09.29.09
ACORN, fraud, and the military industrial complex
Over the last several weeks the “Right Wing Noise Machine“, their version of the mighty wurlitzer, was cranked up in an effort to take down Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN. Their mission includes “building community organizations that are committed to social and economic justice”, and “helps those who have historically been locked out become powerful players in our democratic system”. While some of their employees, it appears, have made mistakes, they deserve the same treatment as any federal contractor. That those in a hurry to punish ACORN have inadvertently ensnared the military industrial complex and it’s fraudulent contractors, is ironic.
Rachel Maddow on her show last week did a great job of showing how the bill to defund ACORN could cause huge problems for some military contractors.
Here is another article on that topic, Whoops: Anti-ACORN Bill Ropes In Defense Contractors, Others Charged With Fraud.
The congressional legislation intended to defund ACORN, passed with broad bipartisan support, is written so broadly that it applies to “any organization” that has been charged with breaking federal or state election laws, lobbying disclosure laws, campaign finance laws or filing fraudulent paperwork with any federal or state agency. It also applies to any of the employees, contractors or other folks affiliated with a group charged with any of those things.
In other words, the bill could plausibly defund the entire military-industrial complex. Whoops.
Two must reads on why the right is attacking ACORN. First this one from Jamison Foser, Like a dog that’s been beat too much.
A new study by professors at Occidental College and the University of Northern Iowa examines the media’s coverage of ACORN, finding that during last year’s presidential campaign and again this year, the “mainstream” media has rushed to repeat a barrage of false claims by Republicans and conservatives about the organization without first checking to see if the claims are true.
And this one from which points to The real reason they hope ACORN fails.
At the same time, I would encourage the handful of fellow progressives who see the story solely as a Fox News witch hunt to acknowledge this part of the bigger picture: That ACORN is a large non-profit that is very poorly run, and in need of some major reform. It would be good, in a way, if that’s what this story were really about — making things work better. But conservatives don’t want to reform ACORN, nor do they want another, better-run outfit to come along and do some of the things it does — helping the urban poor find better housing or increasing voter registration. They want to destroy ACORN and the things it does. Period.
[...]
The real reason they are after ACORN is that they don’t like its core mission — siding with beleaguered homeowners over banks, and trying to register inner-city residents to vote at the same rates as the suburbanites who’ve dominated American politics since the 1980s. Taking down the group’s mission of urban empowerment won’t strengthen America, just the Republican Party. And you don’t need a Ph.D. in social work or journalism to figure this out, since O’Keefe has made it clear that ACORN’s success — and not its corruption — is what prompted him to launch his investigation. Here’swhat he told the Washington Post:
Though O’Keefe described himself as a progressive radical, not a conservative, he said he targeted ACORN for the same reasons that the political right does: its massive voter registration drives that turn out poor African Americans and Latinos against Republicans.
“Politicians are getting elected single-handedly due to this organization,” he said. “No one was holding this organization accountable. No one in the media is putting pressure on them. We wanted to do a stunt and see what we could find.”
But O’Keefe didn’t go after the voter registration unit of ACORN. Maybe that’s because real investigative journalism is hard work, but more likely it’s because powerful people like U.S. Attorneys, who didn’t even have to dress up like pimps because they have subpoena power,already tried that angle and didn’t find one single bogus vote cast. Instead, the two young filmmakers and the deep-pocketed FNC are taking down ACORN through the back door, and if what has already happened in North Carolina is any indication, they will succeed.
In other words, it’s their work helping the poor and getting them registered to vote, that’s gotten ACORN in the right wing’s sites.
None of this is to excuse any errors or fraud that ACORN employees have made. It goes to show how this entire crusade is politically motivated by the right wing to get rid of a group that helps the less fortunate. ACORN registers the poor to vote, and as everyone knows, the less fortunate are more likely to vote Democratic. That the hastily-written anti-ACORN legislation may snag defense contractors is cause for alarm on the right, no matter how heinous the crimes of the military-industrial complex are.
As laid out in the recent HChron editorial on ACORN something like this is what’s probably needed.
On Tuesday, ACORN announced the hiring of former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger to conduct its own internal investigation. Also on Tuesday, the Department of Justice announced an internal investigation to determine whether ACORN has received grant money from the department and, if so, how it has been used.
ACORN deserves the presumption of innocence guaranteed by the American system of jurisprudence. That said, the circumstantial evidence of thoughtless advocacy is deeply disturbing. We believe that independent investigation of ACORN is urgently required.
The Houston Chronicle shares the advocacy organization’s commitment to improving the lot of the poor and minorities in this country. To the extent that this necessary work is being ridiculed or called into question by unacceptable behavior on the part of ACORN staffers, harm is being done. The work of increasing access to voter registration, advocating for affordable housing, bringing affordable health care and broadening educational opportunities for the poor and downtrodden in our midst is critical to an equitable American future.
In short, the work is bigger than ACORN. A cloud of suspicion hangs over it that must not be permitted to besmirch the larger work. If the group has strayed from its mission in significant ethical and legal ways, that fact needs to be revealed. If not, that fact needs to be made equally clear.
Either way, a clean breast must be made so that the historically important task of caring for our last, least and lost can continue unimpeded.
ACORN deserves to be treated like every other federal contractor when fraud is suspected, no better, no worse.