I put an asterisk on the headline because whenever I say it's the last word on a subject, it never is. The post I wrote last week on ACORN got a large response, as I expected -- and I wanted to follow up with one clarification and also a question for those who continue to see this anti-poverty agency as Public Enemy No. 1.
First, the clarification: As several posters kindly pointed out over the weekend, there is indeed a problem with an article from the Washington Post that's linked near the end of the post. There's also a problem with me, in that I made a mistake that I should have known better after all these years, in trusting the Washington Post! I was actually aware that their story on James O'Keefe had a correction -- it's right on top of the version that I linked to -- but I also mistakenly thought the Post did what the Daily News and every other newspaper does when there's a correction, which is to fix the actual body of the article online. Reading the correction and the article again, it doesn't look like they did that, or they did a lousy job of it. So now I've gone back myself and removed the paragraph in question, with a note.
Ironically, there was really no reason for me to include that paragraph anyway -- the whole reason for linking the passage was this quote from O'Keefe that is disputed by no one, in which he said "Politicians are getting elected single-handedly due to this organization." Several commenters claimed over the weekend that the fact that the Washington Post article had a correction delegitimized the entire post -- nothing could be further from the truth. The corrected passage deals with the issue of race, something that wasn't at all the point of my post and isn't even addressed elsewhere. My still-valid point was that O'Keefe and his supporters want to take down ACORN is not because it's failing in its mission -- fighting poverty and increasing voter participation -- but because they don't want it to succeed. As for the confusion over the Washington Post link, the policy here at Attytood is always to correct and clarify and to keep the discussion going forward -- this note would have come faster if I didn't follow what I call my "sanity rule" of avoiding Attytood altogether on my weekend, which is Friday and Saturday. If readers want my immediate attention, you can always email me at bunchw@phillynews.com.
Other comments to the post struck me as a lot less valid. Several readers called ACORN "thugs" -- where's the evidence?...and I say this from Philly, where we know a thing or two about thugs -- while a few others perpetrated a myth that O'Keefe and others have helped to spread, that ACORN is getting or was somehow about to get "billions" in federal dollars, a figure that if true (the actual number is $53 million over 15 years, or little more than $3 million a year on average) would have placed it on a par with the fraudsters who don't get the same anger from the right, such as Halliburton or Blackwater/Xe .
I guess my question for people is that if ACORN isn't up to the job of fighting housing and banking discrimination, helping everyday people deal with foreclosure issues or trying to increase voter participation in urban areas, then what is to be done about these problems?
Someone asked me in the comments what my opinion is about Congress voting to defund ACORN. I think it would have been more responsible -- rather than racing to satisfy Fox News in a matter of hours -- to take a stance like the one that Bank of America just announced. Investigate, push for reforms, and suspend funding until those reforms come about. That is common sense, which seems to be in short supply these days.
Comment removed.
ACORN is nearly dead. However, Senate Bill SB-2099 will require us to put on our 2009 1040 federal tax form all guns that you have or own. It will require fingerprints and a tax of $50 per gun. This bill was introduced on Feb.. 24, 2009, by the Obama staff. BUT . . this bill will only become public knowledge 30 days after the new law becomes effective ! This is an amendment to the Internal Revenue Act of 1986. This means that the Finance Committee has passed this without the Senate voting on it at all. << Were are our rights and why are finger prints required? How is that Constitutional?— Fisher- Comment removed.
- Comment removed.
- Come January 20th, 2013 the Palin Justice Department will THOROUGHLY look into ACORN, La Raza and the SEIU. THEN, we will know the whole truth.— WriteWinger
Will is willing to overlook ACORN's facilitation of child prostitution because he shares their leftist agenda. Disgusting.— jmc- "My still-valid point was that O'Keefe and his supporters want to take down ACORN is not because it's failing in its mission -- fighting poverty and increasing voter participation -- but because they don't want it to succeed." I didn't read his comment that way at all, Will. I took it to mean that, with all the ethical problems swirling around the organization, it needed to be put under the spotlight. Abramoff helped congresscritters get elected too, and you had no problem going after him. But the bigger issue to me was the attempt by the Wash Post to paint it as O'Keefe having issues with minorities - and some commenters on the earlier thread echoed that sentiment. It just goes to show how fast the lies flow through the blogsphere - and the difficulty of reining them back in.— db_cooper
- Will, you've heard the expression that the true usually resides somewhere in the middle, so what's the middle between a billion bucks and 53 mil? The math's simple: the amount's huge.— lefty
- "ACORN is nearly dead. However, Senate Bill SB-2099 will require us to put on our 2009 1040 federal tax form all guns that you have or own. It will require fingerprints and a tax of $50 per gun. This bill was introduced on Feb.. 24, 2009, by the Obama staff." Urban legend, please don't be like Will - and check out this stuff before spraying it about. http://www.snopes.com/politics/guns/taxreturns.asp— db_cooper
- "that ACORN is getting or was somehow about to get "billions" in federal dollars, a figure that if true" Good chance it is true: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/first100days/2009/01/27/republican-leaders-raise-concerns-acorn-stimulus-dollars/ House Republican Leader John Boehner issued a statement over the weekend noting that the stimulus bill wending its way through Congress provides $4.19 billion for "neighborhood stabilization activities." He said the money was previously limited to state and local governments, but that Democrats now want part of it to be available to non-profit entities. That means groups like ACORN would be eligible for a portion of the funds. -------- Also, recall that ACORN was slated to be part of the 2010 Census. That would have involved a fair chunk of fedgov change as well. "would have placed it on a par with the fraudsters who don't get the same anger from the right, such as Halliburton or Blackwater/Xe ." And when all else fails, play the moral equivalence game, eh, Will?— db_cooper
- ---}}} But the bigger issue to me was the attempt by the Wash Post to paint it as O'Keefe having issues with minorities {{{-- LOL! Good point, db. Because going after an organization that has been instrumental in signing up millions of voters could, in no way, be considered as "having issues with minorities." The fact that the vast majority of those voters were poor and/or minorities was, I'm sure, purely coincidence.— Talking point sleuth
- "going after an organization that has been instrumental in signing up millions of voters could, in no way, be considered as "having issues with minorities." The fact that the vast majority of those voters were poor and/or minorities was, I'm sure, purely coincidence." Still stuck on stupid, eh, TPS? You've become a rather pathetic shill now that the Dems are in power. So you may have the last word on this particular exchange, because life is just to short to waste any of it in response to your banalities.— db_cooper
- ---}}} ...life is just to short to waste any of it in response to your banalities. {{{--- LOL! I wonder if anyone else sees anything "ironic" about db's last response to my post? O'Keefe and his backers/supporters/compatriots are targeting an agency that has signed up millions of poor and/or minority voters. That context is important and relevant. Sorry if pointing out the obvious, db, is so bothersome to you.— Talking point sleuth
- Under Mussolini the trains ran on time, infrastructure was greatly upgraded, the standard of living improved after banks and manufacturers were nationalized...that context is important and relevant.— legatus
- That context about Mussolini is important and relevant in what sense, legatus? It is relevant if one is looking at whether or not dictatorial regimes can force certain efficiencies in how government is run. If you think that it's relevant to mitigating the immorality of Mussolini's fascism, that's one you. The fact that O' Keefe chose to release his films via Glenn Beck and a website dedicated to anti-Obama ideology is relevant to his "motivation." As is his statement that: "Politicians are getting elected single-handedly due to this organization." (It's an out-and-out ridiculously false statement.) As is the fact that the organization he went after, has signed up disproportionately Democratic voters, and also provides many useful/valuable services to poor and/or minority communities. Why do you feel compelled to minimize the importance of that context, legatus? That context doesn't justify ACORN workers offering assistance to people pretending to be child traffickers, but it is relevant to O Keefe's motivation. It is also relevant to how partisans have inflated the importance of ACORN's problems with voter registration fraud. ACORN clearly needs to clean up its act. But the fact that ACORN's problems are being used to further partisan interests is undeniable and important context. Would you suggest that all that context is irrelevant as to O' Keefe's motivation, legatus?— Talking point sleuth
Will Bunch, a senior writer at the Philadelphia Daily News, blogs about his obsessions, including national and local politics and world affairs, the media, pop music, the Philadelphia Phillies, soccer and other sports, not necessarily in that order.
E-mail Will by clicking here.
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