Washington Times: Firefighters lose large U.S. grant to ACORN
From the the Washington Times:
Nearly $1 million in Homeland Security funding typically earmarked for fire departments has been awarded to ACORN, despite a clear signal from Congress that it intends to cut off federal funding to the embattled group.
The grant to ACORN’s Louisiana office became public on Oct. 2, less than three weeks after the House and Senate voted to cut off ACORN funding after employees were caught on video advising a fake prostitute and pimp on scams.
It was one of only three such grants issued to the state and made up almost 80 percent of the firefighting money earmarked for Louisiana, prompting one of the U.S. senators from the state to demand that the funds be taken back.
“I request that you rescind this grant based on a history of abuse of federal dollars by ACORN and their clear lack of expertise in this area,” said Sen. David Vitter, Louisiana Republican.
The group has headquarters in Louisiana.
When asked how the money would be spent, ACORN spokesman Brian Kettenring issued a statement criticizing the senator, who confessed in the past to having used an escort service.
“Senator Vitter knows a lot more about prostitution rings than anyone here does, so we’ll defer to him on any matters pertaining to the videos attacking ACORN,” the statement read. It did not explain how the group plans to spend the Federal Emergency Management Agency grant.
Mr. Vitter, who was routinely notified of the grant before it became public, sent his letter to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano on Sept. 22, saying the money should be given “to a more deserving group of first responders.”
One such group might have been the St. Tammany Parish Fire District No. 3, which applied for a $120,000 grant to purchase smoke alarms for low-income families after a January fire killed four childrenin a home that had no working detectors.
I really don’t know what to say here other than WTF??? Seriously WTF?!? I can’t think of single valid reason for the Department of Homeland Security to bypass firefighters and award a nearly $1 million grant to ACORN.
Me thinks Janet Napolitano has some explaining to do.
Washington Times: ACORN Says Workers Conduct ‘Indefensible’
The Washington Times is reporting that ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, is suspending advising new clients as part of its service programs and is setting up an independent review to investigate what happened:
ACORN, calling the actions of some of its employees “indefensible,” has suspended advising new clients as part of its service programs and is setting up an independent review to see what happened.
ACORN chief executive Bertha Lewis said in a written statement that she was “ordering a halt to any new intakes into ACORN’s service programs until completion of an independent review.”
The actions were taken, she said, “as a result of indefensible action of a handful of our employees.”
Videos of ACORN workers giving tax advice to people posing as prostitutes and other revelations have led to growing criticism of the organization in recent days.
Lewis continued: “We have all been deeply disturbed by what weve seen in some of these videos. I must say, on behalf of ACORN’s Board and our Advisory Council, that we will go to whatever lengths necessary to reestablish the public trust. For nearly forty years, ACORN has given voice to communities, and gotten results. Right now, our nearly 500,000 member are working their hearts out for quality, affordable healthcare for every American and to help stop the foreclosure crisis. We must get this process right, so the good work can go forward.”
ACORN, an advocacy group, has fired at least four employees after hidden camera videos showed the group’s workers giving financial advice to women posing as prostitutes. The firings occurred in the group’s Washington and Baltimore offices.
I haven’t been following the ACORN story closely, but it suffices to say were there’s smoke there’s fire. The simple fact that ACORN has apparently fired at least four employees and is taking the steps announced today would seem to confirm what James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles uncovered.
My guess is that the independent review will ultimately find that actions documented O’Keefe and Giles were the work of rouge employees and not the result of institutional problems.
Related
- From ACORN, a mighty controversy grows – Los Angels Times
- Acorn Live! – Wall Street Journal
First Nevada, Now Pennsylvania: 7 ACORN Workers Facing Voter-form Charges
Just days after Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto and Secretary of State Ross Miller announced that voter registration fraud charges had been filed against ACORN and two of it’s employees in that state comes news that 7 ACORN works are being charged voter registration fraud in Pennsylvania:
PITTSBURGH (AP) – Seven Pittsburgh-area ACORN workers were charged with falsifying voter registration forms, with six accused of doing so to meet the group’s alleged quota system before last year’s general election.
District Attorney Stephen Zappala Jr. said he’s hoping the workers charged Thursday will help authorities determine whether Allegheny County ACORN officials will be charged with requiring the illegal quotas or otherwise directing that voter registrations be faked.
“You should consider the investigation as ongoing,” Zappala said.
Six suspects forged a total of 51 cards, a felony that carries up to seven years in prison. The same six also were charged with illegally accepting payments to meet a quota of 20 registrations per day – a misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail.
Count me among those who thinks the Census Bureau should reconsider ACORN’s involvement as a partner in the census. If ACORN’s history of question voter registration campaigns doesn’t disqualify them then these charges should.
Related
- ACORN got $53 million in federal funds since 94, now eligible for up to $8 billion more – Washington Examiner
Media Bias, What Media Bias???
Mike over at Flopping Aces points out striking visual evidence of media bias:
Mark Dziubek of Southington Conn. steps off a bus in Fairfield Conn. on Saturday March 21, 2009 as members of the media wait outside at a AIG executive’s home. A busload of activists outnumbered 2-to-1 by reporters and photographers are paying visits to the homes of American International Group Inc. executives in Connecticut to protest tens of millions of dollars in bonuses awarded by the company.
Today we learn that the group which organized and paid for the bus tour is nothing but a front for ACORN, the infamous voter fraud group whose most famous “community organizer” is none other than President Obama.
If you’re still unconvinced that media bias exists consider this: At the same time as that ACORN/Working Families Party media circus, were reporters outnumbered protesters was going on in Fairfield roughly 300 concerned citizens were protesting out of control government spending at the Ridgefield Tea Party.
I was there, I counted TWO (2) reporters. One from the Ridgefield Press and one from the News Times.
Related
- AIG “distraction” descends into mob mentality as ACORN’s “Working Family Party” organizes bus tour of AIG exec homes – Flopping Aces
Tough Questions for Joe Biden
WFTV anchor Barbara West conducted a satellite interview with Sen. Joe Biden on Thursday, October 23rd. Unlike most reporters West didn’t shy away from asking tough questions… She questioned Biden on democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s ties to ACORN and his plans to “spread the wealth” around. Biden’s answers are quite revealing.
The only quesion I have is why is West the only reporter asking the tough questions?
H/T: Michelle Malkin.
The Good, The Bad and The Ugly…
The Good (H/T: MM): Congressman Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), Chairman of the House Republican Study Committee, today issued the following statement on the agreement reached by House and Senate negotiators on the Paulson plan, and his intentions on the final bill:
“My top responsibility as an elected official is to protect the families and people who trusted me to represent their interests in Washington. I do not take lightly the critical nature of the credit crisis that our capital markets face today and the grave situation that every American will face should our credit markets freeze and remain frozen. Inaction has never been an option, but the Paulson plan should have never been the only option.
“In my heart and in my mind, I believe that this plan is fraught with unintended consequences, would force generations of taxpayers to pick up the tab for Wall Street losses, and could permanently and fundamentally change the role of government in the American free enterprise system. Once the government socializes losses, it will soon socialize profits. If we lose our ability to fail, we will soon lose our ability to succeed. If we bail out risky behavior, we will soon see even riskier behavior.
“I also believe that this Congress, in a rushed effort to provide stability to a troubled credit market, did not adequately discuss or investigate potential alternatives that would have constituted a work out and not a bail out. Even at this moment, it still remains more important for Congress to do it right than to do it fast. I stand ready, as do many of my colleagues, to stay here for as many days as it takes to do this right.
“For the last week, House conservatives have fought to protect innocent taxpayers from an unprecedented government raid on their wallets to bail out Wall Street from their bad decisions and financial losses. Principled Republicans like Paul Ryan and Eric Cantor helped improve the legislation before us by adding increased taxpayer protections and additional Wall Street accountability. But mere improvement is not the test for support. The test is whether, after weighing both the good and the bad, you believe that the plan ultimately leads America in the right direction. Using that test, I cannot in good conscious support this legislation.”
The Bad: Just were did the Treasury Department come up with that $700 Billion bailout figure? They made it up… From Forbes:
“It’s not based on any particular data point,” a Treasury spokeswoman told Forbes.com Tuesday. “We just wanted to choose a really large number.”
Presumably they picked a frighteningly large number in order to scare Congress into acting quickly without thinking the matter through.
The Ugly: From Today’s New York Post:
O’S DANGEROUS PALS
BARACK’S ‘ORGANIZER’ BUDS PUSHED FOR BAD MORTGAGESBy STANLEY KURTZ, New York Post, September 29, 2008
WHAT exactly does a “community organizer” do? Barack Obama’s rise has left many Americans asking themselves that question. Here’s a big part of the answer: Community organizers intimidate banks into making high-risk loans to customers with poor credit.
In the name of fairness to minorities, community organizers occupy private offices, chant inside bank lobbies, and confront executives at their homes – and thereby force financial institutions to direct hundreds of millions of dollars in mortgages to low-credit customers.
In other words, community organizers help to undermine the US economy by pushing the banking system into a sinkhole of bad loans. And Obama has spent years training and funding the organizers who do it.
THE seeds of today’s financial meltdown lie in the Commu nity Reinvestment Act – a law passed in 1977 and made riskier by unwise amendments and regulatory rulings in later decades.
CRA was meant to encourage banks to make loans to high-risk borrowers, often minorities living in unstable neighborhoods. That has provided an opening to radical groups like ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) to abuse the law by forcing banks to make hundreds of millions of dollars in “subprime” loans to often uncreditworthy poor and minority customers.
Any bank that wants to expand or merge with another has to show it has complied with CRA – and approval can be held up by complaints filed by groups like ACORN.
I wish I had something intelligent to say but the only words that come to mind all contain four letters and are not generally used in polite company.
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