I interviewed Sheriff Joe to find out.

Yesterday, the Drudge Report posted a World Net Daily article that celebrated the fact that even mainstream media outlets like ABC and NBC were requesting credentials to the press conference.

“The event is tomorrow at 1 p.m. Mountain Standard Time in Phoenix, 3 p.m. Eastern, and will be live-streamed by WND.

The topic of discussion will be an investigation by Arpaio’s Cold Case Posse into concerns about Obama’s eligibility. It’s the first time an official law enforcement report has addressed many of the allegations about the presumptive 2012 Democratic nominee for president.

The issues include Obama’s eligibility under the U.S. Constitution’s requirements, questions about his use of a Connecticut Social Security number and the image of his purported birth certificate from Hawaii.”

World Net Daily has recently come under fire by the Huffington Post, who, in its best copy and paste fashion, accused the Sheriff Joe of being “bribed.”

Huffington Post:

“That cozy relationship defines Corsi and WND’s coverage of Arpaio and the investigation. It has been so fawning and biased that it appears to be an effort to guarantee that the probe generates a result favorable to Corsi and unfavorable to Obama — in other words, a form of bribery. On top of that, Corsi is violating journalistic ethics by playing both sides of the fence — writing about an investigation he not only instigated but participated in.”

While most of the Huffington Post claims are unsubstantiated, some people may have legitimate concerns about the scope and quality of the investigation. To address those concerns, WND has offered free copies of the report.

“In addition to the live-streaming, WND will make available to the public, the same day by email, the official report distributed to media by Arpaio’s investigators. Those interested in receiving the report can sign up for the free service.

Top national media organizations have indicated their plans to attend, and bookings for radio and television reports are in the works. Expected are reporters from the Associated Press, Reuters, Univision, the Washington Times and NBC, CBS and ABC affiliates, as well statewide radio networks, among many others.

When reached by me by phone this evening in Arizona, Sheriff Joe spoke of his reasons for the investigation. An elected official with over 20 years in law enforcement, Sheriff Joe told me that it was an independent, fair and non-politically motivated attempt to have qualified individuals examine the evidence.

In response to a request from over 250 tea party members in Arizona,Arpaio formed a five man “posse” Arpaio called his all-volunteer group the Cold Case Posse and the posse acted independently of the Sheriff office. “Since they were independent, I can fully guarantee that no tax dollars where used to fund this investigation,” Sheriff Joe stated.

A quick Wikipedia search yields that the use of a “posse” is not new in Arizona.

Building upon Maricopa County’s 50-year-old program, Arpaio expanded the all-volunteer citizen posse through heavy recruiting. The volunteers perform many duties for the sheriff’s office:

• Search and rescue
• Emergency communications
• Prisoner transport
• Traffic control
• Backup for sworn deputies
• Office administrative duties
• Holiday Mall Patrol (which provides motorist assistance and security for shoppers during the holiday shopping season)
• Deadbeat parent details targeting men and women with outstanding arrest warrants for failure to pay child support
• Assisting in immigration sweeps

The timing of the press conference has raised a number of eyebrows as Arpaio faces increasing pressure from a years long investigation by the Department of Justice.  An email sent out by  a group called Grassfire Nation reports that over 100,000 petitions were delivered to the DOJ by Arpaio supporters and informed members of attempts by the DOJ to have Arpaio put a stop to those petitions.

Though Arpaio gave few details of today’s announcement, he spoke confidently about the members of his posse which include three former law enforcement officers and two retired attorneys. According to a number of sources, today’s announcement will lead to some serious questions that will demand answers.

Sheriff Joe puts it bluntly:

“There is new evidence that can prove fraud, forgery and other criminal offenses, I am not accusing the President of committing such acts but these are not just allegations. There are a lot of smoke screens and a lot of smoke. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire”

On October 22nd the Republican party of Nevada will decide on the contentious issue of same day registration for the caucus.

Jon Ralston:

“Nevada GOP Chairwoman Amy Tarkanian, who told me weeks ago she wanted to try to get same-day presidential caucus registration to fuel voter registration, has decided to put an agenda item on the Oct. 22 state central committee meeting.”

The response to this initiative was swift as local activists chimed in on the plan:

“The issue came to a head over the weekend. Jeri Taylor-Swade and Laurel Fee, the leaders of  TRUNC — Tea Party & Republicans Uniting Nevada Conservatives — blasted Tarkanian and the party.”

‘This is a wide open door to massive voting fraud and disruption of the Republican process by Democrat-controlled Acorn type organizations and elitist, calculating Republicans wishing to control the election outcome in our important swing state,’ TRUNC said in a news release.

After the press release from the leader  of TRUNC appeared, the Nevada GOP went into full damage control mode and even released the following statement on their website:

Denials were followed by personal attacks on the opponents of SDR. A review of emails provided by insiders paint a picture of a disorganized state party who got caught with their hand in the cookie jar. Private emails admit that SDR is on the table and why the Nevada GOP wants it, however, the public backlash on the activists seeks to undermine their credibility and silence their efforts. See quote of the story in Las Vegas Sun below:

“The TRUNC missive, which I have posted below, is striking in its melange of rumor-mongering and conspiracy-theorizing — a classic example of why no one in his or her right mind would want to chair a political party. These folks seem to think it’s a bad idea to have prominent GOP elected officials involved in party business and deride Tarkanian’s attempts to professionalize the party. It is quite the read, as you will see.”

“Below that missive, I have posted Clark County Chairman David Gibbs attempt to bring sanity to the discussion, which, in this venue, may be a fool’s errand. The Republicans also are hobbled by so many GOP legislators arguing last session against same-day registration for elections, raising some of the same issues the TRUNC folks do. Yes, a caucus is different than an election. But the argument for doing so — an opportunity to mimic the Democrats’ success in voter registration of 2008 — would seem to outweigh the paranoia.”

Keep in mind that same day registration is not the only change that the Nevada GOP wants to implement ahead of the 2012 elections.

“Nevada’s GOP moved up the date of its caucus to Jan. 14, which threatens New Hampshire’s long-held first primary status and may push its nominating contest into December. The state’s election law states that it not only goes first but also seven days before any similar contest.”

The fight over the primary rages on and this is where things get complicated. Why is all of this important? Why should I care? All of those questions may have alreadly come to mind. Everyone should be familiar with the old adage about those who don’t understand history.

ACORN, Obama’s Project Vote, The ACLU and a host of the usual liberal suspects have been pushing for SDR in key states across the country. Project Vote and ACORN have partnered with Demo’s and organizations like it to weaken our electoral system with such laws.

Just last week a scathing report from a same day registration state was released and it shows that Minnesota leads the nation in voter fraud, mostly because of SDR.

“Minnesota Majority today released a report on voter fraud convictions stemming from Minnesota’s 2008 general election. The report finds that 113 individuals who voted illegally in the 2008 election have been convicted of the crime, “ineligible voter knowingly votes” under Minnesota Statute 201.014.

‘As far as we can tell, this is the largest number of voter fraud convictions arising from a single election in the past 75 years,’ said Minnesota Majority president Jeff Davis, ‘Prosecutions are still underway and so there will likely be even more convictions.’

“…’The problem rests largely on our current Election Day registration system,’ said Davis. ‘Most of the fraudulent votes cast in 2008 could have been prevented by using the normal registration and verification processes. But since the Election Day registration process does not include eligibility verifications, it simply leaves the door open to these kinds of abuses.’”

Who benefits from an early primary and same day registration in Nevada? Let’s see. Corey Drumright is the caucus director for the Nevada GOP. His LinkedIn profile reveals other interesting connections:

Let’s assume for a second that it means nothing that Drumright worked for Romney in 2008. Here is a screenshot of the announcement of the October 22nd meeting and of new staff being added to the Nevada GOP.

Here are screen shots for both of the highlighted names, Alan Philp and Gentry Collins.

So far, that’s three former Romney staffers united in Nevada. Interesting.Even more interesting is the fact that David Gallagher, the Executive Director of the Nevada GOP is also a former Romney sftaffer.

In case you have lost count, that brings our total to four former Romney insiders pushing for same day registration in a state that has already caused controversy for moving it’s primary to January. Romney’s former staffers have also been linked to chicanery in the Florida primaries.

“When Florida defied Republican National Committee rules to move the state’s 2012 presidential primary from an RNC-approved March date to Jan. 31, conservatives immediately suspected that state party insiders had orchestrated the move to help former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney thwart the momentum of Tea Party-backed candidate Herman Cain.”

…”Yet while the moderate Republican faction in Tallahassee was immediately blamed for the primary date-switch, only insiders knew that a key factor was a push from inside the staff of the Tea Party’s own 2010 hero, Sen. Marco Rubio. GOP sources in Washington and Florida say that Rubio’s senatorial chief of staff, Cesar Conda, has been a major force in persuading Florida Republicans to move their primary to January.”

‘Cesar used to be with Romney’s campaign,’ one informed source explained to me in an interview today, adding: ‘Conda used his contacts to push the primary to the 31st because they want Romney in.’”

Robert Stacy McCain points out in his article above the benefits of an early primary for Romney as does US News and World Report.

“A compressed primary calendar benefits former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney in several ways. It gives less time for challengers to blunt his momentum. Texas Gov. Rick Perry, for example, would only have three months to get his campaign off the ground.”

At this point there should be a flag on the field. Florida and Nevada? The RNC primary season is shaping up to be a repeat of the chaos from 2008 but when the rules are changed for a particular campaign, red flags have to be raised.

Across the country, the GOP is waging a war against voter fraud and have been very successful at getting legislation passed. Are the ex-Romney staffers in Nevada so shortsighted that they can’t see the implications of introducing same day registration into the primaries? Is the Nevada GOP willing to sink its state further into the voter fraud quagmire? Reports of rampant fraud in Nevada sprung forth in 2008 and 2010. Nevada is the only state to ever try ACORN as an organization for voter registration fraud and should be quite aware of the perils of SDR.

Las Vegas is a gambling town and it seems like that mentality has invaded the rest of the state. Is Nevada willing to gamble away the general election to control the outcome of the primary?

As Americans deal with an the fallout of having an ACORN community organizer running the country, the scattered ACORN alums continue to infiltrate into other trusted institutions. Including Fox News. Jehmu Greene, former National Director of Project Vote currently spends her days undermining Conservative principles from her position as a Fox News contributor. Greene’s tenure at Project Vote coincided with this reporter’s stint there. Curiously, Greene’s Huffington Post bio omits the position.

In 2006 ACORN was running a massive campaign across the country to raise the minimum wage. Their efforts were tied in with Project Vote’s voter registration drive and the subsequent take over of the House of Representatives by Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats. As a tax exempt nonprofit, Project Vote acquired funds to run “non partisan” voter registration drives but “contracted” with partisan ACORN. This 2004 Joint Effort Agreement attempts to provide legal cover for two organizations that, during my tenure, operated seamlessly as one.

Project Vote’s was started in 1982 by Sandy Newman, a friend of Barack Obama. As Ballotpedia states:

“Project Vote (or Voting for America, Inc.[1]) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit, 501(c)(3) organization. According to its website, Project vote provides ‘professional training, management, evaluation and technical services on a broad continuum of key issues related to voter engagement and participation in low-income and minority communities.’ It was founded in 1982 by Sandy Newman and its current executive director is Michael Slater, who has worked for Project Vote since 2004.[2],[3],[4]

“Project Vote has three primary programs, the Voter Participation Program, the Election Administration Program, and the NVRA Implementation Program…

“One of Project Vote’s most successful voter registration drives was directed by U.S. Senator and presidential candidate Barack Obama in Chicago during 1992. Sandy Newman, a friend of Barack Obama’s, recruited Obama to return to Chicago and head up a massive third-party voter registration effort on behalf of Project Vote. According to Barack Obama himself, the objective of the 1992 program was to organize and assist minority and other disenfranchised communities to ‘get out to vote.’[17]. “

As Project Vote National Director, Greene was responsible for fundraising which included grant applications and contracts. This application from the Tides Foundation (a known ACORN funder that even had ACORN founder, Wade Rathke on its board), shows that Greene was the responsible party for this grant.

In 2008 when the relationship between ACORN, Obama and Project Vote came to light, Project Vote tried to scrub its history and claim no real association with ACORN. Project Vote’s own website states that it has been around since 1982 and several of its grant application reference this year, but Project Vote and Obama both maintain that he worked for a different organization that was started around 1994. This organization, they claim, of course, was never affiliated with ACORN. The screen shot below was taken in 2009  of Project Vote’s website.

Here is the current website and a copy of their 990 tax return.

See Line "L"

The question becomes “What did Jehmu Greene know and when did she know it? Management meeting notes dated 8/11/2006 that were submitted into evidence in the Pennsylvania case Moyer vs. ACORN show that Greene was heavily involved with Sandy Newman and his Wellspring Advisors.

“Jehmu – EAC [Election Assistance Commission] grants for two cities to recruit poll workers for about $17K each. Marisla Foundation giving $50K for operating support. Other still pending with amounts TBD.

ZAP [Zach Polett] – Wellspring sponsored call with 55 funders and Jehmu is following up with them. On the two EAC contracts Jehmu will bottom-line the details.”

Was the newly minted Fox News contributor aware of the shenanigans going on with ACORN, Citizens Consulting Inc. (CCI) and the various tax exempt ACORN entities?” As late as 2009,  Project Vote still claimed 1982 as when they were founded. Why the sudden change after Obama was elected? Was it to protect the lies of our new president?

Was Project Vote committing fraud by lying about its inception and connection to ACORN on grant applications to foundations and even the United State Election Assistance Committee? More importantly, did the former head of Rock the Vote knowingly work with an organization with one of the worst records regarding voter fraud/voter registration fraud?

A November 2006 email from  Sandy Newman congratulates Jehmu and others:

“Whatever the election outcomes, you guys have done one hell of a job! You have an enormous amount to be proud of. Way to go.”

ACORN’s Kevin Whelan responds back to Jehmu and others saying”

“Thanks. CNN says we won in OH and MO.” and “John Fund is on Headline News saying we are Satan.”

The emphasis is mine, but what stake does a tax exempt, non partisan voter registration organization have in the outcome of an election? Project Vote’s Michael Slater chimes in to interpret John Fund’s post-Election 2006 remarks on CNN.

“John’s just saying our felonious activities have helped exposed flaws in the system that can easily be fixed with common sense reforms like making people show picture ID, register to vote in person and prove their citizenship.”

Voting rights and voter registration fraud are no laughing matter and neither is Jehmu Greene’s relationship with Fox News.  In 2008 Greene’s name was given to several Congressional and Federal investigators as someone with knowledge of ACORN’s inner workings. When the opportunity to stand up presented itself, did Greene choose to protect the Democrat establishment?

Michelle Malkin, Glenn Beck and other Fox News personalities have been vilified in the mainstream media and threatened in their personal lives for exposing ACORN. It is an insult to them and average Americans to have a former ACORN insider using Fox News to espouse her liberal bias. From attacking Tim Tebow to smugly “representing” blacks during segments called “Has Obama Abandoned the African-American Community?”  one has to question the judgement of Fox when folks like Walter Williams, Star Parker, Alfonzo Rachel and a host of others like them exist in the Conservative movement.

In this time when honest Americans are taunted and threatened by the likes of James P. Hoffa and slandered by the VP, our only hope is to wake up and realize that radicals have assimilated into the very core of our society. The next time we see a split screen like the one below, one can only hope that Ms. Greene is finally answering the tough question that  Fox should have the courage to ask.

I am scheduled to speak as a panelist at CPAC 2011 on Saturday, February 12, 2011, at 11:30 AM.

My topic is “What’s the Activist Left Up To?”

As always, the Activist Left is up to promoting its radical agenda in many ways.

The Activist Left wants President Obama re-elected, so he can appoint more liberal activists to the federal courts and more radicals like former SEIU lawyer and current NLRB member Craig Becker to the federal bureaucracy

It wants Obama’s political opponents ridiculed and discredited, especially those conservative females who will not shut up, Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann.

It wants Obamacare implemented, notwithstanding its unconstitutionality and the will of the people, with waivers for Obama supporters, like SEIU..

It wants the Obama administration to impose by regulation what it cannot sign into law.

In other words, it’s up to promoting the stealth socialist agenda.

Norman Thomas, a socialist who ran for president of the United States six times, astutely asserted:

“”The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism, but under the name of liberalism they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program until one day America will be a socialist nation without ever knowing how it happened.”

Thomas also explained that he no longer needed “to run as a Presidential Candidate for the Socialist Party” because “[t]he Democrat Party has adopted our platform.”

The Democrat Party is the party that the Activist Left uses primarily to pursue its radical agenda. A look at the ACORN “People’s Platform” from the 1970′s shows that Obama’s current agenda has roots in what I call ACORN’s socialist “wish list.”

Thomas died in 1968.

Two years later Wade Rathke founded ACORN.

The idea was for ACORN to grow from a tiny acorn into a great tree.

Originally, ACORN was an acronym for Arkansas Community Organizations for Reform Now.

Rathke’s long-term goal was “fundamental transformation” and he had much more than Arkansas in mind. In 2009 article, I revealed the ACORN Community Organizing Manual which outlined Rathke’s methods for organizing communities.

Under Rathke’s leadership, ACORN became a national organization and changed its named to Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.

In his biography at his website, Rathke described ACORN as follows:

“The ACORN family of organizations includes radio stations (KNON and KABF), publications, housing development and ownership (ACORN Housing), and a variety of other supports for direct organizing and issue campaigns, such as Project Vote and the Living Wage Resource Center.”

Project Vote is ACORN’s voter mobilization arm. It is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that is supposed to carry out “non-partisan” voter registration drives, to counsel voters on their right, and to litigate on behalf of voting rights – focusing on the rights of the poor and the “disenfranchised.”

DiscovertheNetworks.org asserts that

“Project Vote’s actions suggest that its true agenda is more radical” and “aimed at overwhelming, paralyzing and discrediting the voting system through fraud, protests, propaganda and vexatious litigation.”

Discover the Networks understands.

People simultaneously worked for ACORN and Project Vote, and I was one of them.

My old boss, Zach Polett, helped found ACORN, then founded Project Vote in 1982 and led it while simultaneously serving as ACORN’s political director. He’s partisan.

On Election Day 2010 ACORN, then generally viewed as politically toxic, filed for bankruptcy.

Rathke began to provide cover for the group and posted that ACORN is dead. Rathke also used a tried and true ACORN tactic by warning Congressman Darrell Issa not to investigate ACORN if he wants to be re-elected.

Rathke also looked beyond the United States and created ACORN International. The exposure of an embezzlement scandal in 2008 led to Rathke’s replacement as ACORN’s Chief Organizer, but he remains the leader of ACORN International.

To say that ACORN is dead is to focus on form instead of substance.

ACORN has morphed, not disappeared.

Former Speaker Newt Gingrich described President Obama’s 2011 State of the Union Address as “fundamentally dishonest.” Gingrich was right about that, and Obama has been “fundamentally dishonest” about much more than the State of the Union.

He’s been “fundamentally dishonest” about his relationship with ACORN, and he’s gotten away with it.

I know about it, because ACORN recruited me.

I went from Alabama to Washington, D.C. to work for ACORN in October 2005.

When I came to Washington, D.C., I was put on the Project Vote payroll and given an ACORN email address. For practical purposes, ACORN and Project Vote were one, sharing the same office. I worked simultaneously as a Project Vote development associate and an ACORN strategic writing, research and design consultant. I did fundraising work that supported Project Vote’s voter registration program as well as designed ACORN’s 2005, 2006 and 2007 Political Operations Year End PowerPoint presentations and three state-based PowerPoint presentations.

The people who ran ACORN were radicals and clever. Marcel Reid, a former ACORN national board member and head of ACORN’s DC chapter, told me that the word socialism was not to be used. ACORN was a stealth socialist operation and it has morphed and rebranded, not disappeared.

Wade Rathke resigned from ACORN when an embezzlement scandal involving his brother Dale finally was made public, but he remains a player.

For example, Wade’s January 26, 2011 post in his blog. chieforganizer.com not only begins with a description of his friend Frances Fox Piven as “a brilliant scholar and political theorist, still vitally engaged at the cutting edges of her work while still affiliated with CUNY’s Graduate Center, and someone [Wade]I count[s] as colleague and friend over our 40 years,” but discloses that Piven had turned to him for advice on dealing with Glenn Beck and others who had focused on her.

That’s not surprising. Piven is still a member of the editorial advisory group of the magazine Social Policy, published by Wade, and a board member of Project Vote.

I know what it was like inside ACORN’s DC national office and I was surprised to receive a call from the Obama presidential campaign in late 2007.asking if this was the same Project Vote that Obama worked for in the 90′s.

Zach Polett had mentioned that Obama had worked for us and that he even supervised him during a ACORN Political staff retreat in November 2007

With that staff retreat fresh in my mind, I answered yes and sent an email to Zach Polett, Karyn Gillette, Nathan Henderson James, and Kevin Whelan stating that the campaign wanted someone to call them back regarding some media questions that were being asked at the time.

Soon after, Karyn Gillette told me that she had direct contact with the Obama campaign and had obtained their donor lists. I was given an excel spreadsheet to work with for cultivation of new donors. When I had trouble because of the duplicates, Karyn stated that she would contact her person at the campaign and see if they had another one.

Karyn Gillette also provided lists obtained from the Kerry and Clinton campaigns, as well as the 2004 DNC donor lists, and that these lists were shared with the Political directors of roughly 12 ACORN battleground states in order to raise money for a $28 million dollar (number as of 11/2007) voter registration drive.

Bottom line: ACORN had been improperly coordinating with and operating as an arm of the Obama campaign, and “the Senator from ACORN”‘s involvement with ACORN has been much more than he claimed.

BUT…during the last presidential debate Obama said:

“…with respect to ACORN, ACORN is a community organization. Apparently what they’ve done is they were paying people to go out and register folks, and apparently some of the people who were out there didn’t really register people, they just filled out a bunch of names.

“It had nothing to do with us. We were not involved. The only involvement I’ve had with ACORN was I represented them alongside the U.S. Justice Department in making Illinois implement a motor voter law that helped people get registered at DMVs.”

Obama’s statement that his only involvement with ACORN was representing ACORN in the motor voter case is a lie, not a fact, or, in Speaker Gingrich’s words, “fundamentally dishonest.”

ACORN is the organization with which Obama has been associated throughout his adult life, as organizer, trainer, lawyer, funder and political beneficiary…and Obama’s Achilles heel.

Stanley Kurtz wrote about ACORN, but the alphabet networks and other liberal media did not report his findings.

For example, Mr. Kurtz, in “Planting Seeds of Disaster: ACORN, Barack Obama, and the Democratic party,” revealed:

“[In 1995], as a director at Chicago’s Woods Fund, Obama was successfully pushing for a major expansion of assistance to ACORN, and sending still more money ACORN’s way from his post as board chair of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge. Through both funding and personal-leadership training, Obama supported ACORN. And ACORN, far more than we’ve recognized up to now, had a major role in precipitating the subprime crisis.”

Mr. Kurtz traced Obama’s ties to ACORN and the current financial crisis:

“I’ve already told the story of Obama’s close ties to ACORN leader Madeline Talbott, who personally led Chicago ACORN’s campaign to intimidate banks into making high-risk loans to low-credit customers. Using provisions of a 1977 law called the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), Chicago ACORN was able to delay and halt the efforts of banks to merge or expand until they had agreed to lower their credit standards — and to fill ACORN’s coffers to finance ‘counseling’ operations…. This much we’ve known. Yet these local, CRA-based pressure-campaigns fit into a broader, more disturbing, and still under-appreciated national picture. Far more than we’ve recognized, ACORN’s local, CRA-enabled pressure tactics served to entangle the financial system as a whole in the subprime mess. ACORN was no side-show. On the contrary, using CRA and ties to sympathetic congressional Democrats, ACORN succeeded in drawing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into the very policies that led to the current disaster.”

Ironically, Obama. “the Senator from ACORN,” benefited from the financial crisis that his kind of thinking created with his personal help as organizer, trainer. lawyer, funder and political supporter and win the Presidency.

That’s because the truth did not catch up to the lie.

It would have, if The New York Times had not killed the expose I was working with its reporter, Stephanie Strom, or ABC or CNN had been interested in the truth about Obama.

The Activist Left is comprised of long range planners, people who wait decades to implement their socialist agendas.  In the October 1978 issue of Just Economics, Zach Polett wrote an article entitled “Care & Feeding of the Press Made Easy,” which may explain why mainstream outlets like the Times and Huffington Post carry water for ACORN.

The left will continue to beat the supposed corpse of ACORN while its chapters reorganize and continue pushing the same agenda. According to Conservapedia, the following groups are all part of the thriving ACORN family:

Community Organizations International

Texans Together Education Fund

Health Care for America NOW!

Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment

Voting Is Power

Peace and Social Justice Center of South Central Kansas

Communities Voting Together

Pennsylvania Communities Organizing for Change

Affordable Housing Centers of America, Inc.

New England United For justice

A Community Voice

Communities United

Minnesota Neighborhood’s Organizing For Change

Missourians Organizing For Reform and Empowerment

New York Communities For Change

Working Families Party

Pennsylvania Neighborhoods For Social Justice

Texas Organizing Project

Organization United For Reform (Our) Washington

American Institute For Social Justice

The rising Conservative movement has only slowed the progression of these groups as they continue to push radical legislation. To reach critical mass, the entire country must be made aware of how a broken system of social programs fuels these groups, and Obama’s “fundamental dishonesty” regarding his connections to them.

A 2004 article from the UK’s The Independent noted the inevitable passing of the torch that occurs when businesses and large sums of money are at stake.

George Soros, the 74-year-old billionaire investor and philanthropist, has promoted his two sons, Robert and Jonathan, to senior positions within his fund management business, signalling his desire to put succession plans in place.

A memo sent to investors in the company, which has $12.8bn under management, said Robert Soros, 41, had been named chief investment officer, and Jonathan Soros, 34, had been appointed as co-deputy chairman of Soros Fund Management.

Before the Tea Party movement and Glenn Beck, students earning “liberal arts” degrees across the country would hear their professor joke that according to the Right, George Soros was behind every liberal conspiracy out there. However, most Americans have only recently become aware of the man that is Soros.

Glenn Beck’s expose on George Soros was met with horror and stinging attacks from the radical Left. Insiders understand that like most socialist plans, it’s best to fly below the radar. Glenn Beck’s big spotlight on Soros is troubling because of the powerful Washington political insiders that surround Soros and his ventures.

Essentially, the entire leftist wing of the Democrat party, including the President can be tied to George Soros in some way.

In 2004, at the height of the anti-Bush rhetoric being pushed by the Soros funded Move On.org, Soros transferred some power to his two sons Robert and Jonathan. The elder Soros, a Holocaust survivor, has always been careful to leave few fingerprints on his endless quests for power. Two vehicles for amassing power and “fundamentally transforming” America are his foundation, the Open Society Institute which funds a myriad of liberal causes, and the Democracy Alliance, which serves as a donor advised fund for all types of socialist endeavors.

However, the  younger, and less cautious Jonathan Soros seems eager to follow in his father’s footsteps and get his hands dirty along the way.

In 2004, Jonathan Soros was already serving as a board member of the highly controversial group, America Coming Together.

“America Coming Together (ACT) organized theDemocratic Party‘s Government Union wing, which is represented by such leftist labor unions as the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and AFSCME.

ACT was one of the 33 “progressive” member organizations constituting the  America Votes coalition. It was also a member group of the so-called Democrat Shadow Party, a nationwide network of non-profit activist groups pursuing leftist agendas and campaigning aggressively for Democrat political candidates.”

As this reporter noted in December of 2008, evidence indicates that ACORN insiders and the Soros money machine had their own nefarious reasons for forming these groups.

America Votes Overview Notes 04/06/06

Started in 2003 by Rosenthal, EMILY’s list, SEIU, big money funders, etc. decided to do field work, a huge non-party political field operation designed to take back White House in 2004. Which failed. ACT was part of this grouping or money and organizations and perhaps the best known. Partially a product of McCain-Feingold….

Post 2004, ACT disbanded in summer 2005. AV [America Votes] was needed and valuable. SEIU, Soros, and Dem Alliance invested in AV as one key element of progressive electoral work. AV has more resources, still a table of 30 major progressive political orgs, including ACORN (choice, enviros, labor, community). ….

Political Money rules:

• We prefer that political money go to us in the form of a vendor, which would be CSI [Obama made payments to this group as well], our for-profit business, which doesn’t have to report the cash because it’s a business, like the phone company…

• Three questions: What are rules for raising and spending, what are coordination rules/affiliation rules, what are content rules.Hard money can say anything to anybody. Hard money is money that is raised under the state or federal campaign limits [Think Obama's small donors].

Discover the Networks goes on to note that:

“ACT used intrusive, high-pressure tactics to register and mobilize such voters, both by phone and by door-to-door canvassing. Not only did its canvassers register voters, but they compiled extensive personal dossiers on the latter — including such private information as their drivers’ license numbers and social security numbers — information which could be retrieved on demand through the canvassers’ hand-held Palm Pilots.

On June 23, 2004, the Associated Press revealed that an undetermined number of ACT’s full time canvassers were felons, convicted for crimes ranging from drug dealing to burglary, assault, and sex offenses.

In August 2007, Politico.com reported that the Federal Election Commission (FEC) was fining ACT some $775,000 for having used unregulated soft money to help John Kerry and other Democratic candidates in 2004. The FEC determined that most of the $137 million ACT had raised for its get-out-the-vote effort that year, was derived from contributions that violated federal limits. The settlement was the third largest enforcement penalty in the FEC’s 33-yearhistory.”

Typical ACORN shenanigans. However, instead of being a step removed as just another funder, Jonathan Soros was at the time not only a board member but a “colleague” and friend of ACORN’s  Zach Polett. Similar to ACORN playing dead to avoid prosecution, amazingly neither Polett or Soros were around when ACT headed towards trouble with federal investigators.

In June of 2005, then ACORN Political Director and Project Vote Executive Director, Zach Polett, released  the outline for a five year business planfor ACORN.

“Both to focus the strategic thinking of our political work and to put ourselves in position to attempt to raise the funds to support an ambitious, multi-year political program that grows out of ACORN’s base and strengths, I believe we need a serious, well-argued business plan.On the fundraising side, places we will want to share this business plan include ‘the millionaires club’ (Democracy Alliance),the billionaires (Sandlers’, Soros, etc.), friends and opinion leaders in the voter engagement world (e.g., Frank Smith, John Podesta), SEIU, the voter participation foundations, etc.”

One could infer that Polett was referring to George Soros and the Open Society Institute but unaltered evidence related to an internal ACORN meeting quotes ZachPolett as saying:

“Meeting with Jeff Robinson of N2N to see if he can work with us and Jonathan Soros for big cash regarding business plan.”

Given the advanced age of the elder Soros, it appears that America has much to worry about in dealing with his brazen and well financed sons. Jonathan Soros even went to far as to pen an op-ed for the New York Times, taking up one of the favorite issues of ACORN’s Project Vote. In typical Times fashion, they provided just enough cover to offer a sense of legitimacy. 

“On October 30, a column entitled ‘Vote Early, Count Often‘ was published on the Times op-ed page.  The author, Jonathan Soros, was identified to be, ‘…a lawyer and the president of an investment firm.’ Which is true, but misleadingly incomplete.

Mr. Soros is, of course, the son of antiwar, anti-Bush activist George Soros, and the president of his father’s investment firm.  And much more…

According to MoneyLine, Jonathan Soros gave $250,000 to America Votes in 2004 and the same amount again in 2007.  He has also contributed at least $55,000 to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. And then there’s his funding of MoveOn.org’s activities..

Given the Times’ not-so-proud history with MoveOn.org, shouldn’t it have added something to Soros’s byline to at least inform its readers of his close connection to the organization that created and paid for the “Petraeus-Betray Us” ad?  The fact that it did not indicates that the Times’ editors and publisher have learned nothing from that experience.”

What’s next for America with the Soros family on the loose? Well, according to the Roosevelt Institute, Jonathan Soros fully intends to follow in his father’s footsteps:

“Jonathan Soros is Senior Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute where he explores the role of corporations in society…In addition, he is exploring the the emerging field of of social investment and the ways in which it mobilizes for-profit organziations for the production of public goods.Finally, Mr. Soros is working together with Bo Cutter on the Next American Economy project, which among other topics will test the role of the private sector as a deliberate agent of change in American economic life over the next twenty-five years.”

A part two is needed just to discuss the dangers of Jonathan Soros working with Bo Cutter (W. Bowman Cutter).  Cutter worked with President Carter and was a former senior economic policy advisor in the Clinton administration. Most recently, Cuter served as leader of the OMB transition team for President Obama.

Like many of Jonathan Soros’s friends, Cutter, of course, also has a connection with George Soros and even ACORN. Cutter works with the Podesta group, a group run by Tony Pedesta. Tony is the brother of Obama Transition team member John Podesta, who also runs the Soros funded Center for American Progress. And who is a current fellow at the Center for American Progress? None other than former ACORN national director, Steve Kest.

DO NOT BE FOOLED BY THE APPEALING NAMES USED AS TOOLS IN THE PURSUIT OF POWER AND “FUNDAMENTAL TRANSFORMATION”! With Sorosfunding, so called media outlets like Media Matters paint criminal enterprises like ACORN as harmless activist groups, while the liberal elite sit back and plot the fundamental transformation of America into a socialist society in substance but not name.

On Election Day 2010 ACORN filed for liquidation in bankruptcy, apparently to discourage real investigation by a Republican-controlled House of Representatives when the next Congress convenes. But the truth has not changed or become less relevant and the key players who controlled radical organizations like ACORN and SEIU remain well positioned to pursue their stealth socialist agenda. The ACORN name effectively was retired, because it became politically toxic despite the liberal media establishment led by The New York Times. But the ACORN agenda remains the same and is being pursued under other names not yet deservedly toxic. And the man ACORN and SEIU wanted to put in the White House in 2009 is still there, working on being cleverly re-elected instead of carefully inspected and continuing to do all he can to effect the “fundamental transformation” as fast as he can, be it by appoinment, legislation, executive order or regulation, while trying not to seem too radical to be re-elected.

Cross-posted from Emerging Corruption. Illustrations courtesy of Randy Allamon of the Allamon Cartoon Blog. Follow him ow Twitter!

By Rebecca Diserio

Laura Richardson & mentor Maxine Waters

In a State where virtually no Republican or Independent won Tuesday November 2, many Conservatives in the Golden State are left scratching their heads.  One story of particular interest revolves around the Secretary of State Deborah Bowen (D), and a “letter” sent out by the Democratic Party.  The letter, (copy below), was sent to only Democrats and “Decline to State” in the 28th State Senatorial District, which encompasses cities from Long Beach, Carson, Redondo Beach, Signal Hill, which also crosses most of the 37th Congressional District which was the location of the heated campaign of Star Parker(R) vs. Laura Richardson(D).

In an uncanny string of unrelated events, State Senator Jenny Oropreza (D) passed away mid October.  Her challenger,  John Stammreich (R), was informed it was “too late” to take the late State Senator off the ballot.  It was at this same time, in late October, that the letter arrived to the 28th District registered voters-with the exception of any registered Republicans.The letter, not on official “State of California” letterhead, but return address “Debra Bowen, Secretary of State, California” stated:

“You have the right to know how the illness of Jenny Oropeza’s illness impact your election day choice.

Jenny Oropreza name is on the ballot.  You have the right to vote for her.

If you do and she wins, there will be a special election called.  You will then                                   be able to thoughtfully consider who will represent you in the Senate in the next four years.”

Debra Bowen

Secretary of State

“Letter to 28th District from Bowen, Under Investigation”

The Republican Party responded with a letter of complaint.  John Stammreich (R), stated

“This is wrong. This is the chief elections officer who is supposed to be safeguarding the election process. Instead she is giving her name and her official title to illegally sway the outcome of this election,” he said in a conference call with reporters.”

Here is the official letter of complaint by the Republican Party: (Of Course look who’s office its going to, Outgoing AG Jerry Brown, Our New Democratic Gov, the Sequel–its his 2nd time around as the Gov) Republican Parties Complaint re: Sec’y Bowen Unethical Letter

Star Parker

Enter the 37th District, which as stated earlier encompasses much of the same territory, cities as the 28th State District.  Known as “Democratic Strongholds” for years, the gerrymandering of all of LA County is impressive.  As a life long resident of California, primarily LA County, its a no-brainer to see how the Congressional Districts are drawn for a Democratic victory.  In all of LA County, there is only one Republican Representative, Drier, but his District crosses into San Bernadino County.  But I digress, the 37th, which is Long Beach, Compton, Signal Hill, Carson, and some smaller unincorporated areas, is vastly Hispanic, African American, and Pacific Islander.

I became involved with the Star Parker campaign, and ended up helping set up the Compton office for Star.  My family is from Compton, my father owned a small business there for over 50 years, and his parents before him.  If all politics is local, my family name, Diserio, was a way to recruit a heavy democratic populace, into at least listening for 5 minutes about Star Parker.

Within a few days, with the guidance and leadership of Pastor Charles Patrick, we had a volunteers manning phone banks, and we went to work on Compton.  After 12 to 16 hour days of a month straight, and frequenting the main Long Beach office, and phone banking there myself, the inside scoop from all sources was that Star was making headway, not only headway, but her coffers were filled with donations from all over the country.

The Richardson campaign, in financial trouble, hardly mounted any rebuttal.  The Democratic Party seemingly had thrown Richardson “under the bus”, due to her being an “embarrassment” to the Party.  She had a record of 3 houses simultaneously in foreclosure, she had ethics violations to answer, and she appeared on the “10 Most Corrupt Congressman list “10 Most Corrupt Comgressman by CREW”.    Michelle Obama blew through California, stumping for different candidates, dismissing Richardson, “not even a courtesy blackberry text” was the scoop.

With the death of Senator Oropreza, who was well respected by Dem’s and Rep’s alike, after a day or two of somberness, Parker’s campaign was elated to book Richardson to a few debates. Parker clearly cleaned Richardson’s clock, as documented by many local papers.  Unknown at this time, was the letter, that was sent out.  Clearly, the Democratic Party was concerned with this area, and one reason being the “Port of Long Beach”, which holds ties to several Unions.  Talk around town was of the SEIU dumping “a ton of cash” into Richardson’s campaign, to keep that Port area off limits to a non-politico like Star Parker.  As far as this writing, that money never materialized.

The night before the election Star Parker called a “Townhall” at the last minute.  The mood was elation.  It appeared to all close to the campaign, that Parker, her nationally known personality–both as a columnist, as the founder of CURE foundation, and her network TV work as a frequent guest on Hannity, the View, O’Reilly etc in the last 5 years and her African American roots, rising from a welfare Mom to changing her life so dramatically, had appealed to the 37th District.  What I didn’t know was Richardson had a history of voter fraud.

In the June primary, charges were headlined in the local papers about her campaign, and the Democratic Party, registering nursing home resident, the disabled. Richardson’s opponents in the June Primary, Lee Davis and Peter Matthews filed complaints, which also included their names being left off ballots in over 300 precincts.

As one blogger notes, her blogspot “California is a Third World Cesspool”:

“This IS not a preposterous scenario. I live in long beach(LA COUNTY) and when i go to vote the voter booth never asks me for voter or picture ID. LA HAS MILLiONS OF NON-CITIZEN GREEN CARDERS AND ILLEGALS AND IT WOULD BE A PIECE OF CAKE FOR THEM TO USE FAKE ID’s AND FAKE INFO TO REGISTER TO VOTE.”  “California Blog-Voter Fraud in Long Beach CA”

I do not think California is a cesspool, although, I wanted to be clear that voter fraud is not all that hard to accomplish.   Along with all the other hard cold facts about Ms. Richardson, combined with the unethical behavior of Debra Bowen, our Secretary of State, who is “safe guarding” our elections here in California, I’m sure you’ll be scratching your head too.

Below are some links that are a must see on this story.   Voter fraud Charges June Primary 2010

She is summed up superbly at Frugal Cafe Blogger–check out video of Richardson’s Cuba trip and her love for Castro and admitting Cuba is “beter” than her district  “Laura Richardson LOVES Cuba, Its better than her District”

CNN reports on Laura Richardson’s Ethics Violations

And Star Parker’s bid for Congress? The Registrar stated Parker carried 23% to Richardson’s 67%.  Pretty impressive, not withstanding Richardson’s coffer’s reported “in the red”.  One theme comes to mind for me: Chicago Style: West Coast Edition.

Cross-posted from Emerging Corruption.

In the final days leading up to Tuesday’s critical vote, reports are making the rounds on the Internet that Democrats have acknowledged that they will lose the House of Representatives..

“[John] Kerry was touring Boston Medical Center and decided to enlighten everyone around him by laying his philosophy about the 2010 elections on everyone. This is what he said:

‘We have an electorate that doesn’t always pay that much attention to what’s going on so people are influenced by a simple slogan rather than the facts or the truth or what’s happening,’

Exactly. A simple slogan like, oh I don’t know, ‘Yes We Can.’ Or maybe ‘Hope and Change.’”

Of course, the mainstream media continues to carry water for the Democrats. The question is: If the Democrats are so resigned to loosing, then what’s going on inHarris County, Texas?  In recent days, tension in the county has been at a fever pitch as local Democrats spread fear and warn of voter intimidation. RedState reports that even the local Democrat party has gotten involved by posting an inflammatory message on its website. View the article for the screen shot.

“Notice the words in the first paragraph:

URGENT – THE TEA PARTY IS TRYING TO KEEP YOU FROM VOTING IN THIS ELECTION. DON’T LET THEM!

And further down in the message:

WE CANNOT LET THEM GET AWAY WITH THIS. WE FOUGHT TOO HARD FOR THE RIGHT TO VOTE TO LET A BUNCH OF BIGOTS AND THUGS TAKE IT AWAY FROM US NOW.

Nice, isn’t it. This is how the Dems are operating in Texas, folks. And contrary to what they are saying in the email above, it is the Dems who are intimidating Ms. Engelbrecht’s trained via -Texas- law poll watchers. They are even suing her.”

ACORN and groups like it are known for operating under the radar and rarely cause trouble in strict law enforcement states. For example, the Virginia chapter of ACORN in Virginia Beach, VA had several members arrested after one of their “typical shakedown protests.”  So why mess with Texas? The answer lies on the website of the Soros and Rockerfeller funded America Votes. Click pictures to enlarge.

Voters in 35 states will determine which party will redraw congressional districts for the 2010 election and ultimately control Congress through 2022.

Following the 2000 census, Republican control of the last redistricting process in just five states – Florida, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Texas – resulted in a 31-seat swing in Congress.”

Redistricting? Yes. While the Right is eyeing certain victory, it is being out thought by the Left. Leftist have proven time and time again that they are willing to throw each other under the bus to protect long term interests. Voters need to look beyond the House and examine other key races.

Control of these state legislatures could be decided by just a few thousand voters.

The AV Redistricting Control Project is coordinating and supporting independent progressive and Democratic campaigns in crucial states where the power over redistricting will be determined in the 2010 elections.”

What states are they focusing on? The very same states that have reported massive amounts of ACORN-like voter registration fraud.

Reports from around the country have come in about Texas, Pennsylvania,Michigan, and Florida. Things have been relatively quiet in Ohio and this should raise the alarm bells because the America Votes website says that Ohio is top priority. Maybe having the Soros funded Jennifer Brunner as Secretary of State helps.

America Votes encourages its members by pointing out how even a few small victories in key districts will aid the Democrats.

The website even contains a handy video that breaks down the project.

Harris County,Texas contains one-third the population for the state, and Sheila Jackson Lee’s district has been targeted just like this one from Ohio.

Where does Texas fit in? Why would Democrats go to such lengths as to file 59  unsubstantiated complaints against a citizens group that uncovered fraud? Review the screen shots below.

And let’s not forget Maria Isabel:

“You may have read that there is strong evidence of voter fraud in Houston. Here’s what you may not have heard: the organization accused of shady behavior is linked to a former head of an Obama campaign office. She is a fan of Che Guevara. She is also the person who invited to a town hall meeting a woman who then posed as a doctor at that meeting during the health care debate.”

If Houston Votes worked with Obama for America in 2007-2008 and given Houston Votes founder Fred Lewis and his prior partnerships with ACORN, a partnership with America Votes seems more than likely.

Time to face facts: the Left have always had a way of outsmarting the Right with ballot initiatives, catchy slogans and long term goals of world domination. America needs to wake up and stop counting on what could be an empty victory. The only way to defeat tyranny is to stand up and confront it. Every American should stand behind and support True the Vote in its quest,  and to start investigating fraud in his or her state. Citizen Action.

With exactly one week left before one of the most important mid-term elections in America’s history, a certain party has once again decided to throw out the rule of law.

Dr. Melissa Clouthier explains.

“Republicans don’t run fraudulent election operations. Democrats do. It’s systemic.

Entering this election cycle is a group, True The Vote, who decided to do what they could to keep Houston elections clean and fair. They are not looking to influence the outcome. They’re looking to influence the process. That is, they want an idealistic vision fulfilled: a lawful, clean, fair and fraud-free election.

True the Vote is getting results…

The problem, it seems, is that the Democrats don’t care that it’s their organizations responsible for this and then, the Justice Department, which turns out to be a highly politicized and racist organization these days won’t prosecute.

So systemic fraud goes unchecked, and tacitly approved. And what is particularly galling is that those who risk exposing the fraud are then accused of racism and then sued. The criminals, in a sense, count on not being examined because the charge of racism is so toxic–especially to conservatives.

But we know this fraud exists Democrat-wide and it’s not a black phenomenon. Blacks just happen to be overwhelmingly Democrat.”

Houston Votes has done much grandstanding since the accusations of fraud were leveled against them in a document released to the public.

“Houston Votes, which pays staff to collect voter registrations from citizens has turned in 25,640 registrations generating 7,193 new registered voters and resulting in 3,531 applications which were rejected because either Texas Drivers License numbers and/or Social Security numbers did not match. Houston Votes has also generated 129 felon rejection of applications and submitted 1,133 applications where the No ID box was checked and turned in 1,323 applications after the 5 day statutory deadline.”

While the group has been accused of ACORN-style voter registration fraud, it does not have any direct links to ACORN.  But State Representative Kirsten Thibaut does have strong ties to ACORN in her past and does sit on the advisory board of Texans Together Educational Fund, the parent organization of Houston Votes.

However, most will argue that Thibaut’s past associations have little do with her current position. Or do they? Meet Fred Lewis.

“The ethics reform lobbyist and campaign finance lawyer has launched a new nonpartisan voter registration drive that targets what he calculates are the 600,000 unregistered adult citizens there out of about 2.3 million who are eligible to vote. His team wants to sign up 100,000 of them — all in time for the November election. He sat down with the Tribune last week to talk about the project, Houston Votes 2010, which he hopes will get at least 50,000 new people to the polls.

Part of what makes Lewis believe he can meet that ambitious goal is the success of a similar effort administered in 2008 by the Texans Together Education Fund, a grassroots community outreach program that he founded. It registered 24,000 low-income residents, 65 percent of whom actually cast a ballot.”

Lewis has been described as a community organizer and has established a number of non-profits over the years. In the spirit of ACORN’s Wade Rathke, Lewis’s ventures appear to be all interrelated supporting organizations. One of those organizations is Campaigns for People. Lewis focused on campaign finance reform and used the same “corporate money” argument that Houston Votes has used against True the Vote.

“Our No. 1 enemy is cynicism,” said Fred Lewis of Campaigns for People Monday morning, as he unveiled a new TV ad designed by the CFP to “drive people to our Web site” – www.cleanuptexaspolitics.com – and encourage them to get involved in organizing for campaign finance reform. The 30-second ad features a cigar-smoking representative of the “big-money boys” delivering a contribution worth “a year’s worth of wages” for most of us, and a fleeting vision of headlines announcing “the indictments coming down.”

Who directly supported the work of Campaigns for People? Why Kristi Thibaut’s Texas ACORN. Click pictures to enlarge.

This is what the Campaigns for People’s site looks like today.

Someone went through a lot of trouble to hide their tracks and even the Clean Up Texas Politics site has been scrubbed.

Lewis is also an active board member with Texas Impact. A group that held Townhall meetings with ACORN as late as 2008.

Lewis and Texas Impact also worked directly with ACORN on health care.

As this reporter has stated in many speeches, the white liberals behind ACORN are all to willing to use blacks and other minorities as pawns in their political power games. It appears that the same groups from 2004, 2006, and 2008 are now registering voters under a different name and hiring their old friends as “advisors.”

The King Street Patriots and True the Vote have uncovered the covert actions of ACORN and the Democrats -with the backing of the Obama administration – are poised to destroy them.

All eyes should be on Houston. If Democrats succeed in a state like Texas, ACORN will be registering 10 year old’s next year in red states around the country. Tomorrow, a part two will examine the key players and their motivations in more detail.

What happens when citizens decide to stand up and ensure the integrity of elections? In the age of Obama, they are investigated by the Department of Justice.

From the  Washington Examiner:

“Obama’s Department of Justice has suddenly turned on a dime, becoming the great pro-active protector of voters’ rights:

‘Poll watchers in Harris County, Texas — where a Tea Party group launched an aggressive anti-voter fraud effort — were accused of “hovering over” voters, ‘getting into election workers’ faces’ and blocking or disrupting lines of voters who were waiting to cast their ballots as early voting got underway yesterday.

Now, TPMMuckraker has learned, the Justice Department has interviewed witnesses about the alleged intimidation and is gathering information about the so-called anti-voter fraud effort….

Terry O’Rourke, the first assistant in the Harris County Attorney’s office, told TPMMuckraker that there have been allegations of poll watchers talking to voters, which they are not allowed to do, as well as hovering over voters as they are waiting to vote. He said the complaints came from Kashmere Gardens, Moody Park, Sunnyside and other predominantly minority neighborhoods of the county.’

…Obama’s politicized Justice Department has already lost all credibility when it comes to even-handed administration of justice on this matter. They let the Black Panthers off with one wrist-slap and two complete dismissals after their flagrant voter intimidation was caught on tape. Now they’re worried about poll watchers “talking to voters,” at a time when local Texas officials are preventing people from voting if they are wearing Gadsden Flag pins?”

An interesting fact about this so-called investigation is that the group, True to Vote, had already contacted the DOJ regarding the extreme irregularities related to the voter registration drives in the state. Click to enlarge.

DOJ whistle blower J. Christian Adams writes:

“True the Vote has hundreds of volunteers committed to promoting electoral integrity. They are ready to assist the Department of Justice and Texas election officials by uncovering instances of fraud in registration and voting. True the Vote has undertaken a comprehensive electoral integrity campaign in Harris County, Texas. Their mission is to promote electoral integrity in both the registration process as well as during elections.

They recognize that government agencies like yours have limited resources and cannot always dedicate the requisite attention to investigations. Their hope is that if and when they discover problems with the integrity of the electoral process, government agencies with oversight will undertake an appropriate inquiry.

Because True the Vote has discovered a variety of violations of federal law in Harris County, Texas, within the Department’s jurisdiction, they are referring a number of the matters to the Department of Justice

Because the Department has civil oversight of the Help America Vote Act, and criminal oversight of non-citizen participation in federal elections, I presume that the results of this secondary inquiry will be of great interest. In the meantime, I believe there is sufficient evidence to open an investigation into whether or not non-citizens are being improperly registered to vote in Harris County. As you know, the Department has conducted extensive litigation throughout Texas to enforce Section 203 of the Voting Rights Act. My client would urge you to consider tackling problems of registration fraud there with similar zeal.”

Adams includes a number of exhibits with the letter to illustrate possible voter fraud. Among the findings of True the Vote are:

Persons claiming to be noncitizens have been registered to vote in Harris County.

Voters Registered Multiple Times

Application 1

Application 2

The recurring theme of the Obama administration is corruption and instead of being lauded for being responsible citizens, True The Vote has been sued, harassed, and accused of voter intimidation.

“Mediaite’s Tommy Christopher reports voter intimidation in Harris County, Texas (Houston) by volunteer poll watchers trained by King Street Patriots, a local non-partisan group who started theTrue The Vote campaign. Tommy leads with this inflammatory paragraph saying:

‘In a story that’s sure to draw comparisons to the New Black Panther Party member who brandished a nightstick at a Philadelphia polling place in 2008, a Tea Party group called the King Street Patriots has been accused of ’1960s style’ voter intimidation in primarily minority precincts on the first day of early voting in Texas. The group is being sued by the Texas Democratic Party, following the filing of 14 voter intimidation complaints with the county clerk, and another two dozen with the Texas Democratic Party chairman.’

Catherine Engelbrecht, founder of King’s Street Patriots strongly denies the allegations and noted that it was absurd that ‘little old ladies’ would be intimidating anyone. She says that one 65 year old woman poll watcher came back from poll watching, after being kicked out for simply being present–itself a violation of the law–in tears…

In one instance, three poll watchers were yelled at by a Democrat Harris County Commissioner El Franco Lee who said,’Why are you here? We have never had poll watchers here. Ya’ll need to get on out of here.’

Lee then demanded that the polling place judge give him information about the three poll watchers and the presiding judge complied–giving him their private information. The three poll watchers now fear for their safety and wonder what will be done with their personal information which included their phone numbers and home addresses.”

The actions described by the poll watchers indicate that the Democrats are desperate. Numerous articles by media outlets on the left claim voter intimidation because ordinary citizens decided to become active participants in our electoral process. In the tradition of ACORN-style intimidation tactics by the left, can those poor citizens expect to be targeted at their homes? Democrats only want poll workers who are trained by ACORN using tax dollars.

In 2006, the Election Assistance Commission gave a grant to ACORN’s Project Vote to recruit college students for poll worker training. Click Pictures to enlarge.

Not only does Project Vote have a history of engaging in election season shenanigans with ACORN involving thousands of duplicate registrations, but the group’s reporting on the grant is pure fiction. In a 2007 email, Nathan Henderson-James of ACORN Political Operations advises staff on how to “make it look good” regarding the money given to tax exempt Project Vote and used by ACORN. Click Pictures to enlarge.

It is equally disturbing that the grant in question is part of the Help America Vote College Program, administered by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC), a federal agency established by Congress in 2002 to provide assistance to states in the administration of federal elections. According to its website, since 2004, the EAC has awarded 72 grants worth a total of $2.4 million to recruit and train college poll workers. How much of that 2.4 million went to ACORN?

To be clear, according to Democrats and folks at the DOJ, ordinary citizens who want to ensure fair elections are not welcome at polling places without being accused of voter intimidation but ACORN receives tax dollars to train college students. With ACORN’s history of partisan and aggressive activity, I wonder if they would have qualified without Project Vote’s tax status and reputation.

Will the DOJ silence the efforts of True the Vote or help them expose fraudulent voter registration drives? Will Democrats succeed in painting ordinary citizens as racists? As the election draws nearer, every American should be asking themselves these questions. If citizens are not allowed to expose corruption and fully participate in the electoral process our votes will be diluted by those with partisan political intentions. It’s up to all of us to stand with True the Vote and demand an investigation into the voter fraud in Texas.

However, many participants may have been unaware of the quiet smear campaign that has been spreading for weeks by Obama’s old employer, Project Vote.

“As what is purported to be one of the largest Tea Party gatherings in Virginia gets underway in Richmond this weekend, a new poll clearly shows that Tea Party sympathizers hold minority views on most issues regarding government, government spending, and the budget.

What Happened to Hope and Change? A Poll of 2008 Voters was conduced by nonpartisan voting rights group Project Vote, surveying 1,947 randomly selected Americans who cast ballots in 2008. The poll is unique in that it not only surveys the historic 2008 electorate as a whole, but also includes special samples of black voters, low-income voters, and youth voters, and compares these groups to self-identified Tea Party sympathizers.”

The press release clearly attempts to characterize the convention as a “whites only” event for  angry Tea Partiers to complain.

“Contrary to the claims made by event organizers that the Tea Party frustrations are shared by a wide cross section of America, the results of the new poll show that Tea Party sympathizers — who are overwhelmingly likely to be white, older, and more affluent — are out of touch with the views of both average Americans and the surge voting groups who so decisively increased their participation in 2008.

‘Black voters, low-income voters, and youth voters together represent roughly a third of the electorate, and they will play an increasingly important role in American politics in the years to come,’ says Project Vote’s executive director Michael Slater. ‘Yet over the past two years the opinions and values of these populations have been drowned out by the anti-government rhetoric of more affluent, older, and mostly white Americans who have organized under the Tea Party banner.’”

Project Vote’s report was released in mid-September to much fanfare and liberal media attention. A conference call was planned,  and among the featured participants was Frances Fox Piven. Piven is a professor of Political Science and Sociology at the City University of New York. Piven and her husband Richard Cloward are the same socialists responsible for the Cloward-Piven Strategy.

This reporter listened in on the conference call as elitist liberal whites claimed to understand the concerns of “real” voters, the blacks,  and other minorities Project Vote used for this “study.” Piven was praised for her insight and her socialist connections were never mentioned. During a brief question and answer session, one caller expressed some dismay about the availability of the information that Project Vote had accessed. This comment was laughed off by Project Vote’s Michael Slater.

Sensing an opportunity, I inquired as to how Project Vote had obtained the information of all those voters. Micheal Slater had admitted that some of it was public information, but the rest? Slater refused to answer a directly if the list had been obtained through officials connected with Obama’s administration or his campaign. The call was quickly ended and all callers placed in a conference or holding status.

Project Vote uses the tried and true standard of the Left: instigating racial animosity. According to the report, a minority of whites are controlling the national debate and silencing the true majority, progressive and liberal blacks and Latinos. Among their findings:

“Together, the three “surge” groups represent a larger portion of the electorate than those who self-identify with the Tea Party. Project Vote’s analysis reveals that black voters, low-income voters, and young voters have starkly different views about the role of government, federal spending priorities, and the budget deficit than Tea Party sympathizers, and in fact are far closer to the views of the 2008 electorate as a whole. Key findings include:

• Nine in ten Tea Party sympathizers are white; they are predominantly older, more affluent, and more conservative. Their views on the role of government and government spending are not only starkly different from black voters, young voters, and low-income voters, but from the majority view of a representative sample of all 2008 voters.

• Tea Party sympathizers, while almost universally dissatisfied with the way the country is going, report they themselves are doing very well: more than three out of four say their personal economic situation is fairly good or very good. 76% are married; 78% went to college; 84% are working or retired.

• Majorities of black voters, young voters, and low-income voters, as well as a majority of all voters, support spending the same or more on income support programs such as Food Stamps for less well-off Americans. Two-thirds of Tea Party sympathizers support spending less.

• Strong majorities of black voters, young voters, and low-income voters agree that government should work to provide for the needs of all citizens. Half of all voters agreed with that sentiment, while only one in five Tea Party sympathizers agreed.

Democrats, like the Chair of the South Carolina Democrat Party, are taking these “findings” to heart:

“These studies found that young and minority voters will be a key factor in the midterm elections.

According to Project Vote, the policy preferences of African-American, low-income and young voters are more closely aligned with the mainstream than with the far right and the tea party.

This segment of the electorate turned out in record numbers in 2008. I believe they will turn out again to support candidates who can put partisanship aside and turn our state around. They are tired of Republican hypocrisy and ready to move South Carolina forward with Democrats”

Project Vote and ACORN have a great deal of help from the media who are always willing to carry water for the group. Lefty blog sites like the Raw Story couldn’t resist jumping on the story with a racially charged headline, an obligatory attack on Fox News, vulgar references, and ending with pinning the blame on Bush:

“The findings seem to indicate that corporate networks like Fox News have largely ignored majority views in America, instead dedicating large amounts of time to covering the wealthy, vocal tea party minority.

‘Analysis of the findings from around the net also underscores what we’ve long argued,’ blogger Brad Friedman opined. “[The] Tea Baggers don’t actually give a damn about ‘the deficit’ or even the Constitution. If they did, they wouldn’t have waited until after Republicans lost the elections in 2008 to start marching and decrying the deficit explosion (and supposed concerns about Constitutional rights) brought about under the previous Administration.”

The liberal bloggers are not the only one demonizing the Tea Party movement. Over at The Nation, a writer laments about Obama’s “forgotten base” and paints the Tea Partiers as pessimistic when compared to this courageous and put-upon demographic.

“We’ve all spent so much time dwelling on the slights and accusations of the Fox News crowd, there’s been shockingly little attention paid to the views, frustrations and convictions of what we might call the forgotten electorate, otherwise known as Obama’s base.

“Which is why a new poll from Project Vote of 2008 voters is such a refreshing corrective. According to the poll, Tea Party sympathizers constitute 29 percent of 2008 voters, while black voters, those under 30 and those making less than $30,000 a year together make up 32 percent….

That is the tragic and perilous irony of this political moment: the people with the most faith in the president and the Democratic Party are the hardest hit by the continuing economic disaster; it’s this brute fact that’s driving the so-called enthusiasm gap between liberals and conservatives.”

The fact is most Americans understand the liberal slant of the media and tend to overlook such attacks. The report published by ACORN “affiliate” Project Vote started off as a quiet murmur among bloggers, but the message was clear. It’s time to paint ordinary Americans as selfish, angry and out of touch with reality. By inciting racial and class divisions Project Vote uses a classic Alinsky technique, marginalizing the enemy.

For a long time, the Left was unable to address the issues of the Tea Party and thus resorted to name calling and derision. When that tactic failed, the liberal elitists at Project Vote – presumably with the encouragement or help of Piven – decided to change the dialogue.

The Washington Post was careful not to be seen endorsing the ACORN-tainted story, but was quick to produce one of its own, as evidenced by Project Vote’s “victory” blog posting.

“Yesterday the Post reported that their own new survey finds—as Project Vote’s poll did—that there is strong support for government programs that provide a social safety net and protect ordinary people from the predations of the market.  Although Republicans, and many Democrats, have tried to demonize Washington,’ write Jon Cohen and Dan Balz, ‘they must contend with the fact that most major government programs remain enormously popular…’

According to the Post/Kaiser Family Foundation/Harvard University poll, large majorities among the public say that Medicare (96 percent), Social Security (95 percent), food stamps (82 percent), federal aid to public schools (91 percent), unemployment benefits (91 percent) and environmental protection (89 percent) are important government programs.”

Allah Pundit weighs in here. You can bet that in a few days this story will be accepted as fact and repeated by the likes of Rachel Maddow. However, the biggest danger is in how ACORN/Project Vote has decided to frame the message. Acting as agent of misinformation, Project Vote tries to pretend that the mainstream media has been anything but a willing helper in pushing Obama’s unwanted agenda.

“But it has been a difficult story to convince the media to tell. For more than a year now, the media’s fascination with an apparently ‘angry’ public rising up against alleged government tyranny has seemingly taken priority over the first principles of responsible (objective) journalism. The spectacle of older white people dressing up in Revolutionary War garb and railing against  ‘Obamacare,’  has held many in the mainstream media hostage to their own prejudices. And the herd mentality of our modern, 24-hour news cycle has only made things worse.

By locking in the distorted-but-dominant media frame on the Tea Party as representative of the electorate, the skepticism we expect from good journalism has been locked out. As a result, the mainstream media has not just reported or investigated the news: in beating the drum, it has unwittingly emerged as a vital supporting player, playing in the rise of the Tea Party movement itself.’

That said, we are encouraged by the Washington Post’s initiative in digging beneath the surface of apparent voter anger to independently confirm our findings about attitudes toward government.

The preceding statement will rankle any American who has witnessed the distorted reports, downplayed crowd sizes and hostility towards the Tea Party movement. Project Vote actually credits the mainstream media with the rise of the movement. Their statements are an insult to those who have labored tirelessly for the cause.

In the days leading up to November 2^nd, groups like ACORN and Project Vote hope to tap into the well of racial discontent and class warfare to once again divide this country for their own political goals. And, as usual, will be aided by the mainstream media.

Cross-posted from American Majority.

“Federal health officials for the first time are recommending all people ages 6 months and older get flu shots this fall, instead of just those with the highest risk of serious complications.

More doses of flu vaccine are available nationwide now than ever before.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has always suggested that anyone who wants to avoid the flu should get the shot, said Paul Biedrzycki, director of disease control and environmental health for the Milwaukee Health Department.

‘But the CDC in the past branded flu season as something for the elderly,’ he said.”

The article goes on to state that because of the H1N1 “pandemic” of 2009 that Federal officials believe that:

“The first influenza pandemic in 40 years officially has ended, but the 2009 H1N1 virus is still out there. This year’s vaccine – widely available now – provides protection from three flu strains, including the pandemic H1N1, an H3N2 virus and an influenza B virus.”

The controversial H1N1 vaccine has be included in regular flu shots? All Americans encouraged to get the shot? After talk of forced vaccinations and even a comment about reeducation LINK this seems ominous.

In Washington, DC there have been reports of health care workers not informing patients until after the vaccination that it contained H1N1. Some of those patients report numbness and other discomfort. Loyola University Health System and Washington Hospital Center in DC are among the employers who have made the vaccination a condition of employment.

“Loyola University Health System (LUHS) has adopted a policy to lessen the flu risk to its patients. For the second straight year, the health system is requiring all of its 7,825 employees to get flu shots. Last year, 99.3 percent of its employees were vaccinated against the seasonal flu, among the highest percentage of any medical center in the nation.

Loyola was among the first medical centers in the nation to make the regular seasonal flu shots mandatory as a condition of employment. Exceptions were made for religious or medical reasons.”

Despite the government’s push for universal vaccinations recent reports point to a possible immunity to the H1N1 virus.

“Swine flu no longer represents a major threat in the United States because so many people are immune to the virus that caused last season’s pandemic, health officials said.

Of the 310 million people in the United States, 59 percent are believed to be immune to pandemic H1N1 flu, the researchers said. About 62 million people were vaccinated against the virus, 61 million people were infected by it and another 60 million people 57 or older carry protective antibodies to similar viruses that circulated years ago.

‘It’s very unlikely that the virus will explode in the fall,’ said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, or NIAID, an author of the analysis. ‘We now have evidence of that.’”

Why would the federal government advocate strongly for vaccinations when scientific research demonstrates a reduced threat level?

State and local health officials have already begun targeting children.

“The Arkansas Department of Health has begun offering seasonal flu shots to public school students statewide.

The program began Saturday with shots available at Carlisle Elementary School in central Arkansas.

The department will be going to schools across the state through Dec. 7 to offer the vaccinations to students in kindergarten through 12th grade. Insurance companies will be asked to pay for those who have insurance — others will not be charged.

Seasonal flu shots are not required for children to attend school in Arkansas — but they are recommended.”

Thank goodness, they are not required – yet.

In the past, Americans trusted our government to govern and lead with our best interests at heart. In this current administration, we have seen a blatant disregard for the will of the people and witnessed outright lying from officials. All efforts should be made to educate people on the contents of this new vaccine and, it’s side effects and health officials should be ready to explain why its medically necessary when other doctors disagree.

Cross-posted from Emerging Corruption.

“The Republican National Committee has decided against sending Congressional staffers out on the campaign trail for traditional get-out-the-vote efforts, focusing its resources instead on mailings and other last-minute pre-election efforts, the committee confirmed Tuesday.”

Lately, it has seemed like the RNC has gone the way of the Obama administration and ignored the will of the people. With serious missteps in key races and a national morale problem, the RNC really doesn’t get it.

Dana Loesch reports that after a few posts on Twitter that the RNC responded:

“Shortly thereafter I got an email from RNC spokesman Doug Heye about the matter asking me to call him…

In light of the recent criticisms against the RNC, with the Hawaii conference, Steele’s cross-country tour, I can see why the RNC would want to rectify an ineffective and expensive program to ward off further accusations of wasteful spending – so long as the money saved stays with their GOTV efforts, which Heye explained that it would.

Heye discussed the RNC’s other GOTV efforts.

‘We have 352 victory offices funded by us throughout country. We’ve crossed the 20 million contact threshold – contact in messages left, door knocks, phone calls. We’re ahead of where we were in 2008 and in the next five weeks we’ll have a minimum of two million more contacts.’”

Does the RNC only read the New York Times? Have they paid attention to the countless articles by conservative journalists, bloggers and organizational leaders? GOTV is key the winning an election. A copy of the “proprietary and confidential” “After Action” report from the data company used by the DNC, ACORN, SEIU, Obama for America/Organizing for America contains startling facts and figures that need viral attention fast.

The Background

As previously reported:

“The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now or ACORN spent a number of years perfecting an organizing model that resembled that of Catalist and the Obama Campaign. ACORN’s close ‘affiliate’ Project Vote detailed their efforts in a 2007 report:

‘The Pilot Technology Project carried out during the summer and fall of 2006 was a first attempt to integrate the potential of high quality enhanced data developed for voter participation programs with on-going grassroots community organizing programs. Building upon the work of Catalist (formerly Data Warehouse LLC), Project Vote deployed an updated version of our online voter management system (VBASE) to enable local community organizations to access a robust voter file with enhanced phone numbers, geographic and demographic information for use in voter mobilization, membership development and organizational capacity building.’”

In 2008, years of coordination between leftist groups like SEIU, ACORN, Emily’s List and Obama/Organizing for America, resulted in a turbo charged election cycle unlike none other.

“Get-out-the-vote operations mounted by the Obama campaign, the Democratic Party and progressive organizations mobilized more than one million dedicated volunteers on Election Day. But it was buttressed by a year-long, psychographic voter targeting and contact operation, the likes of which Democrats had never before participated in. In 2008, the principal repository of Democratic data was Catalist, a for-profit company that acted as the conductor for a data-driven symphony of more than 90 liberal groups, like the Service Employees Union — and the DNC — and the Obama campaign.”

While the Atlantic reported on the story, many on the Right may not understand the total impact of the body of work from these so-called progressives.

A look at the Numbers

According to the report:

Progressives completed over 127 million contacts to over 49 million unique individuals. Of these individuals, 28 million voted on Election Day, representing over 20% of all votes cast

Progressives attempted to contact over 106 million people, meaning that over 46% of the U.S. adult population were targets of communication from the progressive community.

82% of progressive activities occurred in 16 highly contested states. Individuals contacted by progressives accounted for 37%6 of all votes cast in these states.

The dialogue during the 2008 election cycle was one of change and blaming the outgoing administration for America’s troubles. This message was not only reinforced by the media, but also with a barrage of emails, calls, visits, etc. from progressive organizers in the weeks before the election. Obama’s margin of victory was born out of these contacts.

“The number of votes cast by new voters who were registered by progressives exceeded Obama’s margin of victory in four states: OH, FL, IN, and NC. “

Voter Registrations

The massive voter registration drives that many were made aware of in 2008 generated over 7 million new applications with the report stating that at least 76% from groups not directly affiliated with a candidate or campaign. The report also notes that only about 5.5 million made it onto the voter rolls. The left calls them “true registrations.” What about this other two million cards? Duplicates? Fraudulent registrations? Ineligible voters? While the left tends the downplay voter registration fraud, the type of activities that garner over two million bogus registrations should be investigated.

Get Out The Vote

Progressive groups have proven to be ahead of the curve in regards to voter contact and the numbers show that their efforts pay off at the polls. According to Catalist:

“ Among all sporadic voters (which include Democrats, Independents, and Republicans), progressive contact is correlated with a 10-point increase in turnout. Among just Democratic sporadic voters, progressive contact shows an 11-point difference.”

RNC are you listening? Face-to-face contact, not paid media or mailings resulted in at least a 10-point increase in turnout.

The Usual Suspects

Though Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is now under investigation regarding a pension scandal and the activities of former leader Andy Stern, they had a banner year in 2008.  By far, Stern earned the privilege of  frequent White House visits and the president’s ear by delivering big numbers for Obama in 2008. With tens of millions of dollars invested in Obama, the SEIU ground troops worked feverishly to turn voters out to the polls.

SEIU Activity Report

• Over 5.2 million direct contacts were made to almost 4.5 million voters.
• 2.5 million pieces of response data was collected from over 1.2 million voters.
• SEIU used high concentrations of live phone calls (64%) and in-person contact (24%) to target voters. In both cases, this is approximately 50% more then the average (as a percent) of all progressives.
• In Indiana, over 40% of all independent progressive contacts (not including federal) were unique to SEIU. In Virginia, over 35% of all independent progressive contacts were unique to SEIU. SEIU also had large shares of unique contacts in other highly contested states, including New Mexico (over 30%), New Hampshire (over 15%), and Oregon and Colorado (over 10%).

The stark reality is that the left is better organized and their leadership more motivated in getting boots on the ground. With their sophisticated micro-targeting, the left is able to identify individual voters in precincts that are more likely to vote for their cause/candidate. This means that folks on the right are rarely contacted and may not be aware of the scale of these operations. By flying under the radar, the left has a guaranteed tactic to sway elections their way. Don’t allow yourselves to be blindsided this November.

Who’s working in your community? Not the RNC, but this year, like 2008, you can bet that progressive groups are on the ground spreading their message of racial divisions, big government and more spending.

Cross-posted from American Majority and Emerging Corruption.

“The Republican Party, with the backing of the Bush administration, will post thousands of party functionaries at polling stations in various parts of the country on Election Day, November 5, to intimidate working class and minority voters from casting their ballots. This anti-democratic operation in being carried out under the cover of ‘poll watching.’

Large numbers of ‘poll watchers’ are to be posted in key places where the contest for congressional seats and governorships is expected to be very close, particularly targeting minority voters and those in strongly Democratic districts.”

During critical mid-term elections and anytime they feel threatened, the left swipes its trusty race card. An article out this week once again raises those fears.

“Minnesota Majority, the North Star Tea Party Patriots and Minnesota Voters Alliance plan to spy on your voting this Election Day….

Are volunteers going to approach voters in line outside schools and fire stations and scare them into showing their papers?

DFL Party Chairman Brian Melendez smells a rat: Election Integrity Watch is trying to dissuade minorities and seniors from voting. ‘There’s a possibility that they will keep people from turning out to the polls,’ he told MPR.”

Let’s get this straight. The left is concerned with citizens who wish to protect the integrity of the electoral system, but not with Black Panthers carrying weapons and spouting hate filled rhetoric? Okay, just checking.

To be perfectly clear on what the standard in for determining what constitutes voter intimidation I have included the entire section from Wikipedia.

Wikipedia

Intimidation

Voter intimidation involves putting undue pressure on a voter or group of voters so that they will vote a particular way, or not at all. Absentee and other remote voting can be more open to some forms of intimidation as the voter does not have the protection and privacy of the polling location. Intimidation can take a range of forms.

• Violence or the threat of violence: In its simplest form, voters from a particular demographic or known to support a particular party or candidate are directly threatened by supporters of another party or candidate or those hired by them. In other cases supporters of a particular party make it known that if a particular village or neighborhood is found to have voted the ‘wrong’ way, reprisals will be made against that community. Another method is to make a general threat of violence, for example a bomb threat which has the effect of closing a particular polling place, thus making it difficult for people in that area to vote.[8]

• Attacks on polling places: Polling places in an area known to support a particular party or candidate may be targeted for vandalism, destruction or threats, thus making it difficult or impossible for people in that area to vote.

• Legal threats: In this case voters will be made to believe, accurately or otherwise, that they are not legally entitled to vote, or that they are legally obliged to vote a particular way. Voters who are not confident about their entitlement to vote may also be intimidated by real or implied authority figures who suggest that those who vote when they are not entitled to will be imprisoned, deported or otherwise punished.[9][10] For example in 2004, in Wisconsin and elsewhere voters allegedly received flyers that said, “If you already voted in any election this year, you can’t vote in the Presidential Election”, implying that those who had voted in earlier primary elections were ineligible to vote. Also, “If anybody in your family has ever been found guilty of anything you can’t vote in the Presidential Election.” Finally, “If you violate any of these laws, you can get 10 years in prison and your children will be taken away from you.”[11][12] Another method, allegedly used in Cook County, Illinois in 2004, is to falsely tell particular people that they are not eligible to vote.[10]

• Economic threats: In company towns in which one company employs most of the working population, the company may threaten workers with disciplinary action if they do not vote the way their employer dictates. One method of doing this is the ‘shoe polish method’. This method entails coating the voting machine‘s lever or button of the opposing candidate(s) with shoe polish. This method works when an employee of a company that orders him to vote a certain way votes contrary to those orders. After the voter exits the voting booth, a conspirator to the fraud (a precinct captain or other local person in collusion with the employee’s management) handshakes the voter. The conspirator then subtly check’s the voter’s hand for any shoe polish and notes that the voter has left some shoe polish after the handshake. Soon afterward that unfortunate voter gets fired or faces other unpleasant consequences.[citation needed]

As Americans nothing is more sacred than one citizen – one vote. Free and Fair elections is something all Americans can agree on. Lately, there has been a widespread misinformation campaign orchestrated by organizations like the ACLU and Project Vote to tie America’s history of racial relations with attempts to fix a broken system.What many on the left fail to tell people is that their actions have been chipping away at the very system it claims to protect. That’s why today, a national call to action is being issues.

As the founder of  the King Street Patriots put it:

“If you are one of the millions of Americans outraged by corruption at the highest levels of our nation’s government, then you can help us stop fraud where it begins – at the polling place, in the precinct where you live, in the streets of your city.”

Inspired by the first ever Beverly Hills Tea Party, the situation is that as Americans we need boots on the ground across the nation at the polls, not only to vote but ready with cameras and video recorders. This is a national call for citizen journalists!! If you are a volunteer working the polls and you see something happen please document and record. Resolute Media Group, Emerging Corruption and other New Media outlets will use social media (i.e. Face-book and twitter) integration to get the stories out that the liberal media will not cover accurately if at all. Text “Patriot” to 90210.

Bold? Yes. Necessary? Yes. If the eyes of the nation are on the polls, then America is safe. Recent news events have led the left to try to turn the back the tide of citizen journalists.

“….every Tom, Dick and Harriet with a blog is a  ‘citizen journalist.’

Worse, they are spreading like the common cold. Ask Shirley Sherrod if you don’t believe me. Sometimes it feels as if there are more “citizen journalists” than citizens. It is hard to know how to feel about that.

After all, it used to be that you couldn’t enjoy freedom of the press unless you could afford to own a press. The Internet has opened the public square to more voices, and you can’t complain about that.

But I don’t believe in citizen journalism because journalism — like any profession worthy of the name — has standards and ethics, and if you don’t sign on to those, I can no more trust you than I can a doctor who refused the Hippocratic oath or a lawyer who failed the bar exam.”

While the actions of some may raise questions, the rise of new media has allowed more information to flow directly to the people. It is almost ludicrous that an industry with a history of spiking stories, partisan activities and slanted reporting would even attempt to cry foul.

When America was founded, ordinary citizens used the media to spread ideas and even those who lacked funding were able to find ways of disseminating information. As citizen journalist our role is not to interact or intimidate, but to observe and report. The left should look at this as protecting the rights of everyone and they are welcome to participate.

Visit the Facebook page for more information.

Join our team of Citizen Journalists and help Stop Voter Fraud! Text to 90210 “Patriot”

Adding to the immigration debate is an organization that has caused outrage and controversy over its mission and programs. CASA de Maryland, also know as the Central American Solidarity Association deserves national attention for it’s programs that target day laborers in Montgomery County, Maryland.

The Background

From Wikipedia (emphasis mine):

“CASA was founded in 1985 in the basement of the Takoma Park Presbyterian Church by concerned U.S. citizens and Central American immigrants. It has since expanded its scope. It is affiliate organization of the National Council of La Raza. It has received funding from a variety of sources, including a two-year grant funding operations in Baltimore from George Soros‘ Open Society Institute. CASA of Maryland is also a founding member of the National Capital Immigration Coalition (“NCIC”) which promotes “comprehensive immigration reform”.[5] Other funding sources include the Annie E. Casey Foundation and United Way. They are a member of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. CASA also has received $1.5 million from CITGO, the state-owned Venezuelan petroleum products corporation.

CASA operates five day labor centers throughout the state, with public and private funding, three in Montgomery County, where its efforts have been the center of controversy. There is both significant support, and significant opposition, to their efforts to provide central sites where contractors can pick up day-laborers….”

Judicial Watch has documents here on the day labor centers.

To be clear, a Soros, and Chavez funded organization with ties to the radical La Raza receives millions in taxpayer dollars while Maryland faces severe budget shortfalls,

“House Minority Leader Anthony J. O’Donnell, R-Calvert/St. Mary’s, offered an amendment Wednesday that would strip $200,000 allocated to Casa de Maryland Inc. from the state’s capital budget.

The amendment failed, 47-89.”

A Washington Examiner articles notes that Casa de Maryland recently formed a political organization called Casa in Action and currently receives a significant majority of its funding from the state.

“CASA will receive nearly $2.1 million this fiscal year from local governments, including $1.3 million from Montgomery County, and another $32,000 in federal money, according to Kim Propeack, the group’s director of community organizing and political action. CASA in Action has raised $45,000 thus far from members paying $9 annual dues, she added.”

While students languish in underfunded schools that are one step above a daycare or prison, Maryland’s Democrat Governor Martin O’Malley partnered with the group to open a multicultural center inside of a restored mansion.

“Governor Martin O’Malley recently joined CASA at the launching of a three-year $30 million campaign to restore the George Oakley Totten, Jr. designed historic Langley Park mansion in Langley Park, Maryland, to be converted into a multicultural center. The center will offer English lessons, legal assistance, job placement”

What other programs have suffered while Casa de Maryland enjoys the seemingly endless largess of state lawmakers? According to the Center for Budget and Policy:

In late 2007 and 2008, some ten states enacted tax increases, closed loopholes, restricted tax credits, or implemented other revenue-raising measures. Major packages were enacted in Maryland, Michigan,and New York.

Other states that have capped or reduced funding for programs that serve people who have disabilities or are elderly include California, the District of Columbia, Florida, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, North Carolina, South Carolina, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, and Virginia

Maryland cut professional development for principals and educators, as well as health clinics, gifted and talented summer centers, and math and science initiatives.

Some states, such as Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming, have implemented cuts to localities, leading to local concerns about reductions in funding for policing, child care assistance, meals for the elderly, hospice care, services for veterans and seniors, and other services.

Other states cutting higher education operating funding and financial aid include Arkansas, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland..

The Immigration debate

Casa de Maryland discourages local police enforcement of immigration laws and advocates for driver’s licenses for illegal aliens – contentious issues in the current political climate. Local point to the fact that crimes in Silver Spring, Maryland and gang activity are on the rise.

Wikipedia notes that tensions ran high in 2006 when “Gustavo Torres, the Executive Director of CASA, remarked to a reporter for the local Gazette newspaper that CASA was determined to track the leadership of a local unit of Minuteman Project, and take the following actions: ‘We are going to target the Minutemen in a specific way… we are going picket their houses, and the schools of their kids, and go to their work. If they are going to do this to us, we are going to respond in the same way, to let people know their neighbors are extremists, that they are anti-immigrant.”

The site Help Save Maryland warns citizens that Casa de Maryland encourages illegal immigration and provides links to a case study on the Langley Park mansion project and a disturbing pamphlet that instructs immigrants in what to do in case of immigration raids.

Did tax dollars pay for this document? The Department of Labor’s website shows that OSHA gave a grant of $200,000 to Casa de Maryland, and $225,000 to an affiliate group. The money was described as being for:

The grantee will provide training for high-risk Latino workers in the construction, building and grounds maintenance, agricultural, and warehouse industries in Maryland. Training will be offered through local community colleges and employment centers. Training will include a train-the-trainer module. The training and/or materials will be offered in English and Spanish. Click to enlarge.

The Obligatory ACORN Connection

Politics as Usual

Major players behind Casa de Maryland include Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas E. Perez. Perez, a former member of Casa de Maryland’s board, worked on O’Malley’s 2006 campaign, Obama’s presidential campaign, and was a member of Obama’s transition team. Byron York describes Perez’s work with the DOJ:

“Of all the transformations that have taken place in the Obama administration, perhaps none is so radical as that within the Civil Rights Division. Under Perez, it is bigger, richer and more aggressive than ever, with a far more expansive view of its authority than at any time in recent history.

Perez is playing a leading role in the Justice Department’s lawsuit against Arizona’s new immigration law. He is promising a huge increase in prosecution of alleged hate crimes.”

Readers may remember that Perez was also actively involved in the dismissal of charges in the DOJ case again the New Black Panther Party and has been accused of lying under oath about the case.

It appears that Casa de Maryland has friends in high places.

As Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley prepares to face off with former Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. in the general election, one has to wonder what win for either side would mean for Casa de Maryland. If O’Malley is elected, the group should anticipate more funding but with two of Ehrlich’s former staff members on record supporting the group, one has to wonder if this will be yet another case of different party-same political corruption.

Cross-posted at Emerging Corruption.com.

“The Republican Party of Texas today unveiled a new website, kristiworksforacorn.com. The site documents Democrat state Rep. Kristi Thibaut’s sordid past and her involvement with the notorious leftwing organization ACORN. Thibaut is the incumbent in House District 133.”

House District 133 encompasses Harris County, Texas the site of massive ACORN-like voter registration fraud and where a mysterious fire destroyed most of the voting machines in the county last week.

“Another blow has been dealt to voters in Harris County, Texas just days after the Harris County Voter Registrar Leo Vasquez released a 72 page PowerPoint on voting irregularities from a local group similar to the infamous ACORN.

‘The integrity of the voting rolls in Harris County, Texas, appears to be under an organized and systematic attack by the group operating under the name Houston Votes,” Vasquez said at a 2 p.m. press conference at his office, where he also released copies of applications in some of the most egregious cases.’

[Friday], voters are waking up with the news that the Harris County Election Technology Center was the site of a massive three-alarm fire early this morning.”

As the site kristiworksforacorn.com points out, Thibaut, actively worked for ACORN for a number of years, and was even a paid lobbyist for the group. Screen shot below. Click to enlarge.

By the way, yes, there was money flowing back and forth between Thibaut and ACORN.

A meeting was held yesterday in Harris County regarding purchasing new voting machines or other options regarding the upcoming elections.

Considering the current political climate and the impending sense of doom that most Democrats are experiencing, a situation is emerging it Harris County Texas and it reeks of corruption. Will voters have a chance to have their voices heard or are political players stacking the deck?

Cross-posted at my new site Emerging Corruption

What really happened during the 2008 elections? Recent information regarding the primary caucuses paints the picture of a campaign that would stop at nothing to win. A campaign that was willing to strong arm candidates and volunteers in order to meet its goal. The documentary We Will Not Be Silenced delves into the Obama 2008 Campaign.

“We believe The Democratic National Committee (DNC) made a grave error by depriving American voters of their choice of Hillary Clinton as Democratic nominee. Senator Clinton, by all accounts, except caucuses, won the Primary Election and, therefore, should be the 2008 Democratic Nominee. That didn’t happen, due largely to illegitimate and illegal acts. We have interviews of many accounts from caucus states recounting threats, intimidation, lies, stolen documents, falsified documents, busing in voters in exchange for paying for “dinners,” etc. There are at least 2000 complaints, in Texas alone, of irregularities directed towards the Obama Campaign, that have lead to a very fractured and broken Democratic Party.”

In July, the 2007 2^nd Quarter Obama Donor List was revealed and tied back to Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) and its sister organization Project Vote. On Friday, August 13^th a three-judge panel of the United States Court of appeals for the Second Circuit upheld a funding ban on ACORN stemming from Congressional action:

“Congress cut off ACORN’s federal funding last year in response to allegations the group engaged in voter registration fraud and embezzlement and violated the tax-exempt status of some of its affiliates by engaging in partisan political activities.”

A clear picture of Obama and his desire to win has emerged and the public is now aware of strong arm tactics and illicit coordination with groups like ACORN. Will an imminent FEC complaint reveal that ACORN/Project Vote used tax-exemept grants and funds to run a partisan voter registration drive to get Obama elected?

Project Vote’s 2007-2008 Development Plan lays out a plan to raise over $20 million dollars through a program that including targeting maxed-out presidential donors. The plan– unaltered since June of 2007 — can be found here.

What is particularly interesting about the plan is that Sandy Newman is mentioned several times including in a the section below.

“Establish a ‘Finance Committee’ who will serve as the financial voice of PV. Put together a small group of PV core funders and/or supporters who can solicit new donors and/or connect PV staff to donors or the appropriate contacts. Points: Sandy, Zach, Jeff, Slater, and Karyn”

As a Development Associate with Project Vote, I attended meetings with Sandy Newman, Zach Polett, and Karyn Gillette at Newman’s offices in downtown Washington, DC. As a founder of the organization, Newman was extremely involved in Project Vote’s finances despite having left the leadership staff in the early nineties. Newman is mentioned on Obama’s website as a friend, and mentor. Click to enlarge.

According to Ballotpedia:

“Project Vote (or Voting for America, Inc.[1]) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit, 501(c)(3) organization. According to its website, Project Vote provides “professional training, management, evaluation and technical services on a broad continuum of key issues related to voter engagement and participation in low-income and minority communities.” It was founded in 1982 by Sandy Newman and its current executive director is Michael Slater, who has worked for Project Vote since 2004.”

The problem with lying is that it often becomes hard to keep those lies straight. Project Vote’s own website states that it has been around since 1982 and several of its grant application reference this year, but Project Vote and Obama both maintain that he worked for a different organization that was started around 1994. This organization, they claim, of course, was never affiliated with ACORN. The screen shot below was taken last year of Project Vote’s website.

Interestingly, Project Vote’s own tax returns repeat this lie as seen in the screen shot below:

Maybe Michael Slater of Project Vote can explain why their website says one thing but their tax returns say another.

Back to Sandy Newman. In 2007, Newman did reach out to potential funders and penned a memo to interested parties in the voter registration/participation community. Newman stressed the importance of the work that ACORN/Project Vote and how important the 2008 elections were.

“Together with the voters added to and remaining on the rolls because of the registration drives conducted over the last two cycles, voters galvanized by these three kinds of programs (even before counting voter turnout work) would exceed the 2004 presidential margin in nine states! They would also have an important impact (whomever they may choose to support) on other elections up and down the ballot, from US House and Senate races, Governor and Secretary of State through state legislature and races at the bottom of the ballot”

Newman also urged funders to give even if the reasons may have been to influence the outcome of the election. Newman gently suggested other ways of giving.

“They may also believe that reducing such distortions is likely to yield policies more in keeping with the interests of those whose representation in the electoral process has been inadequate. The fact that a donor may hold such a belief, or even that it may motivate giving decisions, does not cause a charitable contribution to be improper, provided that the donor intends that the actual work supported remain strictly non-partisan – that is, the work supported may not provide support or opposition to any candidate or party.”

As the chart below reveals, ACORN/Project Vote’s voter registration drive was not targeted at registering voters as it was at winning for Democrats. A number of their political plans and ACORN’s own endorsements of the likes of Obama and Donna Edwards made it clear whose side they were on.

In 2008, it was revealed that the Obama Campaign had given over $800,000 to an ACORN affiliate, Citizens Service Inc,

“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.”

Project Vote’s own 2009 tax returns reveal that it gave a similar amount to CSI.

Here is the explanation:

Ballotpedia quotes from a New York Times article that references the Elizabeth Kingsley report gives insight into who Project Vote was paying at CSI.

“An example would be Zach Pollett, formerly Project Vote’s executive director and also ACORN’s political director, until July, when he relinquished the former title. Mr. Pollett continues to work as a consultant for Project Vote through another Acorn affiliate”

As evidence continues to mount against Obama and ACORN it remains to be seen how long Obama’s Teflon will last. While the public was distracted by ACORN’s antics like registering Mickey Mouse to vote, the group implemented a strategic plan in battleground states to produce the right margin of victory for Democrats. ACORN’s own 2008 Get Out the Vote plan illustrates how this was done. Click to enlarge.

ACORN’s impact in shaping American politics has become clearer since Obama took office. Considering the number of corrupt politicians holding office, that ACORN effect should not be surprising, nevertheless, the actual numbers are quite startling.

When you break those numbers down by battleground state, the true threat of ACORN and its friends becomes even clearer.

With his ineffective leadership, lies to the American people and an imploding economy, the commander-in-chief is starting to resemble yet another corrupt politician from ACORN- a usurper intent on making deals and passing agendas that push America closer to ACORN’s socialist utopia.

For a number of years traditional print media has been on life support, but after the revelations from  Tucker Carlson’s The Daily Caller, it looks like someone finally pulled the plug. The expose on Journolist, a now defunct, listserv that included hundreds of liberal journalists, detailed:

the Journolisters’ attempt, during the 2008 presidential campaign to kill and bury stories about Obama’s relationship with “Reverend” Jeremiah Wright;

their push to deliberately smear innocent conservative journalists and politicos as “racists” and “bigots”

their twisted passion to see Rush Limbaugh killed off and dead;

their intolerant desire to have the government censor and shut down Fox News; and

their baldly partisan effort to coordinate liberal talking points that would discredit Sarah Palin and John McCain, while helping to elect Barack Obama president.

Considering that Journolist included journalists from Washington Post, the New York Times, National Public Radio, New Republic, and Time, one has to wonder if the biggest story covered up in 2008 was the illegal coordination between ACORN and the Obama campaign.

Below is a screen shot from the newly released Obama 2nd quarter 2007 donor list. ACORN obtained this donor list from the Obama Campaign in 2007 to target maxed out presidential donors.

OBAMA DONOR FILE SCREEN SHOT

VIEW THE FULL OBAMA DONOR FILES

Revealed: Obama Donor File Part 1

As a confidential source for the New York Times, I turned this document over to reporter Stephanie Strom months before the 2008 presidential elections and though the list includes information more complete than what the Obama campaign turned over to the Federal Election Commission, the NYT decided to bury the story.

Strom and I used pseudonymous e-mail addresses while communicating and in 2008, Strom wrote:

“I’m calling a halt to my efforts. I just had two unpleasant calls with the Obama campaign, wherein the spokesman was screaming and yelling and cursing me, calling me a rightwing nut and a conspiracy theorist and everything else…”

After this weeks revelations about the efforts of the liberal media to cover-up or spike stories damaging to Obama, Strom’s next words are even more telling:

“What’s happened is that the campaign has answered some of my questions on the record — but when I sought on-the-record answers to my questions about the meeting and about the list, the campaign insisted on speaking only on background. When I asked why, I got the barrage I described earlier. Clearly, I’ve hit a nerve with what you’ve told me. The campaign knows that having the allegations of meeting attributed to ‘former employees’ — and there are more than one of you talking — and having an anonymous denial of the meeting makes it harder for me to get it into the paper.”

In 2008 the liberal media provided the cover needed for Obama to get elected, but two years later, questions remain about his relationship with ACORN and it has been clear that Obama has lied repeatedly to the American people. Its time to get Obama and ACORN on the record about what really happened with the donor lists in 2007 and 2008.

The release of the Obama donor list to the public will be followed by a formal complaint to the FEC, which both Obama and ACORN will have to respond to – on-the-record.

In 2009, the Democrat controlled Judiciary Committee heard testimony from attorney Heather Heidelbaugh, who read my 2008 testimony against ACORN into Congressional record. Evidence, and sworn testimony were among the facts ignored by the members of the committee:

“Based on the testimony, Project Vote, ACORN and other ACORN affiliated entities illegally coordinated activities with the Obama presidential campaign, converting the expenditures by Project Vote, ACORN and ACORN affiliated entities to illegal, excessive corporate contributions to the Obama presidential campaign, in violation of federal law.”

“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty—power is ever stealing from the many to the few…. The hand entrusted with power becomes … the necessary enemy of the people. Only by continual oversight can the democrat in office be prevented from hardening into a despot: only by unintermitted Agitation can a people be kept sufficiently awake to principle not to let liberty be smothered in material prosperity. – Wendell Phillips, speech in Boston, Massachusetts, January 28, 1852.”

From Wikipedia:

“As chairman of the party, Dean created and employed the ’50 State Strategy’ that attempted to make Democrats competitive in normally conservative states often dismissed in the past as ‘solid red.’ The success of the strategy became apparent after the 2006 midterm elections, where Democrats took back the House and picked up seats in the Senate from normally Republican states such as Missouri and Montana. In the 2008 election, Barack Obama used ‘The 50 state strategy’ as the backbone of his candidacy.”

As the November 2010 mid-term elections rapidly approaches it  is now even more important to focus on every race, every state, and every primary. Blogger Melissa Clouthier describes the problem in the Republican party:

“The Republicans conceding in between elections as well as races, themselves, has been a tremendous source of irritation. It is one thing to microtarget and write off a district because it’s ‘unwinnable’. The problem is that too many areas were written off that could, in this election, be won. And now, with no foundation there, it makes the task of winning more difficult. Texas isn’t the only place this has happened. In fact, this is a problem nationwide for Republicans. With a lack of organization and get out the vote effort and the lack of relationship building, many potentially winnable races will be lost simply because there is no there, there. It’s been conceded.”

Clouthier’s article includes a review of a primary race in a solidly red state of Georgia. In Georgia’s 12^th Congressional district candidate Ray McKinney is running a tight primary race against former fire chief Carl Smith, Jr. McKinney, a former supporter of Smith, has run a solid campaign while Smith has been embroiled in a number of ethical situations reminiscent of Democrat candidates. This is where the problem lies, as the Tea Party activists have become more politically savvy, every candidate must be held to a higher standard. To ensure a government that is free of corruption, the people must be willing to expose those within their own party whose actions are not aligned with our values.

According to the Savannah Business Journal:

“On June 9, Thunderbolt Town Council terminated Smith’s $52,000 a year position as Thunderbolt’s Fire Chief. The reasons behind the termination have publicly varied – officially it’s financial reasons, unofficially Smith took too much time off to campaign, and to Smith it’s all politically motivated…”

According to local reports, Smith was advised by former congressional candidate Wayne Mosley, members of the 12th District executive board, and Ray McKinney, that to avoid appearance of conflict of interest, he should resign as Fire Chief to run for Congress. Obviously Smith declined that advice and now there are allegations by concerned citizens in the district that not only was Smith an absentee fire chief but that he may have violated the Hatch Act.

Part of the 50 page watchdog report states:

” The Hatch Act of 1939 was introduced to prevent corruption in government and elections. Its main provision prevents federal employees from engaging in partisan political activity. However, it also applies to employees of state and local governments…..

Currently in Georgia’s 12th congressional district, a public official who has applied for and received federal funds in his capacity as chief of the Thunderbolt Fire Department is in violation of the Hatch Act.”

The report alleges that Smith, in his role as Fire Chief, used his office, uniform, and vehicle to campaign for public office in violation of the Hatch Act. Evidence included screen shots of Smith’s website which show him in various official uniforms on his campaign website and in fund raising letters like the ones below.

The report also includes information on the Federal funds that Smith had either applied or lobbied for in his capacity as Thunderbolt Fire Chief.

As the report points out, politicians in others states have been found in violation of the Hatch act for amounts less than shown above and in one instance, the state of Utah must either forfeit federal funds or force a state senator to resign.

Ray McKinney’s camp is taking this primary seriously and according to the Savannah Business Journal, has raised $100,000 already. McKinney, who I met at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in April, and again in DC over dinner, has been endorsed by local Tea Party groups and One Nation PAC,  has been praised by the NRA and has a plan to clean up the Gulf oil spill.

Character counts in selecting elected officials and Republicans must be willing to recognize the early signs of susceptibility to corruption within our ranks. When representatives go across the aisle on votes like Cap and Trade or Wall Street reform, voters are left wondering what happened. That’s why every race counts. ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, operated under the idea that “all politics is local.” As seen in other districts like California’s 37^th Congressional district where Star Parker is running to unseat Representative Laura Richardson, a corrupt local politician can became a national problem with the outcome of one election.

If Republicans introduce their own problem candidate into the November 2010 election, they run the risk of handing that district over to a Democrat who will capitalize on Smith’s current troubles.

Smith’s ethical issues only highlight McKinney as the viable candidate and a costly run-off will distract from the main goal for putting the Democrat candidate on the defensive. If Republicans unite in GA-12, McKinney is the best choice for a sustainable conservative majority. To donate or find out more information about McKinney, go here. Every race, every state.

Unfortunately for Media Matters, its arguments only work as long as its readers are content with ignoring key facts about ACORN and its role in politics, elections and government itself.

As stated in my previous article posted at many websites, including BigGovernment.com, there are several disturbing connections involving Jack McConnell, the lead paint litigation, and ACORN. Keeping in mind that this is the same “news organization” that still insists that ACORN’s alter ego Project Vote was totally separate from ACORN when Barack Obama worked for them, I will let ACORN’s own words explain its involvement in the Sherwin-Williams California case. The excerpt below is from page 59 of an ACORN report available here (click to enlarge).

Why would Media Matters ignore ACORN’s own words? For the same reason it tries to dismiss my article as a conservative attempt to use ACORN as the “boogeyman.” By omitting the fact that I worked for ACORN and testified against ACORN/Project Vote in 2008, Media Matters hopes to downplay the significance of my knowledge of ACORN’s inner workings and its relationships with others.

In fact, while in the DC office of ACORN/Project Vote I worked on projects that allowed me to discover that among the donors to Project Vote was the private law firm involved in the California lead paint case.

Court documents show that the petitioners, California counties and cities, had not only hired Jack McConnell’s firm, Motley Rice, but also “Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy” (and others) to represent them against the paint companies (interestingly, the Santa Clara County counsel who initiated the lead paint case was appointed by the Obama administration to the Justice Department last year).

Not only did Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy give over $10,000 to ACORN’s Project Vote,  they were ACORN’s own attorneys. The connection between Motley Rice, ACORN and Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy is crystal clear in a reference here from page 31 of a 2006 report by ACORN.

“Amy Schur, directing this effort, was vigilant, and having dogged them all year, has constructed a legal strategy with ALERT and the Cachet firm [sic Cotchett] that has now brought the cities of San Diego and Los Angeles into the lawsuit.”

ACORN founder Wade Rathke mentions donor/attorney Naill McCarthy by name and also explains the lead paint litigation strategy in his book Citizen Wealth.

Wade goes on to explain how organizations like ACORN use litigation to gain power.

To recap for the Media Matters readers who may be used to having their news filtered:

1. ACORN staged a NATIONWIDE campaign against paint company Sherwin Williams.
2. ACORN turned down settlements to clean up the damage because it wanted money.
3. ACORN and its attorneys were in the final stages of given ACORN a seat in the negotiation process in the California case.
4. Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy represented ACORN in similar cases against Household Finance and Wells Fargo.

Don’t be fooled by the misspelling in the ACORN report, Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy is the same law firm that successfully represented ACORN in the Wells Fargo case.

“Wells Fargo Financial, Inc., the consumer finance subsidiary of Wells Fargo & Company, and the law firms of Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy (Burlingame, Calif.) and Miner, Barnhill & Galland, P.C. (Madison, Wisc.) said they have agreed to settle a class action lawsuit…..

In the proposed settlement, Wells Fargo Financial commits to continue for three years several improvements it had already put into practice, which have further strengthened its nonprime real estate-secured lending practices, and to implement other practices to benefit its customers. It also agrees to enact a default relief program, earmarking $2.4 million to provide relief to qualifying class members whose loans have become delinquent by more than 60 days. Qualifying class members who submit claims may also be entitled to cash payments, which will be determined using a formula to disburse up to $4.4 million.

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), a party to the lawsuit, had alleged that Wells Fargo Financial failed to adequately disclose points and prepayment penalties and had inaccurately reported loan balances on some of its California customers to credit reporting agencies.”

ACORN involvement in the lead paint issue was tremendous. Besides releasing reports and, staging protests (both national and international), ACORN even dedicated a separate website to the cause.

ACORN demonstrations included:

A reasonable person would say that given ACORN’s relationship with former Rhode Island Attorney General Sheldon Whitehouse and current United States Senator (an enthusiastic supporter of Jack McConnell’s nomination), and its work with Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy on settlements, does raise the question as whether Motley Rice’s agreement with DuPont paint deserves more scrutiny.

“It’s odd and I think unlawful that the Attorney General, in a sense, appropriated the DuPont settlement moneys for his own purposes. It’s curious part of the money went to his alma mater, another part w[ent] to pay off a pledge made by Motley Rice to a Boston hospital, then the rest of the money went to the Children’s Health Forum, which is not based in Rhode Island at all.”

The fact that ACORN Advisory Committee member and long time ACORN ally Henry Cisneros is on the board of the Children’s Health Forum could be considered a coincidence to the folks over at Media Matters, but what if I were to tell you that the Mayor of Los Angeles Antonio Villaraigosa was on the advisory committee of the Children’s Health Forum?

In 2009 Cisneros was honored for his commitment to ACORN while Villaraigosa engaged in crisis PR for the group. Side note:  Villaraigosa is also board members of the Institute for America’s Future, a group that goes out of its way to protect ACORN interests.

Either Jack McConnell’s law firm Motley Rice was totally oblivious to the FACT that Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy were in the FINAL stages of securing ACORN a seat next to them  at the negotiating table or McConnell lied during his confirmation hearing (see transcript below)

SEN. KYL: I understand. My five minutes is up. It’s kind of hard to have continuity in questioning when we have this kind of limitation. I understood the point you were originally trying to make, but if I can — and I have a couple more minutes’ worth of questions just as a follow up to this.

My point really was not only, is it right to seek this as a movement, but whether you actually encourage these lawsuits in other states — you or your law firm — did you?

MR. MCCONNELL: No, Senator, we did not.

SEN. KYL: Are you aware of any role by the Association of Community Organizers for Reform Now — that’s ACORN — in how those cases might have come to be filed?

MR. MCCONNELL: No, neither I nor my firm have had any relationship with ACORN.

President Clinton said that his answer depended upon what the meaning of the word is is. McConnell might say that it depends upon what a relationship is. Apparently McConnell did not want to acknowledge any kind of relationship to ACORN by the time his confirmation hearing was held. Still, McConnell, his firm and ACORN are all connected. McConnell’s key role in the lead paint litigation in Rhode Island, where ACORN had a significant presence, and his law firm’s subsequent participation in the California lead paint case on the side of ACORN and its California law firm contradict his unqualified assurance that neither he nor his firm “had any relationship with ACORN.”

To quote from ACORN Report shown in the screen shots above:

p. 38: “Luck would have it that the major CA lawsuit against the paint industry is being handled by the same law firm handling our Wells Fargo case [Cotchett, Pitre & McCarthy]–and they want to work together on the lead case. Over the last month we have been able to convince several major CA cities and school districts to join the lawsuit. In a potentially important precedent for our role in these types of cases, we are in the final stages of negotiating a seat for ALERT (ACORN Law for Education, Representation & Training) on the legal team for the case, which puts us at the table–and in the settlement negotiations.”

P. 59: December 2006–”ACORN gets 2 cities and 2 school districts in CA to join a lawsuit against paint companies”

Despite ongoing investigations by the Department of Housing and Urban Development and voter fraud allegations in several states, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now or ACORN continues to maintain its innocence regarding the undercover videos that led to the “dissolution” of the national group. Prominent politicians like Pelosi and Lee have been willing to lend their credibility to ACORN and other radical organizations by ignoring details like the FBI documents released last week by Judicial Watch.

The documents include handwritten notes from FBI investigators interviewing canvassers working with Project Vote, an ACORN affiliate. Among the highlights from the FBI handwritten notes:

• [ACORN] “Told employees not to talk to the FBI. ‘FBI trying to intimidate you.’”
• Fraudulent cards:
  • To cause confusion on election day to keep polls open longer
  • To allow people who can’t vote to vote.
  • To allow to vote multiple times.
• Project Vote will pay them whether cards fake or not – whatever they had to do to get the cards was attitude.
• Constantly threatened
• Staff restricted on what to say to FBI
• “Poverty pimpin” (sic) ACORN
• ACORN HQ is wkg for the Democratic Party.
• PV [Project Vote] pays ACORN $6.00 per card…Said “You treat the cards like (cash) $”
• Some [names] went right from the phone book and made up the rest.

Tom Fitton, president of Judaical Watch raised significant points when he stated:

“These documents show the need for a national criminal investigation by the Obama Justice Department into ACORN. Is Attorney General Holder doing nothing because of Obama’s close connections to ACORN and Project Vote? The information in these new documents has national implications that cry out for further investigation.”

Lawmakers like Representative Donna Edwards who attended the conference have never worried about their connections to ACORN in the past and (considering the speakers listed below) most are willing to turn a blind eye to its transgressions.

This may explain why, when most Americans were beginning their work week, ACORN leaders like Zach Polett were welcomed at a conference called America’s Future Now.

Amid numerous reports of its demise, ACORN sent various top leaders to Washington, DC last week. That statement may bring to mind ACORN’s CEO Bertha Lewis.

However, ACORN’s true leaders have always prided themselves on remaining behind the scenes. Zach Polett, pictured below, is the former Executive Director of Project Vote, former head of ACORN Political Operations and a founding member of ACORN. Polett in his own words, was also once the supervisor of Barack Obama when he worked at Project Vote in the 1990′s

Joining Polett last week were ACORN leader, Steve Kest (picture below) and Project Vote Executive Director Michael Slater. If one can imagine the America’s Future Now conference like a high school reunion, the ACORN leaders were obviously the football team.

Efforts were made to protect the already “victimized” ACORN from any unwanted scrutiny (more on that later) but it is interesting to note that facts mean little to radical liberals and their “progressive” friends. Hundreds of pages of notes, testimony and evidence exist that suggest that ACORN is a criminal organization set up in a manner that is subversive and harmful, but lawmakers, and apparently the FBI are content to ignore critical facts in fear of where a full investigation would lead.

The fact of the matter is Barack Obama is a liar who has used his position to cover up the very criminal activity that got him elected president. In May of 2009, Bill O’Reilly began to delve into the ACORN/Obama story but stopped short after my statement that ACORN operated as an “unofficial arm of the Democratic Party.” O’Reilly chose to form a truce with the White House after pressure from the administration about Fox’s anti-Obama stance and the mainstream media continue to ignore the true story.

Not surprisingly, my testimony in Pennsylvania in 2008 mirrors the FBI notes released last week, and it has been over a year since Heather Heidelbaugh presented testimony before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Yet, instead of investigating, top House Democrats wait for more “credible evidence.” Among the evidence ignored by House Democrats are:

• Project Vote receives donor lists from other Democratic and labor union sources: John Kerry campaign, [Hilary] Clinton campaign, Barack Obama campaign, Democratic National Committee, America Coming Together (“ACT”) (p.3)
• Project Vote development plan was to ‘approach maxed out presidential donors’, and ‘allegedly use the funds for voter registration drives’ (pp.3-4)
• ACORN ‘employees’ were paid through Project Vote for partisan campaign activities telling voters … “don’t vote for Albert Win (sic) or vote for this person” (p. 4)
• There were no divisions between the staff of ACORN and Project Vote, and persons working for one entity actually perform work for either or both organizations (p. 4)
• The Obama campaign’s donor list was part of the evidence admitted into the hearing on the injunction in October 2008 (p. 5)

ACORN’s work has been critical to the Democrats to secure and maintain their majority in Congress. My blog posts have noted this repeatedly, but here is ACORN in its own words from page 46 of a 2006 report describing how they will leverage power with the new Democratic controlled Congress (available here). Click to enlarge.

After two full days of speakers and workshops, the attendees gathered for an awards ceremony on Tuesday night. Awardees included the leftist liberal donor Peter Lewis of Progressive Insurance Company and this reporter arrived early to the event. After inquiring about a ticket for the dinner, I decided to give the VIPs a chance to gather their tickets while I walked around.

Judging from the amount of protection that ACORN received at the America’s Future Now conference, it is obvious that other liberal groups consider ACORN’s work to still be critical to passing the radical agenda.

What happened next can only be described as roaches reacting to sunlight. After smiling for the camera, a stunned Zach Polett of ACORN reacted by scurrying across the room to find Michael Slater of Project Vote while Steve Kest of ACORN attempted to duck into another room with a piano in it. The group chatting so animatedly just a few minutes ago closed ranks (probably to hide other radicals from the lens of my camera).

Inside the awards event Representative Donna Edwards and ACORN insiders discussed plans for America’s future, but in the hall I was denied entry to the event after words from Michael Slater to the event staff . Though it had been confirmed minutes early that there were seats available I was told that tables had just been removed. When I decided to wait in hopes of getting a seat, a staffer named Alex Lawson came rushing out with Tommy Christopher from Mediaite.

Apparently, an everyday American is no longer allowed to ask questions or attend conferences with names like America’s Future Now. The ACORN leaders inside had complained of pictures being taken and I was grilled (while Mediaite videotaped the incident). ACORN could no longer ignore my statements against them so Lawson was sent to remove me from the event. Lawson accused me of working for Andrew Breitbart (which has been revealed to be a Democrat talking point) and refused to sell me a ticket to an event at which public officials, progressive organizations and ACORN celebrated their success in taking America to the far left.

Anyone who has been paying attention knows that ACORN has not disbanded but merely reformed. One has to wonder what else ACORN and its friends are hiding. SEIU, MoveOn, Media Matters and the Center for Community change have all jumped to ACORN’s defense and by discounting the mounting evidence against ACORN, it appears that ACORN is “to big to fail.” The implications of admitting that ACORN is a corruption, socialist organization could implicate dozens of funders, allies, partners and politicians.

Who else was hiding behind the liberal wall at the America’s Future Now conference? Could it have been Jeffrey Robinson of Citizen Services Inc, the ACORN affiliate that was contracted by the Obama campaign for “get out the vote” activities.

“U.S. Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign paid more than $800,000 to an offshoot of the liberal Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now for services the Democrat’s campaign says it mistakenly misrepresented in federal reports.

An Obama spokesman said Federal Election Commission reports would be amended to show Citizens Services Inc. — a subsidiary of ACORN — worked in “get-out-the-vote” projects, instead of activities such as polling, advance work and staging major events as stated in FEC finance reports filed during the primary.”

The same leaders who covered up an embezzlement scandal, ran a massive voter registration drive riddled with fraud and coordinated with the Obama campaign to violate Federal election law are still in place. A glance at Zach Polett’s friend list illustrates this point, from Heather Booth to Tom Matzzie of MoveOn, Polett’s friends have been instrumental in the Democrat party for decades.

The one lesson I took away from the America’s Future Now conference after being turned away is that America is in peril. The left is on a collision course with the Constitution and our freedoms. Among the handouts I picked out was a booklet that laid out the plan for a “Democratic and Socialist Future.” I will share more about this booklet later but it’s important to see that the past two years have shown Americans the political lives of ACORN and exposed the depth of deception Democrats will sink in order to protect their “vote making” machine.

Obama has lied repeatedly about his background,  and his ties to ACORN. It’s time to go after the leaders behind ACORN, and the politicians who are shredding the Constitution for them.

You can follow Anita on her blog or on Twitter.

]]> http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/06/14/key-acorn-leaders-gather-in-dc-to-help-plan-americas-future/feed/ 9 http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/06/02/ofa-and-the-dnc-acorn-2-0/ http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/06/02/ofa-and-the-dnc-acorn-2-0/#comments Thu, 03 Jun 2010 00:04:23 +0000 Anita MonCrief http://hotair.com/greenroom/?p=19364 If elections were like football games, this would be your two minute warning.  All of the passion, energy and renewed interest in politics that propelled the tea party movement of 2009 opens the door to a new level of involvement. As patriot groups around the country prepare for the November 2010 elections, a quiet force has been building behind the scenes.

Investigative reporter Carol Greenberg’s work inside Obama’s Organizing for America has already helped expose the OFA’s connection to ACORN and its network of top Democrat party insiders. Greenberg’s latest article explains the OFA plan to deploy rapid response teams to Ohio ahead of the elections.

Any liberal discussion of Ohio includes the sentiment that “Ohio is ground zero for the left.” Long a playground for groups like ACORN, they conducted voter experiments, filed lawsuits against the state and their voter fraud shenanigans led to a civil RICO suit brought by the Buckeye Institute. ACORN’s settlement of the case required that it surrender its business license in the state.

Unfortunately for conservatives, the awareness of ACORN’s network of organizations and mob like behavior come at a time when he same political workeasily be done by Obama’s permanent campaign. A campaign that was absorbed into the Democratic National Committee after it ceased being Obama for America.

Obama’s ACORN cronies designed a system that could be substantial from any number of leftist organizations, including the DNC.

“Apparently, ACORN and Project Vote were ‘smack dab’ in the middle of another one of Obama’s voter registration drives. According to ACORN reports, ACORN was Catalist’s first client. Let me be clear, the ACORN VBASE, is the archetype of the Obama campaign. ACORN’s technology combined with union money elected a president.”

Draft slides of a 2006 Project Vote PowerPoint show that Project Vote’s method could produce the desired results to sway an election.

Critics of Project Vote and ACORN underestimate their effectiveness in contacting voters to move them on an issue or to the polls.

Other slides detail their plans to turn this Voter Mobilization Network over to the leftist friends (including the DNC).

The left may scoff at whether this connection exists, but Karyn Gillette, then development director of Project Vote, also gave me a copy of the 2004 DNC donor list to work from. Karyn Gillette came to Project Vote from Ohio where she was employed by Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner.

“According to a court filing in Ohio alleging ACORN violated state Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) law, ‘Project Vote, regularly advises Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner (hereinafter “Secretary Brunner”) on election strategy, and recently issuing a news release claiming credit for Secretary Brunner’s directive restricting challenges to suspected unlawful voter registrations.’

“Maurice Thompson, the attorney handling the Ohio RICO action, told me late yesterday, ‘Evidence of collusion amongst ACORN, Project Vote, the Obama Campaign and Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner comes as no surprise to us — these supposedly separate entities appear to have been co-mingling funds, trading political tips, and helping each other gain power for years now.’”

Here is a screen shot of the email Gillette sent to ACORN.org email addresses containing the Democratic National Committee, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Though a number of news outlets like the New York Times had copies of the DNC donor list,  it was never made public, until today.

Click here to view the DNC major donor list ACORN used to fundraise for its voter registration drives.

The OFA’s organizing machine can track millions of calls and mobilize countless volunteers and it would behoove the right to take notice. Twitter and Facebook may spread the message and connect folks but there is a serious need for some good old fashion grassroots door knocking. If conservatives are going to win in November there must be a combination of new and old organizing. In 2004 Ohio surprised the nation by going red for Bush. As many others have noted, there was initially a

…lack of outreach among African American communities. Karl Rove proved in 2004 with black voters in Ohio that persons should not assume that African Americans will consistently vote progressive.”

Organizing for America has stopped the game clock with the unveiling of Vote 2010. November is the goal and they have the ball. Kickoff events are scheduled around the country for June 5th. Inviting emails with subjects like “What are you doing Saturday?” are making the rounds.

Conservatives, what are you doing this Saturday? If you want to win in November, it should be attending one of those kickoff parties. OFA, it’s the new ACORN. Learn who they are and how they operate. Click here to find an event near you or to sign up for their updates. If the OFA can continue to organize to pass Obama’s agenda and maintain the Congressional majorities, and all of the momentum of the past year and a half will be lost.

“President Barack Obama nominated Jack McConnell in March for a spot on the U.S. District Court in Rhode Island. He was recommended by the state’s two senators, Democrats Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse.”

The Heritage Foundation explains McConnell’s background:

“Another of McConnell ‘s claims to fame is the lead paint litigation in Rhode Island and Wisconsin. In Rhode Island, McConnell’s law firm shopped a lawsuit against the former makers of lead paint to Whitehouse, when the latter was that state’s Attorney General. Whitehouse’s successor ratified a decision that Whitehouse made and contracted out the state’s power to sue in the public interest to McConnell’s law firm. In the lawsuit, which McConnell considers one of his most significant, the state sought an order directing the companies to abate lead pigment in all buildings in Rhode Island that were accessible to children on the ground that the buildings were a ‘public nuisance.’

The Rhode Island Supreme Court recognized that lead poisoning was a serious public health problem, but declined to play the role of the legislature and create a new cause of action to address it, as McConnell ‘s lawsuit wanted it to do.”

Have angry mob, will travel

Naturally, when there is an opportunity to exploit the situation, attack business, and make some money, ACORN is not far behind. As so called leaders in the ‘social justice’ movement, ACORN was active in lead paint initiative early on. Whether it was state and local grants or lucrative partnerships, ACORN was ready to sign on. In the case of Rhode Island, ACORN formed an alliance with an organization called the Childhood Lead Action Project (CLAP). CLAP was instrumental in pushing the litigation in Ohio and joined with ACORN to file an amicus brief on behalf of McConnell’s case.

A one time partnership on a case of mutual interest can be overlooked but ACORN and the Childhood Lead Action Project teamed up on a number of projects including

Rhode Island Diesel Pollution Initiative

The National Low Income Housing Coalition

The Fund for Community Progress

The Childhood Lead Action Project presented Jack McConnell with the Above and Beyond the Call of Duty Award and McConnell’s firm Motley & Rice LLC. donated funds to CLAP.

Steal from the rich and give to the liberal rich.

With ACORN organizing protests across the country against McConnell’s target Sherwin-Williams, the “advocacy group” was able to maintain leverage over negotiations and even described their motives to a gathering of staff in December of 2006:

“As an outgrowth of the neighborhood lead-based campaigns in recent years, the profile of our lead work leaped forward targeting giant paint manufacturer Sherwin-Williams. Legal settlements in Rhode Island most notably gave us encouragement that some level of victory was possible in finally winning remediation for the impacts of lead paint.

The initial gamut of the company and others was to attempt to force us to tread water with the trade association, but meetings won through early actions produced nothing. Amy Schur, directing this effort, was vigilant, and having dogged them all year, has constructed a legal strategy with ALERT and the Cachet firm that has now brought the cities of San Diego and Los Angeles into the lawsuit.”

Read more on page 31 of the ACORN 2006 YEYB Report.

ACORN insiders go on to describe how the organization is more concerned about using the lawsuits to force a monetary settlement for the organization than for removing lead paint (emphasis mine):

“We knew going into this campaign that we faced a particular challenge in the current environment. They can settle with ACORN, but still haven’t gotten rid of their biggest problem – the city and state lawsuits.

Over the last 6 months our primary strategy has been to demonstrate to Sherwin-Williams that ACORN has the capacity to compound their legal problems, primarily by getting more cities and states to sue. While right now there is a chance that the company’s legal problems will grow significantly, ACORN’s work could almost ensure that this would be the case. So, deal with ACORN to take out that factor, and they might hope to beat back the worst of what could come.

Sherwin-Williams hasn’t wanted to deal, so we now either give up or make good on our threat. The problem is, while we can get more state lawsuits moving, and these very well may lead to the homes in our neighborhoods being made lead safe, securing the final victory is in the hands of the AG’s and how do we benefit organizationally?

Luck would have it that the major CA lawsuit against the paint industry is being handled by the same law firm handling our Wells Fargo case – and they want to work together on the lead case. Over the last month we have been able to convince several major CA cities and school districts to join the lawsuit. In a potentially important precedent for our role in these types of cases, we are in the final stages of negotiating a seat for ALERT (ACORN Law for Education, Representation & Training) on the legal team for the case, which puts us at the table – and in the settlement negotiations.”

ACORN’s above statement raises questions as to whether McConnell was candid to Senator John Cornyn, R-Texas when Cornyn “a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked John McConnell Jr. if it was appropriate for a lawyer to solicit a school board as a client in a lead paint lawsuit even if the district is not sure its schools contain lead paint.”

Written Questions from Sen. John Cornyn and Written Answers from Nominee John McConnell Jr.

16. Attached as Exhibit A is an August 2, 2000 memorandum from a Texas plaintiffs’ law firm to Texas school board members lobbying the school board to join a lead based paint remediation lawsuit that was headed by Ness Motley, predecessor to Motley Rice LLC and your firm at the time.

a. Do you believe that it is appropriate for a lawyer to solicit a school board as a client in a lead-based paint remediation lawsuit if the district is not aware whether district school buildings have lead-based paint and is not aware of any past remediation costs?

Response: No.

b. Do you believe that it is appropriate for a lawyer, in soliciting a school board as a client in a lead-based paint remediation lawsuit, to assure the district that if it recovers funds for lead-based paint remediation, those funds do not have to be spent on lead-based paint remediation, but may be placed in the general maintenance and operations fund and used for any appropriate purpose?

Response: No.

c. Did you or any attorneys with your firm help prepare the attached memorandum or the resolution attached thereto? If so, please identify who helped in the preparation.

Response: I have never seen the memo that is Attachment A and know nothing about the circumstances of the preparation or distribution of this document. I made diligent inquiry of members of my firm and they advised that they also did not have any involvement with this memo.

Amazingly the ACORN idea of targeting school districts for potential clients in lead paint litigation was used by Motley Rice, though no one cal recall doing so. More interestingly, according to court documents, Motley Rice was also involved in the California lead paint case ACORN was working on.

How much is that AG in the window?

While its no secret that McConnell is a top donor to the Democrats, it should be noted that McConnell’s firm Motley Rice has given tens of thousands to Senator Whitehouse.

However, the question is whether he worked with ACORN on the lead paint lawsuit. In addition to the connection through CLAP, ACORN and McConnell’s share one powerful friend. United States Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) recommended McConnell for the Rhode Island federal court vacancy and he and McConnell have a long friendship

In 1999 Sheldon Whitehouse was attorney general of Rhode Island when he first:

“ initiated a lawsuit against the lead paint industry that ended in a mistrial; the state later won a second lawsuit against former lead paint manufacturers Sherwin Williams Co., Millennium Holdings and NL Industries that found them responsible for creating a public nuisance.[4] However, this decision was unanimously overturned by the Rhode Island Supreme Court on July 1, 2008. The Court found that it is the responsibility of the property owners to abate and mitigate lead hazards (as specified by Rhode Island statute).”

ACORN and its coalition partners had tried a number of strategies before relying on the “all politics is local” mantra and employing the skills of politicians like Whitehouse who obviously had aspirations for higher office. ACORN’s strategy was clear and state attorney generals were a key component of the plan. ACORN stated it would:

Work to find a second large law firm willing to develop a partnership along the lines of the one being negotiated in CA and get several more state AG’s (or cities) to work with us on a lawsuit strategy.

On page 258 of the same report ACORN finished its tale of corporate shakedowns by declaring “we plan on nothing less than a Rhode-Island style win!”

Whitehouse and McConnell worked closely on the Rhode Island lead paint case while the attorney general continued to curry favor with ACORN. In March of 2007 Senator Whitehouse proudly attended an ACORN rally in Washington DC where an ACORN leader stated:

“We need things for the needy and not the greedy,’ said New York ACORN President Pat Boone at the rally. ‘Congress must act now to appropriate $450 billion and fully fund these vital domestic programs, rejecting outrageous and unnecessary tax breaks for wealthy individuals.”

Whitehouse was also instrumental in using the Alberto Gonzalez scandal to politically align the stars for ACORN affiliate Project Vote. A mere two months before Project Vote released – to much fanfare and finger pointing at the right – its report Caging Democracy: A 50-Year History of Partisan Challenges to Minority Voters, Whitehouse paved the way with a provocative letter to the Department of Justice.

Reliable ACORN Senators Edward Kennedy (D-MA) and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) “asked the Justice Department to investigate the alleged ‘caging’ of predominantly African American voters in Jacksonville, Florida by the RNC in 2004.” Rhode Island and Massachusetts are liberal testing grounds for what Project Vote called its “experiments.” Groups like ACORN pushed fusion voting, living wages and lead paint campaigns through areas filled with ACORN friendly politicians.

In 2008 Senator Whitehouse again delivered for ACORN by introducing a bill aimed at fulfilling Project Vote’s action items on voter caging:

Voter Participation – ACORN is committed to helping all citizens exercise their rights to participate in the electoral process by registering people to vote. This election year, ACORN is committed to ensuring that citizens be able to register and cast their votes without fear of harassment and intimidation from dirty political tricks such as voter caging. Prohibiting voter caging, which a New York Times editorial this week called “a little known but pernicious technique,” is the goal of bills introduced in the Senate by Sheldon Whitehouse (S. 2305) and in the House by John Conyers (H.R. 2305). ACORN members will be lobbying their representatives to sign on in support of the bills.

The recommendation of McConnell by Whitehouse, a notorious member of the ACORN 7, “Chicago style politics.” As James R. Copeland explained:

“But you’d have to be paying close attention to know about two of the president’s craziest choices for the federal district courts, Wisconsin’s Louis Butler and Rhode Island’s Jack McConnell.

President Obama nominated Butler last year, but the Senate returned Butler’s nomination without action after it passed through the Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote; the president resubmitted the nomination on January 20 of this year.

…In 2005, Butler authored a split opinion for the court in Thomas v. Mallet, which permitted lawsuits against the manufacturers of paint that may have contained lead, even absent proof that any individual manufacturer’s paint had been used by the person or persons filing the lawsuit.

This expanded Wisconsin law to embrace the theory of “market-share liability,” a doctrine accepted in California regarding litigation against manufacturers of the anti-morning-sickness drug diethylstilbestrol but overwhelmingly rejected in other jurisdictions and contexts thereafter.”

Recently Obama’s Environmental Protection agency passed new restrictions modeled after the Rhode Island and Wisconsin cases:

A new federal rule aimed at reducing exposure to toxic lead-paint chips and dust requires renovators to be trained and certified in EPA-approved methods of containing and cleaning up work areas.

…The EPA estimates that its new rule will add $8 to $167 to the cost of the average interior remodeling job, but contractors say the expense to homeowners will be much greater. “The EPA has grossly underestimated the costs to comply on any job. I can see my labor costs go up by thousands of dollars.”

It appears as though ACORN and the “environmental justice” movement secured a major victory despite losing the court cases because the main goal was not a local victory. ACORN and other organizations wanted to impose national restrictions totaling billions and by using small states like Rhode Island ACORN was able to secure a temporary victory whose momentum could be used to enact national changes.

From little ACORN attorneys powerful politicians grow

If federal judgeships are for sale, “‘the massive campaign contributions…approaching $700,000 over the past two decades’—by McConnell and his wife to [Senator Jack] Reed, [Senator Sheldon] Whitehouse, and an array of other Democrats” might entitle him to one. But judgeships should not be for sale and it is apparent that McConnell would be a “liberal judicial activist” and rule based on his personal empathy and political views instead of follow the law.

McConnell’s involvement in lead paint cases in Ohio, Wisconsin and California without any overt mention of ACORN’s work raises several red flags. What is McConnell hiding and has he been truly honest about his connections to ACORN. Then again, it wouldn’t be the first time an ACORN lawyer with powerful friends was able to get a job he wasn’t qualified for.

You can follow Anita on her blog or on Twitter.

Anita MonCrief

- By Carol Greenberg

Calling all Tea Party groups, tea partiers, twitterers, Facebookers et al, it’s “Tough Love” time!

I’m sure all of you have heard the words “this is serious” and these three little words have become banal to you all.

Many of us Conservatives seem to be “riding high” on the presumption that the November elections will be a slam-dunk for us all. However: money, great candidates and astute campaign managers cannot be assumed to be a winning combination and is no guarantee against  the corrupt Godfather-tactics of the “Community Organizer-in-Chief” in the Oval Office and his elite OFA (Organizing for America) forces. And money is no obstacle.

Several months ago in conjunction with Anita Moncrief I warned against the ongoing threat of OFA.

Just to make sure everyone realizes the fact below, SO LET ME BE PERFECTLY CLEAR:

Barack Obama’s OFA is a project of the Democratic National Committee

I’ve tried to get the attention of my own reps in Congress, the GOP, politicians on twitter, Michael Steele. You name it. My pleas have either gone ignored or I have received the response of:

We know they are there.

Sort of like the scorpion or rattlesnake waiting outside your hotel or bedroom window. NOT a comforting thought.

So this is how it is going to be. We are on our own. We are going to have no choice but to counter-act them ourselves. I went undercover for the third time last week with a conference call to Ohio Lt. Governor Lee Fisher (Dem) who won the Ohio US Senate primary against Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner. I again pretended to be one of “them.” Ohio is a true battleground state and is usually a deciding state not only in presidential elections but mid-term elections as well.

You are all saying “well, Brunner lost the primary to Lee Fisher. But she ain’t a threat anymore.” WRONG! Soros-funded and ACORN- backed  Brunner is still in charge of the November election and I don’t believe anything will be different this go-around.  Even though she lost the primary corrupt Brunner will still be on Obama’s side and stop at nothing as she did in 2008 to pull out all the stops to put and keep Dems in office. Could be she was promised something by Zero for a “great performance”?.. Lest you forget how Election 2008 went in Ohio here is a recap. And back in February Hotline On Call announced the ODP (Ohio Democratic Party) will build a “firewall” to insure Obama is again re-elected in 2012:

The ODP has been deploying staffers all across the state for a road show known as the “Knockout” program. The program aims to “knockout the Republicans for the next decade [by] motivating activists to get involved early and often.[sic] The ODP plans to hold these “Knockout” events in all 88 counties, and in doing so, they’re lengthening their volunteer list. What’s more, ODP field staffers say they’re supplying those volunteers with access to some of their best data to make them most effective now.

Fisher announced on the call last week that Obama will be bringing his artillery to Ohio, rolling out his dreaded OFA “rapid response” teams and included will be at least one, but probably more, “appearances” by the Organizer-in-Chief himself.

If you read my “An Inside Look at the OFA” post you’ll see a couple screen shots of these “rapid response” teams I managed to get while on a webinar with them and warned everyone about.  I’ll show them to you again:

As you can see calls are broken down by representative, precinct, and every single one is carefully logged.

When I heard about how our beloved Scott Brown caved on the cloture vote on Wall Street Reform, apparently under OFA pressure I was poo-pooed by many who believe the 922 calls claim to have been made to his office by OFA was exaggerated, but after what I’ve seen I absolutely believe this is true. And it’s confirmed by this one OFA tweep:

Below is another screen shot of how Lincoln was tossed during the Healthcare Deform fiasco:

As you can see here OFA actually made 114% more contacts than they had originally hoped for. A total of 7,060 calls, doors-knocked on and other means of contact.

As Ohio goes, so goes the nation.

For the most part, yes. Ignore Ohio at your own peril, and the peril of the nation!

And this is what’s in store for all of us all over the country. How Obama plans to keep control in Election 2010. It ain’t pretty:

I can’t make it any plainer than that. Sorry. We’re all gonna have to go out there and work our buns off just like they are or we’ll be headlining in the premier episode of next season’s “LOST.” The biggest problem Conservatives have is we haven’t learned to play hardball like the other side does, so in the words of Todd Beamer

LET’S ROLL!

FYI please read Anita Moncrief’s conclusion “An Inside Look at the OFA Part II” where she connects all the dots between the “usual suspects” of OFA, Obama, SEIU and ACORN.

Wednesday Ms. Moncrief will be following up with the second part of the OFA/DNC expose and their illicit coordination with ACORN to ensure their candidates are elected. Stay tuned…

Crossposted

You’ve just won an all expense-paid trip to Hawaii.

Waikiki Beach

NOW do I have your attention?

Calling all Tea Party groups, tea partiers, twitterers, Facebookers et al, it’s “Tough Love” time!

I’m sure all of you have heard the words “this is serious” and these three little words have become banal to you all.

Many of us Conservatives seem to be “riding high” on the presumption that the November elections will be a slam-dunk for us all. However: money, great candidates and astute campaign managers cannot be assumed to be a winning combination and is no guarantee against  the corrupt Godfather-tactics of the “Community Organizer-in-Chief” in the Oval Office and his elite OFA (Organizing for America) forces. And money is no obstacle.

Several months ago in conjunction with Anita Moncrief I warned against the ongoing threat of OFA.

Just to make sure everyone realizes the fact below, SO LET ME BE PERFECTLY CLEAR:

Barack Obama’s OFA is a project of the Democratic National Committee

I’ve tried to get the attention of my own reps in Congress, the GOP, politicians on twitter, Michael Steele. You name it. My pleas have either gone ignored or I have received the response of:

We know they are there.

Sort of like the scorpion or rattlesnake waiting outside your hotel or bedroom window. NOT a comforting thought.

So this is how it is going to be. We are on our own. We are going to have no choice but to counter-act them ourselves. I went undercover for the third time last week with a conference call to Ohio Lt. Governor Lee Fisher (Dem) who won the Ohio US Senate primary against Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner. I again pretended to be one of “them.” Ohio is a true battleground state and is usually a deciding state not only in presidential elections but mid-term elections as well.

You are all saying “well, Brunner lost the primary to Lee Fisher. But she ain’t a threat anymore.” WRONG! Soros-funded and ACORN- backed  Brunner is still in charge of the November election and I don’t believe anything will be different this go-around.  Even though she lost the primary corrupt Brunner will still be on Obama’s side and stop at nothing as she did in 2008 to pull out all the stops to put and keep Dems in office. Could be she was promised something by Zero for a “great performance”?.. Lest you forget how Election 2008 went in Ohio here is a recap. And back in February Hotline On Call announced the ODP (Ohio Democratic Party) will build a “firewall” to insure Obama is again re-elected in 2012:

The ODP has been deploying staffers all across the state for a road show known as the “Knockout” program. The program aims to “knockout the Republicans for the next decade [by] motivating activists to get involved early and often.[sic] The ODP plans to hold these “Knockout” events in all 88 counties, and in doing so, they’re lengthening their volunteer list. What’s more, ODP field staffers say they’re supplying those volunteers with access to some of their best data to make them most effective now.

Fisher announced on the call last week that Obama will be bringing his artillery to Ohio, rolling out his dreaded OFA “rapid response” teams and included will be at least one, but probably more, “appearances” by the Organizer-in-Chief himself.

If you read my “An Inside Look at the OFA” post you’ll see a couple screen shots of these “rapid response” teams I managed to get while on a webinar with them and warned everyone about.  I’ll show them to you again:

As you can see calls are broken down by representative, precinct, and every single one is carefully logged.

When I heard about how our beloved Scott Brown caved on the cloture vote on Wall Street Reform, apparently under OFA pressure I was poo-pooed by many who believe the 922 calls claim to have been made to his office by OFA was exaggerated, but after what I’ve seen I absolutely believe this is true. And it’s confirmed by this one OFA tweep:

Below is another screen shot of how Lincoln was tossed during the Healthcare Deform fiasco:

As you can see here OFA actually made 114% more contacts than they had originally hoped for. A total of 7,060 calls, doors-knocked on and other means of contact.

As Ohio goes, so goes the nation.

For the most part, yes. Ignore Ohio at your own peril, and the peril of the nation!

And this is what’s in store for all of us all over the country. How Obama plans to keep control in Election 2010. It ain’t pretty:

I can’t make it any plainer than that. Sorry. We’re all gonna have to go out there and work our buns off just like they are or we’ll be headlining in the premier episode of next season’s “LOST.” The biggest problem Conservatives have is we haven’t learned to play hardball like the other side does, so in the words of Todd Beamer

LET’S ROLL!

FYI please read Anita Moncrief’s conclusion “An Inside Look at the OFA Part II” where she connects all the dots between the “usual suspects” of OFA, Obama, SEIU and ACORN.

Wednesday Ms. Moncrief will be following up with the second part of the OFA/DNC expose and their illicit coordination with ACORN to ensure their candidates are elected. Stay tuned…

Crossposted

National Journal rated Obama the most “liberal” United States Senator, even more “liberal” than avowed socialist Bernard Sanders of Vermont (for whom then Senator Obama campaigned), because he earned it.

In her sensational New York Times no. 1 bestseller, “Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Cronies,” published in 2009, intrepid Michelle Malkin generously gave me “special thanks” for daring to expose ACORN corruption and wrote about it and the New York Times cover up of the Obama/ACORN relationship in detail at pages 244-49. (Since that material was added after the manuscript had been sent to the printer, I did not make the index.)

Stealth socialism in vogue

It’s not surprising that on May 3, 2010 Aaron Klein and Brenda J. Elliot released “The Manchurian President: Barack Obama’s Ties to Communists, Socialists and Other Anti-American Extremists” and on May 15, 2010 former Speaker Newt Gingrich released a book titled “To Save America: Stopping Obama’s Secular Socialist Machine.” Of course they are right about Obama’s radical ties and “secular socialist machine.” (I’m looking forward to Laura Ingraham’s “The Obama Diaries,” out on or about July 13, 2010, but I bet President Obama isn’t.)

Even though on October 21, 2008 The New York Times killed the Obama/ACORN expose on which I been reporter Stephanie Strom’s source and I decided to blow the whistle myself and appeared on Laura Ingraham’s radio show before the end of the month, Bill O’Reilly of Fox News apparently did not learn about it until March of 2009 (the month in which attorney Heather Heidelbaugh, for whom I voluntarily became a witness in the Pennsylvania ACORN, testified before a Congressional committee about ACORN voter registration fraud and the New York Times cover up), it was inevitable that the truth about Obama, ACORN and “stealth socialism” finally would become generally known as the socialist agenda was implemented. After all, the idea was for Obama to deliver as President on that “fundamental change” that he promised as a presidential hopeful.

After an appealing generality becomes an examinable specific and the cost calculations are done, putting lipstick on a pig doesn’t fool nearly as many people. For example, Obamacare is a massive wealth redistribution program and–no surprise–not long after it was enacted, an Obama Administration official acknowledged it and we learned that Obamacare would be much more expensive than it had been officially estimated before it was passed.

Defining stealth socialism

Graham L. Strachan explained the “stealth socialism” path this way:

“Why did the Western media persist in calling the social system in the Communist bloc ‘Communism’ instead of Socialism? They did it to manufacture a false reality: to protect the reputation of another form of Socialism which existed in the West….so-called ‘Democratic Socialism’, socialism by stealth, socialism achieved through the ‘permeation’ of existing political institutions by members of organisation such as the Fabian Society, in order to influence the policies adopted by those institutions towards socialism.

“Democratic Socialism itself was based on a lie: that Socialism could be implemented peacefully through the ballot box. The implication was that if the voters didn’t like it they could vote it out again. That was a hoax. Since Socialism does not permit private ownership of property, it cannot be ‘democratic’ in the sense of allowing a choice of political Parties. This is not a matter of ideology, but of logistics. It would be impossible to have a two Party system of genuine democracy, for example, under which the state nationalised all property including business when the Socialists were voted into power, then sold it all back to the people again when they were voted out. The intention of Democratic Socialism was (and still is) to be democratic just long enough to gain power. Then it will declare the ‘end of history’ and entrench itself forever, enforcing its politically correct speech and thought on everybody, and being just as tyrannical as its Marxist revolutionary counterparts.”

How to make a socialist the ACORN way

As an ACORN insider my indoctrination as a socialist was a slow but steady progression from radical liberalism to embracing the stealth socialist methods that had made ACORN a powerful force in American electoral politics. Two years ago, in the mist of a heated presidential election year, I noticed a Facebook page of Socialism 2008. The graffiti-like picture beckoned young Socialists to Chicago, Illinois on June 19th, 2008.  I RSVPed for the event on Facebook without fully understanding what had just taken place. The line between radical, liberal Democrat and socialist was almost invisible at this point.

Working for ACORN/Project Vote facilitated my crossing the “socialist”threshold and I had become what insiders termed “one of the true believers.” True believers were instrumental in the survival of ACORN and the process of making an employee a true believer began on the very first day.

Inside ACORN offices across the country, young, idealistic liberals were being ingrained with the Saul Alinsky style of Organizing. Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals was never mentioned by name, but Alinsky’s tactics were used on employees and ACORN members.

ACORN’s strategy of stealth socialism was aimed at gaining power through duplicity and somewhat assimilating into society. Alinsky, the “father of community organizing,” taught that the path to power necessitated the use of people who would serve as pawns.

“Organizing for power was Alinsky’s political end, not political party influence. When he asked his new students why they wanted to organize, they would invariably respond with ‘selfless bromides about wanting to help others,’ according to Ryan Lizza writing in The New Republic. Alinsky would then “scream back at them that there was a one-word answer: “You want to organize for power!’”

Saul Alinsky almost single-handedly invented the modern art of community organizing…

He was a master teacher of others, and left a legion of trained disciples and organizations, including Obama and Clinton.”

Every ACORN employee was given a copy of the ACORN Organizing Model, bylaws and various information on running campaigns, but the real education was in how ACORN operated behind the scenes. Like Alinsky, ACORN openly organized to build power, but ACORN’s ace in the hole was the black community.

Community organizers became the “information police” for minorities in dozens of cities. As the official representative for its members, ACORN was able to frame the debate in ways that aligned with its People’s Platform.  The platform is based on the socialist idea of sharing the wealth. Members were asked, even coerced, to attend rallies and protests for issues ACORN had decided would lead to power.

As students exited schools with a “liberal arts” education and a desire to help, ACORN stood ready with the social justice flag in one hand and a cigarette lighter and American flag in the other. Attending such events like Socialism 2008 was the culmination of two years of looking the other way and accepting a little bad in order to save the “movement.” Some leave ACORN at this point but the ones who stay are trusted just a little more.

The Road from radical terrorists to professors and community organizers

With greater access comes greater understanding of the true subversive nature of ACORN. As stated last summer in my article “Liberal Fallout Zones“:

“Poverty is big business and a predicate for class warfare intended to perpetuate political power in the masters of that big business. In the current climate special interest groups are writing bills and influencing votes amid a huge liberal spending binge.”

That spending binge is more like a bender now because ACORN, recognizing the past mistakes of other radical groups like Weather Underground and Students for a Democratic Society decided the best way to gain power as was to pass unnoticed in mainstream America. Radicals like Frances Fox Piven and her husband Richard A. Cloward retreated into the world of Academia where they penned papers on Socialism peppered with Alinsky tactics and a new name:

The Cloward-Piven strategy

On May 2, 1966, Columbia’s Professor of Social Work Richard A. Cloward, and his then research associate Frances Fox Piven, wrote a pivotal article in The Nation, articulating “a strategy to end poverty.”

In what became known as the Cloward-Piven strategy, the article argued a revolutionary approach to mobilizing the poor in the form of class warfare against capitalist forces viewed as exploiting labor and oppressing the poor.

David Horowitz, a long-time student of leftist political movements in the United States, characterized the Cloward-Piven strategy as seeking “to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.”

Cloward and Piven argued a “guaranteed annual income” should be established as an entitlement for the poor, a right the poor could assert and demand to be paid.”

Other radicals like ACORN founder Wade Rathke and former Project Vote executive director, Zach Polett formed organizations and began implementing their socialist agenda while using the poor and minority communities as a defense if anyone dared question their actions. According to its website, ACORN planted its seed in American politics long ago and continues to play an “insider’s game” to maintain it.

“Finally, ACORN® began playing the insiders’ game in American politics. Congressional lobbying is practiced by ACORN® staff. Leaders and members became a central part of the insiders’ games, too. Members elected to office or serving on APACs acquired experience and skill applying power from the inside of the political process. Instead of confronting opponents in actions (something ACORN® will never stop doing), members could trade and negotiate from inside positions of power. ACORN®’s work on the savings and loan bailout provided effective means of developing and applying power for low- and moderate- income people. ACORN® members won appointment to the Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) to help determine the management of the billions of dollars of assets the government seized. The payoff to these activities came, and still comes, when substantial numbers of ACORN® members developed the ability to move inside the political sphere that has for so long been closed to low- and moderate-income people.”

Wade Rathke and Zach Polett learned the path to power quickly and utilized their influence to pass the 1996 National Voter Registration Act  (the “Motor Voter” bill). Polett, seated below to the far left in a dark suit and tie, had officially brought the Arkansas based ACORN to Washington.

Interestingly, on the same page with their tales of insider dealing,  ACORN discusses how the network of unions, non-profits and corporations were created for the express purpose of pushing ACORN’s socialist agenda.

“The national lobbying arm of ACORN® is only one example of the diversification within ACORN® that was basic to its success. The ACORN® Housing Corporation worked to create affordable housing in conjunction with banks and state and local government. The United Labor Unions, now Locals 100 and 880 of the Service Employees International Union, became labor organizing arms of ACORN® which organize people where they work. ACORN® Services, Inc. and the canvassing operations enhanced ACORN®’s ability to create the financial resources needed to grow. The Arkansas Institute for Social Justice became the means for developing leadership skills and political talents among the ACORN® members. What was once a relatively simple organization of community groups has became a diversified system of institutions capable of applying specialized skills to solving the kinds of problems ACORN® encounters in its work.”

Along came a socialist

In late 2006 the atmosphere in the office changed and it appeared that the senior staff were energized. Efforts to function as a real office were implemented. Project Vote began using a donor database instead of a box and attempts were made to reconcile the accounting records. In anticipation of what ACORN began calling a “once in a generation opportunity.” John Podesta from the Center for American Progress gave a speech called “Preparing for Power: The Next Cycle?” in December of that year.

After two years with ACORN I understood how they operated and took the close relationship with the Democrat party for granted. The relationship between Democrats and ACORN was that the party needed ACORN to retain their seats and ACORN needed them to pass their agenda items. ACORN’s belief that indeed, all politics is local, allowed them to place people strategically in positions that would allow a run for higher office.

In 2007 when Zach Polett bragged about supervising Barack Obama and that “ACORN produces leaders,” his purpose was to energize the employees so that we would go out there and deliver. ACORN’s voter registration goals and budget were unmatched and the stakes were high.

When Obama’s campaign called the Project Vote offices in late 2007, I could barely contain my excitement as I relayed the information to my supervisors. After receiving the Obama 2007 2nd quarter donor list from Karyn Gillette, I had another look away moment. Were we violating FEC rules by targeting Obama’s maxed out donors? Did I really want Obama to win this way? Believing that the bigger goal was helping people by implementing the ACORN agenda, I put my doubts aside and worked on pulling donors from the list (which included ALL Obama donors, not just the bigger donors required to be reported to the Federal Elections Commission).

From October 2005 until 2008, I did fundraising work with ACORN and used political donor lists. All Democrat: Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Democratic National Committee. When I appeared as a guest on “The O’Reilly Factor” last year, I said that ACORN had served for years as an unofficial arm of the Democratic Party, but Bill O’Reilly didn’t discuss that with me. Ignoring it is exactly what the stealth socialists want.

I once asked Marcel Reid, former ACORN national board member and President of DC ACORN, how it was possible for ACORN to push its agenda and she replied “We never use the word Socialism.” ACORN’s appeal was to simply implement a Socialist agenda without ever saying the word. When Wade Rathke was interviewed by Megyn Kelly of Fox News, Kelly asked Rathke whether he would describe himself as a socialist, and Wade answered no. Kelly proceeded to point out that the ACORN People’s Platform sounded socialism. Rathke weakly tried to defend ACORN against the Socialist label by pretending the “share the wealth” philosophy was not in the ACORN Platform. You can watch the video here.

Eventually Rathke conceded that the share the wealth language was indeed present, but cited some language about the right to be rich and free.

The People’s Platform (or ACORN’s socialist wish list)

ACORN People’s Platform can be found here and it defines what rich and free meant, and it certainly is not capitalism!

“Our riches shall be the blooming of our communities, the bounty of a sure livelihood, the beauty of homes for our families with sickness driven from the door, the benefit of our taxes rather than their burden, and the best of our energy, land, and natural resources for all people.

“Our freedom is the force of democracy, not the farce of federal fat and personal profit. In our freedom, only the people shall rule. Corporations shall have their role; producing jobs, providing products, paying taxes. No more, no less. They shall obey our wishes, respond to our needs, serve our communities. Our country shall be the citizens’ wealth and our wealth shall build our country.

“Government shall have its role: public servant to our good, fast follower to our sure steps. No more, no less. Our government shall shout with the public voice and no longer to a private whisper. In our government, the common concerns shall be the collective cause.”

Marcel Reid’s explanation described “stealth socialism.” Aggressive tactics like ACORN’s protests and rallies were to gain the credibility that would allow the acceptance of a radical socialist agenda. While Reid was president of DC ACORN they proposed a plan to redistribute wealth in the Washington, DC metro area. This plan was proudly presented to the organization at the 2006 ACORN Year End, Year Beginning meeting in New Orleans. The excerpt below is from page 191 of the 2006 ACORN YEYB Annual Report (click to enlarge).

DC ACORN readily admits that “this proposal would essentially be a redistribution of wealth across the board,” but stealth socialism is so effective that even conservative watchdogs have been fooled by the ever changing names of the ACORN empire.

Obama’s agenda mirrors the ACORN People’s Platform as evidenced by a review of the healthcare and energy sections of  the platform. On healthcare, the ACORN’s socialist people’s platform wants to “require the federal government to provide for the health care needs of recent immigrants. ACORN’s position on Energy shows shades of Cap and Trade with goals like:

Prevent any single corporation or conglomerate from owning major interest in more than one of the following resources: oil, natural gas, nuclear energy, solar energy, and coal; or more than one of the following categories: source, refinery, shipping, or outlet.”

Pay no attention to the white liberal behind the curtain

The “Liberals” who elected Obama President may have a “tower of Babel” moment as gay rights, civil rights, immigration rights, environmental extremists, pro-choicers and all the other special interests that supported the Obama presidential campaign strive to push America further to the left and shed all inhibitions. As with ACORN itself, it seems impossible that the coalition that put Obama in the White House and gave Democrats huge majorities in both the Senate and the House of Representatives will continue to work smoothly together now that Obama and the Congressional Democrats are in control and America is learning what Obama really meant by the seductive-sounding “hope and change.” ACORN needed the cloak of stealth socialism to maintain its hold on the poor. ACORN’s image is synonymous with blacks and other minorities and the race card has become the last bastion of its “hope.”

During its greatest crisis, ACORN replaced its white leader with a black woman in order to hide behind Bertha Lewis’s skin color. What they didn’t want the public to see were the white liberal leaders behind the scenes who have been staying in Executive suites and partying in the mountains.

ACORN Political Operations Retreat November 2007 (among the pictured are senior staff Patrick Winogrond, Jessica Angus, Nathan Henderson-James, Kimberly Olson, Amy Busefink and Johanna Sharrard)

Restoring the balance

Stealth socialism allowed ACORN to set the stage for Obama’s “regime” as they called it internally. Wade Rathke was willing to fall on his sword in 2008 to protect Obama, and to attain what nearly 40 years organizing the country towards socialism promised. After the embezzlement scandal, ACORN board members and staff assembled at meetings across the country and as insiders revealed, and I testified about, “fighting Capitalism” was listed as one of the things “great about ACORN.”

Obama has shown himself to be unrelenting in his quest to pass healthcare, take over American industries and weaken our national security. America can’t afford to be fooled by increasingly obvious tactics of the Far Left. It’s time for the great majority of Americans to turn the tables back on the Far Left by getting involved and organized and voting out incumbents who vote against the traditional American way. We need a morning in America, but it’s always darkest before the dawn.

You can follow Anita on her blog or on Twitter.

]]> http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/05/27/obama-acorn-and-stealth-socialism-dire-domestic-threat/feed/ 5 http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/04/29/post-party-summits-taking-the-fight-to-the-ballot-box/ http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/04/29/post-party-summits-taking-the-fight-to-the-ballot-box/#comments Thu, 29 Apr 2010 17:47:24 +0000 Anita MonCrief http://hotair.com/greenroom/?p=18124

As President Obama vacationed in North Carolina this past weekend, concerned Americans decided to dedicate their time to freedom. The Post-Party Summits, hosted by American Majority, Smart Girl Politics and RedState, kicked off the first Summit in Pittsburgh, PA on April 23^rd. American Majority President Ned Ryun explained the idea behind the Post-Party Summits in a recent interview:

“The Post-Parties are about moving from protesting to implementing, and that’s what was so exciting about Pittsburgh: these people came to learn, realizing that the next iteration of the tea party movement is organizing into a potent political force. And I believe that is the answer to bringing about the change needed in this country: the tea party and 9.12 movements organizing into privatized political infrastructure to advance the great principles of free enterprise, individual freedom, and limited government.”

On Friday evening during the opening dinner, Erick Erickson of RedState gave a rousing speech regarding the next step for concerned Americans. The audience went wild when Erickson stated “The silent majority can no longer be silent.”

The Summit training courses were designed to equip citizens with the tools to effectively participate in the electoral process. Classes include, Creative Leadership,Micro-targeting Precincts, Building Effective Coalitions, Running for Office, Media Coaching: TV and Radio, and a host of other classes designed to train Americans to become more involved in the community. Ryun described it as being:

“A community organizer for Freedom”

American Majority, RedState and Smart Girl Politics plan to train in Denver, CO., Jacksonville, FL., Indianapolis, IN., Boston, MA., Kansas City, MO. and Charlotte, NC. Pittsburgh’s summit attracted over 250 participants and the attention of the far left Daily Kos.

As a instructor, this reporter witnessed reactions that ranged from the amazed to the energized at the Summit. Participants expressed an eagerness to get involved and seemed determined to take the information back to their friends and family. American Majority and several of the instructors provided materials and many took home extra for their friends or groups. Feedback from the Summit is evidence of how important the information was to the attendees.

“This was fantastic. I feel like I just robbed you by only paying $50 for this.”

“The whole workshop was BEYOND my expectations! I never expected the degree of excellence. The information was needed….I look forward to follow-ups to learn even more!”

“This is great! No one should feel alone anymore. Hello world, the vocal majority is taking its rightful place!”

“The social networking, wiki and blog workshops (were most helpful). They opened my eyes to the online world and how much we need to participate.”

“I just came home from the Pittsburgh Post-Party Summit and to think I didn’t even know about your organization four days ago, wow! I am so glad that I followed my instincts and went. It was so informative and now I feel I have a support system in this revolution to get back our country. Thank you for all your efforts…..”

Despite the negative media attention that attempts to paint these new activists as angry or dangerous, what the Post-Party Summit really represented was your neighbor next door, your aunt, your mom, everyday Americans who have decided to organizing is not a matter or left or right, it’s a matter of freedom.

]]> http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/04/29/post-party-summits-taking-the-fight-to-the-ballot-box/feed/ 0 http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/04/21/star-parker-v-radical-ethically-challenged-maxine-waters-acolyte-in-california-37/ http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/04/21/star-parker-v-radical-ethically-challenged-maxine-waters-acolyte-in-california-37/#comments Wed, 21 Apr 2010 12:39:44 +0000 Anita MonCrief http://hotair.com/greenroom/?p=17741 The November 2010 elections are shaping up to be  memorable for residents of California as top Republicans target key districts. Minority leader John Boehner hopes to unseat Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House while Chuck Devore actively campaigns for Senator Barbara Boxer’s seat.

America’s eagerness to vote out corrupt politicians has opened the field for candidates who understand the issues and  promise to resist the lure of the DC power structure.

In California’s 37th Congressional District race that candidate is Conservative leader Star Parker.

Parker “is the founder and president of CURE, the Center for Urban Renewal & Education, a 501(c)3 non-profit think tank that provides a national voice of reason on issues of race and poverty in the media, inner city neighborhoods, and public policy.”

The 37th congressional district includes most of Long Beach and Compton, as well as Carson, Signal Hill, and parts of other municipalities and is represented by the ethically challenged Congresswoman Laura Richardson.

Richardson, who owes her seat to ACORN friend Maxine Waters, made headlines for the foreclosure of her home and pending ethics investigations. One blogger notes:

Richardson, in the meantime, has worked a pretty good deal. She has been elected to a safe (lifetime tenure) African American seat in a Los Angeles area Congressional district, where she reaps campaign contributions from many special interests, including area defense contractors and unions. She walks away from this home and lets the lender, Washington Mutual, take the loss.

To pay for her campaign expenses and personal loan debt to HER OWN campaign she collects additional campaign contributions AFTER Washington Mutual forecloses on her equity strapped Sacramento property and takes the loss.

Her credit score takes a hit but she is an elected Member of Congress with a steady and sizable income. Richardson pays herself back from campaign contributions she accumulates over the course of her election year campaign.

Richardson’s personal troubles culminated with last October’s announcement that ethics investigations would move forward for Richardson and her political benefactor Maxine Waters.

RedCountry noted that other California Democrats began to smell blood in the water:

“According to the Los Angeles County Registrar’s office, Democrats Lee Davis, Peter Mathews and Terrance Ponchak have requested ‘Signature In-Lieu’, which allows candidates during the candidate filing period to collect signatures as a method to reducing the candidate’s filing fee.

Who would ever think that troubles for the Democrats could not get any worse in this 2010 election season?

The irony is for Democrats like Rep. Richardson who can’t stop the noise within their own tent leaves the door open for a possible Republican pickup in this Long Beach area congressional seat.

Anger is brewing throughout the country including here in Los Angeles County and we might see an unprecedented voter revolt come this November!“

Star Parker’s decision to run guarantees national attention on this so called “safe seat” which could lead to the type of national support that turned the Scott Brown race. Conversations with Parker over the weekend revealed a reluctant politician, someone who believed in public service and had spent most of her life dedicated to building a stronger America. Parker surveyed the political landscape and responded to America’s need for new leaders by deciding to run, like Allen West and Chuck Devore. In her syndicated column, Parker explores her reasons for running:

“As I wrote a little over a year ago: ‘I thought we were on the road to moving socialism out of poor black communities and replacing it with wealth producing American capitalism. But, incredibly, we are going in the opposite direction. Instead of poor America on socialism becoming more like rich America on capitalism, rich America on capitalism is becoming like poor America on socialism.’

…The government health care takeover which has just been forced on an unhappy America could not have happened without the cooperation of our large pharmaceutical firms and insurance companies. They should be ashamed of themselves…

I’m challenging a Black Caucus incumbent in a district that political pundits rate ‘safe’ for Democrats.

But this year no Democrat representing low income Americans should feel safe peddling the same plantation policies that already have produced our broken schools, broken families, and broken spirits. Now they’re bringing these bankrupt ideas to the whole country.”

Richardson’s ethics issues, support for heath care and her statements regarding “Comrade” Fidel Castro should be fresh in voters minds come November but according to Open Secrets, Richardson still is heavily union backed. The graphic below illustrates that unions have historically poured money into her campaign, big spenders like SEIU may be expected to step up the donations in order to retain the seat.

Tellingly, Parker does not appear to be concerned with appeasing big labor and explained her fundraising strategy. Parker stated that she needs:

“500 people to each get 50 friends to give $50 dollars.”

Her website Star Parker For Congress is currently accepting those donations and Parker’s campaign is creating quite a stir on the right.

With November around the corner Democrats are gearing up to fight for their political lives as viable and courageous candidates attempt to reign in an out of control government.

ProPublica, the brainchild of Herb and Marion Sandler, received journalism’s top honor this week in conjunction with the New York Times.

“ProPublica, a nonprofit investigative-journalism service, won one of two Pulitzers awarded for investigative reporting for a story on the life-and-death decisions made by doctors at a New Orleans hospital during Hurricane Katrina. The story was a collaboration with The New York Times Magazine.”

I explained last year in a four part series titled ACORN and The Sandler’s: A Four part Review of the Housing Crisis that:

“Ed Lasky’s article in the American Thinker illustrates the role of Herb and Marion Sandler in the subprime meltdown.

‘Herbert and Marion Sandler, a New York lawyer and Wall Street analyst respectively, bought a small California thrift in 1963 and built it into GDW — one of the largest thrifts in the nation. The company’s business was built on adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs. These were mortgages offered at low “teaser” rates that ratcheted upward as interest rates increased. They were often sold aggressively to unsophisticated home buyers who did not comprehend the vast financial risks they were taking, or who assumed that housing prices would rise high enough to provide a profit to them when they sold their houses. They were targets for lenders peddling mortgages that should have been stamped with a skull and crossbones, for these were among the most seductive and dangerous types of mortgage.’

“Lasky goes on to note that groups like ACORN “might also have played a role in the expansion of such mortgages to borrowers who may have lacked the ability to repay the loans.” According internal documents, ACORN Housing often used income that was considered “under the table” in order to qualify its applicants for loans. Lenders like World Savings and Bank of America were long time partners who seemed to also benefit (at the time) from these subprime loans.”

An October 4, 2008 sketch on Saturday Night Live described the Sandlers as “people who should be shot.”

The controversial sketch is available here.

The ever liberal New York Times describes Herb Sandler’s ProPublica as: “a non-profit group dedicated to “a new kind of investigative journalism,” and the Washington Post admits to freely accepting input from the organization regarding articles.”

“Jeff Leen, who heads The Post’s investigative reporting unit, said of ProPublica: “They bring us ideas and we choose from their menu.”

Given obvious lack of interest or real investigation into the background and connections of ProPublica it is obvious why failing newspapers like the New York Times would turn to them for help. A lack of resources for investigative journalists on staff and the inherent desire to push a liberal agenda have led to a marriage of convenience whose very existence threatens the integrity of the field.

Herb and Marion Sandler were named among Time magazine’s list of “25 People to Blame for the Financial Crisis.” for their risky and now toxic adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs). However, in true ACORN fashion, ProPublica points the finger at Wall Street and the banks. In a rather odd original song entitled “Bet Against the American Dream” ProPublica takes a jab at Wall Street. The video can be watched here.

The Times and other newspapers have been complicit in the partisan agenda of ProPublica as s one journalist noted in a must read article on ProPublica (emphasis mine):

“In October 2007 Slate magazine’s Jack Shafer wrote a report on the Sandlers’ political contributions and theorized that the decision by the husband-wife team to fund ProPublica signaled an attempt to use their money and influence “to return us to the days of the partisan press.”

The duo has spent “millions on politics,” Shafer wrote “The Federal Election Commission database shows the two of them giving hundreds of thousands of dollars to Democratic Party campaigns. In 2004, Herbert Sandler gave the MoveOn.org Voter Fund $2.5 million …

As Slate’s Shafer posits in his expose of the Sandlers: ‘If I were a newspaper editor considering ProPublica copy for a future issue, the first thing I’d want is proof of the firewall preventing the Sandlers and other funders from picking – or nixing – the targets of its probes‘ …”

It doesn’t seem that there is much restraint at Sandler’s ProPublica where they have attacked ACORN detractors and refused to investigate any story related to corruption in the Obama administration.

Interestingly, race-baiter and Obama friend Henry Louis Gates Jr. sits on the board of ProPublica while Sandler serves as the board’s chairman. This article sums up the creation of this perfect storm:

“Question: What’s a liberal to do? With the burgeoning popularity of Fox News, the Drudge Report website, the dominance of conservatives on talk radio (Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin et al) and the rising tide of conservative political bloggers, it’s no wonder old-line left-liberal journalists are growing anxious about promoting their message to the media. As daily newspaper circulation plummets and the audience of ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN ages and shrinks, liberals are watching their authority fade. They can no longer set the public agenda without being challenged by conservative media voices.

Answer: Create a media outlet that will produce left-wing ‘investigative’ hit pieces that can be given to cash-strapped newspapers at no cost. “

Here is my question: Could a cash strapped newspaper like the New York Times kill a story related to the ACORN/Obama connection? Leading up to the election Strom’s editors at the Times spiked several stories in relation to ACORN. In particular, despite receiving copies of the loan papers, Strom never printed the a story about its business partner Forest City Ratner. Bruce Ratner and FCR own 48% of the Times building in New York and gave ACORN a 1.5 million dollar loan after the embezzlement scandal of 2008. ACORN, a partner in Ratner’s controversial Atlantic Yards deal, seemed to be protected within the Times.

In October of 2008, Strom left a voice mail informing me that her editors had told her to stand down and in a subsequent phone call revealed to me that the New York Times policy “was not to publish a game changing article for either side this close to the election .”

Congressional testimony by Heather Heidelbaugh, Esq. revealed this story to the public in March of 2009.

“The New York Times articles stopped when Ms. Moncrief, who is a Democrat and a supporter of the President, revealed that the Obama Presidential Campaign had sent its maxed out donor list to Karen Gillette of the Washington, DC ACORN office and asked Gillette and Ms. Moncrief to reach out to the maxed out donors and solicit donations from them for Get Out the Vote efforts to be run by ACORN. Upon learning this information and receiving the list of donors from the Obama Campaign, Ms. Strom reported to Ms. Moncrief that her editors at the New York Times wanted her to kill the story because, and I quote, ‘it was a game changer.’”

Clark Hoyt, the ombudsman for the New York Times, has been working overtime apologizing for the paper’s inability to fully cover the ACORN story. After cries from the right for ignoring the ACORN Primp and Pro sting they were besieged on the left for seemingly misreporting the story.

Could their alliances with ACORN businesses partners, funders and an organization with Obama’s friend on the board have jeopardized their journalistic ethics? Did they deserve journalism’s highest honor? Sadly the answers appear to be yes and no.

The media has consistently failed to cover the ACORN/Obama connection and give it the investigation it deserves. As writer Kevin Mooney noted:

“ACORN’s questionable financial transactions and political activity were explored by the New York Times in the months leading up to the 2008 presidential election. But this reporting was abruptly cut off. Now would be a good time to reactivate the investigation since the organization is supposedly disbanding…

The new affiliates operating without the ACORN name will persist in working for health care reform, immigration reform and affordable housing…

“The Times should activate the investigations that were underway in the months leading up the 2008 election and carefully examine how taxpayer funds were allocated between organizations that were precluded by law from participating in partisan policy activity.”

In a time when top awards like the Nobel Peace Prize and now the Pulitzer have been given for good intentions and agenda driven reasons, it appears that for now the Times will continue to coast along and ride out the ACORN/Obama storm.

After an excellent speech, Liz Cheney takes questions in the media room on Thursday.

After escaping the clutches of the MSM, Andrew Breitbart stops by FTR Radio for a chat.

Andrew Breitbart and Representative Mike Pence? Somewhere Eric Boehlert’s head just exploded.

Georgia’s 12th district candidate Ray McKinney shows me his pocket Constitution. On a side note, Nancy Pelosi disavowed all knowledge that such a document existed.

Representative Mike Pence takes questions from Ed Morrissey and other bloggers in the media room.

After delivering a phenomenal speech, the incredible Herman Cain granted me an interview.

After a tortured battle over health care and the rise of the Tea Party movement, the Republican party is currently engaged in external and internal battles to define its course. One blogger commented on Twitter that “we’re not at CPAC anymore,” and judging from the lack of tea partiers among the Republican party elite, one must wonder if SRLC has suffered during the previous year as RNC donors decided to invested in grassroots initiatives. To anyone paying attention, the disconnect between the Republican old guard and the rising grassroots movement is stark.

On Friday evening a well dressed woman with a VIP badge asked me about the “young man with the water bottle” who spoke that afternoon. The woman was a delegate from Florida and she was referring to Andrew Breitbart.

Breitbart had spent most of the day being stalked by members of the main stream media, including Nightline and reporters from the Associated Press and at that moment, it became clear that while most of the media and the left were consumed with the “Pimp and Pro” sting that the effects of social media and the internet had not reached the very core of the party. This is where the Democrats have the edge of Republicans, and it appears that even after a year of unprecedented political participation, the RNC has done little to bridge that divide.

RNC chairman Michael Steele addressed the recent problems that had been highlighted in the news and many Conservatives are ready to forgive and move on. However, questions remain about the RNC leadership and how to overcome not only the internal divide but also how to engage minority and low-income Americans.

One protester outside of the event toted a hand made sign that read “SRLC, the party is over,” but judging from the hodge-podge of signs and causes represented during the protest, even the left are confused as to why they really oppose Republicans and the RNC.

SRLC featured the shining stars of the party with Mike Pence and Herman Cain creating presidential buzz on Twitter despite straw poll results. As November 2010 rapidly approaches, it remains to be seen whether the party will follow the lead of the tea partiers and get its act together in time.

I leave you with a video of one of the protesters explaining the need for universal health care.

The Center for Individual Rights issued the following press release this afternoon:

News release
For immediate release
Contact: Terry Pell (202) 833-8400
E-mail: <Pell@cir-usa.org>
April 6, 2010

Lawsuit against Anita MonCrief dismissed

Today an abrupt end came to a lawsuit that Project Vote, an affiliate of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), had launched against Anita MonCrief, a vocal critic of both groups. The federal judge hearing the case ordered all claims dismissed based on a stipulation by the parties. Project Vote had sued MonCrief and an unidentified “John Doe” for $5 million in damages.

MonCrief worked for Project Vote for two years but became disillusioned by what she experienced there. In various venues, including testimony in court and before a congressional panel, on national television, and in her own blog, she detailed what she regarded as the corruption of both Project Vote and ACORN.

Project Vote’s lawsuit, filed last year in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, featured a slew of counts, including trademark infringement, tortious interference with prospective economic advantage, and trespass to chattels. Represented by the Kansas City law firm of Graves, Bartle, Marcus & Garrett and the Center for Individual Rights (CIR), MonCrief countersued both Project Vote and ACORN for abuse of process, alleging that ACORN was Project Vote’s alter ego and that the two groups had brought the suit to punish her for exercising her right to free speech and to uncover her sources.

Late last year, the judge dismissed the trademark claims, among others, but the rest of Project Vote’s suit and MonCrief’s countersuit against it and ACORN continued into the pretrial discovery phase. Before that phase went very far, however, the parties agreed to a settlement. In return for MonCrief’s dropping her countersuit for abuse of process, Project Vote agreed to dismiss its claims against her in their entirety.

“This is a stunning victory for Ms. MonCrief,” said Terry Pell, CIR’s president. “By dismissing all of its claims, Project Vote has canceled its arrogant attempt to silence a critic using the courts. Ms. MonCrief now is completely free to continue blogging and speaking about Project Vote and ACORN without fear of this action.”

Pell added, “And the utter failure of Project Vote’s suit should encourage others who wish to speak out against corruption at ACORN or anywhere else.”

More information related to this case

As patriots from across America prepare to descend on Washington, DC to protest the government takeover of health care, the Obama administration is touting the impending vote in the House of Representatives as “historic.” Progressive organizations have been preparing for the moment for decades and not even the outcry of millions of Americans will stop them from pushing their radical agenda through.

Ironically, the past week has been filled with numerous stories of how ACORN is disbanding across the country. News outlets from Politico to the New York Times run stories detailing the demise of ACORN. Of course, some are skeptical about whether ACORN is truly going away:

“In an age of lawlessness, rules for some out of government favor, and special privileges for special classes, racketeers and criminals need only change their suit and their hat and live another day to rob, steal, cheat, and engage in human trafficking… “

Conveniently for the Obama administration the “demise” of ACORN could not have come at a better time. As pictures of empty ACORN offices fill the news, Obama pushes forward with an ACORN planned and approved agenda.

In July of last year ACORN honored the work of Senator Charles Schumer, Rep. Luis Gutierrez and Rep. Maxine Waters at their 39^th Anniversary celebration. The invitation email stated:

“P.S. ACORN’s grassroots leadership believes we are experiencing a once-in-a-generation opportunity and must not squander this moment. Your generosity is needed now more than ever. Thanks.”

ACORN’s socialist agenda has always included some form of universal health care and like many of its “campaigns” this is not the first time ACORN has pushed for national change. The group, which was founded in Arkansas 40 years ago, maintained friendly relations with Bill Clinton when he was Governor of Arkansas and then President. The result of this relationship was HillaryCare. Americans fought back and ACORN was forced to back down. However, ACORN was not defeated and began to put a set of conditions in place that in the right political climate, would ensure victory. Michelle Malkin explains a 2008 ACORN memo on why Obamacare is so important:

“Why do they want Obamacare? An internal ACORN memo I obtained from August 2008 makes the motives clear. ‘Over our 38 years, health care organizing has never been a major focus either nationally or locally for ACORN,’ wrote ACORN Philadelphia region director Craig Robbins. ‘But increasingly, ACORN offices around the country are doing work on health care.’ The goal: ‘Building ACORN Power.’ The memo outlines the ACORN/HCAN partnership and strategy of opposing any programs that rely on “unregulated private insurance” – and then parlaying political victory on government-run health care ‘to move our ACORN agenda (or at least part of it) with key electeds that we might otherwise not be able to pull off.’

The objective, in other words, is to piggyback and exploit Obamacare to improve and protect their political health.”

ACORN’s famous liberal experiments were never outwardly dubbed as socialist action items but within the ranks of employees we knew that what made ACORN great was “fighting capitalism.” By never using certain words with members and outsiders, ACORN painted a picture of the poor rising out of poverty and demanding their fair share. In 2006 ACORN partnered with SEIU on several healthcare campaigns across the country

In California, home of Maxine Waters, ACORN’s healthcare campaign in San Francisco mirrors the same tactics used by Obama to pass Obamacare.

“Health: Last year (’05) we saved health clinics. This year we provided the field experience to win a form of universal healthcare. David Sharples staffed the leadership on the campaign with leader Gisselle Quesada. Using the tax program to survey people on health needs, we were able to build a quick base, identify members who could put a face on the problem, and move numerous members on multiple fronts to move the key supervisor and win the campaign.”

According to the 2006 report, ACORN has been working with hospitals to introduce “universal healthcare” at the local levels and that success was the precursor to Obamacare.

The excerpts above are from a 2006 report available here.

The report goes on to state that even ACORN’s non-profit affiliate Project Vote was somehow involved in healthcare

“Our issue-based GOTV program targeted some 686,796 people for an average of three contacts each. For example, Project Vote’s GOTV workers knocked on 396,273 doors in Ohio alone. Similar to our Voter Registration work, canvassers relate participation in the elections to salient issues in low- and moderate-income communities, such as healthcare…”

Critics on the left will state that it is a coincidence that ACORN and Obama’s old employer Project Vote are both advocating for government run healthcare, but all of the evidence suggests that Obama and Congress are settling debts with their old friends.

Before the ACORN embezzlement scandal and the prostitution videos ACORN was more open about its influence on Capitol Hill. The aforementioned 2006 report has another tidbit about the ACORN political machine:

Immediately after the 2006 mid-term elections when the Democrats took control of Congress members were made aware of who put them there. ACORN used its organizing and voter registration arms to set the stage for Obamacare. Newbies like Democrats Sherrod Brown and Claire Mccaskill were just as beholden to ACORN as long standing members of Congress from ACORN districts. The excerpt and screen shot can also be found in the 2006 report:

“Furthermore, we are working to make sure that key leaders in Congress fully understand the role that ACORN played in the 2006 elections: we are working collaboratively with the political department to ensure that the impact of our political work is widely known and appreciated.”

According to insiders, before the 2008 election ACORN and SEIU were so confident that Obama would win that a meeting in Santa Fe, New Mexico had an agenda that included a session entitled: Emerging Strategies III: Healthcare – Regime Change Priority with Richard Kirsch, Executive Director HCAN: Health Care for America Now

Regime Change?  A quick look at Wikipedia gives us an inkling as to what ACORN and SEIU are up to:

“In politics, a regime is the form of government: the set of rules, cultural or social norms, etc. that regulate the operation of government and its interactions with society. For instance, the United States has one of the oldest regimes still active in the world, dating to the ratification of its Constitution in 1789.

The term is also used to distinguish what is actually being enforced from what is considered legitimate. Enforcement of an unconstitutional statute would be a regime but not a law.“

IIf one follows the money, one name (not surprisingly) emerges: George Soros. The Soros backed Democracy Alliance has pumped untold millions into groups that include ACORN and the architect of Obama’s permanent campaign (Organizing for America), Harold Ickes’s Catalist. The Democracy Alliance vision includes changing America through initiatives like health care.

With leftist billionaires lining up to ensure a permanent majority, the march towards socialism has been a well funded one.

“…George Soros and other wealthy liberals formed a loose-knit group to consider how to fund a political comeback. Their answer: Create a permanent political infrastructure of nonprofits, think tanks, media outlets, leadership schools, and activist groups—a kind of ‘vast left-wing conspiracy’ to compete with the conservative movement. The group they created –called the Democracy Alliance (DA)…”

Though the fall of ACORN was not anticipated, ACORN like the DA is a taxable nonprofit and its structure allows for such restructuring. Taxable nonprofit?  Matthew Vadum explains:

“Rob Stein explained the group’s legal structure to the Hudson panel:

‘It is a taxable nonprofit. Think of it as a corporation that does not make a profit and doesn’t aspire to make a profit. We’re an association of individuals….’

“In other words, the DA has no interest in asking the IRS to register it as tax-exempt or to allow contributions to it to be tax-deductible. Were the DA to request tax-exemption as a 501(c)(4) lobby group or as a 527 political group, it would have to abide by a dizzying array of legal constraints. Members of the Democracy Alliance may want to impose Big Government bureaucracy and red tape on Americans, but the friends of George Soros are too rich to be bothered.”

Was ACORN willing to go underground to save Obamacare? Is the Pope Catholic? ACORN’s own 5 Year Political Plan describes a structure that is local in nature and prides itself on being that way.

ACORN’s temporary fall from grace will allow it to go underground with the tacit support of the White House and use Obamacare to rally its base for a 2012 victory unless the ACORN roots of Obama’s socialist agenda are exposed.

]]> http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/03/20/how-acorn-paved-the-way-for-the-obama-regime-and-socialized-health-care/feed/ 10 http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/03/04/why-the-acorn-8-protect-obama-and-lie-to-conservatives/ http://hotair.com/greenroom/archives/2010/03/04/why-the-acorn-8-protect-obama-and-lie-to-conservatives/#comments Thu, 04 Mar 2010 16:46:20 +0000 Anita MonCrief http://hotair.com/greenroom/?p=16231 Last year ACORN alter ego Project Vote sued me for telling the people the ugly truth. Now the ACORN 8 are attacking me because I have acted on my belief that the people deserve truth, transparency and accountability. (The ACORN 8 slogan only calls for “truth, transparency and accountability within ACORN.”) ACORN 8 spokesman Michael McCray recently noted in a hit piece on me that “others have waged a war of rhetoric and words against ACORN and President Obama” while the ACORN 8 “focused on criminality within the association” and described my allegation of “illegal coordination between Project Vote and Obama Campaign” as not having been “publicly verified.”

Marcel Reid, as a former ACORN national board member and head of DC ACORN, understands the Obama/ACORN relationship AND the thuggish way ACORN pursues its goals.

Evidence exists that suggests that the ACORN 8′s denial of illicit coordination between the Obama campaign and ACORN has more to do with the fact that unlike me, Reid and the ACORN 8 are still radical Obama supporters and that’s why the ACORN 8 have avoided the subject of the Obama/ACORN relationship.

Fact: ACORN 8 leader Marcel Reid emailed me more than a year ago (before Heather Heidelbaugh, Esq.’s Congressional testimony based on my testimony in October 2008 in the Pennsylvania ACORN case, my appearances on Fox News and the sensational ACORN videos) that it is a “fact” that “ACORN isn’t sure that it has it’s fingers around Obama’s throat quite as tightly as they would like” and “might do a little street theater” to “cower him into submission the way they have everyone else with few exceptions.”

The Roots of Obama’s Radical Agenda

Obama’s poll numbers are sliding and his healthcare bill does not have public support, but he continues to push a radical agenda onto the American people. Could ACORN and its leftist allies like SEIU have Obama over a barrel? Someone like Reid, a former ACORN national board member, could have these answers.

Obama and Reid are both alums of the Marxist New Party, and Reid served as an officer of the party. The New Party is described this way:

“Co-founded in 1992 by Daniel Cantor (a former staffer for Jesse Jackson’s 1988 presidential campaign) and Joel Rogers (a sociology and law professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison), the New Party was a Marxist political coalition whose objective was to endorse and elect leftist public officials — most often Democrats. The New Party’s short-term objective was to move the Democratic Party leftward, thereby setting the stage for the eventual rise of new Marxist third party.

Most New Party members hailed from the Democratic Socialists of America and the militant organization ACORN.“

If the ACORN 8 are misleading America about their knowledge of ACORN’s political activities and its relationship with Obama, what else are they lying about? Grab a cup of coffee and get comfy, we are going to dig into the accusations by McCray and the facts the ACORN 8 want to avoid. Note: Click on the pictures below to enlarge.

Fact checking the ACORN 8

Lie #1 “Mailroom MonCrief”

My article titled “For CPAC and Glenn Beck: the Truth About the ACORN 8” predictably produced a pained response from the ACORN 8: Michael McCray’s article titled “ACORN Whistleblower / Anita Mailroom MonCrief” posted days later by James Murtagh. Instead of addressing allegations of an internal ACORN power struggle, the ACORN 8 have decided to present a set of lies as fact.  McCray’s article is lacking in substance but high in rhetoric and misdirection, with even the title set up to misinform people and belittle the target, me.

Unsurprisingly, McCray was upset that I “refused [ACORN 8's] advice and pursued [my] own individual advocacy against ACORN and Project Vote.” Contrary to what is stated in his article, I always knew that the ACORN 8 would cover for Obama and I declined to be a part of the group.

What was surprising is that McCray tried to discredit me with a sexist strategy (“hell hath no fury,” he wrote) and a bogus description of me as a former ACORN mailroom employee.

“…perhaps the most damning revelation comes from court filed pleading by Anita MonCrief herself in her answer to Project Vote’s $5 Million lawsuit against her Case No. 09-cv-01109 (RWR).

ANSWER OF DEFENDANT ASHAWNITA MONCRIEF

Paragraph #22 which reads

’22. Defendant [Anita MonCrief] admits that a Pitney Bowes postage meter machine was installed at Project Vote’s Washington, D.C. office…

This is an incredible admission because it means that Anita MonCrief admits she worked in the mailroom at Project Vote….”

The ACORN/Project Vote Washington, D.C. office did not have a mailroom and, although I certainly don’t disparage mailroom employees, I have never been one. I am equally surprised that a lawyer such as McCray, who is affiliated with several legal non-profits and who appears to have helped draft the ACORN 8′s “civil RICO” complaint, would make such a demonstrably false claim.

In December of 2009 I appeared at a House Government Oversight and Reform Committee’s  GOP Forum on ACORN and submitted the followed description of my duties at ACORN/Project Vote. A copy of the testimony is available here.

While at ACORN/Project Vote, I worked in the Strategic Writing and Research Department (SWORD) within ACORN’s Political Operations (POLOPS). As part of the SWORD staff my title was Writer/Researcher. My salary was paid by Project Vote, with which I held the title of Development Associate, but I had an ACORN email address.

In addition, to combat more revisionist history from the ACORN 8, here is an unmodified copy of ACORN’s own 2006 Year End Year Beginning (YEYB) Report, the same one quoted recently at Andrew Breitbart’s Big Government.

The ACORN 8 appear to be so comfortable with the fact that the lies they have told on national television about ACORN have largely gone unchallenged that McCray has decided to invent more.

Perhaps McCray did not check with other ACORN 8 people as to the access I had. And unfortunately for the ACORN 8 few of his outlandish accusations would pass muster at a middle school newspaper.  Using tactics honed through years of ACORN campaigns and organizing strategies, the ACORN 8 exhibit exactly the type of mentality that founder Wade Rathke encouraged in his ACORN Community Organizing Manual.

McCray strove to discredit me because the ACORN 8 could not disprove any number of facts stated in my previous article, so they resorted to common Alinsky tactics of ridiculing, polarizing and attacking the enemy. It is worth noting that ACORN and its affiliate Project Vote have taken legal action against its real threats, Andrew Breitbart, Hannah Giles, James O’Keefe and myself. All of us are victims of multimillion dollar lawsuits.

As this leaked internal ACORN email posted by National Review shows, ACORN talked to the lawyers about an employee because “he knows too much. He can hurt us.” Surprisingly, besides a cease and desist letter, ACORN has largely left the ACORN 8 to spread their revisionist history. A history that did not pose a threat to ACORN’s survival.

The other explanation could be that the leader of the ACORN 8 had signed a joint defense agreement (JDA) with ACORN that none of the other members were aware of. Did that include the other members of the ACORN 8?

In sharp contrast to McCray, the Republican National Lawyers Association expressed a different opinion of me in a blog post after I spoke at CPAC 2010.

“leading figure in the fight for fair elections” and the “ACORN whistleblower ACORN [who] had the CPAC crowd on its feet” by describing her experiences working with ACORN and how the organization engaged in a concerted effort to learn the provisional and absentee ballot laws in each of the 50 states in an effort to see where they could get away with mischief” and “achieved their ultimate goal of the Presidency with the election of Barack Obama”

Lie #2 Muscle of the Money?

Another excerpt from McCray’s poorly written diatribe states:

“Mailroom MonCrief made two powerful allegations which have never been publicly verified (1) illegal coordination between Project Vote and Obama Campaign / Donor List and (2) SEIU Muscle for Money program which are two of the rights favorite accusations.”

The funny thing about lies is that it is often hard to keep track of them. In October of 2008, as the ACORN 8 were struggling to gain attention with their lawsuit against Wade Rathke, I testified under oath about the Muscle for Money Program was the first mention of the program. ACORN 8 leaders Marcel Reid and Karen Inman feigned surprise and then recounted stories of reluctant participation.

“Muscle for Money has generated significant opposition within ACORN.

“‘I don’t mind being up on a soapbox to get someone’s attention but I would much rather talk an’ negotiate, said Karen Inman, a Minnesota resident and former ACORN national board member. “But I just refuse to go someone’s home, that’s a privacy issue and I think this ‘Muscle for Money’ program really went too far.”

“Inman and Marcel Reid, a former board member based in Washington D.C., formed ACORN 8 in October 2008 …The lack of financial transparency and the continued use of Muscle for Money techniques remain top concerns for the whistleblower organization, which has about 30 dues paying members in multiple states, Inman said.”

Reid also seems to have selective memory about her numerous press statements regarding Muscle for the Money and she apparently does not recognize the very evidence she provided. The following email provided by Reid, president of DC ACORN, is from Inga Skippings of the SEIU Equity Project regarding the Carlyle Group.

Reid also provided a similar email to CNN regarding SEIU/ACORN and bank bailouts.

The Fox News special titled “The Truth About ACORN” and broadcast on October 2, 2009 did not address the illegal coordination, but it certainly covered the second, with guest Marcel Reid claiming that she was shocked to learn what “Money for the Muscle” involved when she participated in it with National Paint and Coating as the target. The video can be accessed here and Marcel’s statement begins around minute 16.

Lie #3 The ACORN 8 exposed a one million dollar embezzlement scandal

Further proof of the ACORN 8′s self-serving revisionist history lies in the following statement from their “response article”:

Marcel Reid a former ACORN Board member (DC) who blew the whistle following the $1 Million Embezzlement and co-founder of ACORN 8;

Karen Inman a former ACORN Board member (MN) who blew the whistle following the $1 Million Embezzlement and co-founder of ACORN 8;

Michael McCray a former ACORN Board delegate (GA) who blew the whistle following the $1 Million Embezzlement and ACORN 8 spokesperson;

Nonsense. There is a whistleblower to credit. Neither Marcel Reid, nor Karen Inman, nor Michael McCray was that whistleblower. While working as a confidential source for the New York Times, I found out that not only is the real anonymous whistleblower known to the ACORN 8 but also New York Times Reporter Stephanie Strom. The ACORN embezzlement story was made public by The New York Times on July 9, 2008:

“A whistle-blower forced Acorn to disclose the embezzlement, which involved the brother of the organization’s founder, Wade Rathke. ‘We’ve told them that when the process is ended, we’ll have a look at it,’ said Dave Beckwith, executive director of the Needmor Fund, which has given money to some of Acorn’s charity affiliates for at least 10 years and was contacted by the whistle-blower in May.”

So here is the time-line:

May 2008- ACORN funder, the Needmor fund was contacted by a whistleblower in May.

July 2008- Bertha Lewis, Marcel Reid and Karen Innman all appointed to positions of power within ACORN. New York Times article appeared.

August 2008- After the proposed hand over to Kappa Alpha Psi Federal Credit Union was declined by ACORN and CCI, Marcel and Innman sued CCI and Rathke.

That time-line hints at the truth behind ACORN insider allegations that the plotters of a successful coup began to immediately fight amongst each for control. Court documents point to Reid’s relationship with KAPFCU and the question of whether she was really acting on behalf of ACORN:

So far it has been established that the ACORN 8 have a serious problem with the truth if it does not suit their needs and/or financial goals and we have learned that they are hesitant to debate the facts of my argument.

Over a once Mighty Oak, Tiny Nuts Fight for Control

ACORN insiders paint a tale of internal strife and power struggles that date back to at least 2006. On page 37 of the aforementioned ACORN YEYB report, ACORN Wade Rathke hinted at this struggle:

“Leadership Maude Hurd, as President, and her team continue to be somewhat embattled but opposition has become more specific and marginalized on many issues. It is easiest to understand the national board though these days as having two parties: the ruling party and the opposition party. Some progress was made in some ways in the October meeting in moving the opposition party to being more of a ‘loyal’ opposition, and that is a hopeful sign, if it continues to trend.”

Evidence exists to suggest the departure of Wade Rathke as a result of a whistleblower disclosing the embezzlement scandal permitted the opposition party to use the embezzlement to gain control. ACORN board meeting notes seem to suggest at the alliance between Marcel Reid, Karen Inman and Bertha Lewis that was exposed in my prior article

Bertha takes control:

Lie #4 KAPFCU

In addition, Michael McCray appears to be very upset that his connection to KAPFCU has been exposed and so he tried to rewrite history.

“KAPFCU was contracted by an ACORN management committee to investigate and perform due diligence following the $1 Million embezzlement….”

I told the real story in “For CPAC and Glenn Beck, The Truth About the ACORN 8,” backed with citations and screen shots but I do have additional research.

Apparently, Reid’s unsolicited proposal from Michael McCray’s Kappa Alpha Psi Federal Credit Union (KAPFCU) could be considered part of  the opposition party of the ACORN board strategy to control ACORN for their own gain.

The proposed agreement between ACORN and KAPFCU was an attempt to wrestle control of CCI’s ACORN business for the benefit of KAPFCU without disclosing a potential conflict of interest.. As a member of the associate board, McCray had significant financial interest in this deal. Fourth quarter reports show a net worth of just over $831,083.41 for KAPFCU, so one can assume that millions of dollars a year and control of ACORN’s vast financial network may have been incentive for the ACORN 8′s next actions.

When the proposal was not immediately accepted, Inman and Reid descended on New Orleans with an attorney ACORN insiders claim was hired and paid for by the KAPFCU. The ACORN 8 hired James Gray, the former law partner of William “Cold Cash” Jefferson.

What followed can only be described as misleading press pieces and self-serving statements such as the ones below. The ACORN 8′s lawsuit filed in Louisiana District Court (ACORN vs. Rathke, et al., case no. 08-8342,) was dismissed, but a number of misleading articles and statements made their way into the press.

ACORN insiders state that Reid manipulated the situation. When their deception was revealed to the board, a number of members voted to withdraw the lawsuit and then to remove Reid and Inman. According to ACORN Association board meeting notes dated June 20, 2008, Bertha Lewis and Steve Kest were tasked with hiring professional consultants, not Reid. Inman and Reid’s positions were temporary and the committee reported to the entire board. Reid was expected to  step down at the next board meeting in October of 2008.

The ACORN 8 paint a scenario of ACORN leadership throwing them out, but their peers voted for each action including one of their own ACORN 8 members. Coya Mobley initially voted to withdraw the lawsuit, but changed her mind three days later in a rambling email to the board:

“He is beating us down as if he was our Slave Master with a whip and still creeping into our homes to take what ever he can get. And, all we are going to do is say Master please don’t whip me any more, don’t rape me any more, don’t master don’t!!!!!!!!! WAKE UP PEOPLE……….SLAVERY IS OVER……….STOP THIS MADNESS AND GET OFF OF WADE RATHKE’S TRAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!. “

Mobley repeated the same sentiment on the 6/22/2009 episode Glenn Beck show in a video that has been yanked from the web.

As this is the only video of the ACORN 8 on Glenn Beck that has disappeared, one has to wonder if the removal of the video may have something to do with the embarrassing admission of active participation in the Muscle for Money program.

The Root of All Evil

Michael McCray’s KAPFCU is the nation’s first “virtual credit union” and as a small credit union, KAPFCU is constantly looking for opportunities to grow:

“In 2008, KAPFCU has applied for $100k in financial assistance and $500k in technical assistance.

…Vic also announced that there’s a $1.2B credit union in Baton Rouge that is designated as a low-income institution. This allows them to take in secondary capital, and not affect their net income ratio. KAPFCU is currently at 3.18%. The NCUA would like us to be at 7%. So, the low-income designation is one of the vehicles that KAPFCU plans to utilize to increase its net income ratio.”

In what appears to be a closely knit network of affiliated organizations with the same board members and suspect motives the ACORN 8 are really similar to ACORN. PRWeb searches show press releases where the related organizations laud each other (here, and here)  and in some cases bestow newly created awards on members of the group. My prior article touched on this network, but research has uncovered additional affiliates of the ACORN 8. The new list is as follows:

The Congress Against Racism and Corruption in Law Enforcement (CARCLE)

Power Over Poverty Under Laws of America Restored (POPULAR)

The ACORN 8

The International Association of Whistle-blowers (IAW)

National Judicial Conduct and Disability Law Project

The 3.5.7 Commission (appears to be inactive)

The E-Accountability Project

Focus on Indiana

National Forum On Judicial Accountability (NFOJA), the official network of Community Forums on Judicial Accountability (CFOJA)

As the KAPFCU Administrator of Community Development Financial Initiatives, McCray seems well placed to coordinate the activities of the organizations, including lending the KAPFCU name to rival ACORN projects:

By starting an organization in direct competition with ACORN and then “Whistle-blowing” on ACORN, the ACORN 8 appears to have deceived America into believing that their intentions were noble.

The biggest PR move involved the so-called Department of Justice complaint. The complaint to the DOJ addressed the embezzlement scandal and used a number of examples to support their “civil RICO” complaint. No disputing the facts here, ACORN is corrupt. However, what is missing from the complaint is intriguing and ties the ACORN 8 back to Obama. Reid appeared eager to file the complaint and was even ready to send it to the press without some exhibits being prepared by the lawyers (screenshot below).

At the last minute the complaint was amended to protect Obama’s mentor, former ACORN leader, Madeline Talbott and her husband, Keith Kelleher. Talbott, is also a fellow New Party alum of Reid and Obama. National Review Online provides the background:

“ACORN’s leading role in the New Party as the result of a conscious decision by the organization to move into electoral politics in a more substantial way than they had been able to solely through their political action committee. In addition to [Wade] Rathke and [Zach] Polett, a key early supporter of the New Party was Obama’s closest ACORN contact, Madeline Talbott.“

The startling fact about the “Department of Justice Complaint” is that when filed in District Court by an ACORN 8 member, it was dismissed. Despite the presence of lawyers McCray, and Zena Crenshaw Logal in the ACORN 8, the complaint was found to lack the basic requirement of a cause of action.

“In the law, a cause of action (sometimes called a claim) is a set of facts sufficient to justify a right to sue.”

The judge dismissed on the grounds that the complaint lacked standing and a cause of action, but it did generate the desired media attention the ACORN 8 needed after the Rathke case was dismissed. Click here to read the entire decision.

Dissecting McCray’s Final Lies

Lie #5 Disparaging other ACORN Whistleblowers

McCray, a co-chair of the International Association of Whistleblowers, used the “MGM” acronym for myself, Michael Gaynor and Michelle Malkin without crediting the originator, blogger Michael Volpe. McCray seems to adopt the same faulty logic as Volpe, who assumes that if someone I know writes a piece about a person or even mentions their names, that is disparagement. For the record, I have never attacked Greg Hall, Hannah James, James O’Keefe or any of the others named in McCray’s rant. Mentioning someone or pointing out facts in regards to the ACORN 8 is not meant to disparage (unless the truth is damaging for that individual).

“Mailroom MonCrief, offered one piece of information purporting to link Project Vote and the Obama campaign which has yet to be publicly proved. She studied the ACORN 8 website and presented our arguments and information as her own until the ACORN 8 cut her off. She became frustrated and resentful having no other contacts or access to inside information, and so she began to attack Marcel Reid, the ACORN 8 and any other noteworthy ACORN critic.”

Two quick things here;  first, besides some puff pieces about the embezzlement and a failed lawsuit against ACORN, the bulk of the ACORN 8′s accusations only involved actions related to the board and their financial rival in the KAPFCU deal, CCI. It was only after my October 2008 testimony, that the ACORN 8 started to acknowledge real ACORN criminality.

Second, if one were to apply McCray’s logic, then HE would be accused of attacking James Murtagh, the other co-chair of the International Association of Whistleblowers, or these statements by Volpe, who wrote at length about Murtagh,

“Dr. Murtagh was paid off to the tune of 1.6 million dollars and silenced at the exact same time that the NIH was investigating Grady Hospital…”

Volpe continued:

“Former Grady trustee Bill Loughrey tells me that the settlement with Dr. Murtagh was never approved or even accurately described to Grady’s board of trustees. He says that he was stunned to learn that tax dollars were paid to Dr. Murtagh, conditioned on his silence. He thinks the agreement is invalid and that the judicial process has been misused.”

Volpe is a minor character in the ACORN 8 story, but he offers an opening to explore a pattern of behavior by Marcel Reid of lying and manipulating bloggers and some media persons.

Volpe’s reward for writing hit pieces on Reid’s enemies was a recommendation of his Wade Rathke interview to Breitbart’s Big Government. Reid helped a so-so writer with a very small following gain access and attention he could not have gotten on his own . As the screen shot of a misdirected email below illustrates, Reid is quite content to pull the strings and let others do her dirty work. While she “lols”, her fingerprints are covered by so-called bloggers like Volpe.

Bloggers and journalists who have written favorable pieces on the ACORN 8 have been granted appearances on “Beck”. Including the late blogger Nancy Armstrong (MsPlaced Democrat).

Print journalists Kevin Mooney and his friend Matthew Vadum, associates of both myself and the ACORN 8, both made appearances during “ACORN 8 week.” Marcel and I worked on a number of pieces with both Vadum and Mooney, who have been responsible for a number of breaking pieces on ACORN. Vadum and I have also appeared on the G. Gordon Liddy Show.

Lie #5 “Rage Against the Beck”

In yet another ridiculous error-filled and sexist claim McCray states that:

“On March 13, 2009 [This should be May 13, 2009] U.S. Representative Michelle Bauchman [It's Michele Bachmann] (R-MN) appeared on the Glenn Beck show and announced a press conference she was having on Capital [This should be Capitol] Hill. Rep. Michelle Bauchman [Michele Bachmann] disclosed the topic was ACORN and she invited both Marcel Reid and Anita MonCrief to participate in the event. In response, Glenn Beck encouraged Michelle Bauchman [Michele Bachmann] to continue to put pressure on ACORN but he advised her to be careful with Anita MonCrief considering her checkered past. From that day forward Anita MonCrief has engaged in a personal vendetta against Beck, Reid and ACORN 8 for the slight she believes she received from Glenn Beck on March 13, 2009 [May 13, 2009] – hell hath no fury. “

What McCray does not state is that Marcel Reid had promised Beck’s producers that she would deliver me as she had promised other whistleblowers and ACORN experts to Beck. On May 10, 2009 while reviewing the Elizabeth Kingsley report with Marcel, I took a call from Susan Wertheim of the Beck show on Marcel’s phone. Here is the follow up email Susan sent.

I had begun working with a Eric Shawn of Fox’s America’s News Headquarters. I trusted Shawn’s work on ACORN and finally decided to go on TV and tell my story. On Mother’s Day, I appeared with Shawn and the Nevada Secretary of State.

This appearance had been in the works for sometime and Marcel was aware of this, so when I got the following email from Beck’s Producers, I assumed that Marcel had arranged it and gave her the back story.

Megyn Kelly interviewed me the next day, and Beck wanted me for that evening. Things went a little haywire because, as a novice, I did not know that by accepting Megyn’s invitation that I would upset Beck’s producer Susan, and what followed is a clear indication of how alliances can compromise the integrity of a story. Susan lectured me on the competition for guests at Fox and indicated that I had committed some type of faux paus by appearing on anything but Beck first.

Just two short months after the March show with the RNLA’s  Cleta Mitchell, on which I declined to be interviewed, but for which I provided important background on the AIG bus tour, Beck began warning others, including Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, to stay away from me in favor of the ACORN 8.

Michael McCray appeared in my place in what became “ACORN 8 Day.”

Despite Beck’s slight, even he can not deny that I have provided much evidence connecting ACORN/Project Vote and Obama. The problem with me seemed to lie in the fact that Reid could not control me and make me appear on “Beck” at her command, and it apparently became easier to spread lies than to deal with someone who would not compromise herself for Reid’s power grab. Just a month later,  Beck did not mind relying on my blog for information that would serve as the background for at least two of his shows.

Realizing that we can not let the Left silence us, I put my feelings about Beck’s comments to Bachmann aside, and supported Beck during a summer boycott of his advertisers by the Van Jones affiliated Color of Change.

McCray insinuated that I attacked Beck in my first piece, but instead I pointed out the same inconsistencies in his approach that many other conservatives like Mark Levin have pointed out. Did the ACORN 8 fool Beck? After all, McCray portrays himself and his ACORN 8 allies as friends of the conservative movement.

“MonCrief is featured favorably in the OGR committee report along with Karen Inman, Michael McCray, the ACORN 8 and Marcel Reid who also attended the conservative convention.”

Marcel Reid is about as conservative as Max Blumenthal, who also showed up for his own purposes at CPAC 2010.

Lie #6 The ACORN 8 are allies of the conservative movement

The ACORN 8 use conservatives for their own purposes and those conservatives either do not know the reality of the ACORN 8 or accept the ACORN 8 as an enemy of their enemy.

McCray went on to state:

“We have never professed to be anti-ACORN or anti-Obama. Although many other conservative activists want us to be; which brings us back to Anita MonCrief.”

“While others have waged a war of rhetoric and words against ACORN and President Obama we have focused on criminality within the association…. We have not criticized others for their activism and collaborate with those whom we share common interests; and we respectfully disengage from those who do not share our goals or approach.”

As one blogger put it at Hot Air in a post about Beck, “Its not conservative”

Lie #7 Anita MonCrief is a thief

Beck’s CPAC speech mentioned ‘redemption’ a number of times and like it or not, he did make some powerful points. By admitting that he is not perfect, he opens a door to himself and let’s people in. People love him for his boldness and the way he interacts. Redemption means acknowledging fault and being vulnerable in a public way. I’m not perfect, as I’ve explained repeatedly (here,  here,  here, and here ) but I admitted that I was on the wrong path.

Despite the way Beck speaks of redemption, he still used the fact that I put personal expenses on a Project Vote credit card to warn Bachmann away, a tactic used repeatedly by the ACORN 8. The ACORN 8 have joined ACORN in trying to discredit me now that I am exposing them. I testified under oath regarding the credit card matter and discussed it on “The Laura Ingraham Show” in October 2008. Contrary to what McCray would like you to believe, I did not try to pass my expenses off as company expenses and was paying the balance. I wrote about it extensively here.

Conclusions

I have addressed the allegations made by McCray in his piece without alliteration, slogans or lies.  On the other hand, the ACORN 8 have done everything to paint themselves in a favorable light while bullying and marginalizing anyone who dares to speak the truth about them

The irony is that as America fights back against Obama’s dictator-like attitude towards passing healthcare, we are continuing to make the same mistakes of the past. ACORN was funded during Republican administrations because we did not have our own infrastructures in the minority and low-income areas. Unfortunately for Republicans and conservatives is that what was most expedient was also most harmful. ACORN invaded our schools, toyed with our banks, wrecked havoc on the electoral system, and laid the groundwork for a permanent leftist majority. By aligning ourselves with radicals to solve one problem, we create others. The ACORN 8 have been conning conservatives and protecting Obama and his dangerous agenda.

ACORN appears to have honed these tricks and has now decided to re-brand on a national scale. However, given its history, many are skeptical:

“If you want to see whether ACORN is really changing its ways, check to see whether the signatories to those local ACORN bank accounts are changing. When it comes to ACORN, the money is the organization, and the name is just the name.”

In order to operate effectively, ACORN requires little public scrutiny and a lot of lore and misdirection (think registering Mickey Mouse to vote). For 40 years ACORN’s organizing model has survived social revolutions and political upheavals and to understand ACORN a review of the 1970′s “manifesto” of ACORN founder Wade Rathke is essential.

ACORN Community Organizing Model

Acorn Organizing Model

Keeping up with the little nuts that have fallen off Rathke’s tree has begun and one has to wonder how long before another mighty “oak” is formed.

“In a message that resonates to this day, President Reagan proclaimed, ‘Our people look for a cause to believe in,’ and then asked: ‘Is it a third party we need, or is it a new and revitalized second party, raising a banner of no pale pastels, but bold colors, which make it unmistakably clear where we stand on all of the issues troubling the people?”

“The ACORN 8 is America’s last, best chance to empower low and moderate income members of society through Integrity in Community Organizing.

“If you love ACORN and its original mission; you should support the ACORN 8. If you hate ACORN and its corrupt practices; you should support the ACORN 8. If you are an ACORN member and tired of being ignored; you should support the ACORN 8. If you are an ACORN employee and tired of being sacrificed for senior management; you should support the ACORN 8. If you are an ACORN donor and want to be sure you were not a victim of funder fraud and that your contributions are not being used for illegal political activities; you MUST support the ACORN 8. If you are a taxpayer and want to be sure your tax dollars are not funding a corrupt organization; you MUST support the ACORN 8.”

“KAPFCU’s Administrator of Community Development Financial Initiatives Michael McCray says of his CU:

‘As a virtual institution, we’ve been an ugly duckling for nearly four years. Our balance sheet and profit/loss profile differs from most community based credit unions.

We don’t have a physical office, we operate through a 20 member advisory board and management team. KAPFCU provides service to the entire country – instead of a local geographic market. We just don’t look like the typical low income or community development credit union. Consequently, it has been very difficult for us to successfully receive financial support from credit union or philanthropic communities’

Independent columnist Michael Gaynor has done the legwork on this one:

“…McCray had opportunistically responded to the ACORN embezzlement scandal by pushing for Kappa Alpha Psi Federal Credit Union (KAPFCU) to replace Citizens Consulting, Inc. (CCI) as ACORN’s accountant and ACORN 8 leaders and former ACORN national board members Marcel Reid and Karen Inman quietly helped him.

The truth is that the ACORN embezzlement scandal presented a golden opportunity to take control and make lots of money and McCray recognized it and acted, with the assistance of ACORN 8 leaders and without disclosing McCray’s interest in KAPFCU (http://www.kapfcu.org).

KAPFCU’s bid to replace CCI and do ACORN’s accounting work failed, despite the best efforts of McCray, Ms. Reid and Ms. Innman.

As reported in ACORN’s Submission in Support of Its Petition for Writ of Quo Warranto in the now dismissed ACORN v. Rathke case filed in a Louisiana state court (available at http://www.capitalresearch.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/10/acorn-v-rathke1.pdf):

…”These two Board members, and their attorney, further attempted to coerce the Board by reporting that the Temporary Restraining Order had been granted, attaching a copy, instructing the Board, IMC, Senior Staff, and the Executive Committee to comply with its terms, and warning the Board that it may otherwise be participating in concealment of evidence and violations of federal law. In fact, at the time Mr. Gray wrote the Board, IMC, Senior Staff, Executive Committee and Corporate Counsel, he and his clients knew that the bond had not and would not be paid and that the TRO was not in effect. This pesky fact was not reported to the members of the ACORN Board, all of whom are non-lawyers or to ACORN’s Corporate Counsel.”

Even more significantly, the Submission continued: “ACORN is also concerned about the relationship between the two Board members who filed the suit, their attorney, and KAPFCU, an organization that the two Board member promoted to take over the financial responsibilities of ACORN from CCI, one of the named defendants in the Petition. Mr. Gray holds himself out as representing both ACORN and KAPFCU in this matter, which appears to present a conflict of interest. ACORN has not hired KAPFCU, the KAPFCU proposal is not responsive to the Board’s resolution for financial review, and KAPFCU has no legal interest in the litigation. KAPFCU’s only interest in this litigation is in taking over ACORN’s business from CCI. Mr. Gray has ignored ACORN’s request to explain the relationship, and ACORN specifically refuses to waive the conflict.”

“…’Moncrief finally agreed to go on the record’ and Strom had scheduled a meeting with her. It was when she called Moncrief to cancel the meeting that Strom allegedly told her that her bosses had killed the investigation to protect Obama. Obviously, if Strom was about to hit pay-dirt with an on-the-record witness, Daley’s assertion that she killed the story because Strom ‘had come up empty-handed’ is false.

Hoyt interviewed Strom, of course, but–rather remarkably–he does not reveal what Strom told him about her conversation with Daley in which Daley killed Strom’s ongoing investigation. That’s a rather significant omission, isn’t it? Instead, Hoyt merely quotes Strom’s observation that she did write a story on ACORN that appeared on October 22:

Before they were to meet, Strom said, another source gave her an internal report detailing concerns about impermissible political activity by Acorn and its tax-exempt affiliates. The resulting article was published on Oct. 22.”

After halting The Times Obama/ACORN investigation, Reid’s loyalty to the progressive cause may have led her to befriend a reluctant whistleblower who had the goods on Obama and ACORN. As noted in the recently released report by the the House Oversight Committee, Reid and I began as allies exposing ACORN wrongdoing. We were both radical Obama supporters and she urged me not to hurt Obama’s election prospects by accepting an invitation to do Fox News on the days before the election.

“IF the idea for ACORN to go after Wade is decided upon–the recommendation is to wait until after December–elections, ACORN needs to get their corporation in order, clean house in terms of getting paperwork in order, etc.”

Following O’Keefe’s arrest in Louisiana, ACORN has proceeded to do a number of victory laps, claiming vindication. A glowing Bertha Lewis appeared on the Ed Show to crow about this latest development, and today ACORN is pushing for prosecution in Maryland and California. Raw Story has the full story here.

The link within the email lands here.

Anita MonCrief

From a tiny acorn, a mighty oak can grow. With ACORN’s help, Barack Obama “grew” from an ACORN community organizer and instructor, to an ACORN lawyer and ACORN benefactor as a board member of donor organizations, to an ACORN-backed Illinois state senator, to ACORN’s favorite United States Senator, to ACORN’s candidate for President of the United States in 2008. This article shows how ACORN and its allies helped organize America to make Obama President in this, the computer age.

Barack Obama’s meteoric rise from rookie Senator to President had man marveling at the efficiency and breadth of his campaign. Obama’s ability to fund raise had seasoned experts playing catch up while his voter registration money machine operated in the background. In 2008, the New York Times explored a seemingly innocent tactic the Democrats were utilizing to elect Obama. The article stated several times that the Republicans had honed this technique and Democrats were just “borrowing the play.”

“For years, Republicans had the landscape to themselves. More recently, however, Democrats, along with such allies as trade unions and progressive groups, have poured millions of dollars into building two formidable databanks. One is managed by the Democratic National Committee and can be used by candidates up and down the ballot. The other is Catalist, a for-profit company headed by Harold M. Ickes, a Democratic political operative, that specializes in providing data for scores of liberal groups supporting the Democratic ticket as well as for the Obama campaign itself.”

Progressive organizations, trade unions and a for profit group run by someone who had been implicated in the radical Teamstergate saga of the 1990′s? The crack reporting of The Times glossed over this toxic mix, and the Obama machine kept running.

Harold Ickes‘ company, Catalist, has been credited with creating this machine:

“Catalist collects and stores millions of pieces of information from public records and commercial sources. In addition to voting rolls and tax information, it also has data about voters’ magazine subscriptions and their cars. Campaigns also contribute e-mails, cell-phone numbers and even times when people are likely to be home.

Ickes, 69, said that by using Catalist the Obama campaign is able to generate data as detailed as lists of swing voters who are home in the afternoon in a six-block neighborhood in Cleveland, Ohio. The list can even suggest which voters would be receptive to a pitch based on Obama’s ‘change’ theme, and which may be more interested in his health-care or energy policies.”

The origin of Catalist is intriguing and appears firmly rooted in the same community organizing spirit that has spread throughout the country.

“Even before I was an elected official, when I ran Project Vote voter registration drive in Illinois, ACORN was smack dab in the middle of it, and we appreciate your work.” -Barack Obama

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now or ACORN spent a number of years perfecting an organizing model that resembled that of Catalist and the Obama Campaign. ACORN’s close “affiliate” Project Vote detailed their efforts in a 2007 report:

“The Pilot Technology Project carried out during the summer and fall of 2006 was a first attempt to integrate the potential of high quality enhanced data developed for voter participation programs with on-going grassroots community organizing programs. Building upon the work of Catalist (formerly Data Warehouse LLC), Project Vote deployed an updated version of our online voter management system (VBASE) to enable local community organizations to access a robust voter file with enhanced phone numbers, geographic and demographic information for use in voter mobilization, membership development and organizational capacity building.”

Apparently, ACORN and Project Vote were “smack dab” in the middle of another one of Obama’s voter registration drives. According to ACORN reports, ACORN was Catalist’s first client. Let me be clear, the ACORN VBASE, is the archetype of the Obama campaign. ACORN’s technology combined with union money elected a president.

To understand the importance of Catalist to the Obama Campaign and later Organizing for America I have included the educational screen shot below.

The writer of the article above sums up the relationship this way:

“Think of MyBo / Party Builder / VAN Votebuilders as being the tool sets and interface for volunteers, staff and field organizers, and Catalist as being the organizer and repository for the data as it flowed in and out of various OFA systems.”

A 2005 Year End ACORN Political Operations PowerPoint further illustrates ACORN’s involvement in the creation of the system that powers the President.

Matthew Vadum’s profile on the OFA offers some background on the major players but the hows and whys have largely gone unnoticed. In addition to a payment made from Obama for America directly to an ACORN affiliate, Project Vote managed to secure the Obama 2nd 2007 donor list. After all, this cross sharing among campaigns, non-profits and unions appears to have been the goal of the ACORN VBASE. A 2007 report the the Beldon Fund regarding a $75,000 grant lays the groundwork.

“The reason that VBASE, a customized database system has such value in the work of Project Vote’s field partners, such as ACORN, is because the model of groups like ACORN integrates year-round community organizing with heavy bursts of civic engagement work.”

ACORN insiders describe the Obama presidency as a “once in a generation opportunity” and ACORN was prepared to make it happen. Research uncovered details the concerted effort of a myriad of non-profit, 527′s LINK and union organizations skirting campaign finance and IRS codes. While ACORN is not directly involved with the Voter Activation Network, ACORN affiliates/partners are. America Votes, SEIU, State Voices and even the DNC’s owned VoteBuilder share information through this alliance.

In 2007, Project Vote was ready to launch their “beta” phase of the VBASE project and targeted a state that had been made friendly by the election of ACORN ally Ohioan Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner:

“The initial beta version of our 2006-07 database was piloted in Ohio by one of our local community partners. This pre-launch was a bug-testing period for the new system, addressing issues of file access, remote support, and appropriate server load.”

Brunner campaign consultant, Karyn Gillette was set to join Project Vote after successful work on the Brunner, Sherrod Brown and ACORN connected Ohioans for a Fair Minimum Wage campaigns. Meanwhile, Obama was running a massive campaign in Ohio and ACORN’s partnership with Catalist allowed a for profit business to market their state of the art organizing technology:

“The success of this program is such that Project Vote will be incorporating it into its 2007-08 Voter Participation Program. While we are still wrestling with the details, we are committed to rolling out this sophisticated and robust system to support the civic engagement efforts of our local partners as they pursue voter registration and voter education programs and as they integrate those efforts into their on-going community organizing programs”

The perfect marriage of ACORN and Catalist was made possible by the deep pockets of the unions:

“Michael Podhorzer, Deputy Political Director of the AFL-CIO, has said: ‘Catalist is an essential part of the foundation necessary for building progressive political power in our country. The labor movement relies on the state of the art political technology services provided by Catalist and we are proud to be an early subscriber.’

Discover the Networks goes on to explain the motivation behind Catalist:

“Reasoning from the premise that the United States is a nation rife with racism and injustice, Catalist notes its commitment “to using [its] talents and technology to nurture a vibrant, growing, progressive community, and to working with that community towards a more just, equitable and tolerant America.”

Obama has repeatedly denied any real ties to ACORN. If Obama is lying about organizing, could this mean that there is another purpose over at Organizing for America. Over the summer the nation witnessed the President call out this ready brigade to pass health care and stifle dissent. It’s time for the mainstream media to focus on what ACORN is really doing.

The “history making” Obama machine was directly engineered by ACORN’s voter database experiments. ACORN’s sister organization, Project Vote, received tax exempt money to fund a venture with the for-profit Catalist. Catalist, the Voter Activation Network, SEIU and America Votes provided the needed cover that allowed ACORN to operate in the background.

Without regard for tax codes or campaign laws; candidates and groups like America Votes, SEIU, Project Vote and other “progressive organizations” at times share staff, resources and donors. ACORN boasts over 440,000 member families and Obama benefited from the free flowing data between the campaign and ACORN provided by Catalist.  America is now facing a progressive agenda backed by a ready army of paid organizers trained in ACORN tactics, and the name Organizing for America seems to be missing a question mark.

I have invited Carol to guest blog at my sites this week for Part I. Carol’s courage in standing up for America and the information provided has allowed me to write the stunning Part II that will follow shortly.

Thank you,
Anita MonCrief

-By Carol Greenberg

Obama’s “permanent campaign” Organizing for America has managed to skirt campaign finance laws while continually providing the unprecedented “opportunity to help the president.” Countless emails fill boxes across America with the sender name President Barack Obama.

Organizing for America has kept a high profile and played a key role in the healthcare debate. Obama’s managed to turn his extraordinary campaign model into a post-election campaign/organizing website where OFA honed their method of using the internet to reach progressives to push through his increasingly unpopular agenda.

During Barack Obama’s campaign he used a similar tool and website called “Obama for America.” Utilizing the skills he learned at ACORN as a community organizer, Obama was able to acquire the “highest office in the land”. In an election night quote from November of 2008, Obama addresses a crowd who voted for “Hope” and “Change.”

“This victory alone is not the change we seek —
it is only the chance for us to make that change.”

— President Barack Obama, Election Night, 2008

And almost immediately after Mr. Obama was elected, the name of his campaign tool “Obama for America” was changed to “Organizing for America.” Here is a screen shot:

Interestingly, on Jan. 17, 2009, three days before Mr. Obama is sworn into the Presidency, he announced the switch-over from “Obama for America” to “Organizing for America.”

And here is a screen shot of Organizing for America, or OFA; in its present state. If you notice, it has Mr. Obama’s name on it:

The bottom half of the screen shot is not visible, but trust me: it says “Project of the DNC.” For those of you who wish to examine the site, the link is here.

Throughout the ensuing months between Mr. Obama’s roll-out of OFA and the present I have taken a peek at the site every once in awhile, out of curiosity to see what he was saying. Frankly I’m not sure if any other man in the Oval Office ever had a web page, but this one is asking visitors to “create an account.” Hmmmm… That’s really different. So I did. And I signed up for his e-mails. After all, shouldn’t we ALL want to be privy to the message our President has to say?

I watched the site, and received his e-mails. And many times was disconcerted, being a Conservative; about WHY he always seemed so successful at overturning any efforts, Congressional votes, etc. that Conservatives brought forward.

One day I received an e-mail alerting me to an “OFA Training Seminar.” It was to be a 4-hour session on community organizing, his way. And the seminar was not far from my home. I remember the saying “it is always good to learn the ways of one’s enemies” so I decided to attend. Undercover. As one of “them.” The opposite side of the table.

We had a ball. There was meet and greet time, we were fed pizza and all the trimmings; unfortunately no beer. There was a video. Papers were passed out, “cheat sheets” of how to approach prospective people to educate them about Mr. Obama’s policies and agenda. And also ways to entice them to vote for progressive candidates. We broke up into small groups. We made friends. We rehearsed with one another the spiel we would give in the “community organizing arena.” By the end of the evening we were one big happy family. I went home that evening without committing to anything. I figured I would get a follow-up phone call, tell them I wasn’t interested, and that would be the end of it. But all the while I kept thinking there just has to be more to this than what I experienced that evening. Mr. Obama was winning “big time” at everything he undertook.

Unexpectedly about a week later I received another “opportunity.” An e-mail from OFA inviting me to be part of one of their on-line “webinars” which would teach canvassers how to enter information into OFA website databases. I was intrigued, but vacillated. After all, this would be going deeper into the “belly of the beast.” But I ultimately decided I would probably never get another opportunity such as this, so being the brave woman that I am I RSVPed in the affirmative. This was based out of the home, a conference call with a trainer on-line, using one’s own computer only as an observation tool. There was no disclaimer ahead of time, I was invited; so I decided while the trainer was moving through the OFA/Votebuilder system I would get some screen shots. Which I did. But don’t get any ideas out there anyone. This is a highly secure and password-protected website. And because this was a demonstration, I do not have any access to the website.

The conference call training session was meant to give users an overview of the system, and I was surprised at its design and detail. For example, below is a database of persons contacted and the result of what is called “Member of Congress” commits. In other words, who has agreed or not agreed to contact their Congressperson.

When the “webinar” was over, and I had the time to take a good look at the screen shots, this is when I was stunned. I realized finally this is why the Conservative movement has been taking a hit all these months. I have to give 5 stars to their system. It is highly organized and every call, every contact, every encounter is logged. Every precinct in the country is in the website which allows for detailed study and analysis of canvassing and vote results.

I let it go for a few days. Undecided about the importance of what, if anything I had discovered. Probably just good for a teaching lesson to the Conservatives about how we need to become more organized, just like the premier “Community Organizer in Chief.”

I have done a couple of diaries for RedState. A few days later I encountered a diary by Moe Lane, and it was about OFA. Only his opinion was the complete opposite of mine. That post Correcting the Record on Organizing for America is linked here. It’s a short post, but all the while I was reading it, the more agitated I became. Moe Lane is a great and respected writer, but after all he had not experienced and seen first hand what I had.

I decided to do a “rebuttal” post. Sorry Moe, but I have to rebut your OFA assessment. That post can be found here. And a couple of weeks later, Moe Lane did another post on OFA. Revisiting Sifry and the OFA withering. This is when I decided that some action needed to be taken to inform others about the formidable group that OFA has become.

First I am going to post a few screen shots from the OFA/Votebuilder/DNC website. Any and all data that may be able to identify someone’s identity has been removed.

Here is a screen shot of canvassing results. Notice how all data is carefully logged.

Another shot, this one of one of their volunteers and his/her territory to be canvassed:

Mr. Obama also has a database of people who are “underinsured” that he can contact and trot out at a moment’s notice when he needs a sob story for his Healthcare Reform:

Next we have a screen shot of the dreaded “rapid response teams.” These are the people Obama’s OFA rolls out during a “crisis” to be door-knockers, set up phone banks; etc. These are the same “rapid response teams OFA rolled out for the Scott Brown Massachusetts senate race “crisis” and the Blanche Lincoln Arkansas “crisis”:

Have you ever wondered how Obama was able to “toss” Lincoln in October, to get her to “cave” on the Healthcare vote? Here is my final screen shot:

Notice that the “team” had 114% more “vote commits” than hoped for, for a total of over 7,000 phone calls, doors knocked on, and visits to Lincoln’s office. This my friends, is why Conservatives are losing in the organizing arena.

If you’ll notice at the top of each screen shot, it says “VoteBuilder” somewhere, so I decided to see what I could find out about “VoteBuilder.” And it wasn’t very difficult.

My research took me to February of 2007. Howard Dean, then Chairman of the DNC, announces the creation of a state-of-the-art voter-file interface. This will be called “Votebuilder.” I am including a couple of pertinent excerpts from the announcement below. The link to the full announcement is found here.

Today, the Democratic National Committee announced that it has signed a deal with Voter Activation Network (VAN) to create a nationwide voter file interface for the DNC’s national voter file. The new voter file, which has been renamed “VoteBuilder”, builds on both the significant enhancements and upgrades Chairman Dean made during the 2006 election cycle and the critical investment in the DNC’s voter file made by former Chairman Terry McAuliffe. The new, web-based tool will ensure that from the National Party to the state parties, Democratic candidates have access to the state-of-the-art tools needed to help win elections. VoteBuilder also represents the next step in Chairman Dean’s efforts to build and strengthen the infrastructure of the Democratic Party. [sic]

And this quote from Howard Dean specifically:

VoteBuilder will enable users to more easily and effectively sync data automatically, and facilitate the swapping of data between state parties and the DNC, thereby providing state parties and candidates with the most up-to-date and accurate voter data available. As an example, the DNC will be able to create an updated nationwide list of voter contacts on a daily basis.

My state, Ohio, was more than just a battleground state during Election 2008 because of Secretary of State Brunner and the ACORN debacle, so I decided to do some research on those “little nuts.”

Anita MonCrief’s blog gave me a wealth of information.

ACORN’s 501(c)(3) non-profit arm Project Vote needed an effective way of classifying and organizing all their “VR” or “voter registration” cards into a local database. At the time, all their cards were being sent to a central national database entry company to be compiled. According to insiders in ACORN Political Operations, ACORN had learned from the failures of the Clinton adminstrations and decided that a successful “Progressive” agenda required collaboration. ACORN relied heavily on Project Vote, whom often describe themselves as:

“the largest non-partisan voter participation organization in the United States and a leading provider of technical assistance and direct services to the larger civic participation community.“

Project Vote proposed the creation of a “List Acquisition and Enhancement Project” which would allow them to build a strategic plan to build and maintain statewide voter files in all states, particularly in states crucial to electing progressive candidates, Ohio being one.

The lists would include voter data, demographics, or “metrics,” and consumer data among other things.

Interestingly, Project Vote’s ambitions described above are similar to Howard Dean’s “pride and joy” VoteBuilder. VoteBuilder was designed by the Voter Activation Network who unsurprisingly list the “usual suspects” as clients.

Part II will reveal reveal the ACORN connection through a variety of “partner” and affiliate organizations created to deceive America about who is really pushing the Obama Agenda.

(Click to enlarge)

In a move that is oddly fitting for a President who failed to interrupt his Hawaiian vacation to respond to a terrorist attack, Barack Obama is heading to Massachusetts to assist his base of union and community organizers.

“Obama is headed to Massachusetts Sunday to campaign for Democrat Martha Coakley, whose race against Republican Scott Brown has narrowed to a toss-up as voters zero in on the cost of a massive health insurance bill in Congress.”

As the left struggles to maintain “Ted Kennedy’s Seat” the cracks are beginning to show in a radical agenda many believe was crafted by leaders at groups like the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. As Brown supporters eye the state warily, ACORN has largely gone underground in Massachusetts. Beginning in the 1970′s ACORN has operated silently in states across the country conducting “progressive experiments” in liberal states like Massachusetts through the use of organizing around ballot initiatives.

Allamon of The Allamon Cartoon Blog

Lisa Ranghelli, a Massachusetts native, authored a report entitled ACORN Wins: The Monetary Impact of ACORN Campaigns, A Ten Year Retrospective, 1995-2004. Ranghelli’s report listed several ACORN legislative agenda items like predatory lending laws and minimum wage increases “tested” in Massachusetts shortly before a nationwide campaign:

“Categorized by issue area, these totals encompass the estimated monetary benefits of some of ACORN’s major campaigns between 1995 and 2004, including:

• Passage of 11 living wage ordinances, and minimum wage increases in Illinois, Massachusetts, Florida, New York, and the City of San Francisco.
• Legislation limiting predatory lending in Massachusetts, New Mexico, California, New York and New Jersey, and improvements in federal regulations.

…STATE EITC INCREASES

Finally, ACORN has successfully increased the earnings of low-wage workers by allowing them to keep more of what they make. In Massachusetts, ACORN led a coalition that won an increase in the state Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) in 1999, from 10 percent of the federal credit to 15 percent, or a 50 percent increase. According to the State Department of Revenue, close to $21 million additional dollars went into the pockets of low-income taxpayers annually after the increase was implemented.”

After the disastrous defeat of HillaryCare in the 1990′s, liberals began to operate under the idea that “all politics are local” and both before and after Ted Kennedy facilitated ACORN’s leftist agendas that were precursors to ObamaCare. In a 2006 report ACORN details its next steps after assisting Democrats with “taking back Congress:

ACORN Legislative Agenda for 2007

Working Families Agenda

Minimum Wage – Soon after the new Congress gets to work in January, both the House and the Senate are expected to move bills to increase the minimum wage to $7.25 an hours in three steps by 2009. While almost everyone believes this will pass (and Bush has indicated he will sign an increase), the fight will be over getting a clean bill – without poison pill amendments such as small business tax breaks or “protection” of small business from health insurance costs (read: higher premiums and insurance cut offs for our members). ACORN will take a leadership role in both raising the profile of the issue with our friends in Congress in select Congressional Districts in Dec and Jan – AND targeting some moderate Republicans and weak Dems who are more likely to go along with the poison pills.

Soon after we get the $7.25, Sen. Kennedy will introduce a more ambitious bill to restore the value of the minimum wage to its historic levels (more like $9.00/hr.) AND index it to inflation. We’ll likely have to fight for this bill for many years, and it is not likely to be a very big priority in year one, 2007.

Paid Sick Days – ACORN intends to make the fight for paid sick day a big one in 2007. To supplement our city and state campaigns on this issue, we will push for the Healthy Families Act (introduced by Sen. Kennedy and Rep. DeLauro), which would require employers to provide 7 paid sick days a year.

Kennedy’s unequivocal support led to ACORN attempting to establish its now embattled Working Families Party in Massachusetts:

“The Working Families Party in New York and Connecticut continued to establish themselves shrewdly as political forces. The ballot project in Massachusetts to advance election opportunities (read fusion) made it to the ballot, which was never easy, but unfortunately could not overcome some of its negatives, so lost decidedly by a woeful margin, even in the trenches of liberalism. This will be something that we will have to answer in the future.”

As speculations of desperation regarding ObamaCare swarm around the Internet, see Hot Air, for example,  ACORN has continued working silently through partners like Emily’s List and America Votes. The ACORN agenda became the cornerstone of the Obama campaign and then presidency, with Obama and Democrats fiercely protecting ACORN along the way.

“In 2007, for the first time in 12 years, we will be working with a Democratic controlled Congress. Without being overly optimistic (after all, it takes 60 votes to pass anything controversial in the Senate, and Bush is still President), we are developing an ambitious agenda of programs and priorities that we will be pushing for. In particular, we will be paying attention to how our allies in Congress can assist us in our campaign work by holding hearings and otherwise shining a spotlight on our issues and targets – something that only the majority party can do.

Furthermore, we are working to make sure that key leaders in Congress fully understand the role that ACORN played in the 2006 elections: we are working collaboratively with the political department to ensure that the impact of our political work is widely known and appreciated.

Legislative priorities will include:

ACORN Working Families Agenda, including an increase in the minimum wage, paid sick days, expanded EITC, and Childcare assistance.

Immigration reform, which may actually move early next year.

Legislation outlawing predatory lending practices (as opposed to just stopping bad pre-emptive legislation).

Additional funding for housing counseling, and a separate pool of funding for delinquency/foreclosure counseling and outreach.

A housing trust fund – which will make funding available for our development program.

Possible legislation on RALs, payday lending, and other predatory financial practices, as well as support for our VITA and benefit access centers.

Election reform, on voting machines, voter registration issues, etc…

As Coakley continues to make mistakes that would cripple anyone on the right, her status as an empty suit for the “Kennedy Seat” has almost reached satirical proportions. What ACORN and the Democrats did not count on was the same qualities that first made Kennedy appealing to voters are being exhibited by Brown. Brown’s supporters see him as a wild card, someone who is going to shake things up and listen to the people. Hopefully Ted Kennedy would be proud.