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ACORN Statement on the Value of Community Organizing
ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) ^ | September 4, 2008 | Maude Hurd

Posted on 09/05/2008 10:18:36 AM PDT by mukraker

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) President Maude Hurd issued the following statement after presumptive Republican vice president pick Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuiliani made disparaging comments about community organizing during the Republican National Convention Wednesday night.

“ACORN members, leaders and staff are extremely disappointed that Republican leaders would make such condescending remarks on the great work community organizers accomplish in cities throughout this country.

The fact that they marginalize our success in empowering low- and moderate-income people to improve their communities further illustrates their out-of-touch with ordinary people. Through community organizing, people are empowered to take action to solve their own problems, develop leadership skills and make decisions that improve their lives and their communities.

ACORN has been building organizations and developing leadership among low- and moderate- income residents in neighborhoods throughout the United States for 38 years.

During that time, ACORN chapters have worked individually and collectively to organize innovative grassroots campaigns on a number of critical issues. As the nation’s largest grassroots community organization with more than 400,000 member families, ACORN employs 400 organizers that carry a huge responsibility of helping disenfranchised people in their communities.

In the past 10 years, ACORN has helped more than 30 million American families through our various organizing campaigns: better schools, financial justice, living wages, community improvement, immigration, healthcare, predatory lending, voter engagement and utilities.

The total monetary value of recent victorious ACORN campaigns was quantified in a 2006 report entitled, “ACORN Wins”.

Over the last decade, ACORN’s victories amount to $15 billion, an average of $1.5 billion per year going directly into low- and moderate-income communities to help strengthen working families.

Community organizers handling such awesome responsibilities is no laughing matter," Hurd concluded.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Miscellaneous; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2008; acorn; communityorganizer; democratparty; democrats; electionpresident; elections; maudehurd; mccainpalin; nobama08; obama; obamabiden; votefraud; voterfraud
ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), the "official" organization for community organizers that Barack Hussein Obama was a part of in his early days in Chicago, has taken umbridge with the GOP.

And here I thought non-profit organizations were supposed to be non-partisan, not allowed to attempt to influence legislation or elections.

I actually took a look at their wenbsite, read through some of their propaganda. And I still have no idea what a "community organizer" is or does.

1 posted on 09/05/2008 10:20:22 AM PDT by mukraker
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To: mukraker

Me neither, but I do know the bastards do it with my tax money.


2 posted on 09/05/2008 10:24:18 AM PDT by wordsofearnest ("The fundamental solution (w/b) that there is no longer any need to immigrate")
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To: mukraker

We’ve got more community organizations in my own hometown than Carter has liver pills. Yet, only 45% of our high school kids graduate. Pretty disgusting. They were the best schools around when I was a kid.


3 posted on 09/05/2008 10:24:45 AM PDT by Sacajaweau (I'm planting corn...Have to feed my car...)
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To: mukraker

I lived in Chicago for 17 years and as far as I can tell, they keep people of color in poverty.


4 posted on 09/05/2008 10:25:39 AM PDT by yobid (MSM paralyzed by hurricane Sarah)
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To: mukraker

The ONLY sign I saw of POLITICS on Reed College’s Campus (Portland, Oregon- I was there with my niece previewing a few weeks ago).....was a posted note from ACORN looking for election workers!


5 posted on 09/05/2008 10:26:26 AM PDT by goodnesswins (Palin has run a state, town and fishing operation. Obama ain't run nothin' but his mouth.(Steyn)
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To: wordsofearnest

ACORN just got slammed with voter fraud. Michele Maulkin has a nice piece on them from June. Victory ‘08 needs to counter.


6 posted on 09/05/2008 10:26:32 AM PDT by Mashood
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To: mukraker

“The fact that they marginalize our success in empowering low- and moderate-income people to improve their communities further illustrates their out-of-touch with ordinary people”

Hhhhuuuummmm, in the rest of the country — we call those people — Family, Friend, Coach, Priest, Pastor, Teacher, Neighbor, Scout Leader, and Youth Group Minister...out-of-touch — I think not.


7 posted on 09/05/2008 10:28:25 AM PDT by areukiddingme1 (areukiddingme1 is a synonym for a Retired U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer and tired of liberal BS.)
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To: mukraker

They used to run a lot of ads in The Washington Post years ago. It seemed that they had a fairly high turnover rate. That what I surmised from the ads - they were always in the paper.


8 posted on 09/05/2008 10:28:28 AM PDT by RexBeach
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To: mukraker

They operate on the assumption that if you’re poor, its because you haven’t effectively obtained enough services from government, and you need them to help you get more services from government.

The idea that the answer to poverty is investment, building businesses, putting people to work, working to attract industries, thats not part of their palette.

Their whole purpose is to interpose themselves between you and government, so that you will think you need them, and they can invent programs that have to be funded by government which they will in turn manage. That money won’t go to you, though, it will go to other community organizers to pay for them to find other ways to interpose themselves between you and government.

Its welfare for leftists. They don’t solve poverty. They feed upon it.


9 posted on 09/05/2008 10:28:51 AM PDT by marron
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To: Sacajaweau
Carter has liver pills

Does the phrase 'older than dirt' mean anything to you?

10 posted on 09/05/2008 10:28:52 AM PDT by tbpiper (Obama/Biden: Instead of Ebony and Ivory, we have Arrogance and Insolence.)
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To: mukraker

Shocking that ACORN values it’s community agitators,,errr,,organizers. Who woulda thunk?


11 posted on 09/05/2008 10:29:20 AM PDT by austinaero
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To: mukraker

I remember when I was an undergrad at UT Austin that ACORN ran ads in the Daily Texan all the time. Everyone understood that anyone who signed on with them was a deadbeat loser who didn’t want to get a real job.


12 posted on 09/05/2008 10:29:56 AM PDT by Don'tMessWithTexas
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To: mukraker
Finally, ACORN is on record as the employer of Barack Obama when he was a "community organizer." And ACORN is the most indicted, most convicted organization in the history of vote fraud in the history of the United States. Bar none.

This needs to be publicized. Strictly factual attack ads should be made of this.

Congressman Billybob

Tenth in the ten-part series, "The Owner's Manual (Part 10) -- The Remaining Amendments"

Latest article, "The Straight-Shooting Governor"

13 posted on 09/05/2008 10:30:10 AM PDT by Congressman Billybob (www.theacru.org)
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To: Mashood

ACORN is renown for epidemic registration and voting fraud, across the nation.

Their patron sait is Saul Alinsky, who advocated that the ends justfiy the means and “morality” is just another weapon.


14 posted on 09/05/2008 10:30:43 AM PDT by unspun (Mike Huckabee: Government's job is "protect us, not have to provide for us.")
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To: mukraker

They got nailed for fraudulent voter registrations in New Mexico in 2004. They also got in trouble for paying less than minimum wage while agitating for a “living wage” in Santa Fe.


15 posted on 09/05/2008 10:32:05 AM PDT by Tijeras_Slim
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To: mukraker

"Community Organizer"

16 posted on 09/05/2008 10:32:14 AM PDT by Bubba_Leroy (DNC = Do Nothing Congress)
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To: mukraker

During that time, ACORN chapters have worked individually and collectively to organize innovative grassroots campaigns on a number of critical issues...


Indeed!

The Acorn Obama Knows

Cuyahoga board probes ACORN voter registration drive

10 more voter registration workers face investigation (ACORN)

City refers 32 more to DA for voter fraud (ACORN in Milwaukee, WI)

And of course:

ACORN Watch: Voter fraud and mortgage scams on your dime

17 posted on 09/05/2008 10:36:08 AM PDT by EdReform (The right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed *NRA*JPFO*SAF*GOA*SAS*CCRKBA)
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To: wordsofearnest

Our tax money shouldn’t be going to any of these groups.

The ones on the left, especially, do whatever they please with the money they receive regardless of the rules/regulations they’re supposed to follow.

If ACORN is so great and does such an awesome job, they should be able to survive on their own through donors who believe in their mission and the results they achieve.


18 posted on 09/05/2008 10:37:19 AM PDT by Nickname
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To: mukraker
MM says it very well.. “Both Rudy Giuliani and Sarah Palin specifically mocked Barack’s experience as a community organizer on the South Side of Chicago more than two decades ago, where he worked with people who had lost jobs and been left behind when the local steel plants closed. Let’s clarify something for them right now. Community organizing is how ordinary people respond to out-of-touch politicians and their failed policies.”

Let me clarify something. Nobody is mocking community organizers in church basements and community centers across the country working to improve their neighbors’ lives. What deserves ridicule is the notion that Barack Obama’s brief stint as a South Side rabble-rouser for tax-subsidized, partisan non-profits qualifies as executive experience you can believe in. What deserves derision is “community organizing” that relies of a community of homeless people and ex-cons to organize for the purpose of registering dead people and shaking down corporations and using the race card as a bludgeon.

As I’ve reported previously, Obama’s community organizing days revolved around training grievance-mongers from the far left group ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now).

The ACORN mob is infamous for its bully tactics (which they dub “direct actions”); Obama supporters have recounted his role in organizing an ambush of a government planning meeting on a landfill project opposed by Chicago minority lobbies.

With benefactors like Obama in office, ACORN has milked nearly four decades of government subsidies to prop up chapters that promote the welfare state, undermine the free market, and perpetuate illegal immigration and voter fraud. Since I last detailed ACORN’s illicit activities in this column in June (see “The ACORN Obama knows,” June 19, 2008), the group continues to garner scrutiny of law enforcement:

http://license.icopyright.net/user/viewFreeUse.act?fuid=MTQ4NTY0Ng%3D%3D

19 posted on 09/05/2008 10:38:08 AM PDT by TribalPrincess2U
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To: mukraker
The fact that they marginalize our success ... people are empowered ... develop leadership skills ... building organizations and developing leadership ... worked individually and collectively to organize innovative grassroots campaigns on a number of critical issues ... employs 400 organizers that carry a huge responsibility of helping disenfranchised people ... better schools, financial justice, living wages, community improvement, immigration, healthcare, predatory lending, voter engagement and utilities ... ... ACORN’s victories amount to $15 billion ... Community organizers handling such awesome responsibilities is no laughing matter," Hurd concluded.

I'm still confused on what they do. I didn't see anything about ensuring manufacturing or retail businesses could operate in those communities to provide jobs, teaching the skills that employers actually want (like showing up on time and working during work hours), or emphasizing their personal responsibility to fix their personal problems. I didn't need to be empowered. Instead, I got an education and a job. I didn't need an organizer to develop my leadership skills. Instead, I joined the Boy Scounts of America and then once I had a job took on responsibilities and produced results, so I came to be recognized as a leader by actually leading. I don't need an organizer working for "financial justice", whatever that is, because I pay my bills on time, save money for the future, and plan ahead. As for "utilities", I'm confused. My utility company has never been an issue, and I've heard most of them are the same for customers who pay their bills.

So, now that ACORN has spoken up, what exactly is it that they do, and why do adults need someone else to do this for them?

20 posted on 09/05/2008 10:39:53 AM PDT by RogerD (Educaiton Profesionul)
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To: mukraker
Sarah Palin didn't make disparaging remarks about community organizers.

She made disparaging remarks about an alleged community organizer who claims it makes him qualified to be President.

21 posted on 09/05/2008 10:41:35 AM PDT by justlurking (The only remedy for a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.)
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To: mukraker

How about talking to you local government if you have a beef? That is why you elect them. Are people such idiots that they need “organizers” to teach them how to live their lives?


22 posted on 09/05/2008 10:42:06 AM PDT by LetsRok
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To: mukraker

These people are pretty think skinned, aren’t they?


23 posted on 09/05/2008 10:42:44 AM PDT by Cricket24 (ULTRA PATRIOT!!)
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To: mukraker

“We at ACORN (Anti-American Criminal Organization for Republican Neutralization) are proud of our long heritage of criminal enterprise as regards fraudulent voter registration, bribes and payoffs to leftists seeking the overthrow of the Republican party, our attempts to fix elections for crooked DNC operatives, and our unending commitment to do everything in power to undermine American values! Save us all o’ most high Lord God Messiah Osamabama!”


24 posted on 09/05/2008 10:46:56 AM PDT by Doc Savage ("Are you saying Jesus can't hit a curve ball? - Harris to Cerrano - Major League)
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To: mukraker
And I still have no idea what a "community organizer" is or does.

They facilitate election fraud.

25 posted on 09/05/2008 10:49:43 AM PDT by LouD
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To: mukraker

Weren’t they convicted of voter fraud? How come they don’t mention that on their list of credentials?


26 posted on 09/05/2008 10:50:57 AM PDT by Unam Sanctam
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To: mukraker

ACORN helped drive the steel industry out of Pittsburgh with their protests back in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. They were particularly fond of showing up at churches on Sunday to disrupt the services, putting dead fish in deposit boxes to disrupt bank business and similar childish actions.

They didn’t help anyone but themselves, but drew support from deluded liberals like David Soul (remember him?) and his brother, the former (Lutheran) minister Daniel Solberg, who were both jailed for their part in the protests.


27 posted on 09/05/2008 10:53:26 AM PDT by mak5
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To: mukraker
As First Gentleman, Palin has encouraged young Alaskans who cannot afford college to consider jobs in the oil and gas industry as an effective training ground and has advised the Governor on workforce development issues for the natural gas pipeline she supports. He is a community volunteer working in youth sports, coaching hockey and basketball.

It looks like TODD Palin was a "Community Organizer" as well,according to Wikipedia.Damn,even her husband has more experience than the "O".

28 posted on 09/05/2008 10:56:51 AM PDT by quack
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To: mukraker

I want to see the progress in these communities over the years. If seems our tax dollars that are doled out by these community organizers are not held to any responsiblity or accountability, which leads me to believe they end up in the pockets of these community organizers and thie fiends.


29 posted on 09/05/2008 11:06:04 AM PDT by ronnie raygun (IF YOU ARE NOT CONSERVATIVE BY 35 YOU HAVE NO BRAIN. W CHURCHILL)
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To: Nickname

ACORN is an extortion machine and nothing more. 15 Billion dollars is a lot of loot, do we see any real results for this money? It seems to me that it is just another “white collar welfare program” that is exploited by blacks. They even complain about being out of money, but they still collect their paychecks.


30 posted on 09/05/2008 11:06:26 AM PDT by BatGuano (Go John and Sarah!)
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To: mukraker

Sweet. Now ACORN has put themselves on the scope. Time for some “Who is ACORN” profiles.


31 posted on 09/05/2008 11:07:20 AM PDT by TankerKC (Those are my principles. If you don't like them, I have others.)
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To: mukraker
And here I thought non-profit organizations were supposed to be non-partisan, not allowed to attempt to influence legislation or elections.

Community organizers, especially associated with ACORN, are political activists. The primary aim is to get leftist policies enacted and leftists elected. Community organizers encourage protests for more government assistance. There was a leftist university professor who obtained grant money to buy camcorders for his class. The students recorded residents who complained about various public services, demanding more government services and handouts. Undoubtedly, the cameras encouraged complaints and victim status claims. Unbelievably, the professor won a teaching award for his political activism.

32 posted on 09/05/2008 11:15:22 AM PDT by businessprofessor
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To: mukraker
Community organizer is a fancy name for a nobody. Looks like the #1 community organizer should have done a better job orgainzin' Chicago.

[FR thread] Nearly 125 Shot Dead In Chicago Over Summer

33 posted on 09/05/2008 11:18:18 AM PDT by Arrowhead1952 (Sarah Palin is NOT worried about anything being above her pay grade!)
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To: Congressman Billybob

Why is ACORN not being dismantled through RICO prosecutions?


34 posted on 09/05/2008 11:22:47 AM PDT by Doug Loss
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To: mukraker

Community organizers sign up dead people, dogs and felons to vote liberal.

ACORN has been repeatedly held in violation of election laws for doing just that, IIRC.


35 posted on 09/05/2008 11:23:53 AM PDT by Uncle Miltie (Palin for President! (Who was that old fogey she was with?))
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To: mukraker

Yes, it is very valuable
- it shakes down the Gov’t to supply funds to inner-city lib politicians to distribute to their constituents.
- it creates usefull voting blocks for left-wing, liberal politicians
- it is useful in creating cover for voter fraud.

Of course they believe “community organizing” is useful.


36 posted on 09/05/2008 11:28:30 AM PDT by PGR88
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To: mukraker; yobid; marron
"Community Organizer" is a term straight out of the 1950's and 60's from the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) to refer to those small time political activists that tried to turn this country to the left by "organizing" the poor and disaffected in inner cities.

Obama grew up around these types: Frank Marshall Davis in Hawaii (formerly from Chicago), and several disciples of Saul Alinsky in Chicago.

Their only "responsibilities" were allegiance Joe Stalin and Communist Russia.

37 posted on 09/05/2008 11:30:41 AM PDT by HardStarboard
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To: areukiddingme1
"The fact that they marginalize our success in empowering low- and moderate-income people to improve their communities further illustrates their out-of-touch with ordinary people"

I may be way off base (but sadly, I know that I'm not) but I suspect that "empowering low and moderate income people to improve their communites" includes some facet of taking money they didn't earn from people who didn't give it to them by their own choice.

38 posted on 09/05/2008 11:37:46 AM PDT by libs_kma (NOBAMA. Keep the change)
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To: mukraker

This came in late last night on another thread. A chapter Obama wrote about community organizing, race baiting, and kudos to Jesse Jackson. For someone who has no black American history, but rather a Kenya-American history, he sure has co-opted the black American history as his own.

http://www.edwoj.com/Alinsky/AlinskyObamaChapter1990.htm


39 posted on 09/05/2008 11:40:40 AM PDT by mabelkitty (Why does Obama hate pregnant women so much?)
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To: mukraker
A community activist is a liberal politico who is paid with federal money. When you hear the Dims scream for more money to spend on housing, a lot of it goes to support their footsoldiers with ACORN.

Those people are way, way left. Obama is in disguise, but he would be ACORN's friend in the White House.

40 posted on 09/05/2008 11:43:21 AM PDT by colorado tanker ("I just LOVE clinging to my guns and my religion!!!!" - Sarah Palin)
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To: mukraker
The ‘community organizer’ lines were bait for a trap, and the left wing nut blogs are stupid enough jump in with both feet.

'Community Organizer' means so much more then the ‘no executive responsibility’, it opens the door to Obama’s radical leftist/communist roots and horrible philosophy of life which Obama and Axelrod do not want the American people to know about.

L. DAVID ALINSKY (son) sees Saul Alinsky’s (radical leftist father) handiwork in Obama convention http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/letters/articles/2008/08/31/son_sees_fathers_handiwork_in_convention/

“The Democratic National Convention had all the elements of the perfectly organized event, Saul Alinsky style. Barack Obama’s training in Chicago by the great community organizers is showing its effectiveness.”

L. DAVID ALINSKY in letter to Boston Globe

THE FRONT PAGE OF ALINSKY'S BOOK GIVES INSIGHT INTO THE MIND OF ALINSKY front page of leftist radical Saul Alinsky’s book here (David Alinksy's Father):

http://sweetness-light.com/archive/hillary-clintons-idol-saul-alinsky-and-satan

Obama has had an intimate and long-term association with the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (Acorn), the largest radical group in America.

ACORN is known for having a very dirty record, voter fraud being one of its favorite activities:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=obama+acorn+voter+fraud&aq=3&oq=Obama+ACORN.

The ACORN Obama Knows

41 posted on 09/05/2008 11:43:23 AM PDT by FreedomProtector
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To: wordsofearnest

I’d rather be known as an event organizer. At least you’re working and making a honest buck instead of shaking down people like Obama did for the daly political machine.


42 posted on 09/05/2008 11:44:50 AM PDT by mainerforglobalwarming
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To: mukraker; All

Hey, it’s great that ACORN has weighed in b/c now we can have a better chance to put the spotlight on them and on Obama’s extensive work with ACORN and also the Gamaliel Foundation, Woods Foundation, etc. supporting far-left organizing and activism.

ACORN = socialists working for a socialist America

ACORN specializes in vote fraud, too!!

Obama has worked closely with them.


43 posted on 09/05/2008 11:46:04 AM PDT by Enchante (Millions of liberals stock up on laundry detergent as they soil more underwear)
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To: libs_kma

“taking money they didn’t earn from people who didn’t give it to them by their own choice”

Great point indeed!

Funny...they used to call that sort of thing — “Organized Crime” — or, “the mafia.” I guess when you use lawyers, its called community organizer...


44 posted on 09/05/2008 11:59:47 AM PDT by areukiddingme1 (areukiddingme1 is a synonym for a Retired U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer and tired of liberal BS.)
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