| Final-Fan said: Sqrl, you've said that Congress attempted to give ACORN huge gobs of money, but the ACORN site says "ACORN is a non-profit, non-partisan social justice organization with national headquarters in New York, New Orleans and Washington, D.C. To maintain independence, ACORN does not accept government funding and is not tax exempt." http://acorn.org/index.php?id=12342 How do you reconcile these? |
Fair question:
"Although ACORN's projects run a wide gamut, the group claims as its purpose helping low- and middle-income Americans — through initiatives ranging from improving urban public schools, to providing counseling on how to avoid "predatory lending," to increasing the availability of "affordable housing." Most of these programs are conducted locally, by state-level ACORN organizations — which are often set up as 501(c.)3 nonprofit entities distinct from the national ACORN umbrella, a 501(c.)4 lobbying organization. Sounds benign enough — except that, according to Bob Huberty, executive vice president of the Capital Research Center, these tax-exempt 501(c.)3s "have no reason for existence other than to get grants from the government and foundations." They are, essentially, an ACORN front for asking Uncle Sam to subsidize political activity."
I was perhaps a bit vague in the way I explained it previously but the end result is the same. The money gets put into a "fund" and later gets handed out to the groups by whoever controls the fund (which is setup by the legislation typically or its put into existing funds), its not a direct hand-out but its a method of moving money around that, as far as I can tell, both parties use. Only occasionally do they call each other on it because they both like to use it and neither side has an interest in shutting it down.
You can read further in that article for more specific examples of Acorn recieving money. Although I have to admit, even without this kind of info I would find it pretty hard to swallow that I'm supposed to take ACORN's word for it that they don't do this kind of thing. They've had enough tangles with voter fraud accusations among numerous other criminal allegations that I think its safe to say they aren't the most straightforward and honest group.
In all honesty this too could probably be its own topic =P
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| To Each Man, Responsibility |
