It’s time to shut down ACORN, work against voter fraud

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/11/us/politics/11acorn.html

You both are quite welcome, but don't thank me, thank the Wall Street Joural. The liberal media is making my job easy.

In case there are any stragglers out there still worried about ACORN and voter fraud, I was googling around today and discovered that the Wall Street Journal had a liberal bias on this.

You might want to just google [voter fraud prosecutions] and see what pops up. But read what this liberal rag has to say:

So, when you hear someone getting hysterical about ACORN and voter fraud, remember:

Five years, unprecedented resources, across the country, not one case was even prosecuted, let alone a conviction.

Not one case! What is Ross Balano doing here? Is echoing Republican talking points useful? Why this witch hunt on ACORN? Should we be worried that voter intimidation and voter suppression are bigger concerns?

good reply to such nonsense.

Talk about grasping at straws.

Does anyone even remember any plan that McCain espouses for this country anymore, other than "we're doing great in Iraq and the economy's fine"?

I appreciate the time and effort you took in countering the emotionally reactive comments of others.

The American Center for Voting Rights was a sham. Read the Wikipedia article if you want the truth. This is SO boring, folks! Republicans drag out this scary monster every two years right around Halloween.

Click to see the American Center for Voting Rights Wiki Page

Note anything about this? THEY ARE REPUBLICAN STOOGES. It is hardly "nonpartisan". The only Democratic member ran Democrats for BUSH! LMFAO!

HERE IS THE MOST IMPORTANT PART. READ IT UNTIL IT SINKS IN.

NONE OF THIS MATTERS. REPUBLICANS WANT TO CRUCIFY ACORN BECAUSE THEY HELP POOR AND HOMELESS PEOPLE. THEY ARE LIBERAL. DUH.

Let me make sure you saw this bit about FIVE YEARS, UNPRECEDENTED RESOURCES, NOT A SINGLE CASE ACROSS THE F-ING COUNTRY.

Click to see the American Center for Voting Rights Wiki Page

To: Interested Parties
From: Bertha Lewis and Steve Kest
Date: October 9, 2008
Re: The Truth About ACORN's Voter Registration Drive

Election Day is less than a month away, and our efforts to make sure that low-income and minority voters have a voice and vote on November 4th are in full swing. Unfortunately, just as we've seen in previous election cycles, the more success we have in empowering these voters, the more attacks we have to fend off from partisan forces making unfounded accusations to disparage our work and help maintain the status quo of an unbalanced electorate. We want to take this opportunity to separate the facts of our successes from the falsehoods of our attackers.

On Monday, October 6, as voter registration deadlines passed in most states, ACORN completed the largest, most successful nonpartisan voter registration drive in history. In partnership with the nonpartisan organization Project Vote, we helped register over 1.3 million low-income, minority, and young voters in a total of 21 states. Highlights of this success include:

We collected over 151,000 registrations in Florida, 153,000 in Pennsylvania, 215,000 in Michigan, and nearly 250,000 in Ohio.

An estimated 60-70 percent of our applicants are people of color.

At least HALF of all are registrations are from young people between 18-29.

We are proud of this unprecedented success, and grateful to everyone who supported us in this massive effort, from our funders and partners to the literally thousands of hardworking individuals across the country who dedicated themselves to the cause and conducted the difficult work of registering 1.3 million Americans, one voter at a time.

And this work is far from over: now begins our effort mobilize these new voters around local and national issues, getting them to the polls and helping to channel their commitment and conviction into an ongoing movement for change in our communities.

As The Nation pointed out recently, ACORN's success in registering millions of low-income and minority voters has made it "something of a right-wing bogeyman." Though ACORN believes that the right to vote is not, and should never be, a partisan issue, attacks from groups threatened by our historic success continue to come, motivated by partisan politics and often perpetuated by the media without full investigation of the facts. As a result, there have been a few recent stories about investigations of former ACORN workers for turning in incomplete, erroneous, or fraudulent voter registration applications. Predictably, partisan forces have tried to use these isolated incidents to incite fear of the "bogeyman" of "widespread voter fraud." But we want to take this opportunity to set the record straight and tell you a few facts to show how these incidents really exemplify everything that ACORN is doing right:

Fact: ACORN has implemented the most sophisticated quality-control system in the voter engagement field, but in almost every state we are required to turn in ALL completed applications, even the ones we know to be problematic.

Fact: ACORN flags incomplete, problem, or suspicious cards when we turn them in, but these warnings are often ignored by election officials. Often these same officials then come back weeks or months later and accuse us of deliberately turning in phony cards.

Fact: Our canvassers are paid by the hour, not by the card, so there is NO incentive for them to falsify cards. ACORN has a zero-tolerance policy for deliberately falsifying registrations, and in the relatively rare cases where our internal quality controls have identified this happening we have fired the workers involved and turned them in to election officials and law-enforcement.

Fact: No charges have ever been brought against ACORN itself. Convictions against individual former ACORN workers have been accomplished with our full cooperation, using the evidence obtained through our quality control and verification processes.

Fact: Voter fraud by individuals is extremely rare, and incredibly difficult. There has never been a single proven case of anyone, anywhere, casting an illegal vote as a result of a phony voter registration. Even if someone wanted to influence the election this way, it would not work.

Fact: Most election officials have recognized ACORN's good work and praised our quality control systems. Even in the cities where election officials have complained about ACORN, the applications in question represent less than 1% of the thousands and thousands of registrations ACORN has collected.

Fact: Our accusers not only fail to provide any evidence, they fail to suggest a motive: there is virtually no chance anyone would be able to vote fraudulently, so there is no reason to deliberately submit phony registrations. ACORN is committed to ensuring that the greatest possible numbers of people are registered and allowed to vote, so there is also NO incentive to "disrupt the system" with phony cards.

Fact: Similar accusations were made, and attacks launched, against ACORN and other voter registration organizations in 2004 and 2006. These attacks were not only groundless, they have since been exposed as part of the U.S. Attorneygate scandal and revealed to be part of a systematic partisan agenda of voter suppression.

These are the facts, and the truth is that a relatively small group of political operatives are trying to orchestrate hysteria about "voter fraud" and manufacture public outrage that they can use to further suppress the votes of millions of low-income and minority Americans.

These tactics are nothing new, and history has shown that they will come to nothing. We'll continue to weather the storm, as we've done for years, and we'll continue to share the truth about our work and express pride about our accomplishments.
Most importantly, we want to assure you that this good work continues, unabated and undeterred. ACORN will not be intimidated, we will not be provoked, and in this important moment in history we will not allow anyone to distract us from these vital efforts to empower our constituencies and our communities to speak for themselves. If the partisan political machines are afraid of low-income and minority voters, they're going to have to do a lot better than coming after ACORN.

After all, there are now at least 1.3 million more of them, and they will not be silenced. They're taking an interest, and taking a stand, and they'll be taking their concerns to the voting booth in November.

And ACORN will be here, to make sure that the voices of these Americans are heard, on Election Day and for every day to come.

"The idea that activist groups are required to effectively galvanize legal voters to register is one that died a natural death in the eighties." Rilly? Were that true, voter registration groups would be drawing a blank in their efforts.

"The cysto kid has never displayed any mental capacity beyond closed minded, dogma driven cynicism" No, you don't have the mental capacity nor the education to make that judgment.

If Republicans were out registering voters to stop the horrid abuses of ACORN it would indicate that Republicans were honestly indignant rather than looking for easy-chair cheap shots.

You misrepresent my position. I do indeed find nothing wrong with voter registration efforts, by ACORN and otherwise. Can't think of anything more in step with the idea of democracy than encouraging voting.

But such efforts have nothing to do with those allegations of "dead people voting" that the right-wingers keep bringing up. Let's keep it honest, chazzy, and not engage in disingenuous conflation of voting registration efforts and actual voting fraud.

I'm not sure there's an inherent flaw, but that's not the requirement, so until it changes, voter registration efforts are perfectly acceptable and, indeed, admirable.

I am blown away that Interface, who I respected as an intellectually honest liberal, finds nothing wrong with ACORN....nothing wrong with with people coming from beneath their headstones to vote.......bizarre.

The cysto kid has never displayed any mental capacity beyond closed minded, dogma driven cynicism, so I am not surprised by his constant vacuous posting asking where the republicans are registering voters. The idea that activist groups are required to effectively galvanize legal voters to register is one that died a natural death in the eighties.

Where is the flaw in accepting personal responsibility for registering to vote? Where is the flaw, I would submit, in mandating that the voter personally show up to register?

Voting is among the greatest priviliges that we are offered. It is a personal responsibility to take advantage of that privilige. It is, in my view, one that should be embraced by all.....each and every one of us who has the personal motivation to want to participate in the process......that should be the only acceptable motivation.....not money...not drugs....not a partisan promise of personal benefit from a candidiate.

I worked (as a 20 year old volunteer in the summer of '65 for 3 months) in 4 Mississippi counties registering a largely illiterate group of people.....about 70% of whom were black. It was honest, honorable (dangerous I might add), well motivated work. I came to find out that very few of them actually voted.......they were registered but not properly motivated to vote.

I will suggest that similar activities today (ACORN) enable, indeed encourage, the people who drum up the registrations for personal gain have the opportunity to vote illegally......even while the registrant is a disinterested non participant. That is wrong and should not only be discouraged ....it is and should be ...against the law.

And Young Republicans participate at peril to their souls?

to submit EVERY application they receive. They flag the ones they suspect are fake. So if they fail to turn in ANY applications, they are breaking the law.

The system's working just fine.

are doing great, thank you, without stooping to fraud and corruption.

Do you realize that "broken record" requires that the listener to remember, not LP's, but 78's?

Kenm--
If the well-funded, well-organized Republican Party can't find enough scrubbed YR's to man the barricades, they could do as ACORN does and hire people on quota. Seriously--do you see how difficult it is to distinguish between a real issue that nobody wants to do anything material about, and an artificial issue that's free to complain about?

The republican base is not the dead, illegal, underage, or imaginary. The vast majority of voters, including democrats, register at the DMV or other government registration points by showing proof of residence. I dont believe the republicans have an ACORN organization. The democrats have always had a much better and bigger registraion apparatus through unions and organizations like ACORN. On election days the get out the votes run by unions and ACORN like organizations pick up and drive voters to the polls if necessary. THe republicans have nothing like this.

Dont get me wrong, I want every legal resident to cast a ballot. But I think it is the responsibility of the voter to make the effort to register and vote. It is an individual responsibility that goes along with our rights as citizens. The exception to this is the elderly who may need an outside resource to assist them in voting, meaning transportation.

ACORN or any organization that tries to undermine the trust and confidence we have in our elections is harmful and we must not tolerate in any way this type of fraud.

But my question is legitimate. If Republicans believe this is a horrifying crime against democracy, where is the Republican effort to register voters? Is this something that requires immediate action, or is this a cheap talking point that merely involves cut-and-pasting across the Internet of the same list of "charges"?

WHERE IS THE REPUBLICAN VERSION OF ACORN????

ACORN and its attempt to steal the election for Obama and other democrats is not a distraction. I keep reading that voter registration is not the same as casting a ballot. Registering people who are dead, illegal, underage, not residence, or just plain crack heads allows people to apply for an absentee ballot or vote in that persons name, especially if you dont have to prove your identity. What this may cause is the day after the election the courts will have to become involved to resolve a close election as each of these ballots will have to be certified and accounted for. You need to make the case that what ACORN is doing is harmless, legal, or wont infringe upon the outcome of the election. If what they were doing would not result in their desired outcome, why do it?

ACORN is trying to steal this election and every voter, democrat, republican and independent should demand the harshest prosecution of these people.

Voter registration fraud is serious, but by and large the only persons who benefit from it are:

(a) an employee who's faking names to defraud their employer (which is why Kansas City ACORN turned in those employees back in 2006), and (b) the various Republican blowhards who want to play the politics of distraction by conflating voter registration fraud and actual voter fraud.

http://www.kmbc.com/news/10214492/detail.html

It's a bullshit issue, and one that folks like Balano need to be called on. I wish the Star would do some serious reporting on this and underscore that, while voter registration fraud is a federal crime, it's not the same as nor does it seem to lead to actual vote fraud, despite the efforts of right-wing moonbats to make that conflation.

The politics of distraction should be challenged by the media, not aided and abetted.

IF THIS IS A REAL PROBLEM WHERE ARE THE REPUBLICANS REGISTERING VOTERS???????????

The Acorn Indictments
A union-backed outfit faces charges of election fraud. Friday, November 3, 2006 12:01 A.M. EST

So, less than a week before the midterm elections, four workers from Acorn, the liberal activist group that has registered millions of voters, have been indicted by a federal grand jury for submitting false voter registration forms to the Kansas City, Missouri, election board. But hey, who needs voter ID laws?

We wish this were an aberration, but allegations of fraud have tainted Acorn voter drives across the country. Acorn workers have been convicted in Wisconsin and Colorado, and investigations are still under way in Ohio, Tennessee and Pennsylvania.

The good news for anyone who cares about voter integrity is that the Justice Department finally seems poised to connect these dots instead of dismissing such revelations as the work of a few yahoos. After the federal indictments were handed up in Kansas City this week, the U.S. Attorney's office said in a statement that "This national investigation is very much ongoing."

Let's hope so. Acorn officials bill themselves as nonpartisan community organizers merely interested in giving a voice to minorities and the poor. In reality, Acorn is a union-backed, multimillion-dollar outfit that uses intimidation and other tactics to push for higher minimum wage mandates and to trash Wal-Mart and other non-union companies.

Operating in at least 38 states (as well as Canada and Mexico), Acorn pushes a highly partisan agenda, and its organizers are best understood as shock troops for the AFL-CIO and even the Democratic Party. As part of the Fannie Mae reform bill, House Democrats pushed an "affordable housing trust fund" designed to use Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac profits to subsidize Acorn, among other groups. A version of this trust fund actually passed the Republican House and will surely be on the agenda again next year.
Acorn and its affiliates have pulled some real stunts in recent years. In Ohio in 2004, a worker for one affiliate was given crack cocaine in exchange for fraudulent registrations that included underage voters, dead voters and pillars of the community named Mary Poppins, Dick Tracy and Jive Turkey. During a Congressional hearing in Ohio in the aftermath of the 2004 election, officials from several counties in the state explained Acorn's practice of dumping thousands of registration forms in their lap on the submission deadline, even though the forms had been collected months earlier.

"You have to wonder what's the point of that, if not to overwhelm the system and get phony registrations on the voter rolls," says Thor Hearne of the American Center for Voting Rights, who also testified at the hearing. "These were Democratic officials saying that they felt their election system in Ohio was under assault by these kinds of efforts to game the system."

I've asked repeatedly and gotten no answer--if there is some demonstration that actual voting fraud has taken place, i.e., people voting who aren't qualified to vote, where are the Republicans OR Libertarians OR Methodists with an alternative ACORN, registering people the appropriate way?

I'm getting tired of artificial outrage in this particular election, and I have no doubt whatsoever that ATTEMPTED voter fraud is a fact of life. So where's the action? Where's the boots on the ground? Where's the 'clean' registration of voters by honest volunteers?
Or is it just one more instance of a desperate shot of finding an issue that resonates with voters?

ACORN's blatant abuse of the voter registration system

Just what is the abuse? ACORN collects registrations from people and turns them in. Some people are dumb and register multiple times. Some people are malicious and attempt to defraud ACORN by collecting fake registrations. The organization fights such fraud as best as it can, but it's a typically underfunded nonprofit.

Keep in mind, ACORN doesn't register voters -- local governments register voters. ACORN is simply providing people an opportunity to register, and, being on the frontlines, is a convenient target for right-wing mudslinging.

Divisive partisanship on the part of the Republicans is behind the attack on ACORN, which an anti-poverty organization which attempts to aid the poor and disenfranchised by getting them involved in politics that impacts them. Encouraging such civic participation is quintessentially American and democratic.

This thread has been full of partisan finger pointing in both directions.....each side diplaying some genuine concerns for their perspectives with little if any GENUINE CONCERN for plausible solutions moving forward that both sides might be able to fully embrace. That should be the primary concern and focus for ALL fair minded AMERICANS.

The democcratic partisans see no problem with ACORN's blatant abuse of the voter registration system. The republican partisans see no problem with concerns expressed by the dems for elctronic manipulation of actual voting results.....where or what are viable solutions to the universal distrust of a system gone awry.????

Just last night in Harris County Texas (houston) an investsigative report revealed that 4000 dead people are not only registered, but have cast ballots in this year's primary.
http://www.click2houston.com/investigates/17671375/detail.html

There are multiple counties nationwide that have more people registered to vote than there are living in the county. That is appalling to all of us.

I, like the overwhelming majority of Americans am totally in favor of every eligible citizen registering and voting. Where does a reasonable solution rest? .....Why have we, as a nation whose citizenry are overwhelmingly fair minded, completely lost our ability to think and view issues with that filter of fairness as the overiding filter ....in front of partisanship?

I am deeply saddened by what has happened to my country...our country. The divisive partisanship that we now see and live with is and should be disturbing to all of us.

I am a 63 year old libertarian ......my guys never win.....I am used to that.....But I still want the system to be one that we all can embrace with a conviction that it's fair and just.

I am committing my remaining years of political participation to seeking solutions and building a comsensus for a solution to this unnecessarily divisive problem.

Too late. You've got twenty-seven days left to manufacture an issue, and this isn't going to do it. I'd like to see another moral, conservative Congressman get caught with his fly half-unbuttoned in the Boys room of an elementary school in Jacksonville, Florida, or something, but I, too, will probably have to learn to live with disappointment.

would like to distance himself from his attorney role in an ACORN case, but some of the mud should and will stick. I would like to see greater scrutiny to his ties to the Democrats who turned Fannie Mae into their personal Housing Project.

There is no way the results of the last two Presidential elections could be reconciled with the results of the exit polls. Statistically speaking, it was an impossibility.

The RNC used Diebold's allegiance to their cause to commit extensive voting machine fraud in 2000 and in 2004. Here is video of a Republican discussing the issue:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsgY4_BB2lo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9Kq4dxPwY8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jy1sz-xBxf8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Vvq_YseZVc

There is absolutely no reason to think they won't do it again.

These stories about ACORN are primarily a pre-emptive coverup for the cheating via voting machines that is to come, as well as being additional smear tactics against Obama.

These ACORN stories, while disturbing, are allegations of voter *registration* fraud. People would still have to actually manage to vote under these names somehow. Diebold and the RNC are persuasively alleged to have committed actual voting fraud, en masse.

Hack-a-vote: Students Learn How Vulnerable Electronic Voting Really Is

ScienceDaily (Oct. 8, 2008) — Undergraduate and graduate students in an advanced computer security course at Rice University in Houston are learning hands-on just how easy it is to wreak havoc on computer software used in today's voting machines.

As part of his advanced computer science class, Rice University Associate Professor and Director of Rice's Computer Security Lab Dan Wallach tests his students in a unique real-life experiment: They are instructed to do their very best to rig a voting machine in the classroom.

Here's how the experiment works:

Wallach splits his class into teams. In phase one, the teams pretend to be unscrupulous programmers at a voting machine company. Their task: Make subtle changes to the machines' software -- changes that will alter the election's outcome but that cannot be detected by election officials.
...

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081007102851.htm

It seems to me that if people want to actually do something to protect the democratic process, instead of jumping on a soap box and spouting devisive rhetoric against community organizers trying to help poor and homeless people exercise their rights as citizens, they ought to demand the same RECEIPT that they get from a McDonalds or a gas pump.

I have never understood why a DIEBOLD voting machine can't PRINT MY BALLOT and let me check it for errors. Then I walk it over to the box and stick it in the slot for safe keeping in the event of a contested election.

Yeah printers will jam and run out of paper. Big f---ing deal. Gas stations and fast food chains seem to be able to survive these technical issues without collapsing. So can our government. Perhaps our voting boards can visit with some Quik Trip and take some notes.

If this isn't just more artificial Republican outrage in search of an issue, WHERE'S THE CORRECTIVE REPUBLICAN VERSION OF ACORN? Where are the Young Republican volunteers fanning out to register voters first, to make sure ACORN doesn't get to turn in anybody but the leftovers and the outright frauds?

Is there any evidence?

I would like to know what evidence supports the claim that ACORN is some sort of force for evil. It looks like they had some people working for them that ripped them off and they reported it.

I also want to know the number of ACTUAL voter fraud cases successfully prosecuted in the US last year or whenever is available.

Anyone?

http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2008/10/red_meat_attracts_rabid_dogs.php

Sarah Palin is pouring gasoline on the fire.

I mean, it's so over-the-top it's just silly. :-)

Troll.

You've got to stop holding, back, mang, you're keeping it all bottled up inside and it'll eat you alive. Let it out, let your words run freeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!
Sheesh.

Are we there yet? Could we please hold the election next week? Are we waiting for some more Republican-style entertainment, a prominent conservative Senator caught in Mistress Felice's dungeon or something right before we go to the polls? Let's get this over with.

A thinking, feeling human being, with hopes, dreams, regrets and triumphs....naaaahhhh.

ACORN is Mr. Obama's favorite charity. Mr. Obama fixed it so ACORN gets big bucks from Fannie and Freddie. Mr. Obama is a liar. Mr. Obama's stock-in-trade is The Lie. Mr. Obama's closest friends and associates are criminals and liars. They, including Mr. Obama, will say or do ANYTHING to advance their mad drive for power. They all, including Mr. Obama, are sacchrine-sweet on the outside and deadly cyanide-vapor on the inside. Such entities (I will not refer to them as "human") are more deadly than the deadliest vipers. Mr. Obama is a clever, very skillful liar. The word "dishonest" does not approach describing the depth of Mr. Obama's moral degeneracy and depravity.

http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2008/10/more_on_the_accusations_agains.php

Yes. Voter fraud affects everyone, regardless of political party. You would also agree that voter suppression affects everyone, regardless of party, right?

Hang on. Why the personal attack on Democratic voters? What you see as "defending ACORN" is also called "reacting calmly" to a hysterical worry. I have seen studies that say that voter fraud is miniscule.

Have you considered that vote fraud is a felony, carries a 5 year prison term and a $10,000 fine? All for one fraudulent vote?

I hear a lot of people screaming that the house is on fire but I don't even see any SMOKE. I think most liberals AND conservatives are saying "Show me the numbers of ACTUAL PROVEN fraudulent votes before screaming fire in a crowded theater." It has NOTHING to do with political party.

Since I reject the first assumption about my intentions here, I reject your conclusion too. Make sense?

OK, now we are getting to the meat-and-potatoes of the topic. Do you have a link to a news story showing that people have been actually REGISTERED TO VOTE (not that the form was filled out multiple times)? And you do recognize that ACORN turned in some workers themselves, right? They were being ripped off and called the cops.

Why should I, a voter concerned with my tax dollars, spend money cracking down on a problem if it does not exist or if other problems such as voter intimidation and voter roll suppressions, are causing even more harm to the process. This is not a question you can ignore. Consider carefully.

I look forward to the links. I want to see evidence from mainstream news sources, not from right wing editorials that do not provide verifiable evidence, of course. Drudge Report, NewsMax, freerepublic, etc, are okay as long as they link to the REAL evidence and don't rant about it with no proof. Fari enough?

Again, dial it back a bit on the assumptions. I love this country, probably at least as much if not more than you. Do not call me a water carrier for the Democrats just because I object to trashing a community organization when it is politically expedient. I don't know much about ACORN, but I have read "The Crucible", I saw "Good Night and Good Luck" and I know about the McCarthy era.

My America is above that.

United we stand, divided we fall.

but if some numbnut turns in multiple registrations, that doesn't at all translate into multiple votes.

There's no evidence that voter registration fraud (or simple mistakes by people registering twice for whatever reason) results in actual voting fraud at the polling booths.

It's a non-issue. Certainly ACORN doesn't benefit from such fraud -- indeed, their efforts to reach as many unregistered voters as possible are undermined by erroneous multiple registrations, so the right-wing charges simply make no sense from a logical standpoint.

I ask again, why aren't you more worried about electronic voting machines and their susceptability to computer glitches or even malicious hacking?

ACORNs involvement in the meltdown of our economy needs to be investigated too.

ACORN, and Obama Are Tied To The Recent Financial Market Meltdown

The Seeds Of The Financial Meltdown Were Planted By Obama And ACORN!

And Obama Relationship With ACORN Isn't The Only Terrifying And Shocking Relationship Obama Is Trying To Hide!

Obama Is Also Involved With His Cousin Who Is Trying To Overthrow A Country In Africa. Truly Shocking That Americans Are Even CONSIDERING Obama As A Potential President.

For those of you who defend ACORN has it dawned on you that ANY fraudulent vote is wrong because it means the election is no longer 1 person 1 vote. That affects you too! You like it because it supports Democrats, but it hurts America. So what you are saying is party above country or Constitution.
In Ohio one voter registered 72 times in 18 months through ACORN. That is 1 person in state multiple that by many people in 50 states and see if it still looks small. The ACORN workers not the government turn in the fraud votes. Why should the goevenment be burdened by the extent of that fraud? Not respectful of person paid by tax dollars to do an honest job of entering registrations truned in. Voters too lazy to go to the library or MVD to register might not care enough to vote. ACORN has been implicated in fraud for over 10 years.
If these Christian ACORN organizers want to help the poor go in and help clean up the neighborhoods, assist the elderly, organize parents groups to do the same. This could help the poor or minority instead of sabotaging the Constitutional voting process and carryijng water for the Democratic party!

The fact is, ACORN is not the one that is registering these people, it's the government.

voice of reason.

The facts are ACORN and other liberal leaning get out the vote organizations are trying to steal an election.

Sorry, but that just doesn't fly -- a few fraudulent, redundant, or incomplete voter applications getting submitted to the voter registration board and getting turned down, has no impact on the election.

What you've got is a few bad apples trying to scam ACORN out of their wages -- and perhaps some jokers or confused persons who are themselves registering multiple times -- and, as they should, getting flagged by the voter registration board for doing so.

Logic comes into play at some point here, and logic tells us that there's no way that get-out-the-vote and voter registration efforts by ACORN are efforts to "steal" the election.

I'd be much more concerned with electronic voting machines. It's much more plausible that they could be hacked by someone intent on circumventing the will of voters -- or just simply that the votes will not be recorded accurately through computer glitches, as has been reported out of Ohio.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081007102851.htm

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/09/opinion/09thu2.html

I have noticed that it seems to be typical to take an us versus them approach in these threads. Look at how many people say that Barack Obama "must" be a part of some Chicago crime syndicate. I know Christian evangelicals that have worked for ACORN. Throw them under the bus! Intellectuals are weird and should be made fun of too. Elitists? Don't get my blood boiling. They aren't like regular folks by definition.

I wonder how many people showing all this hatred towards Chicago, ACORN, intellectuals, elitists and such, have those magnet bumper stickers on their cars that say "United We Stand".

There is a second half to that saying, let's not forget.

Divided We Fall.

I love this country. I wish we could stop shouting senseless insults at people that are from some Chicago politics, "left wing" ACORN community activists, universities, Hollywood, "all" politicians, the list is endless and includes people you consider your friends and family, eventually.

This article reminds me why I am cynical in nature. First out of the ballpark, I would like to point out that ACORN is simply turning these forms in which ultimately go to the state's secretary of state. Anyone with a tenth grade civics class would know that(maybe some here didn't make it that far?). The fact is, ACORN is not the one that is registering these people, it's the government. Sounds to me like the state governments need to take care of themselves better. I would secondly like to point out that a lot of people can't make it to the polling booth on November 4 because it's on a Tuesday. That at least eliminates most people working retail or two jobs. That is why absentee and early voting are so important not only for the military, but for college students (oh, the liberals!) and people working out of state or country. Get over yourself, GOP.

States’ Actions to Block Voters Appear Illegal

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/09/us/politics/09voting.html?_r=2&hp&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Forty six fraudulent voter registrations in Nevada has led to the purging of thousands of legally registered voters from the rolls.

I smell an attempt to steal yet another election.

Does anyone reasonably believe that 46 voters can change an entire election?

I certainly think tens of thousands can.

Scapegoating an organization to make political hay is UnAmerican and advocating that is shameful. Want your candidate elected? Go campaign for him and let the people vote.

A group of concerned citizens watched as underage high school students were registed right off the campus of several Reno and Sparks, NV High Schools. The voter register groups had the students register several times.

The Concerned Citizens called the Washoe County, NV Voter Registar. The response "We can't do anything about that".

But, that was last week. Bet they do something now.

In Las Vegas, some involved with ACORN are now "Spilling Their Guts Out"!

It's Time To Take "OUR COUNTRY BACK". Not after the election, NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!

MMBTD

....needs to clean up their house. If they have good work to do, they can't do it with all this stuff happening. And do you really not expect the GOP to run with it? Its not as if the Dems haven't painted the GOP with the same brush if the need warranted.

Of course Interface will see this as a BS issue. The facts are ACORN and other liberal leaning get out the vote organizations are trying to steal an election. How successful they are, which is your argument, is relevant on so many levels. Just by attempting to steal the election undermines the peoples trust in the process. Worse yet, with all of these stupid daily polls, which are not really accurate, showing Obama winning big, what happens when or if Obama loses. You, Interface will be leading the charge of voter fraud and stolen elections. ACORN is robbing us the electorate of the trust we need and demand of our electoral process. Everybody, democrat, republican, or independent should be upset and demand harsh punishments for those that participate in this fraud.

Anyway, the question I might ask is, why register Mickey Mouse at all, whether its one or hundred. What's the intent? Not good, I'm sure.

It ain't a good intent -- it's the hourly employees hired by ACORN trying to bilk ACORN out of their wages, whether it be by being stupid enough to register Mickey Mouse, or by copying names out of a phone book in order to make it look like they were doing their job instead of dicking around.

It doesn't benefit anybody but those folks and the right-wing nutsacks who want to scream voter fraud in the name of suppressing legit voter registration efforts.

Hear hear!
This is al smoke and mirrors.

Interface, please, seriously. "Serious reporting" is an oxymoron.

Anyway, the question I might ask is, why register Mickey Mouse at all, whether its one or hundred. What's the intent? Not good, I'm sure.

As you know, I work in a bank and have worked for a mortgage company--ACORN is not the good guys to me, the number of people with good intentions are few compared to those that don't.

"doesn't care about voter fraud because it is beneficial to Democrats"

But it's not "beneficial to Democrats" -- you can register "Mickey Mouse" as many times as you want, but the thing is, he ain't voting.

Voter registration fraud is serious, but by and large the only persons who benefit from it are (a) an employee who's faking names to defraud their employer (which is why Kansas City ACORN turned in those employees back in 2006), and (b) the various Republican blowhards who want to play the politics of distraction by conflating voter registration fraud and actual voter fraud.

http://www.kmbc.com/news/10214492/detail.html

It's a bullshit issue, and one that folks like Balano need to be called on. I wish the Star would do some serious reporting on this and underscore that, while voter registration fraud is a federal crime, it's not the same as nor does it seem to lead to actual vote fraud, despite the efforts of right-wing moonbats to make that conflation.

The politics of distraction should be challenged by the media, not aided and abetted.

and read about how registrars in swing states are illegally throwing out
voter registrations. Who do you think that benefits in states like Nv, N. Carolina, Ohio and Colorado?
Enough of the faux indignation from the right.

Evidence of fraud, evidence of partially, it not totatlly causing the mortgage meltdown is laid at their feet; and for the sake of political victory they ignore it.

It goes to show you how morally bankrupt the Left in this country truly is.

I sincerely hope that Franklin Rains who cooked the books at Fannie and stole a hundred million, the cheats and liars at AOORN, and the idle Congress who allows this crap are punished to the fullest extent of the law. They should be behind bars.

Ken Lay in comparison to these scoundrels was a penny ante shoplifter.

Typical liberal rhetoric, doesn't care about voter fraud because it is beneficial to Democrats. This idiotic view that people who are to lazy or uninterested to register to vote need to is the dumbest premise I have ever heard. ACORN should have all funding removed, and their leaders should be prosecuted. The above poster states voter fraud is rare, huge lie! Acorn itself has been responsible for turning in over 600,000 fraudulent ballots this year alone. They are being investigated by the FBI in 11 states. They have had many members incarcerated for submitting false registrations, and imagine that they always support Democrats. This is the kind of country we will live in if people are stupid enough to elect Obama. Be afraid, very afraid.

Comic relief!

since it's only the right-wing moonbats like Rogue and Mainstream who seem to take him seriously.

How could any county election official take any registrations from this outfit seriously? How many times do they have to rub our noses in our faces with their shameless tactics???

Rember foks this is the outfit that employed Obama to "train" their leaders. What a shameful group, and our tax dollars indeirectly support this scum. They are too clever by a mile to get direct taxpayer funding, but they blanket all "organizations" that do. An absolutely disgusting bunch. What more info, check this out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyYciV4Ccs8

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Comic relief!

I have personally witnessed voter fraud and it is not uncommon at all, but it can be easily hidden or masked as something helpful. How much of our population cannot read or write? More than you think. How are those voters voting? They are getting some sort of assistance. That is what I witnessed which at that time boiled down to the dems sitting in cars that brought them to the voting station with the voter unable to figure out the ballot and being told to just use the X to vote straight party. ACORN is always in the bag for democrats because that is where they get their support and funding. Registering voters should have absolutely no party connection, but should just be a citizen's requirement like registering at 18 for selected service. NO grass roots organization should be trying to register voters for either party. What is pathetically sad is how many uninformed voters vote every year. I am not talking about differing opinions of solutions, but not knowing a thing about the different branches of government. Perhaps when registering to vote it should be a requirement to take a test just like we have to take a test to drive to show any level of competence. If the person can't read or write which most certainly will prove to be challenging, an oral exam can be given. Again, do we really want just any voter to vote? It is a right, but let's raise the bar shall we?

how do we even start with this guy?

Come on, KC Star -- why give him this soapbox?

it could do an expose on ACORN and show all of the places where it loots the till to survive. Lousy pack of parasites.

Here are a couple of excellent links to help calm this "fraud hysteria". I strongly suggest that a steady and rational analysis of the fraud "problem" will show that this is jumping at shadows. Whether you agree with ACORNs politics of trying to help poor and homeless people, keep your powder dry and see what is real and what is agenda-based. Pouring gasoline on this fire won't put it out. Clamping down on activists is not the right way to solve problems.

http://truthaboutfraud.org/

http://truthaboutfraud.org/pdf/TruthAboutVoterFraud.pdf

The PDF is a good source of information. The conclusion is that voter fraud is extremely rare and carries harsh penalties (Each act of voter fraud in connection with a federal election risks five years in prison and a $10,000 fine, in addition to any state penalties), etc.

The report suggests that accusations of voter fraud are used to SUPPRESS the vote, not to make it more fair for every legal voter.

If we start clamping down on those helping the poor that are left leaning, these actions can backfire and shut down those helping the poor that are on the right, too.

Ready, FIRE, Aim! is not a sensible reaction to a perceived problem.