On Saturday, I told you that I told you state Republicans are getting a little nutty over ACORN. They seek a statewide investigation into voter fraud even though this grass roots organizer ended its registration efforts last May, at least in the Lehigh Valley.Then I heard from a fellow, a left-leaning commenter who would rather stay below the radar. He spent a few days working for Allentown's Clean Water Action, an organization that by its own admission runs "muscular and effective grassroots campaigns to defeat anti-environment candidates, and support candidates who are committed to protecting our waters, our health, and our future."
Here's what he tells me. Remember, this is just one person's perspective.
We had a kid work one day with us who use to work for ACORN. Apparently ACORN in Allentown would pull people off the street and ask, 'Would you like to make $10 a hour?' Needless to say, this is not the most crafty way to get good canvassers. A ad in the Treasure Hunt would be better. Many ACORN canvassers/community organizers, may very well be poorly educated and desperate to make quotas.Clean Water has a PAC that is permitted to engage in political activity. My concern is that groups like Clean Water and ACORN are sloppy when they canvass. I don't buy the theory that there is some deep, dark conspiracy to steal the election. I do believe, however, that paying people to canvass for registrations, should probably be illegal.
I was cut loose from Clean Water Action after three days for not meeting fundraising quotas. Had I maybe made up names, I could have stayed. All these non-profits that go door to door have crazy quotas. These groups are rather shady and are definitely pro-Democrat.
Clean Water Action will be hired (I sat in the meeting my last day) by a still unknown but Democratic campaign to do the GOTV. CWA is a non-profit. This sounds like a for profit venture. They have really been stumping for Bennett and may most likely do her GOTV.
Bernie what you are missing here is the part2. On election day these same groups roll into places like downtown Allentown and actually intimidated these newly registered people into voting. In recent presidential elections I witnessed Move On people dressed in all black with red arm bands, think these outfits don't cause concern amongst the poor and newly registered voters?
ReplyDeleteNow ask yourself what would be the result if Republican affiliated groups used similar tactics to improve their GOTV numbers.
Scott Armstrong
Name one enterprise that doesn't have a quota of some form or another.
ReplyDeleteI used to be a canvasser for Citizen Action; I think after I left they affiliated with CWA but I'm not sure. There were fundraising quotas but not terribly onerous. I was meek, mild and shy and didn't have trouble making quota. There were certainly other problems with CA in terms of how they treated their workers, but that's not relevant to the "fraud" issue. Personally I think the ACORN thing is a tempest in a teapot. The fraud that exists is fraud committed *against* ACORN, not *by* ACORN. Poorly screened employees make up names or take name out of the phone booth for the sake of getting paid. It's crappy and unethical on the part of the employee, but it's not voter fraud. They may fill out a card with "Daffy Duck" but Daffy is not going to be showing up at the polls on November 4.
ReplyDeleteAs far as "intimidating" people into voting, that's an amusing accusation coming from a party with a history of intimidating people into NOT voting.
I don't see anything wrong with paying people to canvas. It is no different than paying an advertising agency to create a television ad or brochure for a political campaign.
ReplyDeleteAs far as these people being uneducated, so what! Evey citizen has the right to participate in our political process if they choose to do so, paid or unpaid.
If they happen to make poor a decision in choosing a candidate or policy to back it is our fault for not seeing to it that we live in a society where are strong majority are educated.
Daphne,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment. I pretty much agree there is scant evidence that people are actually intimidated into voting. It is usually the other way around.
I also agree that there is a difference between voter fraud and voter registration fraud.
"I don't see anything wrong with paying people to canvas. It is no different than paying an advertising agency to create a television ad or brochure for a political campaign."
ReplyDeleteWhen people are canvassing to register people for financial reward instead of as volunteers, I think the danger exists that we will have lots of bogus registrations. The 20% figure cited by voting registrar Stacy Sterner is too high, and these are just the ones she caught. Something needs to be done to address those high figures.
Perhaps I am wrong about insisting there be no paymeny, but that does tend to lead to trouble. When the Green party tried to get Romanelli on the ballot, it was paying $1 per signature. It resuled in a fraudulent nomination petition.
I think we need to make some changes.
just another story that will never make the major media news because it doesn't suit thier liberal purpose... just like only 2 local news agencies showing up for a Rudy speach in bethlehem that no one knew about. thanks for at least bringing it to peoples attention Bernie.
ReplyDeleteIt's a political story as old as voting and rather prescient considering the Chicago-style get-out-the-vote schemes of legend and in use today. Did I mention that Senator Obama is from Chicago?
ReplyDeleteIn one-party crooktocracies like NorCo, this is especially troubling since the party likely to benefit is the one that runs everything like the Politburo.
Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Vote early and often!
Don't think people can be intimidated into voting? Get out and into the precincts in downtown Allentown on a presidential election day and see it for yourself. I have!
ReplyDeleteExactly how do Republicans intimidate people into not voting?Spare me the flyer story in Philly, there aren't any Republicans left in that town.
Scott Armstrong
Scott Armstrong
"Exactly how do Republicans intimidate people into not voting?Spare me the flyer story in Philly, there aren't any Republicans left in that town."
ReplyDeleteBullseye. If the ACORN scheme was benefiting Rs, we'd have arrests already. If Raines, Johnson and Garelick - Fannie and Freddie crooks, all - weren't Obama advisers (on economics of all things!), they'd already be in cuffs as well. Vote Obama! Alot!
Here's the way it works, They register them to vote..homeless or totally fictitious people. On election day they go get some people (not the same one necessarily) and give them booze, cigarettes, a couple of bucks or in some instances even drugs to go vote. If the poll worker asks for photo ID (something ACORN has fought for years) then they do a provisional ballott and hope it gets through. IN 7 out of 10 cases the poll worker will not ask for the photo ID, THat is what they count on.
ReplyDeleteI have seen it, I have dealt with it and I have been working with the SURE and HAVA folks to keep it from happening on an epidemic scale in this election.
Don't forget the dead voters. Their names are only purged from the voter lists every five years. In a one party town(Philly, Pittsburgh, Allentown?) it is not difficult to see how these souls find a way to cast their votes even after death.
ReplyDeleteScott Armstrong
Mr. Armstrong,
ReplyDeleteThanks for pointing that out. Yes in Philly flyers are being distributed stating that anyone with legal troubles or outstanding traffic violations will be arrested by undercover agents if they try to vote. Also, cars having outstanding parking tickets will be towed and impounded. You are correct is stating that these are being distributed in neighborhoods that are not traditionally republican.
As for Acorn, hold the individuals accountable. Both sides pay volunteers. If pay is going to occur at all, it should come after a registration is certified as authentic by voter...not before.
Scott, you do realize that in Allentown voting is handled by Lehigh County, not the city. Since Lehigh County is majority R on commission and had an R exec in 2005, your assertions have no basis in reality since the last presidential election was in 2004. Doing the math, this means the R's are complicite in this corruption?
ReplyDeletePerhaps we can turn the table and point out that communities in Western Lehigh County are single party rule. Maybe we can investigate voter fraud out there based on the simple fact that R's control those local gov'ts with no D's being elected in many of them.
Witch hunts for everbody!
I also love the bait and switch: blame ACORN for something and then cite an incident involving Move On. I'm sure NARAL is waiting on your list to follow. That would round up the conspiracy theories nicely.
ALOHA!
ReplyDeleteSee McCain praise ACORN in 2006.
Maybe they register dead voters, since McCain has dead ideas, and a campaign on life support!
http://www.americablog.com/2008/10/mccain-told-acorn-in-2006-that-they-are.html
ALOHA!
Highly illogical. Perhaps McCain entered a parallel Universe, between 2006 and today.
ReplyDeleteLive long and prosper.
The base nature of the discourse here is at times tedious.
ReplyDeleteScott Armstrong
The ACORN thing is absolutely, mind numbingly, inane. Large scale voter fraud is nearly impossible. Republicans are starting to sound like 9/11 truthers when it comes to ACORN, or the far left when it comes to electronic voting (I think it's ridiculous we can't manage to produce safe, cheap, audit-able voting machines with multiple redundancies... but I think the actual number of votes that are altered or "go missing" are far less than in traditional voting scenarios.)
ReplyDeleteLarge scale voter suppression? Much easier.. especially if you have people willing to stretch the boundaries of the law. Anyone who thinks voter roles should be purged because of a typo or because their name appears on a foreclosure list is a criminal in my book.
NARAL likes Barry for not letting embarrassing abortion survivors receive treatment, lest they live to tell their stories.
ReplyDeleteIf Palin had aborted her defective fetus, she'd be a hero to the left. Instead, she's just another extremist baby cultist.
anon 10:50,
ReplyDeleteYou do know Dent got a 100% rating from NARAL last year right? Still voting for him?
ben a.,
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely not. Never have; never will.