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Acorn At Its Best

Acorn makes it alright.

Hey- someone deleted my reply post on this from yesterday. WTF!?

Anyway this isn't an isolated incident. Another ACORN office in D.C. was exposed today for the same thing. They went out of their way to help a guy figure out how to evade taxes, AND get set up to where he could import 13-15 year old girls for prostitution purposes and not get caught. They even brought in, voluntarilly, their own "tax expert" to help advise them. The full video is 49 minutes, and in it you can hear them over and over telling the guy, "We're looking out for your best interests here," while what they perceive to be a 15 year old girl is standing next to him assumingly about to be used as an underage prostitute. Community orginizing at its best people.

According to ACORN's staff in DC, a pimp is a "marketeer" or "consultant." It's okay to have 10 Salvadorean underage girls turning tricks in the house ACORN will help arrange for them, because the pimps are "just the landlord." As long as they have a profit and loss report, they have no problems.

sorry 17sss, i deleted it because i saw someone else had already posted this topic a few hours before me.

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Originally posted by Faj27 sorry 17sss, i deleted it because i saw someone else had already posted this topic a few hours before me.

ok oh... sorry man I didn't even realize this was a different thread.

the silence is deafening on this topic. Acorn now busted in D.C., Maryland, NY, California.... and Andrew Breitbart has more videos coming out next week including what he calls "a blockbuster that's going to come out of left field."

Can't wait to see what that means. The irony is that this piece of shit community orgainzation group operates on tax dollars, and seems to have a systemic issue offering advice on how to avoid paying taxes. Not to mention the 1.3 million fradulent votes they were forced to purge from their roles during the election, and the 12 different branch offices currently under indictment for voter and tax fraud.

News flash, nobody gives a fuck (except for Republicans scraping the bottom of the barrel for a scandal). If this is all Republicans can come up with, Democrats should have no problem with the 2012 election..

Hasn't the government cut funding? What the fuck else do you want?

And not to undermine the obvious problems, but the reason that no one cares is because it's a few bad apples working for a non-profit. It's hilarious how people try to make the actions of a few individuals emblematic of an entire organization. I mean, I think the left's view of AIG, banks, etc. is way over the top, since they don't recognize all the good work done that isn't problematic, but quite productive. I would expect you to see the same on both topics.

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Originally posted by Groundhog Boy Hasn't the government cut funding? What the fuck else do you want? And not to undermine the obvious problems, but the reason that no one cares is because it's a few bad apples working for a non-profit. It's hilarious how people try to make the actions of a few individuals emblematic of an entire organization. I mean, I think the left's view of AIG, banks, etc. is way over the top, since they don't recognize all the good work done that isn't problematic, but quite productive. I would expect you to see the same on both topics.

a few bad apples? It is a systemic problem obviously. and the videos haven't even stopped coming. it is amusing that because the past-tense....er... main stream media doesn't cover it, it's not news. I wonder why that is- perhaps because Obama used to be an attorney for them and is fully tied to their community organizing. christ.

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Originally posted by The17sss a few bad apples? It is a systemic problem obviously. and the videos haven't even stopped coming. it is amusing that because the past-tense....er... main stream media doesn't cover it, it's not news. I wonder why that is- perhaps because Obama used to be an attorney for them and is fully tied to their community organizing. christ.

Silence is deafening on this issue? A systemic problem, "obviously"?

Maybe because you attach yourself so quickly and easily to the bullshit you listen to on AM radio and read in the fucking Limbaugh Letter that you lose sight of a little perspective on this. So let's put things in a bit of perspective:

quote:

ACORN has received a grand total of $53 million in federal funds over the last 15 years -- an average of $3.5 million per year. Meanwhile, not millions, not billions, but trillions of dollars of public funds have been, in the last year alone, transferred to or otherwise used for the benefit of Wall Street. Billions of dollars in American taxpayer money vanished into thin air, eaten by private contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, led by Halliburton subsidiary KBR. All of those corporate interests employ armies of lobbyists and bottomless donor activities that ensure they dominate our legislative and regulatory processes, and to be extra certain, the revolving door between industry and government is more prolific than ever, with key corporate officials constantly ending up occupying the government positions with the most influence over those industries. Exactly as one would expect, the prime beneficiaries of all of that pillaging continue to grow. The banks that almost brought the world economy to collapse but then received massive public largesse because they were "too big to fail" are now bigger than ever; as The Washington Post delicately put it: "The crisis may be turning out very well for many of the behemoths that dominate U.S. finance." Everything involving the government turns out well for these "behemoths" because they own and control the U.S. Government. Just this week, The Post detailed how the government and Wall St. are now so intertwined that banking executives are spending vast resources to increase their presence in Washington: (snip)As previously documented, Goldman Sachs itself has a virtual lock on the top Treasury positions no matter which party is in power. The vaunted bipartisan "Baucus plan" was literally written by a Baucus aide who just left her position as Vice President of Wellpoint to write the health care reform plan for the Senate -- a revelation which barely caused a ripple. And the Supreme Court is on the verge of striking down the few limits on corporate involvement in our politics, a ruling which may (or may not be) constitutionally defensible but which will flood American politics with so much corporate money that it will give new meaning to the term "oligarchy." So with this massive pillaging of America's economic security and the control of American government by its richest and most powerful factions growing by the day, to whom is America's intense economic anxiety being directed? To a non-profit group that devotes itself to providing minute benefits to people who live under America's poverty line, and which is so powerless in Washington that virtually the entire U.S. Senate just voted to cut off its funding at the first sign of real controversy -- could anyone imagine that happening to a key player in the banking or defense industry? Apparently, the problem for middle-class and lower-middle-class Americans is not that their taxpayer dollars are going to prop up billionaires, oligarchs and their corrupt industries. It's that America's impoverished -- a group that is growing rapidly -- is getting too much, has too much power and too little accountability. Anonymous Liberal has a superb post on the manipulative inanity of the Fox-generated ACORN "scandal" (h/t D-day): quote: Let's take a step back and consider just what ACORN is. It is a non-profit organization whose mission is to empower and improve the lives of poor people. As with many other organizations, ACORN has a number of legally distinct parts, each of which has different sources of funding and engages in different kinds of activities (ACORN's conservative enemies routinely conflate these various parts to imply that ACORN is using federal money for improper political purposes). Since its founding the 70s, ACORN and its employees and volunteers have fought successfully to, among other things, increase minimum wages across the country, increase the quality of public education in poor areas, and protect people from predatory lending practices. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, ACORN helped rebuild thousands of homes and assisted victims in relocating and finding housing outside of New Orleans. The ACORN activity that has drawn the most conservative ire is its voter registration efforts which, consistent with ACORN's mission, are primarily aimed at low-income voters (who tend to vote Democratic). . . . But even if you take these film-makers at face value and assume the worst, the reality is that ACORN has thousands of employees and the vast majority of them spend their days trying to help poor people through perfectly legal means (and receive very little compensation for doing so). Even before yesterday's Senate vote, the amount of federal money that went to ACORN was very small. This is a relatively insignificant organization in the grand scheme of things, but it's an organization that has unquestionably fought over the years to improve the lives of the less fortunate in this country. That the GOP and its conservative supporters would single out this particular organization for such intense demonization is telling. In September of last year, the entire world came perilously close to complete financial catastrophe. We're still not out of the woods and we're deep within one of the worst recessions in U.S. history. This situation was brought about by the recklessness and greed of our banks and financial institutions, most of which had to be bailed out at enormous cost to the American taxpayer (exponentially more than all of the tax dollars given to ACORN over the years). The people who brought about this near catastrophe, for the most, profited immensely from it. These very same institutions, propped up by the American taxpayer, are once again raking in large profits. But rather than focus their anger on these folks, conservatives choose to go after an organization composed almost entirely of low-paid community organizers, an organization that could never hope to have even a small fraction of the clout or the ability to affect the overall direction of the country that Wall Street bankers have. ACORN's relative lack of political influence was on full display yesterday, when the U.S. Senate (in which Democrats have a supermajority) not only entertained a vote to defund ACORN, but approved it by a huge margin (with only seven Democrats opposing). If one were to watch Fox News or listen to Rush Limbaugh -- as millions do -- one would believe that the burden of the ordinary American taxpayer, and the unfair plight of America's rich, is that their money is being stolen by the poorest and most powerless sectors of the society. An organization whose constituencies are often-unregistered inner-city minorities, the homeless and the dispossesed is depicted as though it's Goldman Sachs, Blackwater, and Haillburton combined, as though Washington officials are in thrall to those living in poverty rather than those who fund their campaigns. It's not the nice men in the suits doing the stealing but the very people, often minorities or illegal immigrants, with no political or financial power who nonetheless somehow dominate the government and get everything for themselves. The poorer and weaker one is, the more one is demonized in right-wing mythology as all-powerful receipients of ill-gotten gains; conversely, the stronger and more powerful one is, the more one is depicted as an oppressed and put-upon victim (that same dynamic applies to foreign affairs as well). It's such an obvious falsehood -- so counter-intuitive and irrational -- yet it resonates due to powerful cultural manipulations. Most of all, what's so pernicious about all of this is that the same interests who are stealing, pillaging and wallowing in corruption are scapegoating the poorest and most vulnerable in order to ensure that the victims of their behavior are furious with everyone except for them. UPDATE: John Cole highlights what might be the most telling aspect of all of this: demands for a "Special Prosecutor" into Obama's so-called "relationship with ACORN" from the very same circles that vehemently objected to investigations into torture, illegal government spying, politicized prosecutions, military contractor theft, Lewis Libby's obstruction of justice, and virtually every other instance of Bush-era criminality. Those, of course, are the very same people who, before that, demanded endless inquiries into Whitewater and Vince Foster's "murder." There's nothing more valuable than petty, dramatic "scandals" to distract attention from what is actually taking place. http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenw...eria/index.html

So taken in full perspective on what exactly we're dealing with here and how much is given by the government to this organization, all I have to say is fuckin' puleease.

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Originally posted by MisterOpus1 Silence is deafening on this issue? A systemic problem, "obviously"? Maybe because you attach yourself so quickly and easily to the bullshit you listen to on AM radio and read in the fucking Limbaugh Letter that you lose sight of a little perspective on this. So let's put things in a bit of perspective. So taken in full perspective on what exactly we're dealing with here and how much is given by the government to this organization, all I have to say is fuckin' puleease.

Yes lets put it in perspective, and pay attention to the facts, which I know get in the way of the Left's template to sweep all things negative towards Obama/Democrats under the rug. Their history of voter fraud, tax evasion, embezzlement, goes back a lot further than this year. So, yes it is obvious that it's a systemic problem... obvious to those who read publications outside of MoveOn.org, the HuffPo, and Kos. For instance:

1) They take 40% of their revenues from taxpayers. Read this article with factual links to their fradulent voter registration dealings and how their money tree operates... and this was just as of 2004!
http://www.nationalreview.com/comme...00410311142.asp

2) Establishing a low-income housing program with Citibank to get loans to illegal immigrants who can't even produce a social security number. This is 2006.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic...&type=printable

3) Forced to purge 1.3 million votes from their roles in 2008 nationwide. Pleaded guilty in Seattle for voter fraud (largest case uncovered in Washington's history), and have been indicted for the same in Ohio, New Mexico, Missouri, and 7 more states. This is 2007. And right after the Seattle conviction, Senator Bob Casey (D-PA) offered a bill to give them more money. wtf?
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/ht...syndication=rss

4) Acorn worker accepting crack cocain for fradulent registered votes in Ohio in 2004.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/edito...ml?id=110009189

5) Obama's campaigned funneled an $800,000 payment to an ACORN front group called "Citizen Services, Inc." for "campaign advance work"... which Obama's administration says is no big deal. Yet once uncovered he had to "amend" the financial report because they were "mistaken" as to the services CSI would provide.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pit...n/s_584284.html

6) Anita Moncrief, whistleblower for ACORN exposing "The Roots of a Scandal"... this one goes deep, all the way back to 1996.
http://anitamoncrief.blogspot.com/2...of-scandal.html


7) NY Times story which was buried until right after the election, even though the reporter pushed for it to be in print well before that... exposing the illegality of ACORN's "project vote" and its ties to Obama's people.
http://www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=h...Q3EfhQ7EeuyQ5CV

8)Report by the Employment Politics Institute from 2004 showing Union embezzlement and sucking money from Americorp.
http://www.accessmylibrary.com/arti...tion-fraud.html


It just goes on an on and on.... again, all of the above doesn't even include the videos that came out last week, or the new ones coming out this week- they were never turned away from any offices in which they entered asking for illegal help. I bet you haven't even watched the videos. It is a systemic problem undoubtedly, and ACORN needs to be completely dissolved as an organiztion.

What's disturbing is that Obama is so closely tied with them. And you supporters of Obama seem to be ok with this, damn the facts and examples that keep coming out. He said on Stephanopolis' morning show today that "I didn't even know ACORN was getting a whole lot of Federal money." BULLSHIT!!!!! There is over $8 BILLION in earmarked money for ACORN in the stimulus bill.

Wake up man.

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Originally posted by The17sss Yes lets put it in perspective, and pay attention to the facts, which I know get in the way of the Left's template to sweep all things negative towards Obama/Democrats under the rug. Their history of voter fraud, tax evasion, embezzlement, goes back a lot further than this year. So, yes it is obvious that it's a systemic problem... obvious to those who read publications outside of MoveOn.org, the HuffPo, and Kos. For instance:

Would you like to explain how voter fraud has anything to do with the videos above?

I won't go Opus's route with the comparisons to Wall Street, because I don't agree with that, either, but stop trying to make mountains out of molehills.

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Originally posted by The17sss Yes lets put it in perspective, and pay attention to the facts, which I know get in the way of the Left's template to sweep all things negative towards Obama/Democrats under the rug.

Yeah, that must be why when his numbers were falling in the polls, the majority of those falling numbers were comprised of Democrats and Independents who were pissed off at him for not following through with his campaign promises - because we want to sweep all negative things away from him...right.

Jesus, of all the people and groups who knew full well how to do that, the irony from your Limbaugh extremists really cannot be overlooked....

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Their history of voter fraud, tax evasion, embezzlement, goes back a lot further than this year. So, yes it is obvious that it's a systemic problem... obvious to those who read publications outside of MoveOn.org, the HuffPo, and Kos. For instance: 1) They take 40% of their revenues from taxpayers. Read this article with factual links to their fradulent voter registration dealings and how their money tree operates... and this was just as of 2004! http://www.nationalreview.com/comme...00410311142.asp

So let's examine this a bit closer and compare. As Greenwald depicted in the article I gave you to which I highly doubt you even fucking bothered to read:

quote:

ACORN has received a grand total of $53 million in federal funds over the last 15 years -- an average of $3.5 million per year. Meanwhile, not millions, not billions, but trillions of dollars of public funds have been, in the last year alone, transferred to or otherwise used for the benefit of Wall Street. Billions of dollars in American taxpayer money vanished into thin air, eaten by private contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, led by Halliburton subsidiary KBR.

So again I say, fucking puleease. 3.5 mill versus tens of billions of $ that's been essentially swept away from companies that didn't even have to compete for their bids in 2 different wars under Bush (and yes, under Obama as well), not to mention the tens of billions that's been given away not just under TARP but under laws passed by Republican legislatures (and yes, some Democrats went along with it as well) that essentially allowed Wall Street to govern itself. Congress rightfully pulled the funds to ACORN pending a further investigation, which I'm sure you are aware of.

But what I want to know is where was all your outrage along with your Conservative bretheren, i.e. in the neocon circles, at all the money thrown and seemingly disappearing to defense contracts? Do you really want to get in a pissing match with me on how much of our taxpayer money has REALLY been thrown down the drain in that regard, all because of a Republican Administration and their neocon allies wanting an endless war, AND which so many of them coincidentally made gigantic profits from? By all means, let's compare if you like.

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2) Establishing a low-income housing program with Citibank to get loans to illegal immigrants who can't even produce a social security number. This is 2006. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic...&type=printable

A problem to which Citibank, WellsFargo, and any other mortgage group could easily remedy by requiring ID status of these individuals that came from the initial ACORN screening. Why are you not blaming these companies as well for allowing this to happen? Because it's all ACORN's fault again?

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3) Forced to purge 1.3 million votes from their roles in 2008 nationwide. Pleaded guilty in Seattle for voter fraud (largest case uncovered in Washington's history), and have been indicted for the same in Ohio, New Mexico, Missouri, and 7 more states. This is 2007. And right after the Seattle conviction, Senator Bob Casey (D-PA) offered a bill to give them more money. wtf? http://seattletimes.nwsourc...syndication=rss

I'm pretty certain we've discussed this issue here before, and surely you know the difference between voter registration and actually voting, right? Despite those individuals who misused the program to get extra voter registrations, as we discussed here and I'm pretty sure you were involved with that discussion, none of those illegal registrations turned into actual votes. And please also remember that it was ACORN who turned in these voter registration frauds in the first place.

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4) Acorn worker accepting crack cocain for fradulent registered votes in Ohio in 2004. http://www.opinionjournal.com/edito...ml?id=110009189

And Limbaugh used his fucking maid to get his Oxycontin. How is this one person an example of an systemic problem? Are you accusing ALL of ACORN workers being crackheads now, all 13,000 canvass workers?

I'm also certain that no Blackwater, Halliburton, or any subcontractor over in Iraq has never been caught using illicit drugs either, right? Or any worker from AIG?

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5) Obama's campaigned funneled an $800,000 payment to an ACORN front group called "Citizen Services, Inc." for "campaign advance work"... which Obama's administration says is no big deal. Yet once uncovered he had to "amend" the financial report because they were "mistaken" as to the services CSI would provide. http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pit...n/s_584284.html

No, Obama said the nature of CSI's services was misrepresented on his campaign disclosures to the FEC, and they described it as an oversight. If you can truly demonstrate otherwise, present your evidence now. It's also noted that this was during the primaries and not the general election.

As for the charge, Politifact notes:

quote:

During the third presidential debate, McCain made the additional charge that the Obama campaign directed campaign money to ACORN, calling the group "the same front outfit organization that your campaign gave $832,000 for 'lighting and site selection.'" Here's what we know about that allegation: The Obama campaign paid a group called Citizens' Services $832,386 during the primaries. (For comparison, the Obama campaign has spent an overall $391-million through August 2008.) Some of the expenditures are listed as sound, stage and lighting, and others are listed as get-out-the-vote efforts. ACORN has said Citizens Services subcontracted out part of the get-out-the-vote work to ACORN, but ACORN officials say it was "a small amount." The Obama campaign said it paid Citizens' Services, who in turn paid $80,000 to ACORN. The two groups share offices in New Orleans. We can confirm through campaign finance public records that Obama paid Citizens' Services, but we can't independently confirm what part of the contract ACORN actually received, so we are not ruling on that statement. We're including the facts of the matter here for our readers to consider for themselves. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-m...th-obama-acorn/

Again I await anxiously for direct evidence that demonstrates his guilt of association here.

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6) Anita Moncrief, whistleblower for ACORN exposing "The Roots of a Scandal"... this one goes deep, all the way back to 1996. http://anitamoncrief.blogspot.com/2...of-scandal.html

Oh for fucking fuck's sake, you loony, stupid son of a bitch, 17. Did you go to her website and read some of her conspiracy shit that she wrote? Jesus, another tie to the wonderful Community Reinvestment Act and how all those poor people that ACORN must have helped out just crashed the subprime system, right?

Fuck, do we have to go over this shit again so you and Anita might get a bit of a grasp on what happened? Again, the main culprit of the scandal was the result of those entities not covered by the CRA, i.e. the nonbank mortgage companies who grabbed the bulk of the mortgage market out of the hands of CRA-regulated banking companies. Only 6% of the subprime loans made by CRA-lenders went to low income borrowers, while 60% went to middle and high income borrowers:

http://www.federalreserve.gov/newse...er20081203a.htm

Nonbank mortgage industries not covered by the CRA had some 50% of the subprime loans:

http://www.house.gov/apps/list/hear.../barr021308.pdf

and another 30% were created by nonbank subsidiaries.

So let's break down that 6% of subprime loans. I'm sure ACORN had a part in that, no doubt. But is that even a worthy fucking comparison to the builking that was done by these nonbank mortgage entities that were not regulated, thanks to the likes of Phil Gramm and his lovely world of deregulation via the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999.

And of course she had to invoke Fannie and Freddie, which has little to do with this shit:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/o...r=1&oref=slogin

http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2...ain-blame-game/

http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/07/new...sion=2008090712

But she and you are welcome to continue blaming the poor and ACORN for this financial mess, evidence be damned I suppose. Not like you ever listened to anyone else besides what Limbaugh or Hot Air spoon feeds you anyway.

And where is her evidence that ACORN housing is a so-called landlord? Is this even verifiable at all?

I'm sorry, perhaps she does have some pertinent information, but she really did herself a major disservice trumping these dicredited GOP talking points.

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7) NY Times story which was buried until right after the election, even though the reporter pushed for it to be in print well before that... exposing the illegality of ACORN's "project vote" and its ties to Obama's people. http://www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=h...Q3EfhQ7EeuyQ5CV

Yeah, I liked that story myself, especially the part about the election fraud lawyer, Heather Heidelbaugh:

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Heidelbaugh, who worked for the Penn. Republican State Committee in a vote fraud lawsuit against ACORN...

Huh, so a Republican election-disrupting attorney discovered a problem that's based on her insider's unverifiable "insider information"

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8)Report by the Employment Politics Institute from 2004 showing Union embezzlement and sucking money from Americorp. http://www.accessmylibrary.com/arti...tion-fraud.html

I think you mean Employment POLICIES Institute. Well I'm running low on time, and I think I've dissected most of your tripe as it is. I'll just leave this last link on that group which demonstrates they're quite the interesting group in their own right:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.ph...icies_Institute

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It just goes on an on and on....

Only in your extremist Conservative circles, that is.

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again, all of the above doesn't even include the videos that came out last week, or the new ones coming out this week- they were never turned away from any offices in which they entered asking for illegal help. I bet you haven't even watched the videos. It is a systemic problem undoubtedly, and ACORN needs to be completely dissolved as an organiztion.

Actually I have. I've watched them extensively. Since this post is getting long, I'll respond to that in another post later.

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What's disturbing is that Obama is so closely tied with them.

Not with anything that you've demonstrated so far. And any ties he might have had is a fucking drop in the bucket compared to the ties that the GOP and the previous Administration had with groups and subcontractors that builked billions of $ from taxpayers in the current 2 wars.

But of course we hear nothing from your side on that. Just those few millions of $ given to ACORN that was just recently cut off by Congress.

quote:

And you supporters of Obama seem to be ok with this, damn the facts and examples that keep coming out. He said on Stephanopolis' morning show today that "I didn't even know ACORN was getting a whole lot of Federal money." BULLSHIT!!!!! There is over $8 BILLION in earmarked money for ACORN in the stimulus bill.

Fucking demonstrate this now. According to Fack Check and Politifact, the part of the bill under "stabilizing neighborhoods" is an area that ACORN has never applied for and had no intention of applying for:

http://www.factcheck.org/2009/02/th...bill-and-acorn/

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-m...-rebuilding-mo/

And even if they did apply for it, they would have to compete for it with other organizations.

quote:

Wake up man.

A Limbaugh whore like you telling me to wake up is pretty comical, but also a bit sad.

I fully acknowledge that there are some workers at ACORN that have been at fault. Again, when you have 13,000 canvass workers who are essentially temporary employees, it's ineviteable. But what is it that ACORN does? Again I refer back to the article I gave you that you didn't bother to read from Greenwald when he quoted Anonymous Liberal (www.anonymousliberal.com):

quote:

Let's take a step back and consider just what ACORN is. It is a non-profit organization whose mission is to empower and improve the lives of poor people. As with many other organizations, ACORN has a number of legally distinct parts, each of which has different sources of funding and engages in different kinds of activities (ACORN's conservative enemies routinely conflate these various parts to imply that ACORN is using federal money for improper political purposes). Since its founding the 70s, ACORN and its employees and volunteers have fought successfully to, among other things, increase minimum wages across the country, increase the quality of public education in poor areas, and protect people from predatory lending practices. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, ACORN helped rebuild thousands of homes and assisted victims in relocating and finding housing outside of New Orleans. The ACORN activity that has drawn the most conservative ire is its voter registration efforts which, consistent with ACORN's mission, are primarily aimed at low-income voters (who tend to vote Democratic). . . . But even if you take these film-makers at face value and assume the worst, the reality is that ACORN has thousands of employees and the vast majority of them spend their days trying to help poor people through perfectly legal means (and receive very little compensation for doing so). Even before yesterday's Senate vote, the amount of federal money that went to ACORN was very small. This is a relatively insignificant organization in the grand scheme of things, but it's an organization that has unquestionably fought over the years to improve the lives of the less fortunate in this country.

Going after a group that has used $53 million in taxpayer funding is an easy target for the GOP, much easier than going after the banks or subcontractors in Iraq who've stolen exponentially more than this. But are we to argue that ALL of the $53 million has gone to those EEEVIL items you listed above, or can we safely conclude that much, if not most of the money has gone to useful things for the poor? Can we also easily conclude that even these useful things the GOP and extremists do not want to happen?

Yes, we can:

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James O�Keefe, one of the two filmmakers, said he went after ACORN because it registers minorities likely to vote against Republicans: "Politicians are getting elected single-handedly due to this organization," O�Keefe told The Washington Post. "No one was holding this organization accountable." http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/200...&pagewanted=all

That is all we need to know about the GOP. That's all we need to know about this crackdown and filmmakers. In their own words - politicians, i.e. DEMOCRATS help get elected by ACORN. And why is that? It's not because of voter fraud - we know this because you and I have argued this. The voter registrations are checked, and is impossible on all levels for Mickey Mouse to come in and vote. It's because this organization goes to the poor who feels Democrats represent their interests better than Republicans, and gets them over to the voting booths.

And that's what the GOP wants to stop. Yet another ploy by the GOP of voter intimidation and voter suppression. Remind me to start a thread on that sometime, one that actually has a little bit of supporting evidence.

I'll talk about the films in more detail later.

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Originally posted by MisterOpus1 And that's what the GOP wants to stop. Yet another ploy by the GOP of voter intimidation and voter suppression. Remind me to start a thread on that sometime, one that actually has a little bit of supporting evidence.

I will just place this here and move on back to lurking.......

Holy shit

quote:

Originally posted by MisterOpus1 So let's examine this a bit closer and compare. As Greenwald depicted in the article I gave you to which I highly doubt you even fucking bothered to read: So again I say, fucking puleease. 3.5 mill versus tens of billions of $ that's been essentially swept away from companies that didn't even have to compete for their bids in 2 different wars under Bush (and yes, under Obama as well), not to mention the tens of billions that's been given away not just under TARP but under laws passed by Republican legislatures (and yes, some Democrats went along with it as well) that essentially allowed Wall Street to govern itself. Congress rightfully pulled the funds to ACORN pending a further investigation, which I'm sure you are aware of.

I did read it. If you are trying to have a pissing contest over what political party spends more excessively and wastes more taxpayer money on failed programs and policies, take a look at your voter registraion card. It's quite laughable you are using the Iraq war spending as a benchmark to absolve ACORN's taxpayer funding... becuase it's not about that; it's about the culture of corruption that exists within that organization, and is obviously pervasive and has been tracked as being so for over 10 years. I highly doubt YOU read the article showing the corrupt money tree of the ACORN organization. If you did, you wouldn't have written a 10,000 word rebuttal. Basically, all you need to know is that on their literature, they say: ACORN is a non-profit, non-partisan social justice organization with national headquarters in New York, New Orleans and Washington, D.C.

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But what I want to know is where was all your outrage along with your Conservative bretheren, i.e. in the neocon circles, at all the money thrown and seemingly disappearing to defense contracts? Do you really want to get in a pissing match with me on how much of our taxpayer money has REALLY been thrown down the drain in that regard, all because of a Republican Administration and their neocon allies wanting an endless war, AND which so many of them coincidentally made gigantic profits from? By all means, let's compare if you like.

Again with the "tax dollars down the drain" argument. I should remind you that (just to name a few) Social Security, the "war on poverty", the "great society", the current stimulus debacle... shit, how about Cash for Clunkers? All Democrat ideas which have evolved into total overpriced boondoggles. You seem to think that because certain programs used with taxpayer dollars are enlised with "good intentions", the consequences don't matter.

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A problem to which Citibank, WellsFargo, and any other mortgage group could easily remedy by requiring ID status of these individuals that came from the initial ACORN screening. Why are you not blaming these companies as well for allowing this to happen? Because it's all ACORN's fault again?

No- I'm not saying those banking institutions are off the hook... but you are trying to argue that because it's "not just ACORN" involved in shady dealings that they are off the hook. They are equally responsible for fostering that illegal activity.

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I'm pretty certain we've discussed this issue here before, and surely you know the difference between voter registration and actually voting, right? Despite those individuals who misused the program to get extra voter registrations, as we discussed here and I'm pretty sure you were involved with that discussion, none of those illegal registrations turned into actual votes. And please also remember that it was ACORN who turned in these voter registration frauds in the first place.

Dude... have you ever heard the phrase "where there's smoke, there's fire"?? It doesn't mean anything to you that ACORN has been routinely been indicted in several states in several election cycles for illegal voting activity?

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And Limbaugh used his fucking maid to get his Oxycontin. How is this one person an example of an systemic problem? Are you accusing ALL of ACORN workers being crackheads now, all 13,000 canvass workers? I'm also certain that no Blackwater, Halliburton, or any subcontractor over in Iraq has never been caught using illicit drugs either, right? Or any worker from AIG?

It's just one of many examples of the types of people that work for the organization... like establishing a pattern of behavior in a person vs. them flying off the hinges one time.

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No, Obama said the nature of CSI's services was misrepresented on his campaign disclosures to the FEC, and they described it as an oversight. If you can truly demonstrate otherwise, present your evidence now. It's also noted that this was during the primaries and not the general election. As for the charge, Politifact notes: Again I await anxiously for direct evidence that demonstrates his guilt of association here.

HAHA! Oh, they said it was "an oversight" and therefore should be absolved? Well shit... if I ever kill someone I'll just tell the cops it was an oversight. I'm sure they'll understand. I think you didn't read this section of the linked article, because you're response is weak:

quote:

The Ohio primary was March 4. According to FEC records, the Obama campaign paid Citizens Services Inc. $832,598.29, from Feb. 25 to May 17. A Trib analysis of campaign finance reports showed Obama paid CSI for services that stood out as unusual. For example, CSI received payments of $63,000 and $75,000 for advance work. Excluding the large payments to CSI, the average amount the Obama campaign spent with other organizations was $558.82 per check on more than 1,200 entries classified as advance work. Citizens Services Inc. is headquartered at the same address as ACORN�s national headquarters in New Orleans. Citizens Services was established in December 2004 to �assist persons and organizations who advance the interests of low- and moderate-income people,� according to paperwork filed in Louisiana. In a 2006 ACORN publication, Citizen Services Inc. is described as �ACORN�s campaign services entity.�

That's just a little more than fishy, isn't it? Or maybe just an oversight

quote:

Oh for fucking fuck's sake, you loony, stupid son of a bitch, 17. Did you go to her website and read some of her conspiracy shit that she wrote? Jesus, another tie to the wonderful Community Reinvestment Act and how all those poor people that ACORN must have helped out just crashed the subprime system, right?

lol... I have to admit, I'm actually thickening up my skin and enjoying reading responses like this because A) they really are funny and it makes me think, "Shit... despite this political nonsense, I bet MisterOpus would be cool to hang out with," and B) because even after saying that, you go on to acknowledge that:

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I'm sorry, perhaps she does have some pertinent information.

and

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So let's break down that 6% of subprime loans. I'm sure ACORN had a part in that, no doubt....

...which is all I'm saying; ACORN is at least complicit in all of this. They are not acting alone; I never insinuated this. But they are actively involved in shady illegal shit using taxpayer money to do so, and that is my problem.

quote:

I think you mean Employment POLICIES Institute. Well I'm running low on time, and I think I've dissected most of your tripe as it is. I'll just leave this last link on that group which demonstrates they're quite the interesting group in their own right: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.ph...icies_Institute

oops... you're right. I meant to say "Policies". I read the link you posted about them. I don't see the problem... checks and balances are necessary. So what if they are affiliated with the GOP? A Democrat front group sure as shit wouldn't take the time to investigate ACORN or expose embezzlement. The investigation produced factual illegal practices, not partisan opinions.

quote:

Yeah, I liked that story myself, especially the part about the election fraud lawyer, Heather Heidelbaugh: quote: Huh, so a Republican election-disrupting attorney discovered a problem that's based on her insider's unverifiable "insider information"

Almost, but not quite as funny, as ACORN's representatives saying the actions of the people on video are reprehensible, and ACORN will provide an independant council to investigate. Here is how independant the team is:

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The Council includes many prominent Democrats, including the man who helped President Obama Transition Team, John Podesta, President and CEO of the Center for American Progress; former Maryland Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend; Andrew Stern, International President of the Service Employees International Union; and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Henry Cisneros.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalp...orn-reacts.html

If you check out those people, you'll find Cisneros worked regularly with ACORN as HUD Secretary and would later plead guilty to lying to the FBI to cover up a political embarrassment. Stern heads the SEIU which has several chapters of its organization run by ACORN. Podesta runs the Soros-funded Center for American Progress, which has been coordinating the public defense of ACORN this summer.

quote:

Not with anything that you've demonstrated so far. And any ties he might have had is a fucking drop in the bucket compared to the ties that the GOP and the previous Administration had with groups and subcontractors that builked billions of $ from taxpayers in the current 2 wars. But of course we hear nothing from your side on that. Just those few millions of $ given to ACORN that was just recently cut off by Congress.

First, let me remind you that all of your Congressional Democrats voted to move ahead and finance that war. I know it's an inconvenient fact, but still. Stop trying to make the war part of this subject- it just isn't, and has nothing to do with internal corruption in ACORN.

Secondly, I can't demonstrate that Obama is tied to ACORN? Are you forgetting that he represented them as their attorney in 1995? Are you forgetting his words from December 1st, 2007 when he said this at a speech in Des Moines--->

quote:

Let me say before I even get inaugurated, during the transition we're going to be calling all of you in to help us shape the agenda. We're going to be having meetings all across the country with community organizations so that you have input into the agenda for the next presidency of the United States of America.

Snap... telling ACORN they will be helping shape the agenda. The examples are too plentiful to list. If you think the community organizer in chief is not tied to a major community organization group he represented as an attorney, and helped train in voter registration techniques, you need professional help.

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Fucking demonstrate this now. According to Fack Check and Politifact, the part of the bill under "stabilizing neighborhoods" is an area that ACORN has never applied for and had no intention of applying for: http://www.factcheck.org/2009/02/th...bill-and-acorn/ http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-m...-rebuilding-mo/ And even if they did apply for it, they would have to compete for it with other organizations.

You mean like, how Halliburton had to compete (wink wink nudge nudge)? But here- it's demonstrated for you (a simple google search could have done the trick if you really wanted to find out).

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As the Capital Research Center's Matthew Vadum has documented, $3 billion from the stimulus package, another billion dollars from HUD, and $4.5 billion in Community Development Block Grants look set to come Acorn's way for a total of $8.5 billion. The Issa report further charges Acorn with submitting false filings to the IRS and the Labor Department, and violating the Fair Labor Standards Act and the ERISA law.

http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArt...333241444242458

The article has plenty of other interesting illegal activities perpetuated by this, as you believe, corrupt free organization with just a few bad apples.

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A Limbaugh whore like you telling me to wake up is pretty comical, but also a bit sad.

*sigh*

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I fully acknowledge that there are some workers at ACORN that have been at fault. Again, when you have 13,000 canvass workers who are essentially temporary employees, it's ineviteable. But what is it that ACORN does?

You need to acknowledge more than that... that there is a pervasive and systemic seed of corruption in ACORN that is germinating. All organizations have their share of fuck ups, but this is NOT the norm.

quote:

That is all we need to know about the GOP. That's all we need to know about this crackdown and filmmakers. In their own words - politicians, i.e. DEMOCRATS help get elected by ACORN. And why is that? It's not because of voter fraud - we know this because you and I have argued this. The voter registrations are checked, and is impossible on all levels for Mickey Mouse to come in and vote. It's because this organization goes to the poor who feels Democrats represent their interests better than Republicans, and gets them over to the voting booths. And that's what the GOP wants to stop. Yet another ploy by the GOP of voter intimidation and voter suppression. Remind me to start a thread on that sometime, one that actually has a little bit of supporting evidence. I'll talk about the films in more detail later.

That is bullshit about James O'Keefe saying that in the context you are presenting... show me the exact quote on record of him saying he specifically went after ACORN because they register minorities. That is a pathetic attempt at injecting race into this, and no doubt a paraphrased comment by Media Matters or the like in the same way Maureen Dowd said Joe Wilson was really saying, "You lie, BOY!" I watched every interview with O'Keefe and not once did he say that, and Andrew Brietbart never would stake his reputation on backing them if that were the case. And even if there was a racial context, which there isn't, it wouldn't change the facts of what was uncovered. You play the victim card for the poor and minorities almost as well ACORN does.

You are heading off the cliff with the grand old GOP conspiracy theory of trying to squash the poor and minorities. You're better than that man. Yeah ACORN is basically like a missionary group, who's goal is to help those who can't help themselves out of the goodness in their heart. Fucking spare me.

And if you want to talk about voter intimidation, please discuss what just happened with our wonderful Attorney General letting the Black Panther Party members off the hook for clear voter intimidation in PA during the election... carrying around a gun at the polling place, and who's myspace page said one of his hobbies was "killing whitey". Unreal.

Holy shit.

quote:

Originally posted by The17sss I did read it. If you are trying to have a pissing contest over what political party spends more excessively and wastes more taxpayer money on failed programs and policies, take a look at your voter registraion card. It's quite laughable you are using the Iraq war spending as a benchmark to absolve ACORN's taxpayer funding... becuase it's not about that; it's about the culture of corruption that exists within that organization, and is obviously pervasive and has been tracked as being so for over 10 years. I highly doubt YOU read the article showing the corrupt money tree of the ACORN organization. If you did, you wouldn't have written a 10,000 word rebuttal. Basically, all you need to know is that on their literature, they say: ACORN is a non-profit, non-partisan social justice organization with national headquarters in New York, New Orleans and Washington, D.C.

You're not very good with numbers are you?

The amount that was wasted on ACORN doesn't seem to be enough to pad the pockets of even the cheapest Cheny aid.

Really, maybe if you counted from 1 to a million and then from one million to 80 billion you would get a bit better idea about the proportional importance of problems in the systems we work with these days.

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Originally posted by atbell You're not very good with numbers are you? The amount that was wasted on ACORN doesn't seem to be enough to pad the pockets of even the cheapest Cheny aid. Really, maybe if you counted from 1 to a million and then from one million to 80 billion you would get a bit better idea about the proportional importance of problems in the systems we work with these days.

If it's a systematic problem do total dollars amounts actually matter - it's still a problem.

quote:

Originally posted by Fir3start3r If it's a systematic problem do total dollars amounts actually matter - it's still a problem.

A problem relative to billions misspent on private contractors and yet nothing done about that? Not really. Never saw the government break a contract with Halliburton or KBR.

quote:

Originally posted by Fir3start3r If it's a systematic problem do total dollars amounts actually matter - it's still a problem.

Reminds me of the very small, "ring fenced" subprime issue that popped up in 2007. Hey, it was only gonna be a $200 million problem...max!

quote:

Originally posted by atbell You're not very good with numbers are you? The amount that was wasted on ACORN doesn't seem to be enough to pad the pockets of even the cheapest Cheny aid. Really, maybe if you counted from 1 to a million and then from one million to 80 billion you would get a bit better idea about the proportional importance of problems in the systems we work with these days.

Reminds me of someone else who's also a little confused on monetary value:



Sorry I've taken so long - death in the family (well, okay, it was our cat, but my wife was really taken to him and she's a mess). More detailed reply to 17 later today.

Re: Acorn At Its Best

this whole thing has been politicised and blown out of proportion for the sake of DRAMA.

I mean if you go and help prostitutes, than people say 'OMG look at him! he is giving tax advise to prostitues!! SHAME!!!'

And if you dont do any help, than people say 'look at him, he is sooo cruel and cold, just because the poor girl is prostitute he just kicked her out like she is a roadside orphange animal or something.. '

The moral of the story?

: "When some wannabe reporter joins a cheap media company and decides to do a sting operation by being a prostitute, she is prostituting herself more than a real prostitute does.. "

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