Now will Congress investigate ACORN?
Examiner Editorial
September 14, 2009
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| In this Oct. 7, 2008 file photo, an investigator enters the ACORN office in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File) |
Dozens of states have charged ACORN employees with voter registration fraud, numerous corporations have paid exorbitant sums of hush money to get the group to call off its demonstrators crying racism, and media organizations have exposed serious questions about how the radical group has spent the hundreds of millions of federal tax dollars it has received over the years. Yet the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now continues uninterrupted with its corrupt voter registration campaigns and corporate shake-downs, while still collecting millions from the government for mortgage and foreclosure counseling, and other purposes.
But an unheralded young man and woman, acting as citizen-journalists, may have finally thrown open ACORN's doors wide enough to shine light on the ugliest of truths about the group. James O'Keefe, a filmmaker, and Hannah Giles, an aspiring investigative reporter with the National Journalism Center, posed as a pimp and prostitute while using a hidden camera to get the goods in ACORN's Washington, D.C., and Baltimore offices.
The intrepid duo entered those offices seeking advice on getting a loan for a brothel featuring 13-year-old girls smuggled into this country from Latin America. They got that and much more, including suggestions on how to conceal the true nature of the enterprise on tax returns. Without voicing any moral qualms about the enterprise, some of the ACORN employees even provided helpful hints on keeping the poor girls quiet about their plight as sex slaves.
The initial reaction from ACORN officials once the O'Keefe/Giles videos were posted on BigGovernment.com was to dismiss them as doctored misrepresentations created by an "international entertainment conglomerate disguising itself as a news agency (Fox)." But, instead of defending their employees who appeared on the video, ACORN officials fired them, thus confirming the legitimacy of the videos. That was the least they could do, considering the apparent evidence on the videos of multiple state and federal felony charges, including participating in child abuse, aiding and abetting tax evasion, and conspiracy to transport minors across state lines for the purposes of prostitution.
The time has come for Congress to stop evading its responsibility to conduct a full-scale investigation into ACORN operations. It's bad enough that dozens of ACORN employees and volunteers have been convicted in recent years of multiple election law violations. Now the O'Keefe/Giles videos provide graphic proof that an organization that supposedly uses its federal largess to counsel poor people on how to avoid foreclosure is using at least some of its federal dollars to encourage the most heinous of crimes against children. Congress can no longer ignore its responsibility to get at the full truth about ACORN, no matter how disgusting it may ultimately be.
