Somebody Get A Nutcracker
Even if your first impulse is to protect the “chosen one” (I’m looking at you MSM), there seems little doubt that ACRON’s “voter registration drive” is engaged in criminal activity that has the effect of undermining the legitimacy of the upcoming elections if unchecked. This article from the Wall Street Journal leaves no doubt about the scope of this fraudulent enterprise:
The Michigan Secretary of State told the press in September that Acorn had submitted “a sizeable number of duplicate and fraudulent applications.” Earlier this month, Nevada’s Democratic Secretary of State Ross Miller requested a raid on Acorn’s offices, following complaints of false names and fictional addresses (including the starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys). Nevada’s Clark County Registrar of Voters Larry Lomax said he saw rampant fraud in 2,000 to 3,000 applications Acorn submitted weekly.
Officials in Ohio are investigating voter fraud connected with Acorn, and Florida’s Seminole County is withholding Acorn registrations that appear fraudulent. New Mexico, North Carolina and Missouri are looking into hundreds of dubious Acorn registrations. Wisconsin is investigating Acorn employees for, according to an election official, “making people up or registering people that were still in prison.”
Then there’s Lake County, Indiana, which has already found more than 2,100 bogus applications among the 5,000 Acorn dumped right before the deadline. “All the signatures looked exactly the same,” said Ruthann Hoagland, of the county election board. Bridgeport, Connecticut estimates about 20% of Acorn’s registrations were faulty. As of July, the city of Houston had rejected or put on hold about 40% of the 27,000 registration cards submitted by Acorn.
That’s just this year. In 2004, four Acorn employees were indicted in Ohio for submitting false voter registrations. In 2005, two Colorado Acorn workers were found to have submitted false registrations. Four Acorn Missouri employees were indicted in 2006; five were found guilty in Washington state in 2007 for filling out registration forms with names from a phone book.
If this doesn’t amount to a systematic assault upon the right to cast a free and meaningful ballot, than nothing ever could. To underscore this point, a think tank in Ohio has brought a RICO action against ACORN:
The Buckeye Institute, a Columbus-based think tank, today filed a state RICO action against the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) on behalf of two Warren County voters. The action filed in Warren County Court of Common Pleas alleges ACORN has engaged in a pattern of corrupt activity that amounts to organized crime. It seeks ACORN’s dissolution as a legal entity, the revocation of any licenses in Ohio, and an injunction against fraudulent voter registration and other illegal activities.
Plaintiffs Jennifer Miller of Mason, Ohio and Kimberly Grant of Loveland, allege that ACORN’s actions deprive them of the right to participate in an honest and effective elections process. They allege fraudulent voter registrations submitted by ACORN dilute the votes of legally registered voters.
“The right to cast a vote that is not diluted by fraudulent votes is a fundamental individual right,” Buckeye Institute President David Hansen said.
“ACORN appears to be recklessly disregarding Ohio laws and adding thousands of fraudulent voters to the state’s roles in the process,” Maurice Thompson, Director of the Buckeye Institute’s 1851 Center for Constitutional Law said. “Such voter fraud erodes the value of legally cast votes,” he added.
In the complaint, Thompson cites an accumulation of evidence showing numerous instances of admitted fraud by ACORN employees, as well as individuals solicited by ACORN.
“In light of its hiring, training and compensation practices, ACORN should have known its conduct would cause fraud,” Thompson said. “It also should know that its conduct will cause fraud in the future.”
In addition, the complaint cites conduct by ACORN in Colorado, Indiana, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.
The sheer scope of these criminal activities, and the fact that they are localized in the states where the current presidential election is most closely contested, preclude the notion that we are simply dealing with a handful of “bad apples.” (The absurdity of such an idea is covered pithily here.) Everything about ACORN’s efforts speak to a coordinated policy meant to swamp election officials with thousands upon thousands of suspect registrations. If even 10% of the fraudulent application evade detection ACORN could effectively influence election results, and not only in the presidential race.
Now, you will see the old chestnut trotted out that there hasn’t been an election seriously affected by voter fraud (depending on what you think happened in Illinois in 1960.) Even were that true in the past, we have never seen such an organized and wide ranging attempt to undermine the electoral process. That makes this new territory.
That the Obama campaign has given ACORN upwards of three quarters of a million dollars for these very same “registration” efforts should be viewed as a serious black eye. It is fair to ask what sort of ethical standards are implied by Obama’s employing such an organization. (And, yes, the utter lack of an ethical standard is in itself an ethical standard.)
h/t Memeorandum
Politics | Rich Horton Tuesday, 14 October , 2008
By Dean, Tuesday, 14 October , 2008 @ 7:52 pm
I hope the RICO tactic works but don’t you have to prove there was a degree of conspiring at the national level?
From my vantage point, it would seem that this culture of corruption is inbred at the local level and voter fraud is just kind of “what they do” absent any direction from up the food chain.
By Rich Horton, Wednesday, 15 October , 2008 @ 6:49 am
I hope the RICO tactic works but don’t you have to prove there was a degree of conspiring at the national level?
They were state RICO charges so I don’t think it has to leave Ohio for them to make their case.
Its sorta sad that the equation has become Democrats = lawlessness.
By feeblemind, Wednesday, 15 October , 2008 @ 9:16 am
My thinking is that ACORN tactics are the wave of the future. If the dems win in the fall with the majorities predicted, I don’t believe they will ever give up power. Stuffing ballot boxes will keep them in power forever. People opposing the stuffing of ballot boxes will be accused of disenfranchising voters or of simply being right-wing extremists. I despair.
By martian, Wednesday, 15 October , 2008 @ 2:09 pm
Remember the old Democratic Party battle cry “Remeber to vote early and often!” They say it’s the mottoe of the Daley machine of which the Obamessiah is a rather prominent alumnus.
By Mwalimu Daudi, Wednesday, 15 October , 2008 @ 3:39 pm
I agree with feeblemind. This is the pattern in many African countries.
And like those countries America will end up as economic basketcase.
By marybel, Wednesday, 15 October , 2008 @ 4:04 pm
If these states conduct their elections anything like California, there is indeed, if you play the percentages, great risk of vote froud. For example, once you are a registered voter, a sample ballot is sent to your address. Attached to the sample ballot is a request for an absentee ballot that only requires a signature. If it matches the signature on the registration, you get an abentee ballot in the mail. I tell you trutfully, I could register, get a ballot for, and have my foxhound vote. Even if 90 % are caught, 10% s a pretty nice margin in a tight race, say, in Ohio.