Earlier this week Glenn Greenwald chimed in on the hysteria surrounding the non-profit, ACORN, which helps the less fortunate among us. The group made news last year when a few bad apples committed voter fraud which was promptly reported to the authorities by ACORN itself. Now the brouhaha is over another small group who were videotaped giving advice on buying a home for the purpose of turning it into a whorehouse.
Greenwald argues (and I agree with him) that the idiots who were videotaped and those who committed the fraud do not represent ACORN as a whole, which does much good for the poor. In addition, these transgressions are inconsequential compared to those of other much larger groups who receive substantially more tax money than ACORN.
ACORN has received a grand total of $53 million in federal funds over the last 15 years -- an average of $3.5 million per year. Meanwhile, not millions, not billions, but trillions of dollars of public funds have been, in the last year alone, transferred to or otherwise used for the benefit of Wall Street. Billions of dollars in American taxpayer money vanished into thin air, eaten by private contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, led by Halliburton subsidiary KBR. All of those corporate interests employ armies of lobbyists and bottomless donor activities that ensure they dominate our legislative and regulatory processes, and to be extra certain, the revolving door between industry and government is more prolific than ever, with key corporate officials constantly ending up occupying the government positions with the most influence over those industries.
Yet both the Senate and the House have voted to deny ACORN any funding from the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act of 2010.
Sadly, both of our Senators, Kohl & Feingold voted in support of the amendment to keep money away from ACORN. On the other hand, my Representative, Tammy Baldwin voted against the amendment. So what happened with Messrs. Kohl & Feingold? What is their bone to pick with ACORN? Does this mean Austin King is going to return to Madison?
No comments:
Post a Comment