Take the Bastards Down

Dropkick Murphys, in support of the Wisconsin protesters.



To purchase a limited edition "Take em Down" T-shirt, click here. Proceeds benefit the Workers’ Rights Emergency Response Fund.

Stop illegal foreclosures

Sign the online petition here.

ACORN cleared

Just so you know.

When a duo of right-wing provocateurs posing as a pimp and prostitute released selectively-edited videos trying to impugn the community activist group ACORN, both Democrats and Republicans condemned the organization.

Congress then voted to cut off federal funding for the group (a decision that was later ruled unconstitutional). Following negative press and Congress' vote, ACORN effectively disbanded Apr. 1 and reorganized under new names.

But a just-issued report by the Government Accountability Office that reviewed ACORN's federal funding at the behest of Congress found little grist for the mill for politicians or right-wing bloggers looking to bash the now-defunct advocacy group for the poor.

The 38-page report surveyed over 31 federal agencies, probing how ACORN used federal funds and whether adequate controls on spending existed.

The report found no evidence of fraud, lax oversight or misuse of federal funds.

In fact, the report discovered that ACORN had adequately accounted for spending $40 million worth of major and minor grants awarded by the federal government to the group since 2005 to combat a variety of problems afflicting poor Americans, including lead poisoning, housing discrimination and lack of adequate job training.

The preliminary report on the group’s funding also found that of the grants that warranted audits no irregularities in spending were found. Smaller grantees said that oversight was adequate as well.

Of eight major grants awarded ACORN by the federal government the report found fault with one, a grant by Neighbor Works.

“Neighbor Works determined that ACORN Housing Corporation had not provided a description of what it planned to accomplish under the grant, as required. After Neighbor Works brought this to the attention of ACORN Housing Corporation officials, these officials subsequently provided the documentation. Oversight of sub-awards is generally delegated to grantees,” the report states.

Of fifteen sub-grants awarded ACORN by a variety of federal agencies, the report did not find any irregularities.

Along with the preliminary finding, the federal agency did a comprehensive review of all criminal investigations by the Department of Justice and federal Inspector General’s since 2005. [...]

The agency also found the Federal Election Commission had closed all investigations into voter fraud by the group.

Of corurse, that still leaves open the question about the motives of the "right-wing provocateurs posing as a pimp and prostitute" and their financial backers. Do they hate poor people, programs that work to help poor people, or the effective use of federal funding?

Nobel Peace Prize winner

President Obama. Let's hope that this does indeed "contribute a little bit for what he is trying to do," as the Norwegian Nobel Committee hopes. Let's also hope it also emboldens Obama to base decisions in Iraq and Afghanistan on the best interests of the entire world and not just the interests of defense contractors.

Reach out

Have you contacted the White House and told the president not to cave on healthcare reform today?

Equal pay for equal work

As the father of a daughter, this makes me happy.

President Barack Obama is signing into law an equal-pay bill that is popular with labor and women's groups and is expected to make it easier for workers to sue for decades-old discrimination.

Obama was to sign the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act on Thursday during an East Room ceremony, a move that effectively ends a 2007 Supreme Court decision that said workers had only 180 days to file a pay-discrimination lawsuit. Obama and fellow Democrats campaigned hard against the court decision and promised to pass legislation that would give workers more time to sue their employers for past discrimination.

"This bill will be a big step forward not just for women, but for families," the White House said in a statement announcing the bill signing. "It is not only a measure of fairness, but can be the difference for families struggling to make ends meet during these difficult times."

It's also nice to see Congress clean up one of the bigger, more repugnant messes made by the Supreme Court.