Funding cuts: ACORN now, Blackwater soon?

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Monday, September 28, 2009

News Funding cuts: ACORN now, Blackwater soon?

Posted By Rhiannon Fionn-Bowman on Mon, Sep 28, 2009 at 9:49 AM

When will those dingleberries in Washington learn to read the bills they're voting on? Or, better, when will they pay attention to what their office staff writes in those bills before they present them for a vote?

In the GOP's rush to penalize ACORN, after members of their wing nut movement set them up in a sting operation, they pushed a bill through Congress that could also mean the end of Bush II's beloved Blackwater program. Whoopsi daisy.

You remember Blackwater, right? They're the North Carolina-based, ultra-conservative, blood-thirsty, paramilitary group that thought the Iraqi war was their chance to spark a Biblical holy war. Oh, and they've received over $1 billion -- with a 'B' -- in government funding (which is a 2007 number, before Blackwater reorganized as Xe.)

They've been sued by the families of the American's they've killed. The Iraqi government is expected to file criminal charges for their murder of innocent Iraqi citizens. The F.B.I. is investigating them, which -- by the way, costs us a pile in taxpayer dollars. They've lied to Congress, wasting everyone's time and, again, taxpayer dollars. And, yet, they are still receiving massive amounts of funding from our government. More, the Obama administration has increased their funding.

Because, why, again? Our own military forces aren't good enough, or something?

Meanwhile, darn those ACORN folks for trying to help poor people.

Yeah, ACORN, like any large group of humans, has a few bad seeds. Fortunately, they've been caught and penalized. But, at least that organization wasn't mowing down innocents in an effort to rush Armageddon.

I mean, really, shame on ACORN for reporting their own voter registration irregularities. Thanks to them, all of those falsified registration forms were brought to light and no voter fraud occurred. And, shame on that one lady for thinking she was Candid Camera. I mean, $3 million -- with a 'M' -- per year for 15 years.

With more than a billion dollars funneled to an organization led by a religious fundamentalist to kill innocents versus $50 million to help American's poor, it's easy to see where our priorities lie as a nation. In the battle of war and nation building versus helping our own less fortunate citizens, war wins.

Overly-broad language used by lawmakers intending to pull government funding for community organizing group ACORN may have the unintended effect of forcing the government to also pull funds from much of the military-industrial complex, a Tuesday report revealed.

"The congressional legislation intended to defund ACORN, passed with broad bipartisan support, is written so broadly that it applies to 'any organization' that has been charged with breaking federal or state election laws, lobbying disclosure laws, campaign finance laws or filing fraudulent paperwork with any federal or state agency. It also applies to any of the employees, contractors or other folks affiliated with a group charged with any of those things," wrote Huffington Post reporter Ryan Grimm.

"In other words, the bill could plausibly defund the entire military-industrial complex. Whoops."

Mother Jones was quick to note that could mean any firm in the Project on Government Oversight's contractor misconduct database could be facing a removal of government funds -- including the private security firm formerly known as Blackwater Worldwide.

House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) praised the result, calling it a victory for a “united Republican effort.” The Associated Press referred to it as a “GOP-led strike.”

Sensing a window of opportunity with the GOP's overly-broad language, Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) is looking to build a list of firms that may also be lumped in with ACORN under the legislation.

"You see, regardless of what you think of ACORN, it is laudable to stop taxpayer money from going to organizations that commit fraud against the government," he said in a statement. "So as per the bill's text, I'm going to put into the Congressional record a list of organizations who have committed fraud against the government or employs anyone who has."

Grayson's list is now online and growing, and he's soliciting the Internet's help to add firms which have committed fraud against the government.

The as-of-yet unverified list reads like a who's who list of the most influential American corporations, including Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, General Electric, Raytheon, L-3 Communications, Blackwater Worldwide (now known as Xe Services, LLC), Kellogg Brown & Root, Bank of America, IBM, Halliburton, AT&T, Hewlett-Packard Company, DynCorp International Inc., CACI International, Inc., Dell, Inc., Exxon Mobil and many, many more.