The ACORN Business

How does ACORN operate? I have some knowledge of how they work after spending several years working for the New York legislature in Albany. ACORN would bus up hundreds of people in NYC to lobby legislators to get them to vote for their pet projects - namely affordable housing. It's the kind of thing that those working in the legislature figured out - and those in ACORN likewise had the system figured out. They would arrange conferences and meetings with legislators from both parties, since they knew that it would require getting Senate Republicans to sign off on deals just as surely as it required Assembly Democrats (that's a situation that remains to this day as both chambers have been controlled by the same entrenched political parties for decades).

A few of the more professional types would lead around a group of seniors (since the legislature usually meets Monday through Wednesday (sometimes Thursdays) from January through July, you aren't going to get many younger folks unless they're taking the day off from school) from office to office. The professionals would do the introductions, make a few comments, and let a few of the seniors talk about how they're being squeezed on housing and other basics. The legislators or those legislative staffers filling in while the legislators were in chambers or otherwise unavailable would listen in, say a few words, and they'd be on their way. You would get 20, 30, or 40 people trying to stuff into the offices, and it could be overwhelming.

It would happen every year - like the swallows at San Juan Capistrano or the migration of Canadian geese or .. heck, you get the idea.

It was a ritual.

And other union groups and lobbyists would employ the same tactics.

SEIU, UFT, Local 1100, etc.

They'd use the same tactics because they worked.

Thus, it wouldn't be all that surprising that Sen. John McCain was seen at one of the ACORN meetings, or that he's pushed for his amnesty immigration package with ACORN backing since ACORN will often work across the aisle to get their leftist agenda passed. It's what they do, and their ultimate goal is to institute a leftist agenda. Amnesty is a leftist project, and it disturbs me to no end that McCain supports a process by which illegal aliens get to circumvent the legal immigration and naturalization process.

Cramming the voter rolls with bogus votes is one way they accomplish the task and they overwhelm election boards across the country, especially in urban areas. They'll even try and get Mickey Mouse on registered to vote. They tried to get thousands of registrations entered in Indiana, but out of the first 2,100 registrations, 100% were rejected for being fraudulent.

You want a complete guide to ACORN fraud? Here you go.

However, there's a difference between being at a conference and publicly backing and supporting this corrupt organization with hundreds of thousands of dollars as the Obama campaign has done.

They also cavalierly dismiss Obama's undeniable connection to ACORN, as detailed by Mark Levin at "The Corner" blog on National Review Online. Obama worked for and represented ACORN and has given $800,000 to it from his campaign. Remember how Democrats were ready to hang Republican politicians who might have gone to lunch with lobbyist pariah Jack Abramoff? You want to talk to me about guilt by association? But Obama's deep associations with corrupt people and organizations don't so much as flicker the liberal eyebrow.

We now know about the investigations of ACORN-related voter registration fraud in 10 states. But have you heard some of the particulars about its nefarious activities in Pennsylvania?

The American Spectator's Jeffrey Lord reports: "'Between March 23rd and October 1st, various groups, including ACORN, submitted over 252,595 registrations to the Philadelphia County Election Board' with 57,435 rejected for faulty information. 'Most of these registrations were submitted by ACORN, and rejected due to fake social security numbers, incorrect dates of birth, clearly fraudulent signatures, addresses that do not exist, and duplicate registrations. In one case, a man was registered to vote more than 15 times since the Primary election.'"

There's no innocent explanation for any of this in Pennsylvania or for similar ACORN activities in other states. Why aren't honest Democrats joining Republicans in crying foul? How can they be so willfully blind to these threats to our system? I guarantee that if you ask, they'll give you their favorite liberal dodge, "Both sides are doing it." Dream on.

There is no innocent explanation for the $800,000 to ACORN; Obama and ACORN are tied at the hip.

Jim Hoft notes that ACORN, which claims to be nonpartisan, is openly running advertising calling for people to canvass for Obama in Ohio.

GOTV for Obama! Ohio ACORN is doing a Get Out The Vote project with the OBAMA Campaign. Ohio ACORN is hiring canvassers to go door to door encouraging voters to vote for Barak Obama.

ACORN is hiring in Cleveland (216)431-3905 , Columbus (614)425-9491, Cincinnati (513)221-1737, for Dayton (call Cincinnati), and for Toledo call Cleveland. Or email polnatoh@acorn.org and your inquiry will be routed to the appropriate person in each of these cities. Intake and training will be held daily at local ACORN offices. Canvass begins on Wednesday Feb. 27th and will work through election day. Please, only persons wishing to work all or most of these days (Saturday and Sunday included) should inquire.

Please do not contact the Obama campaign directly regarding this post as they are not the organization doing the hiring and it will only distract their staff and volunteers from the other important work they are doing on behalf of Senator Obama.

This reeks, but it's part and parcel of the ACORN business.

UPDATE:
Still more fraud courtesy of ACORN in Ohio. Thousands of bogus voters added to the rolls, and some have already voted:

The vote of Darnell Nash, one of four people subpoenaed in a Cuyahoga County probe of ACORN's voter-registration activities, was canceled and his case was turned over to local prosecutors and law enforcement, Board of Elections officials said yesterday.

Nash had registered to vote repeatedly from an address that belonged to a legitimately registered voter, officials said during a hearing at which the subpoenaed voters were to testify.

Board officials had contacted Nash this summer, questioned his address and told him to stop repeat registering.

But still, he breezed into Ohio election offices - the state allows early voting for president - reregistered with a fake address and cast a paper ballot, officials said.

"He came in on 9/30 and Mr. Nash again registered to vote at [someone else's] address, and he cast a ballot," said board official Jane Platten.

Nash did not turn up for the hearing.

How many hundreds, or thousands, of people have done what Nash did? We'll never know, because groups like ACORN have purposefully flooded election boards across the country so as to overwhelm them with ballots that they simply can't verify in time.

It gives new life to the quip - vote early and often.

Wizbang notes that the same thing is going on in Pennsylvania.

The Cleveland Leader reports that 5% of ACORN registrations in the Cleveland area are bogus. That's another 3,000+ registrations. With razor thin margins likely deciding this election, these bogus voter registrations that slip through the cracks are going to be sufficient to turn the election.

UPDATE:
Speaking of overwhelming the system, consider what Mark Steyn notes about how Democrat community organizers (ACORN?) went onto college campuses and to get people to polling places to overwhelm officials who had limited provisional ballots on hand, and auto-magically Democrat election lawyers arrived to demand that these people be allowed to vote directly onto ballot machines "to preserve the right to vote" despite their absence from the voter rolls. Watch for this to happen yet again.