Acorn, some facts for a change

midcan5

Member
The right wing bogeyman ACORN tries to make sure the poor and the minorities have a voice in America. This is a good thing, as the conservative nanny state for the wealthy has changed the country for the worse ever since Reagan began the war on the middle class working American. Of course it is controversial to the wingnuts, they worship greed and money. Regular people and their right to a fair and level playing field need a voice too. For too long only the rich have had power and you see clearly today the effect that has had.

The Truth About ACORN's Voter Registration Drive

by Bertha Lewis and Steve Kest

"Election Day is less than a month away, and our efforts to make sure that low-income and minority voters have a voice and vote on November 4th are in full swing. Unfortunately, just as we've seen in previous election cycles, the more success we have in empowering these voters, the more attacks we have to fend off from partisan forces making unfounded accusations to disparage our work and help maintain the status quo of an unbalanced electorate. We want to take this opportunity to separate the facts of our successes from the falsehoods of our attackers."

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2008/10/10
 
I prefer the economy Carter and Volker were responsible for in 85 to the mess Nixon made that came to full head in 1980.
That would be LBJ's spending and War, seeing as how the economy began tanking in 1968. Also, since the economy had recovered by 1976 with an historically low misery index, the credit must either be Nixon or Ford's. It took Reagan the better part of two years against pressure to cave in (1982 has been called the Reagan Recession for reasons of sheer ignorance) until he could bring the Bull Market to bare (no pun intended).
 
Fact: Our canvassers are paid by the hour, not by the card, so there is NO incentive for them to falsify cards. ACORN has a zero-tolerance policy for deliberately falsifying registrations, and in the relatively rare cases where our internal quality controls have identified this happening we have fired the workers involved and turned them in to election officials and law-enforcement.

Well now, this is interesting. When I first heard about this, I am thinking... well maybe the ACORN people had some motivational incentive to pad the books, but here we have the admission that this isn't the case, it doesn't benefit them one bit to turn in bogus registrations. To me, that completely nullifies any possible explanation for doing it, other than the obvious intent to defraud the election. What other motivation would there be? It doesn't mean any more money for the ACORN worker, if they are caught doing this, it costs them their job, according to what I read... so why would they? Only one reason I can think of, can anyone else think of another???
 
The right wing bogeyman ACORN tries to make sure the poor and the minorities have a voice in America. This is a good thing, as the conservative nanny state for the wealthy has changed the country for the worse ever since Reagan began the war on the middle class working American. Of course it is controversial to the wingnuts, they worship greed and money. Regular people and their right to a fair and level playing field need a voice too. For too long only the rich have had power and you see clearly today the effect that has had.

The Truth About ACORN's Voter Registration Drive

by Bertha Lewis and Steve Kest

"Election Day is less than a month away, and our efforts to make sure that low-income and minority voters have a voice and vote on November 4th are in full swing. Unfortunately, just as we've seen in previous election cycles, the more success we have in empowering these voters, the more attacks we have to fend off from partisan forces making unfounded accusations to disparage our work and help maintain the status quo of an unbalanced electorate. We want to take this opportunity to separate the facts of our successes from the falsehoods of our attackers."

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2008/10/10

What ever their intent is at ACORN there's an unacceptable lack of institutional control if not out right corruption in the organization.
 
What ever their intent is at ACORN there's an unacceptable lack of institutional control if not out right corruption in the organization.

When wearing my cynics cap I agree. But that is life.


"Can you direct me to the railway station?" asks the stranger. "Certainly," says the local, pointing in the opposite direction, towards the post office, "and would you post this letter for me on your way?" "Certainly," says the stranger, resolving to open it to see if it contains anything worth stealing." Amartya Sen
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Well now, this is interesting. When I first heard about this, I am thinking... well maybe the ACORN people had some motivational incentive to pad the books, but here we have the admission that this isn't the case, it doesn't benefit them one bit to turn in bogus registrations. To me, that completely nullifies any possible explanation for doing it, other than the obvious intent to defraud the election. What other motivation would there be? It doesn't mean any more money for the ACORN worker, if they are caught doing this, it costs them their job, according to what I read... so why would they? Only one reason I can think of, can anyone else think of another???

Ok, lets look at other reasons.

If you were a temp working who was lazy. (and I don't think its a stretch to think there are thousands of lazy workers out there) If you don't feel like busting your butt out in the heat to get registrations, you don't put much effort at all into it. And when it gets close to time to turn in your cards, you know that turning in 3 completed cards will get you fired. So you fill out a few dozen in your kitchen and have some friends join in.

That is not an outrageous scenario. It is certainly more feasible than saying that ACORN hired hundreds (thousands?) of temp workers in order to commit fraud.




The basic problem here is who do you expect to oversee the registration of voters.

If you expect a group that is focused on volume to do so, when they are not allowed access to the databases that you would need to do it, then ACORN is the enemy.

If you expect the office tasked with verifying and completing voter registration to do its job, then ACORN is nothing more than a community action group that has grown.
 
The Complete Guide to ACORN Voter Fraud

October 14, 2008 - by Jim Hoft

And you thought 2000 was bad.

This year’s election is shaping up to be one of the most controversial in history. Just this week, a [1] federal judge ordered Ohio’s top elections official to verify the identity of newly registered voters by matching them with other government documents. The very next day a 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals[2] set aside the federal judge’s order on verifying registrations.

Further igniting the voter fraud/voter registration debate was the news that a national community organizing group is being investigated in at least 14 states and several swing states for massive irregularities. This news would make headlines anyway, but what made it worse was that Barack Obama was a key player in this organization, the [3] Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, in the past. Obama [4] trained its local leaders, [5] represented the organization in court, and worked to [6] funnel funds to the organization. The Obama campaign also [7] donated $800,000 this year to an ACORN affiliate.

What is ACORN?

The [8] Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) is a community-based organization that advocates for low and moderate income families founded in 1970 by Wade Rathke and Gary Delgado. [9] Rathke, one of the most powerful hard-Left activists in America, is a former member of a radical 1960s group, the [10] Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). The Weathermen terrorist group split off from the SDS in 1969. [11] ACORN says its priorities include better housing and wages for the poor, more community development investment from banks and governments, and better public schools.

ACORN is also known for its voter registration efforts.
[12]

This year alone [13] ACORN has registered 1,315,037 voters.

Although the organization prides itself for its registration efforts, it also has a long history of scandal. In the state of Missouri in 1986, [14] 12 ACORN members were convicted of voter fraud. But that case was not an isolated incident in the state. In December 2004, in St. Louis, six volunteers pleaded guilty of dozens of election law violations for filling out registration cards with names of dead people and other bogus information. Authorities launched an earlier investigation after noticing that among the new voters was longtime St. Louis alderman Albert “Red” Villa, who died in 1990. The volunteers worked for “Operation Big Vote” — a branch of ACORN — in St. Louis.

On February 10, 2005, Nonaresa Montgomery, a paid worker who ran Operation Big Vote during the run-up to the 2001 mayoral primary, was found guilty of vote fraud. Montgomery hired about 30 workers to do fraudulent voter-registration canvassing. Instead of knocking on doors, the volunteers sat at a St. Louis fast food restaurant and wrote out names and information from an outdated voter list. About 1,500 fraudulent voter registration cards were turned in.

In October 2006, St. Louis election officials discovered [15] at least 1,492 “potentially fraudulent” voter registration cards. They were all turned in by ACORN volunteers.

In [16] November 2006, 20,000 to [17] 35,000 questionable voter registration forms were [18] turned in by ACORN officials in Missouri. Most all of these were from St. Louis and Kansas City areas, where ACORN purportedly sought to help empower the “disenfranchised” minorities living there. But the ACORN workers weren’t just told to register new voters. The workers [19] admitted on camera that they were coached to tell registrants to vote for Democrat Claire McCaskill.

In 2007, in Kansas City, Missouri, four ACORN employees were [20] indicted for fraud. In April of this year [21] eight ACORN employees in St. Louis city and county pleaded guilty to federal election fraud for submitting bogus voter registrations.

And, that was just Missouri.

This year there have been several accusations of fraud against ACORN. Over a dozen states are investigating the organization already. Here is a complete list of the ongoing investigations:

North Carolina — State Board of Elections officials have [22] found at least 100 voter registration forms with the same names over and over again. The forms were turned in by ACORN. Officials sent about 30 applications to the state Board of Elections for possible fraud investigation.

Ohio — [23] The New York Post reported that a Cleveland man said he was given cash and cigarettes by aggressive ACORN activists in exchange for registering an astonishing 72 times. The complaints have sparked an investigation by election officials into the organization, whose political wing has supported Barack Obama. Witnesses have already been [24] subpoenaed to testify against the organization.

Nevada — Authorities [25] raided the headquarters of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now on Tuesday October 7, 2008, after a month-long investigation. The fraudulent voter registrations included the Dallas Cowboys starting line-up.

Indiana — More than [26] 2,000 voter registration forms filed in northern Indiana’s Lake County filled out by ACORN employees turned out to be bogus. Officials also stopped processing a stack of about 5,000 applications delivered just before the October 6 registration deadline after the first 2,100 turned out to be phony.

Connecticut — Officials are looking into a [27] complaint alleging ACORN submitted fraudulent voter registration cards in Bridgeport. In one instance, an official said a card was filled out for a [28] 7-year-old girl, whose age was listed as 27. 8,000 cards were submitted in Bridgeport.

Missouri — The Kansas City election board is reporting 100 duplicate applications and 280 with fake information. Acorn officials [29] agreed that at least 4% of their registrations were bogus. Governor Matt Blunt [30] condemned the attempts by ACORN to commit voter fraud.

Pennsylvania — Officials are [31] investigating suspicious or incomplete registration forms [32] submitted by ACORN. 252,595 voter registrations were submitted in Philadelphia. Remarkably, 57,435 were rejected — most of them submitted by ACORN.

Wisconsin
— In Milwaukee ACORN improperly [33] used felons as registration workers. Additionally, its workers are among 49 cases of bad registrations sent to authorities for possible charges, as first reported by the Journal Sentinel.

Florida — The Pinellas County Elections supervisor says his office has [34] received around 35 voter registrations that appear to be bogus. There is also a question of [35] 30,000 felons who are registered illegally to vote. Their connections with ACORN are not yet clear.

Texas — Of the 30,000 registration cards ACORN turned in, Harris County tax assessor Paul Bettencourt says just more than 20,000 are valid. And just look at some of the places ACORN was finding those voters. A church just next door is the address for around 150 people. More than 250 people claim a homeless outreach center as their home address. Some listed a county mental health facility as their home and one person even wrote down the [36] Harris County jail at the sheriff’s office.

Michigan — ACORN in Detroit is being [37] investigated after several municipal clerks reported fraudulent and duplicate voter registration applications coming through. The clerk interviewed said the fraud appears to be widespread.

New Mexico – The Bernalillo County clerk has notified prosecutors that some 1,100 fraudulent voter registration cards were [38] turned in by ACORN.

That’s not all. So far this year at least 14 states have started investigations against ACORN. Talk about a culture of corruption. It is so bad that Representatives of Congress [39] have asked for the Justice Department to investigate, and GOP presidential candidate John McCain is [40] bringing it up in his stump speeches. The Obama camp is [41] stealthily altering its “Fight the Smears” website to distance themselves from the organization — quite a challenge considering how close their candidate’s association has been with the group.

The liberal vs. conservative, voter fraud vs. voter intimidation debate will no doubt continue after this election. But this year, with the assistance of scandal-plagued ACORN, it appears that — so far — the voter fraud side is winning.



LOL

Just today in the news they had Mickey Mouse registered as a voter.

http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/elections/article852295.ece
 
From everything I have read ACORN has cooperated completely with all the investigations they have had.

Also, if you will notice, there are lots of cases where voter registration cards were found to be bogus.



How do they find this out? Often by comparing them to the SSN databases and DL # databases. Those are the most accurate ways of doing this.

Would you prefer that ACORN have access to the DMV & SSI databases?

I am all for busting anyone who commits these frauds.

If there is any evidence that the frauds were perpetrated by ACORN itself then close the organization down.

So far I haven't seen it. I haven't seen it any more than I have seen that McCain is responsible for people calling for Obama's death.
 
What ever their intent is at ACORN there's an unacceptable lack of institutional control if not out right corruption in the organization.
Seriously. Standing around doing nothing at all to fix the issues while saying, "We're being robbed!" is definitely not showing any reasonable person that they even have any urge whatsoever to be straight up with what they have been doing. They create a culture within the organization that rewards lying and fraud and do nothing at all to fix it except just keep on paying those people...

If I ran even a simple gas station that way I'd be fired.

It may be all we see is the tip of the iceberg and the excuses.

It may be incompetence but it doesn't appear that way when all they do is stand around with hands in pockets and talk about how they've been the "victims".
 
People they have hired ten of thousands of people and these lying bastards who fill out mikey mouse are harming ACORN.

a couple of dozen people out of tens of thousands.

How many wall mart employees have ever been prosecuted with a crime?

You who are attacking ACORN on this issue are obviously people who are partisan hacks.
 
People they have hired ten of thousands of people and these lying bastards who fill out mikey mouse are harming ACORN.

a couple of dozen people out of tens of thousands.

How many wall mart employees have ever been prosecuted with a crime?

You who are attacking ACORN on this issue are obviously people who are partisan hacks.
I think that people who believe that any company who rewarded people for directly lying was somehow still a good company are partisan hacks.

Again, I still believe we only see the bare tip of the problem and that it is far more prevalent than has been identified. As I see the leaders of ACORN tell me, "Yup, we're the victims" yet see no institutional changes in how they conduct the business.

Either they are inept, or there is a reason for continuing the same practices that are clearly negative impacting.
 
OK I must be missing something?

where is the part of them rewarding people for directly lying?
Fill out bunches of forms, get paid more. Reward... Duh.

You are missing what you don't want to see. Instead of fixing the issues they stand about and complain about how victimized they are.

They aren't victims, they created this system for a reason.
 
Fill out bunches of forms, get paid more. Reward... Duh.

You are missing what you don't want to see. Instead of fixing the issues they stand about and complain about how victimized they are.

They aren't victims, they created this system for a reason.


AAAANNNTTT!

You got it wrong!

They DO NOT pay per reg ,they pay by the hour.

That is just one of the LIES that have been swirling arround this crap.
 
AAAANNNTTT!

You got it wrong!

They DO NOT pay per reg ,they pay by the hour.

That is just one of the LIES that have been swirling arround this crap.
And they give extras for more regs. Don't be directly obtuse purposefully so you can sit around and have joy-joy feelings about that you want to feel good about. To have you call people "partisan hacks" is laughable.

They incentivize the activity that is causing them their problems. Quotas, etc.
 
Lets see proof of what you claim?

They pay by the hour.
There is absolutely no reason for people to falsify documents otherwise Desh, use just the tiniest bit of logic, it will go a long way.

Again, when they get people past their fear and to talk we are going to find more than just this. I have a friend working at a local news station that says that it isn't far away either.
 
Here is the reason people do this Damo: They are people who dont understand that these phoney regs will be looked at by ACORN. They think that it wont be traced back to them.

Its the same reasons some employees ANYWHERE do stupid things.

Do you realize this does not benifit ACORN in ANY possible way?

Why commit a crime that hurts you and gains you absofuckinglutely nothing?

Why did you not use that part of logic in your thinking?
 
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