[geeks] Appropriate Ayn Rand comment for the election...

[Lionel Peterson]

On Nov 6, 2008, at 2:46 PM, Bill Bradford <mrbill at mrbill.net> wrote:

> On Thu, Nov 06, 2008 at 01:47:05PM -0500, Lionel Peterson wrote:
>> ACORN doesn't "accept" registration forms, they solicit applications.
>> They are not as passive as your statement would lead me to believe.
>>
>> Isn't it a crime to knowingly submit a false registration form? Why
>> didn't ACORN work with law enforcement to stop false registrations?  
>> How
>> do I know they didn't? Because you don't indict, raid and prosecute  
>> your
>> informants...
>
> http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081018/ap_on_el_ge/fraud_or_foolishness
>
> "ACORN officials have repeatedly claimed that their own quality  
> control
> workers were the first to discover problematic ballots. In every state
> investigating bad registrations, ACORN tipped off local officials to  
> bogus
> or incomplete cards, spokesman Kettenring said.

Yes, that is their claim, it is not, as yet been established as fact.

An ACORN worker in PA (I believe, butmy iPhone connection is too weak  
to really search for), has testified in court that they were paid per  
registration form, were not trained in any real way, and that QC was  
non-existant. This was under oath, under penalty of purgery. I'll  
concede the matter is not settled, but ACORNs chickens as coming home  
to roost.

>
> Many states require that all registrations be submitted to local  
> voting
> officials so that election directors are in charge of vetting problem
> ballots, not the groups collecting them.

I believe I already agreed on that point, but to be clear, yes, in  
some cases they did, but did their self-reporting resemble a good- 
faith effort, or did they simply say "here are the incomplete  
registration forms".
>
> Part-time ACORN workers receive one day of training and are paid $8  
> an hour
> to collect signatures, according to Kettenring. He blamed bogus  
> cards on
> cheating and lazy employees trying to make a buck for doing nothing.

You don't get hundreds of thousands of bogus registration form from a  
hand-full of "bad apples". Ohio, as I understand it, has that many  
bogus registration forms. Oddly, the best outcome would be that yes,  
in fact each of the 200,000 bogus forms were completed and submitted  
by 200,000 fools unaffiliated with ACORN or any other voter  
registration group.

> When caught, Kettenring said, those workers are fired. The group is  
> in the
> process of tallying the number of bad cards ACORN flagged for election
> officials, he said. Kettenring said he doubted the percentage of such
> registrations would reach 2 percent."

He is their spokesman - what is he supposed to say? Yep, we broke lots  
of laws in a massive, multi-state conspiracy?
>
> Again, for emphasis:
>
> "Many states require that all registrations be submitted to local  
> voting
> officials so that election directors are in charge of vetting problem
> ballots, not the groups collecting them."

Submit is not the same as present as valid. If ACORN truely has no  
responibility, why the training?
>
> Why would a group RAT THEMSELVES OUT if they were trying to commit  
> fraud?

They didn't rat themselves out, they threw a few hourly workers under  
the bus in an effort to deflect blame... Surely you can see the  
difference.

Lionel