You Lie! ... President Obama: 'I Didn't Know ACORN Was Getting a Whole Lot of Funding'

Is President Obama lying again? His statement to George Stephanopoulos today: "I didn't know ACORN was getting a whole lot of government funding." (Via Memeorandum.)

If this isn't an outright lie, I don't know what is. As one of the commenters at Lucianne notes:

Just when you thought that this mans credibility could sink no further, he makes this incredibly stupid statement:

"I didn't even know that ACORN was getting a whole lot of federal money."

The Apollo Alliance wrote the darned Stimulus Bill that has $4.19 Billion earmarked for the ACORN umbrella. You know, Van Jones’ organization Apollo Alliance, he’s a good friend of Valerie Jarrett like the BFF kind. Come on man, that statement is an insult to every American's intelligence [spelling corrections appended].

Absolutely.

The New York Times reports that Senate Democrats met with President-elect Obama in January to discuss "the proposed $800 billion economic recovery plan ... on track for passage by mid-February." The measure included funding for neighborhood stabilization and community development block grants. As House Minority Leader John Boehner noted in January, "ACORN Could Get Billions from Democrats' Trillion Dollar Spending Plan: 'Job Creation' Bill Offers Taxpayer-Funded Bonanza for Organization Reportedly Under Federal Investigation."

Plus, at the Washington Examiner, "Stimulus Bill Funds ACORN Despite its History of Corruption." And, Puma-Eyes, "ACORN Positioned for Billions of Obama Stimulus Scratch."

And this statement comes from the House conference committee bill itself:

The conference agreement provides $3,000,000,000, of which $1,000,000,000 is appropriated for the Community Development Block Grant program and $2,000,000,000 is available for the Neighborhood Stabilization Program. This funding is provided instead of the $5,190,000,000 proposed by the House. Funding was not provided in the Senate. The Neighborhood Stabilization Program funding will assist states, local governments, and nonprofits in the purchase and rehabilitation of foreclosed, vacant properties in order to create more affordable housing and reduce neighborhood blight.

ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis denied that her group was receiving neighborhood stabilization grants, but according to Eric Brown:

ACORN has basically denied that it has received or plans to seek the $2 billion in “neigborhood stabilization” funds provided for in the stimulus bill. The bill, however, also contains $1 billion for “community development block grants” and $2 billion for the “provision of emergency assistance for the redevelopment of abandoned and foreclosed homes” (page 103 of the PDF). ACORN seems to be involved in this program. ACORN is hardly the stranger to public funds some have suggested; a search for ACORN-related information on the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s website alone yields over 500 hits, including clear indications that ACORN Housing Corp. receives public funds.

Check the full text of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 here.

In February, the White House trumpeted the initial distribution of block grant funding from the bill, "Fighting Foreclosure and Homelessness":

Just a week after President Obama signed the Act into law, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) today allocated 75% of its recovery funds -- $10 billion -- to create green jobs, to revive housing markets with high rates of foreclosure, and curb homelessness ....

The money opened up today includes:

$3 billion to develop, finance, and modernize public housing; $255 million for Native American and Native Hawaiian Housing; nearly $100 million for lead hazard reduction; $2.25 billion to kick-start the production of stalled affordable rental housing projects under the Tax Credit Assistance Program (TCAP); $2 billion to undertake much-needed project improvements to maintain the quality of critical affordable housing; $1 billion to rehabilitate affordable housing and improve key public facilities under the Community Development Block Grant Program; $1.5 billion to reduce homelessness, and prevent it among those facing a sudden economic crisis; and a temporary increase to the loan limits of mortgages insured by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA).

Here's a screecap of the White House page, just in case:

All we're missing is a direct statement from the president showing that his comments today are blatantly dishonest. But for good measure, Fire Andrea Mitchell adds this:

ACORN of course received over $800,000 from Obama during his presidential campaign, has received over $54 from the government over the last 10 years or so, and was set to receive about $8.5 BILLION from the stimulus package this year. Obama also was an attorney for ACORN during the ’90s. Obama’s first big “community organizer” jobs involved ACORN in 1992. He has been working along side ACORN since before he became an elected official. Obama also trained ACORN employees. There's also a famous soundbite of him now telling Acorn how they “will have a seat at the table” once he got elected [spelling corrections appended].

The ABC report is here, "Obama on ACORN: 'Not Something I've Followed Closely' Won't Commit to Cut Federal Funds."

Are You Freaking Stupid? has more, "ACORN Latest Group Thrown Under Bus. But Obama is Not Really Aware of Them." Also, Gateway Pundit, "Obama On ACORN Scandal: 'Not Something I've Followed Closely'," and Hot Air Pundit, "Obama On ABC This Week Reacts To The ACORN Videos."

**********

UPDATE: Linked at Patriot Room!

Obama Paid $800,000 to ACORN Subsidiary - Media AWOL

Where is the media reporting on Citizens Services Inc., an ACORN front-group that received $800,000 from the Barack Obama campaign in 2008? See, "Obama to Amend Report on $800,000 in Spending." And from Flopping Aces, "Connecting the Insidious Obama and ACORN Nexus":

Barack Obama’s ties to ACORN (see Memeorandum) are not incidental nor are they casual ...

The money given to ACORN through one of its front companies–CSI–was not a simple clerical error. The Obama Presidential campaign deliberately tried to hide its relationship to ACORN and funneling almost $1 million dollars to ACORN by using a group with no experience doing the task that it was ostensibly hired to do. The story is pretty simple–it is about Citizen Services Inc., a Nigerian director of CSI [Citizens Services Inc.] living in Minnesota and false campaign financing report.

If you want to understand why ACORN offices across the country are able to give crafty advice on avoiding taxes, fooling the police and setting up child prostitution businesses then you must first understand why the campaign of Barack Obama gave almost $1 million to an organization with no track record in doing the electioneering work they were hired to do.

See the full report, here.

Cartoon Credits: Wordsmith.

Islamic Jihad Goes to Capitol Hill

From Hummers & Cigarettes, "Islam On Capitol Hill: How Will The MSM Cover It?":

As you can see in the promotional image of the event, the organizers are hoping for 50,000 attendees. In light of the 9/12 March on Washington event last weekend, I promptly started to wonder how this one will be covered by the mainstream media. It will be interesting to see how favorably or unfavorably the attendees will be portrayed: radicals? whack jobs? honest folks exercising their freedom of speech? Will numbers of attendees be accurate or suppressed or exaggerated? Will the MSM be shocked and insulted by religious hordes gather at Capitol Hill, or will the fact that these are Muslims result in being given a "pass" by the press? If it were Christians gathering, let alone Catholics, would the event even be covered or would the people be ridiculed for believing in God?

Well, great questions. I'm not holding my breath, obviously.

The event's program includes two top leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, Sheik Muhammad Jebril and Sheik Ahmed Dewidar. See, Atlas Shrugs, "September 25th, National Prayer Day - Leader of 'Islam on Capitol Hill' said: 'The White House Will Become the Muslim House', America is 'Controlled by the Jews'."

ACORN on Fox News Sunday: Bertha Lewis 'Outraged'; Disses Darrell Issa, Stonewalls on Firewalls (VIDEO)

A really interesting exchange here. Bertha Lewis claims to be outraged by the Giles/O'Keefe investigation, but she won't look at Congressman Darrell Issa. She exhibits classic confrontational body language with crossed-arms and demonstrably deep-breathing:

The Hill has a report, "ACORN Defends Itself; Issa Remains Critical":

Seeing its federal funding under threat from Congress, ACORN’s leader defended the community organizing group from allegations of tax fraud Sunday.

“You have an organization that absolutely pays its taxes, that absolutely has firewalls,” said Bertha Lewis, CEO of ACORN, short for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. Lewis was appearing on "Fox News Sunday" with Chris Wallace ....

“The bottom line is there is no transparency in ACORN,” said Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), ranking member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Issa and other Republicans have investigated the community organizing group. Issa’s staff issued a report where it alleges ACORN of tax fraud, hiding its books behind a number of overlapping charity and nonprofit groups.

“You are giving an answer that your own counsel says isn’t true according to your own counsel. You don’t have firewalls. That’s from an internal memo,” Issa said.

Issa's August ACORN report is here: "Committee on Oversight and Government Reform."

See also, Patrick Ishmael, "Breitbart: Prepare for a 'Blockbuster' 'From Left Field' Next Week" (via Memeorandum).

Leftists Won't Fight the 'Real War'

"Our bill calls for the redeployment of U.S. troops out of Iraq so that we can focus more fully on the real war on terror, which is in Afghanistan."

-- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, March 8 [2007]

In "Reconciliation and Resolve in Afghanistan," I discussed the heightened agitation on the radical left for a U.S. defeat in Afghanistan. As is so often the case, the left's new attention to withdrawal in Afghanistan is emblematic of the hypocrisy and unseriousness of the antiwar forces on national security. The most prominent leftist lie is that the U.S. was fighting the wrong war in Iraq, that America should focus its resources to defeating the "real" terrorists in Afghanistan. As hardliner Spencer Ackerman admitted, "For years, many progressives have argued that the real war on terrorism is in Afghanistan as a rhetorical bludgeon to argue against the Iraq war, and relatively few criticized Obama’s plans for escalation."

So now we have another example of this at the Moderate Voice, "The Futility of American Deaths in Afghanistan." The Moderate Voice basically argues that Americans are clueless on Afghanistan and its stupid to think we can win. I've already addressed the basic argument in my post cited above. So, I'm turning things over to Michael van der Galien, in "Liberals' New Obsession: Afghanistan":

I can’t help but notice that the war in Afghanistan is strangely quickly becoming the new Iraq War. Liberals said for years that US soldiers died in vain in Iraq. This war could not be won, they said. It was time (whether it was in 2003 or 2008) to withdraw ....

Then Bush did what had to be done, sent extra troops, developed a new strategy and turned things around. Suddenly anti-war activists were nowhere to be found. Barack Obama did win the elections, of course, but the anti-war crowd did not even mention Iraq once. The reason was rather obvious; things were finally going just fine and Americans knew it. They could complain, advocate immediate withdrawal, but no one would fall for it.

So they had to find a new obsession, a new reason to condemn “American imperialism” and the war on terror. A new excuse to advocate isolation and surrender to forces that wish to destroy the West.

They looked around, trying to find a good cause. They tried Venezuela but that one didn’t work. Americans don’t like socialists. Iran, then. But Americans fear Iran and there’s no war going on between Iran and the U.S. Not at this moment anyway. North Korea then? Nope. Not a good ’cause’ either.

Luckily for the left things went wrong in Afghanistan. The coalition ran into serious resistance. In fact, the Taliban seemed to make a comeback. They pushed government and forces further and further back and controlled an constantly growing area.

And so they finally found their new cause, their new obsession through which they could feed their anti-American hunger.

The troops have to be withdrawn! The war effort in Afghanistan is doomed! The Taliban is too strong! We shouldn’t ever have gone to war with this country anyway! Bush lied, people died!

The tactics the far-left uses share close resemblance to the tactics they used to discredit the war effort in Iraq. In fact, they are exactly the same, including pretending that the war was illegal or at least unnecessary.

Lest we forget, Afghanistan was attacked because the country’s government protected Al Qaeda, which attacked America on 9/11/01. The war on Afghanistan was an act of self defense, not of aggression. It was meant to destroy or at least severely weaken organizations and the government that killed thousands of innocent Americans on that black day.

The goal wasn’t to bring glorious peace, democracy and prosperity to the Afghan people but to weaken Al Qaeda and the Taliban so they couldn’t attack Americans on American soil anymore.

More at the link. Also, Memeorandum.

The quotation at top is found at Charles Krauthammer, "Which Is 'The Real War'?"

Conserva-Care: Encourage Competition in Healthcare

From Richard Viguerie, at the Los Angeles Times, "Conservatives Encourage Competition in Healthcare":

The main problem with American healthcare is too much government. Let's reduce government control and let real competition create better services and lower prices.

The shortest explanation of conservatives' approach to improving the best -- albeit still imperfect -- healthcare system in the world is: Do the opposite of what President Obama wants.

I see four key components to the conservative approach.

First, it's time for honesty from Democrats, Republicans and the health profession. People don't know their own healthcare costs when they're covered, therefore they don't shop around for better prices and there's less incentive to keep costs low. Health savings accounts would put sanity back into the system because people would have "skin in the game." When people spend their own money, they spend it more wisely.

Second, government must not directly or indirectly control healthcare. Democrats and Republicans have demonstrated time and again that they succumb to special interests. Keep the government's nose out of patient-doctor relationships and do not create a government database of medical records.

Third, respect constitutional constraints, which means most federal involvement is barred or limited. Use the commerce clause of the Constitution productively, as it was intended, to break down inefficient barriers to interstate commerce. Allow citizens of any state to choose from what's available in all 50 states. Let consumers carry their coverage from job to job and from state to state. Include reasonable tort reform, but only consistent with the Constitution.

Fourth, don't discourage profit. The desire for profit drives better prices, service and products.

Further, any reform should not require individuals to obtain health insurance. Besides being frightful, unprecedented Washington authoritarianism over individuals, mandating captive markets destroys incentives to keep costs lower and consumer service higher.

Obama claims that health insurance is a moral imperative. By law, hospitals can't deny emergency treatment for patients who aren't insured, leaving an unpaid care gap estimated at more than $50 billion annually, according to the American Enterprise Institute. Conservatives and independents at the tea parties, town halls and beyond believe it is a moral imperative to stop burdening the next generations with trillion-dollar deficits and to stop government's stealing from the Medicare trust fund, which now has unfunded liabilities of $36.3 trillion, according to the Heritage Foundation.

Other opinions at the link: Dr. Bill Frist, David Frum, and Mickey Edwards.

Special Prosecutor for ACORN

Well, to follow up my previous piece (on the accession of Chicago machine-politics to the White House), Charles Lipson's new essay is a perfect accompaniment. See, "Independent Prosecutor for ACORN":

ACORN is in very deep, very public trouble, and the U.S. attorney general should appoint an independent prosecutor to investigate. What we know so far is due entirely to two amateur reporters, James E. O'Keefe III, 25, and Hannah Giles, 20, who managed to videotape a web of corrupt practices in ACORN offices. Dressed as a pimp and prostitute, O'Keefe and Giles walked into ACORN offices from New York to California and simply asked for business advice. ACORN officials were happy to provide it and were secretly recorded explaining exactly how to evade the law and scam the government. The tapes were riveting. Fox News rolled out a new one each night for a week, creating a firestorm of outrage and a burgeoning political scandal.

ACORN employees, without raising an eyebrow, much less calling the police, explained how the young sex workers could label themselves "performance artists," underreport their income, evade taxes, fraudulently buy a house to ply their trade, and, worst of all, import underage girls from Central America to use as child prostitutes. One ACORN employee helpfully explained that the teenagers would even be tax-deductible since they would be "dependents," living in the pimp's house. Some states, led by California, are saying they will investigate. But this is a national scandal and there ought to be a full-scale national inquiry. To ensure impartiality -- and the appearance of impartiality -- political appointees at the U.S. Department of Justice should recuse themselves. This case demands an independent federal prosecutor ...

ACORN's close ties to the progressive movement and Democratic Party mean that there will be little public confidence if Holder decides not to pursue an ambitious investigation and ultimately prosecute.

Ironically, ACORN's chief executive officer, Bertha Lewis, strengthens the case for an independent prosecutor with her robust defense of the organization. FOX News, she says, is pursuing her group solely for political reasons. They oppose ACORN, she says, because it is associated with progressive politics, labor organizing and the Obama administration's health-care initiative. Unfortunately for ACORN, Lewis' charges also mean that if the Obama administration decides not to prosecute or to indict only low-level employees, the public will wonder if they are seeing a political defense by ACORN's friends, a coverup rather than a fair-minded, independent decision by the Justice Department.

More at the link.

See also, the Washington Post, "For ACORN, Video Is Only Latest Crisis."

Bonus: The Sundries Shack, "The ACORN Pimp-Slap of the Week."

Image Credit: Patriot Room.

(Behind The) Scenes at the Obama White House

The image is from Swampland, and if you click the link, go to the image and click to enlarge. Then scroll left to find Valerie Jarrett with the First Family. You can see Jarrett at left below as well, where she's partially visible:

If you didn't read it, don't miss Ben Johnson's essay at FrontPage Mag, "Valerie Jarrett: The Next Van Jones."

Note as well that Chicago Mayor Richard Daley is standing with Jarrett, and he's almost fully obscured in the picture above. And recall from the campaign last year, Stanley Kurtz was doing phenomenal research into Barack Obama's Chicago background and radical roots. An especially good piece was Kurtz's essay at the Weekly Standard, "Barack Obama's Lost Years: The Senator's Tenure as a State Legislator Reveals Him To Be An Old-Fashioned, Big Government, Race-Conscious Liberal." The piece is worth skimming over again, but the summary's worth citing:

The real Obama? ... Fundamentally, he is a big-government redistributionist who wants above all to aid the poor, particularly the African-American poor. Obama is eager to do so both through race-specific programs and through broad-based social-welfare legislation. "Living wage" legislation may be economically counterproductive, and Obama-backed housing experiments may have ended disastrously, yet Obama is committed to large-scale government solutions to the problem of poverty. Obama's early campaigns are filled with declarations of his sense of mission-a mission rooted in his community organizing days and manifest in his early legislative battles. Recent political back flips notwithstanding, Barack Obama does have an ideological core ...

Those "community organizing days" are from Obama's radical ACORN activism. We're seeing just now how that stuff's working out. See Charles Lipson, "Independent prosecutor for ACORN."

Oh, for your added pleasure, don't miss Jim Treacher's uproarious parody of the Swampland images, "I Find Your Lack of Grace Disturbing."

Frank Rich: Glenn Beck's Wild 'Cosmology' is 'Scapegoating' Paranoia

This picture's from Gateway Pundit, "HUNDREDS RALLY AGAINST OBAMACARE At McCaskill's Missouri Office." It's one of my favorites from this summer's town halls. The woman's sign captures perfectly what I've been hearing over and over again all year: "It's not racism, you freaking idiots. It's patriotic dissent at this presidency and its disastrous policies."

That context is incredibly important in understanding the escalating accusations of racism among those on the radical left. As Carolyn Tackett has shown, groups like the Soros-backed Media Matters have alleged that President Obama is now in danger of being assassinated amid the success of grassroots activists in beating back the left's socialist tide. And as I noted earlier, we saw Charles Blow's argument that we're seeing "aversive racism," which is "a subtle but insidious form of prejudice that emerges when people can justify their negative feelings toward blacks based on factors other than race."

Wow. Take that to its logical conclusion and any opposition to what Obama actually does (a factor "other than race") is racist. Notice that, basically, you can't win: You're racist if you call the president a "darkie" and you're racist if you call the president "corrupt." Yep, we've had none other than former President Jimmy Carter say it's so. Of course, the meme would work better if networks like MSNBC weren't trying so hard to make the charges stick (remember Contessa Brewer arguing that is was racist for white people to show up to the town halls with guns - the only problem being that MSNBC edited the video to hide the face of the gunowner, who was black).

So, it's no surprise to see the New York Times' Frank Rich hop on the bandwagon with his latest screed, "Even Glenn Beck Is Right Twice a Day":

With all due respect to Jimmy Carter, the racist component of Obama-hatred has been undeniable since the summer of 2008, when Sarah Palin rallied all-white mobs to the defense of the “real America.” Joe Wilson may or may not be in that camp, but, either way, that’s not the news. As we watched and rewatched the South Carolina congressman’s star turn, what grabbed us was the act itself.

What made the lone, piercing cry of “You lie!” shocking was that it breached a previously secure barrier. It was the first time that the violent rage surging in town-hall meetings all summer blasted into the same room as the president. Wilson’s televised shout was tantamount to yelling “Fire!” in a crowded theater. When he later explained that his behavior was “spontaneous” rather than premeditated, that was even more disturbing. It’s not good for the country that a lawmaker can’t control his anger at Barack Obama. It gives permission to crazy people.

And more, where Rich takes on Beck:

If there was a real hero to this crowd, it was the protest’s most prominent promoter, the radio and TV talker Glenn Beck.

Time put Beck on its cover this week. Man of the Year may not be far behind. Beck is not, as many liberals assume, merely the latest incarnation of Rush Limbaugh. He is something different. That’s why he is gaining on his antecedents — and gaining traction in the country’s angrier precincts.

Though Beck’s daily Fox News show is in the sleepy slot of 5 p.m., his ratings are increasingly neck and neck with the prime-time tag team of Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity, and he has beaten them in the prized 25-to-54 demographic. It’s not just because he is younger (45). This self-described “rodeo clown,” who wells up with tears for dramatic effect, doesn’t come across as cranky or pompous, like Limbaugh and O’Reilly. A fervent Mormon convert and proselytizer, he is untainted by association with the old Dobson-Robertson-Reed religious right. Unlike Limbaugh, he bonds with his fallible listeners by openly and repeatedly owning up to his own mistakes, including his history of drug and alcohol abuse. Unlike Hannity, he is not a Republican apparatchik.

Beck has notoriously defamed Obama as a “racist,” but the race card is just one in his deck. His ideology, if it can be called that, mixes idolatrous Ayn Rand libertarianism with bumper-sticker slogans about “freedom,” self-help homilies and lunatic conspiracy theories. (He fanned Internet rumors that FEMA was establishing concentration camps before tardily beating a retreat.) It’s the same crazy-quilt cosmology that could be found in last weekend’s Washington protest, where the marchers variously called Obama a fascist, a communist and a socialist, likening him to Hitler, Stalin, Castro and Pol Pot. They may not know that some of these libels are mutually exclusive. But what they do know is that they need a scapegoat for what ails them, and there is no one handier than a liberal, all-powerful president (who just happens to be black).

All of this is getting tiring. As conservative/libertarians become increasing successful in restoring the nation's political balance to that of the country's founding, the entrenched radicals on the left and their 'moderate' enablers in the GOP establishment are resisting with everything they've got, no matter how depraved.

I got an e-mail today from the Tea Party Express, and they're response to the racist slurs is perfect:

It's important for us to realize that the very reason that they are attacking us is because we are making a difference - we have those who are advancing a Big Goverment, socialistic push for America's future on the defensive. And liked a trapped animal they are lashing out in desperation -- attempting to smear us in an effort to silence us.

More at Memeorandum, especially Power Line, "Are You A Racist?"

See also, Generation Patriot, "You're Too Stupid To Argue Politics: Racism."

Charles Blow: Top NYT Race-Baiter Decries Race-Baiting

I was going to say "chief" NYT race-baiter, but Charles Blow's still second fiddle to the heavies on the op-ed page, Maureen Dowd and Frank Rich. That said, the dude can get his race-baiting on. See, "Here We Go Again."

Race has become a vicious game of bludgeons and crutches, where acerbic accusers run roughshod over earnest egalitarians and political gain is sought even at the expense of enlightenment.

Blow then rattles off a bunch of survey evidence suggesting vestiges of racism, then continues:

Racism is real. It is very likely an element of some people’s opposition to President Obama, but everyone who wants smaller government is not a racist.

Let’s stop talking about racism as if it’s black or white. There are many shades of gray.

Blow's one of those guys who practually holds himself up as possessing the "Judgment of Solomon." Yet this is not an issue we can just cut down the middle to find out who's really genuine on race. When we have this many people at the demonstrations, there are bound to be some kooks. The Lyndon LaRouche Democrats fit that bill through August, although the left tried to turn these guys into Bircherite-Republicans. Now we have the idiots at Media Matters alleging that the current environment is analogous to 1963, when President Kennedy was assassinated (see, "Bloviating, Media Matters Style"). No matter that Lee Harvey Oswald was a communist who had visited the Soviet Union and married a Russian. Didn't fit the leftist meme, actually. But the left is all about historical revisionism in the monstrosity of a hegemonic takeover of state and society.

At the video above: "Wallace On The Obama White House: 'They Are The Biggest Bunch Of Cry Babies I have Dealt With In My 30 Years'."

Sean Hannity: 'The Valley Hope Forgot'

From Sean Hannity on Fox on Friday, "The Valley Hope Forgot: Schwarzenegger Responds to Crop Crisis":

We are live tonight from the San Joaquin Valley. We're in California, where the government has turned off the water, now forcing countless farmers into unemployment and food lines.

And joining me now from Sacramento is the governor of the great state of California. Governor Schwarzenegger is with us.

Governor, thank you for being here. Thank you.

That segment is the bottom clip of four:

ACORN Shuts Down Offices Nationwide: San Diego Housing Hustler-Pimp Fired! (VIDEO)

I reported on ACORN's Santa Ana office closing down yesterday. Now we have the Los Angeles Times reporting that ACORN is downsizing nationwide: "ACORN Scaling Back or Shutting Down in Many Cities" (via Mememorandum):

Stung by the recession and a string of scandals, the ACORN community activist organization has been shutting down in many of the communities it once worked to empower.

No new clients are being signed up, said national spokesman Brian Kettenring, while the group conducts an internal investigation into how its business is conducted.

The Assn. of Community Organizations for Reform Now had already shuttered 40% of its centers -- in cities including Chicago, Salt Lake City, Atlanta and Omaha -- since its high of 105 offices two years ago, he said. The branches helped low- and middle-income clients with housing, jobs and navigating government aid programs.

Kettenring said that the closures were mostly due to the poor economy and had become more frequent in the last year.

"We're seeing the same challenges the entire nonprofit sector is seeing," he said.

But former ACORN members say the scandals that have recently dogged the organization -- including allegations of mismanagement and voter registration fraud -- have been a bigger problem.

You can say that again. Kinda funny how we're seeing all these offices closing in the immediate wake of the Hannah Giles/James O'Keefe undercover investigation.

Also, from Big Government, "San Diego: ACORN Stands By Their Employee, Until They Don’t."

And from the New York Times, "G.O.P. Checks for a Pulse, and Finds One." (Via Memeorandum.)

Hey, Ain't That Racist? Lady GaGa Does Al Jolson ... Leftist Establishment is Down With That!

I've admired Lady GaGa quite a bit. She's extremely hot, in an unordinary way. But she's crossed a line of decency with her new blackface gig, on the cover of the fall issue of V Magazine:

Semi-nude images from the photo-shoot are here.

When entertainers in the early 20th century donned blackface, these artistic representations were soon condemned as racist stereotypes. Al Jolson's images are perhaps most famous; his scenes as a blackface entertainer in The Jazz Singer (1927) are widely acknowledged as patently racist today:

Recall Jane Hamsher, in a 2006 essay at Huffington Post, argued that Senator Joseph Lieberman had been "an integral part of the GOP's bully machine for the past six years ..." Hamsher illustrated the post with this awful blackface of Lieberman below, which was promptly removed amid the understandable outcry (complete with a feigned apology from "Hammering" Jane):

So what's up with Lady GaGa? Have we come full-circle and Birth of a Nation iconography is back as hot glam-fashion in the Hollywood-New York media-cultural complex?

The V Magazine piece argues that GaGa "pushes the outer limits of the avant-garde ..." And one celebrity gossip page quipped of GaGa's getup, "She wants to know if anyone still thinks that joke’s funny. ‘Cause I sure as hell do!"

Another gossip page jokes about GaGa's pubic hair (symbolically represented in the photographs), and one commenter finally asks, "Why is she in blackface? Is that what the kids consider cool these days. I'm just asking ..." But the thread gets its share of racial humor: "LOVE her pearly whites!!!!"

No word on the blackface gig from Perez Hilton, Lady GaGa's biggest Hollywood fan-boy (and fat-boy tag-along GaGa groupie). Of course, Hilton's cool with Kanye West's racist power grab at the video music awards last week, and he puts down rumors that GaGa's tour with Kanye was dumped: "Not Cancelled! Kanye/GaGa Tour Still Happening!" It turns out that GaGa's Al Jolson resurrection and Kanye's race-baiting don't rate up there with Carrie Prejean's opinion that marriage is for men and women. Nope, that's bigotry!! Remember Perez Hilton's total disbelief, with illustrations, when Ms. Prejean actually exercized her rights: "Carrie Prejean IS Suing The Miss California Organization!":

That's pretty much the leftist double-standard in action.

Now to be clear, as I said, I like Lady GaGa. I genuinely appreciate her oeuvre, and of course I think she's a sexual knockout.

But hey, aren't we having this big debate over racism in America? We're hearing all about the "racists" who're attacking President Obama from the likes of Jimmy Carter and Maureen Dowd. You know, remember how Joe Wilson's racist for suggesting that Obama's a liar (never mind that Obama's really a liar)? All the lefties are up in arms! Jim Crow is back!

But, ah, isn't Lady GaGa's Al Jolson schtick kinda Jim Crow-ish, you think?

Better not tell the MSM. They might attack me as, well, racist!

Irving Kristol, 1920-2009: Godfather of Neoconservatism

The Astute Bloggers graciously provides the New York Times link, "Irving Kristol, Godfather of Modern Conservatism, Dies at 89." Also, my good friend Ken Davenport has written his own thoughtful commemoration, "Irving Kristol, 1920-2009." Ken focuses on how Kristol's neoconservatism has become the most important critique of modern statist ideologies (and of especially the consequences of post-1960s Democratic Party social policy).

There's lots of commentary at Memeorandum. See Jules Crittenden, GayPatriot, Power Line, The Other McCain, and Outside The Beltway. See especially John Podoretz's obituary at Commentary, and Robert Kagan at the Washington Post. And Myron Magnet, at City Journal, shares a personal anecdote about Kristol's compassion:

His generosity, especially to young conservatives, was legendary. It was partly a matter of policy, for nurturing the talented and finding them influential jobs is the way to build a movement. But it was even more an emanation of the sweetness of his temper and the depth of his humanity. I was complaining to him about New York’s plague of aggressive panhandlers back in the 1980s, and he said, “If someone is so in need that he asks me for money, who am I to determine what’s driven him to it? I always give something.” The reality he always had before him was the human reality.

You could probably say the same thing about most neoconservatives. These folks, mostly, are former liberals who saw the light. But coming to one's senses doesn't mean abandoning compassion. Neoconservatives have a goodness of vision that's defining, and a propensity to back idealism with power that's frightening to many. Indeed, that's why no other manifestation of conservatism has generated as much hostility among antagonists. One need only to read the comments at Firedoglake's entry to get the feel for how badly leftists want to eviscerate Kristol, but they're ironically constrained by the same morality that's the central plank of the neocon vision: Be good and do good in furtherance of the good society (and don't be afraid of raw power while you're at it). That said, not all of the commentators at the post let their better values contain them, and this remark on the "evils" of the neocon worldview perhaps perfectly captures the left's nihilist zeitgeist:

Neoconservatism visited two disastrous and seemingly endless wars upon us. It engaged in a third, the War on Terror, which wasn’t just seeming but truly was endless by definition. Indefinite detention, rendition, torture, and domestic spying are just a few of its accomplishments. Neoconservatism also helped bankrupt the country, wrecked our image abroad, and damaged our Constitution. It institutionalized the public lie and championed immunity for those neoconservatives, of whom there were many, who broke the law. This is the cobbled together, amazingly unthought out “philosophy” of which Irving Kristol was the godfather.

You can see how comprehensive is that repudiation. But what's most interesting - besides the classic neo-socialist repudiation of the neoconservative worldview - is how the commenter pleads the neocon mindset is an "unthought" philosophy. It's a ridiculous statement, of course, borne of a demonic hatred of the mind that's characteristic of today's hardline leftist ideologies. The comment thus captures both the secular demonology and the secular collectivism that's essential to the base of today's Democratic Party.

As a younger neocon myself, Irving Kristol was less important to my theoretical development than have been the Kagans (Robert, Frederick, and Kimberly) and Charles Krauthammer.

But I nevertheless often return to Irving Kristol's brief and excellent summation of neoconservative ideology, published at his son William's Weekly Standard, "The Neoconservative Persuasion." If folks really are unsure about the fullness of the neocon worldview, which is as much a theory of domestic politics as it is one of foreign policy, they can't go wrong spending some time with that essay. And if readers want more, Commentary has made available the magazine's complete archive of Irving Kristol's work from its pages:

We at COMMENTARY will be opening the entirety of his 45-article oeuvre in our archives (from his first contribution, a short story called “Adam and I,” published in November 1946, to his last, a 1994 essay entitled “Countercultures“) for free perusal by all readers. It is a treasure trove, as he was himself an incomparable treasure of a man, an intellectual, and an American. May Bea, Bill, Liz, and Irving’s five grandchildren be comforted among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem.

Cross-posted from Right Wing News.

Defending the ACORN Mob Enterprise

At the video, ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis wants to slam down the race card against the conservative activists at Big Government who went undercover to expose the corruption and malfeasance at the community organizing group. Here's the key quote from Lewis: "I think that says a little bit about what Mr. O’Keefe thinks that a black and brown organization would go for." More at the clip:

Sadly, the flip side of Lewis' comments are truly racist: That Americans shouldn't expect high standards of morality from those entrusted to advocate for the poor, or from the minority poor themselves.

Given that, it's especially interesting to read Joe Conason's pitiful attack on the GOP for its allegedly depraved campaign against a "noble" institution. See, "In Defense of ACORN: The Right-Wing Crusade Against ACORN Is a Far Bigger Fraud Than Any Misdeeds a Few Employees Might Have Committed":

Like so many conservative attacks, the crusade against ACORN has been highly exaggerated and even falsified to create a demonic image that bears little resemblance to the real organization. Working in the nation's poorest places, and hiring the people who live there, ACORN is not immune to the pathologies that can afflict institutions in those communities. As a large nonprofit handling many millions of dollars, it has suffered from mismanagement at the top as well -- although there is nothing unique in that, either.

Yet ACORN's troubles should be considered in the context of a history of honorable service to the dispossessed and impoverished. No doubt it was fun to dupe a few morons into providing tax advice to a "pimp and ho," but what ACORN actually does, every day, is help struggling families with the Earned Income Tax Credit (whose benefits were expanded by both Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton). And while the idea of getting housing assistance for a brothel was clever, what ACORN really does, every day, is help those same working families avoid foreclosure and stay in their homes.

Perhaps the congressional investigation now demanded by some Republican politicians would be a useful exercise, if conducted impartially. A fair investigation might begin to dispel some of the wild mythology promoted by right-wing media outlets.

Among the most popular canards on the right, repeated constantly by conservative pundits and politicians, is that ACORN has been found guilty of engaging in deliberate voter fraud, using federal funds. In reality, ACORN has registered close to 2 million low-income citizens across the country over the past five years -- a laudable record with a very low incidence of fraud of any kind.

Conason's an incredibly bad liar, although I guess that's what makes a skilled smear-merchant.

It's widely known that ACORN's essentially a criminal enterprise. John Fund has done yeoman's work in covering the epic scale of ACORN's corrupt voter registration racket. See, for example, "A Victory Against Voter Fraud"; "An Acorn Whistleblower Testifies in Court"; and "More Acorn Voter Fraud Comes to Light."

But see also Dana Loesch's post yesterday, "Taxpayer Funded Serve.gov Filtering Activists to ACORN." Dana shows that some of ACORN's poor assistance is designed to help disadvantaged clients avoid paying taxes. As she notes, "after they assist you in procuring housing for your brothel of underage girls, ACORN can also assist you in skirting your taxes ..."

All of this is straightforward. ACORN's a thug organization and corporate-shakedown enterprise. If it wasn't for Hannah Giles and James O'Keefe, the group would be enjoying continued mob activity outside of the public eye. The mass media doesn't care, and the radical left loves ACORN's radical anti-capitalist expropriation. And for both Bertha Lewis and Joe Conason to blame this on white racist assumptions of "black and brown people," or as part of a long GOP "frenzy" of attacks on the poor, is simply indicative of how morally bereft are those on the left today.

Carrie Prejean Rocks Values Voters Summit!

From the Wall Street Journal, "Carrie Prejean Wows Values Voters":

Conservative leaders are gathering this weekend in Washington, D.C., for the annual Values Voter Summit, but so far none has excited the crowd as much as former beauty queen turned marriage activist Carrie Prejean.

“Wow this is so exciting. I’m so excited to be here in Washington, D.C.” Prejean said to a standing ovation and raucous applause. “This has been a whirlwind of events, this has been absolutely crazy.”

The pageant controversy is an understandably emotional topic for Ms. Prejean: "Even though I didn’t win the crown that night. I know that God has an even bigger crown up there for me." And at various moments at the video:

More at The Dakota Voice, "Carrie Prejean at the Values Voter Summit."

Network Wars! Fox News Statement on Full-Page 9-12 Ad

From Michael Tammero, Vice-President of Marketing at Fox News (link):

“Generally speaking, it’s fair to say that from the tea party movement … to Acorn ... to the march on 9/12, the networks either ignored the story, marginalized it or misrepresented the significance of it altogether.”

CNN's now going after Fox (link).

Via Memeorandum.

Orange County ACORN Office Shuts Down!

The Orange County ACORN office has shut its doors. I just spoke with the landlord at the office complex in Santa Ana, California, where local ACORN hacks provided services. The building-owner said she had just spoken with ACORN officials at the Los Angeles office. The group announced intent to vacate the premises this morning; personnel would be coming to Santa Ana to clear out their effects at an undisclosed date. The website to ACORN's Santa Ana office is here.

CEO Bertha Lewis released an earlier statement at ACORN's main page:

As a result of the indefensible action of a handful of our employees, I am, in consultation with ACORN's Executive Committee, immediately ordering a halt to any new intakes into ACORN's service programs until completion of an independent review.

Looks like the termination of "new intakes" is starting right away, with the immediate downsizing of service delivery for the group. I took these photos. At bottom is the protest sign of Tawnya, one of the Orange County 9-12 protest organizers who visited the office today (that's her reflection in the first picture at the window):

(ADDED: Via Snark and Boobs, check WISTV News, "ACORN Loses Federal Cash, Vacates Columbia Office; Clyburn Responds"; plus, linked at Patriot Room.)

Andrew Breitbart: CNN 'Despicable', 'More Videos to Come'

Care of Freedom's Lighthouse, "Andrew Breitbart Slams CNN for their ACORN Coverage; Tells Megyn Kelly 'There Are More Videos to Come'":

At the viddy, Breitbart says, "We set traps for ACORN. And every time the lied, and they went to the mainstream media to lie ..."

Great stuff.

Also, Voting Female, "ABC CBS NBC – Kamikaze Media, Ignored Hurricane ACORN; not Your Grandfather’s Main Stream Media Anymore."

ADDED: From Big Government, MEDIA MATTERS: ‘On Fox, Breitbart bashes CNN’s ACORN coverage’." (Via Memeorandum.)

Charles Johnson and Andrew Sullivan: American Power Called It!

I'm scooping AOSHQ by months!

Check out Ace's post, "Inevitable: True Conservative Andrew Sullivan Praises 'Continued Evolution of Charles Johnson'."

But from American Power back in May, "Charles Johnson and Andrew Sullivan: Separated at Birth?":

And here's Andrew Sullivan's fine words in praise of Little Green Footballs:

The pioneer of the anti-Jihadist blog, Little Green Footballs, is repulsed by some of the developments on the populist, racist right. He's right to be; and has the courage to say so. For that he is subjected to the usual mau-mauing. Check out his blog. It's an Yglesias Award in motion.

I think it's fair to say that LGF's now gone completely to the other side. Is there anyone out there still aguing to the contrary? LGF Founding Bloggers was quite fair to Charles in a post the other day, "LGF Delinks Pajamas Media!." And my friend Michael van der Galien has long resisted throwing Charles under the bus (see, "Civil War Raging in the Right-Wing Blogosphere") But hey, the evidence is pretty overwhelming by now. The dude's cracked.

Obama Abandons Missile Defense to Appease Russia, Iran

From the Wall Street Journal, "Obama's Missile Offense: It's Better These Days To Be a U.S. Adversary Than Its Friend":

President Obama promised he would win America friends where, under George W. Bush, it had antagonists. The reality is that the U.S. is working hard to create antagonists where it previously had friends.

That's one conclusion to draw from President Obama's decision yesterday to scrap a missile-defense agreement the Bush Administration negotiated with Poland and the Czech Republic. Both governments took huge political risks—including the ire of their former Russian overlords—in order to accommodate the U.S., which wanted the system to defend against a possible Iranian missile attack. Don't expect either government to follow America's lead anytime soon ....

The White House justifies its decision by claiming to have new intelligence showing that Iran's long-range missile capabilities are not as advanced as previously believed. Instead, it intends to upgrade and deploy currently available missile interceptors that are useful mainly for intercepting short- and medium-range missiles, where, it says, Iranian capability "is developing more rapidly than previously projected."

We're all for deploying interceptors to stop Iranian missiles of every range. But the Administration's argument is difficult to credit, not least because our sources told us as early as February that the Administration was prepared to abandon those sites—which is to say, well before the allegedly new intelligence became available.

It's also hard to square the intelligence community's sanguine assessment with Iran's successful launch of the solid-fuel Sejil missile in May. With an estimated range of 1,560 miles, the Sejil could deliver a one-ton payload as far as Warsaw. That cannot be comforting when the International Atomic Energy Agency is now saying that Iran has "sufficient information" to build an atomic bomb and will also "overcome problems" involved in its delivery system.

The Administration's likelier motive for scrapping the interceptors is that it hopes to win Russia's vote at the U.N. Security Council for tougher sanctions on Iran. Maybe the Russians have secretly agreed to such a quid pro quo, though publicly they were quick to deny it following yesterday's decision.

And as Russian opposition leader Garry Kasparov has noted, Vladimir Putin's Kremlin benefits by keeping the Iranian crisis on a low boil, because the threat of a Middle East crisis drives energy prices up while putting U.S. interests at risk. Russia also likes spooning out dollops of diplomatic help at the U.N. in exchange for material Western concessions. This time, the concession was missile defense. Next time, perhaps, the West can be seduced into trading away the pro-Western government of Georgia, or even Ukraine.

Also, at National Review, "President Obama knows how to put a smile on faces in Tehran and Moscow: This morning, he announced the abandonment of plans to develop a small missile-defense system in Eastern Europe."

At Hot Air, "Democrats to Obama: Um, What Exactly Are We Getting For Selling Out Poland to Russia?" (Via Memeorandum.)

Plus, see the Astute Bloggers, "OBAMA CEDES POLAND AND CZECH REPUBLIC - SCRAPS MISSILE DEFENSE FOR EUROPE." And Stop the ACLU, "Obama’s European Missile Plan Is Actually Pretty Good If We Take Out the Appeasement."

Image Credit: Bosch Fawstin.

The Ideological Clarity of the Democratic Agenda

From John David Lewis, "Obama’s Atomic Bomb: The Ideological Clarity of the Democratic Agenda":

As the leader of the Democrats—the party that carries an historical reputation for expanding government power, higher taxes, and limitless spending—Obama reasserted and rejuvenated his party’s traditional commitment to the statist course. This commitment permeates his speeches. He regards businessmen not as valuable producers, but as conniving parasites who must be placed under comprehensive government controls, including a “czar” to approve executive pay. He expressed this desire in an angry rant against financial managers who received contracted bonuses.8 Obama regards doctors not as lifesavers, but as predators willing to sacrifice their patients to needless operations in order to get money.9 He regards the police who respond to reports of a burglary as cops who act “stupidly,” before the relevant facts are clear. He regards overseas regimes that have pledged to continue to attack the United States as deserving of apology. Meanwhile, he wants to prosecute American intelligence officers who used “harsh” interrogation techniques against enemies who have killed Americans. Obama and his administration are overtly and publicly committed to an ideologically radical leftist agenda.

Obama’s choice of advisors has helped to define his antibusiness agenda. He hired, for instance, John Holdren as his director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy. Holdren has expressed his views of industry in print since the 1970s: “A massive campaign must be launched to restore a high-quality environment in North America and to de-develop the United States.”10 Such views are consistent with a range of policies planned by the administration, from stringent business regulations being drafted by the Congress and Obama’s economic czars, to cap-and-trade legislation intended to strangle industry, to unremitting attempts to place the medical industry under comprehensive government control.

Such views permeate Obama’s rhetoric, which connects him in many people’s minds to the most radical (i.e., consistent) advocates of democratic socialism. Despite his attempts to appear moderate, the basic nature of his administration—its essential identity, purpose, and worldview—is becoming crystal clear. He is a leftist and a socialist on principle, who vilifies the free market, apologizes for his country before murderous foreign dictators, and finds salvation in ever-growing government power. Not all Americans see him this way, but the number is growing with his every word and deed.11

Obama, of course, does not intend to be clear about his socialist identity. He is trying to come across as a “reasonable,” moderate “centrist.” But his attempts to appeal to moderate voters are angering the hard left and alienating the independents. Meanwhile, an increasing number of astute American voters on the right are largely unmoved.12 Many people are seeing him as a skilled orator who is trying to save his agenda.

Image Credit: The People's Cube.

Why ACORN’s Internal Audit is a Sham

From Matthew Vadum, "Once Upon an ACORN: Why ACORN’s Internal Audit is a Sham":

The announcement by ACORN that it is creating a panel of inquiry consisting of its corrupt friends is a fairy tale. ACORN did the same thing last year after an internal scandal but when the honest people on ACORN’s internal panel began asking uncomfortable questions, it cast them out.

Since it’s a fairy tale, let me tell the story the fairy tale way:
Once upon a time there was a group called the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN). It was run, and continues to be run today, by very bad people who do very bad things while they pretend to make America a better place.

Read the whole thing, at the link.

Plus, Andrew Berman, "ACORN’s Internal Audit is a Sham."