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Not surprising since Obama came out of the eternally corrupt Chicago political machine.

But but ACORN is a wonderful organization who is just being harrassed by those evil conservatives. Liberals would never do anything wrong.

Turbotale:

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Not surprising since Obama came out of the eternally corrupt Chicago political machine.

The American people don't seem to be hearing your message. Obama leads in virtually every poll by an average of about 6 points. He leads in practically every battleground state.

Maybe if you scream and cry louder people will finally hear your important message?

LOL!!!!

An obvious right wing front group, with every single piece of supporting "evidence" linked to other extremist right wing blogs with very dubious reputations for accuracy.

Fact, is, that no sucessful prosecution for voter fraud has ever been brought against ACORN, and evey action brought by a Republican party operative has been dismissed out of hand for lack of evidence.

Aside from the facts TomFitz notes regrading ACORN's innocence, is it even clear that Obama worked for ACORN?

I seem to recall that he worked with a group that had some affiliation with ACORN, but that he didn't directly work for ACORN himself.

You would think that as many times as these Repubs have tried to go to this ACORN well, they would've done a better job of drawing the connection with Obama.

I guess, though, if it doesn't exist, it's kind of hard to make the connection.

ACORN falls again: The worst case of voter-registration fraud in Washington state history Plus: John Edwards & ACORN, perfect together By Michelle Malkin • July 26, 2007 10:00 PM

Update 7/27 10:05am Eastern. Here’s the PDF of the settlement agreement (via David Postman):

a. ACORN agrees that submission of registrations that have been fraudulently collected by an ACORN employee and not reviewed pursuant to the quality control procedures, or willfully turning in fraudulent cards, may constitute grounds for criminal prosecution of ACORN as a corporate entity unless such cards have been segregated by ACORN pursuant to the requirements of section 7 of this agreement.

b. ACORN agrees that violations of the terms of this agreement may be used as evidence in the State of Washington in future criminal prosecutions against ACORN employees, ACORN management, or ACORN as a corporate entity.

Guess which left-wing group is at the center of the worst case of voter-registration fraud in Washington state history? Yep, you guessed it: ACORN. The same ACORN tied to massive voter fraud in Missouri. And Ohio. And 12 other states. Here’s the Washington state scoop via Seattle’s KOMO TV: “King County prosecutors filed felony charges Thursday against seven people in what a top official described as the worst case of voter-registration fraud in state history, while the organization they worked for agreed to keep a better eye on its employees and pay $25,000 to defray costs of the investigation. The seven submitted about 1,800 registration cards last fall on behalf of the liberal Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, which had hired them at $8 an hour to sign people up to vote, according to charging documents filed in Superior Court.”

Prosecutors didn’t sugercoat the fraud: “This was an act of vandalism upon the voter rolls of King County,” said Dan Satterberg, the interim King County prosecutor. But officials tried to give ACORN some benefit of the doubt, noting that the defendants were motivated by financial gain rather than intentions of sabotaging the election. However:

….in interviews with King County Sheriff’s Detective Chris Johnson, several of the defendants - while freely admitting they forged the forms - insisted that they had been told ACORN would shut down their office in Tacoma if they didn’t improve their numbers, Johnson wrote in a probable cause statement.

One, Ryan Olson, said another worker in the office told him “do what you have to do” to turn in more cards.

ACORN’s oversight of the workers was virtually nonexistent - to the extent that civil charges could have been warranted, Satterberg said.

In a settlement agreement announced Thursday, ACORN, which cooperated with the investigation, agreed to pay $25,000 and to make improvements in its management, training and oversight of suspect voter registrations throughout the state.

The Seattle Times adds that the announcement of criminal charges came after the King County Canvassing Board revoked 1,762 allegedly fraudulent voter registrations submitted by ACORN employees.

According to prosecutors, six ACORN workers “had admitted filling out registration forms with names they found in phone books last October. The canvassers filled out the forms while sitting around a table at the downtown Seattle Public Library.”

You’ll love some of the names they used, via Sound Politics:

Tom Tancredo
Dennis Hastert
Alcee Hastings
John McKay
Leon Spinks
Frekkie Magoal
Fruto Boy Crispila

Google “Fruto Boy Crispila.” You’ll see the listing in the cached entry on the King County voter rolls (the PDF file is gone, but you can see the line item):

I didn't read your post closely, but I did see a separation agreement. Was ACORN actually convicted of any wrongdoing? Anybody who doesn't want to litigate a case can opt for a settlement. It doesn't confimr guilt.

I'm also still waiting to hear what any of this has to do with Obama.

No, in this case, the court clearly showed that there were questionable registration forms submitted by poorly trained and over zealous ACORN volunteers.

That formed the basis of the settlement.

The part about the names used is probably false. This is Michelle Maklin after all! You can't take any of this at face value.

Her assertions about massive voter fraud in 17 other states is false. There is no record of any litigation or FEC action in 17 states, only the loud and baseless acusations by right wing bloggers.

IT's ironic that Malkin specifically mentions Missouri.

The case she is talking about there was filed by the US Attorney in the Western District (Kansas City), only days before the November elections.

The ink was barely dry in the court filings when every right wing radio talking and Fox Noise started screaming about ACORN and how the Justice Department was going after them.

Remember this was less than a week before the election.

The rest of the story is interesting as well.

IT seem that the US Attorney in the Western District of Missouri had been on the job for less than six months. He replaced a former Bush apointee who had been summarily fired for no cause.

The new US Attorney had very little if any prosecutorial experience, but was a former staffer of Karl Rove.

His name is Barry Schlotzman.

Less than two weeks after the November election, Schlotzman's suit against ACORN was dismissed summarily.

The following year, the House Government Reform Committee began looking into the rash of US Attorney firings that had occcurred between 2004 and 2006.

As with many of the sneekier aspects of the Bush adminstration, these firings violated longstanding tradition. Presidential appointees ususally serve the length of the adminstration unless they retire, get appointed to something else, or have some ethical or performance problem.

In a little noticed manuever, the Bush adminstration inserted a provision into the renewal of the USA Patriot Act that removed the 90 day time limit in the terms of interim presidential appointements, meaning that these new appointees didn't have to be confirmed by the Senate.

This was how Rove's lieutenant became US Attorney in Missouri,

He immediately began a caging operation to eliminate "unqualified" voters and purge the rolls of Democratic voters.

This was a time honored GOP practice. KAtherine Harris had run a huge voter caging operation in Florida in 2000. and the GOP ran caging operations in Missouri, Ohio, and New Mexico in 2006. They had started one in Michigan this year, but they got caught early on.

The next task in the startegy was the nuisance suit against ACORN.

Justice Department guidelines state that legal actions of this sort should not be filed in the 90 days before an election, lest they appear to be politically motivated.

Schlotzman reluctantly admitted that he knew of this policy and willfully violated it in bringing the ACORN suit. He aslo defied the credibility of the committee by claiming not to know what a voter caging operation was, even though it was clear that he was running a caging operation.

The next day he resigned.

One week later, Rove resigned.

This is what we're really talking about here.

The only weapon the GOP has this year is its propoganda machine.

So, they gin up all the old stories, knowing that sheep like Terrortoon won't connect the dots or fact check anything.

Fortuneately, this year, it seems to only be working for the true believers.

Actually, they were paid 8$ an hour. So they were employees, not volunteers. Just like the convicts that ACORN was using here in Wisconsin to gather questionable voting registrations. But I am wasting my time informing you of anything, aren't I?

You are.

I am familiar with the case, even though I got it wrong about them being paid.

In any event, you have systematically ignored my fact checking of your spin pieces, like the demolition job I did on your Malkin piece.

The right wing talkers are braying about ACORN.

ACORN is one of thier hobby horses.

They never talk about GOP tactics. They just point to the other side and accuse them of variations on their own crimes.

Also, I'm still wating to hear how this connects to Obama.

When did Obama work for ACORN?