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By Gene Quinn |
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Earlier today I took a minute to go to Google and type “ACORN” into the new search and to my great surprise an article titled Court documents reveal ACORN’s troubled history came up. Of course we all know by now that ACORN has for years attempted to subvert elections, and this year the effort seems exceptionally broad and really threatens the integrity of the election, particularly if Barack Obama wins. What really surprised me though was that the article was investigated by NBC News investigative blog and actually published on MSNBC.com. What is the world coming to? Is this story so big now that even MSNBC cannot ignore it? Let me make my bold, fresh prediction right here, right now. If MSNBC is reporting on ACORN then this will become an even bigger problem for Barack Obama than anyone could have previously imagined.
Right after I became a lawyer I joined a law firm in New Hampshire and one of the partners was running for Congress. He had the misfortune at the time of being a Democrat in a Republican State. That has changed since then, and I will write about that in the future, but the point is that I have seen campaigns up close and I can tell you from my experience what Barack Obama and ACORN are saying about how this is just about rogue employees just doesn’t add up. On its face they make are argument that many with campaign experience would find credible. The truth is that there are a lot of young people who get energized by a candidate and they work for the campaign. They are tasked with things such as getting people to sign petitions and the like. At the rallies I attended for my boss I would get asked repeatedly to sign a petition that would ensure he had a place on the ballot. I did sign once, but only once. That didn’t stop folks from approaching me continually, even after I explained to them that I already signed and then explained the law to them. These kids would just say, well can you sign again so that we are sure to have your name? Clueless, but not fraudulently so.
The ACORN problem is of a whole different sort. It is hard to believe it, but in Nevada ACORN actually hired prisoners to collect voter-registration forms. That’s right, prisoners. I am not talking about convicted felons who had been released from jail, I am talking about those still in jail but allowed to work as part of prisoner-work-release programs. In fact, according to MSNBC there were some 59 state prison inmates hired by ACORN in Nevada, and one particular inmate – Jason Anderson – was actually put in a supervisory role as team leader. I have to tell you friends this is a totally different matter than allowing college volunteers who mean well but are uninformed collect signatures for a petition. ACORN hired prisoners to register people. What were they thinking was going to happen?
But wait, it gets even better! Nevada investigators have apparently identified a Nevada woman, Roberta Casteel, who says she did not register to vote, but who submitted a voter-registration application through ACORN. What is even more odd is that this particular voter-registration had the accurate name, driver’s license number and Social Security number for Ms. Casteel. Even MSNBC smells a rat ans writes:
How, then, did the ACORN workers find her name, driver’s license number and Social Security number? Here’s one clue: Casteel’s purse was stolen last year, she said. Now how would state inmates living in a halfway house know about that?
A very good question indeed!
I could go on and on about all the factual circumstances surrounding ACORN. I say where there is smoke there is fire, and if the news media would actually do the job of investigating and reporting facts we will soon enough see a fire, and a big one. Why do you suppose that all of these shady activities are going on in battleground states? Why do you suppose that Barack Obama initially claimed he had no affiliation with ACORN now or at any time in the past? For crying out loud his primary experience that he claims qualifies him to be President is that he was a community organizer! Convenient how he initially forgot that he represented ACORN in a lawsuit and that he trained Project Vote workers and that Project Vote was affiliated with ACORN. It is also convenient that he forgot that Project Vote shared the same office address as ACORN, that his own campaign paid ACORN $800,000 to get out the vote and that his own campaign then incorrectly disclosed the ACORN payment on his election filings.
Do you see a pattern developing with Barcak Obama? I sure do. Whenever his past is questioned he distances himself from what actually happened and then all traces of the proof start to vanish from accessible databases, as if nothing ever really happened. He has done the same thing with Bill Ayers, Reverend Wright, Rezko and now ACORN.
Lets face facts. Barack Obama is a politician from Chicago. None of this should come as a surprise to anyone. What is sad though is that because the media has been openly rooting for Barack Obama since at least the end of 2006 we know very little about the real Barack Obama. I never thought I would stick up for Hillary Clinton, but we are now seeing first hand what she was complaining about for months during the primary. Now I disagree with Hillary Clinton on most things, but at least we know who she is, what she stands for and she has been thoroughly vetted. Something we just cannot say about Barack Obama. For crying out loud, Obama is personal friends with Rashid Khalidi, a former member of the Palestine Liberation Organization and a founder of the rabidly anti-Israel Arab American Action Network.
I sure hope John McCain scores a knock-out this evening in the final Presidential debate!
Tags: ACORN, John McCain, msnbc
Posted in Election 2008, Obama | Comments (0)
