.

The Mayor wanted to annex, SP wanted to "invite to be annexed", then have citizens decide at the local level.

Additionally Stein wanted expanding land-use restrictions and building codes, SP wanted "to eliminate property taxes" because the sales tax had won out as the least harmful increase for a local police force. SP also wanted to slow down the rate of government growth and build roads and water and sewer systems.

SP decides to challenge a 4th term incumbent Mayor for his office.

1st 2 Promises--1. Cut her own pay 2. Reduce property taxes.

Sought To Promote Wasilla as a pro-free enterprise town.

SP takes part in debate against all challengers including Mayor Stein.

SP won that race by a wide margin.

This was SP's 1st victory over POLITICS AS USUAL, more importantly, the citizens of Wasilla's 1st victory.