It was good to see ACORN brought up in tonight’s debate. My frequent attention of late to the topic has brought on Lefty critique (22 comments!) that the group has never actually been convicted of electioneering fraud. But we’ll leave that dispute aside for the time being.

Investigative reporter Stanley Kurtz points us to the deeper problems:

On ACORN, I continue to be stunned by Obama’s denials of his extensive ties to this execrable group. The fact that ACORN came up at all is good. Most folks still don’t know what ACORN is, how bad it is, and how deeply it’s tied to the financial meltdown. John McCain needs to make sure the public learns about ACORN and Obama. Obama’s dissembling on his ties to ACORN shows that he recognizes his vulnerability on the issue.

ACORN is a powerful example of an Obama “association” that has immense policy implications. ACORN is a genuinely radical group. It believes in economic redistribution, the same question raised by the “Joe the Plumber” controversy. And ACORN’s campaign to undermine credit standards in this country was an extremely important contributing cause of our economic meltdown. So Obama’s ACORN ties are part and parcel of the core issues at play in this campaign. [link added]

This is astute commentary. But you have to read Stanley Kurtz’s full-length New York Post column (H/T The Daily Blogster) to see the background on ACORN’s agenda and its dangerous relevance to Barack Obama’s record and program. And yes, Obama’s campaign did give $800,000 to a front group for ACORN.

Serious allegations – and indictments for – voter registration fraud only scratch the surface of the problems with ACORN. Tonight’s debate isn’t the only time Barack Obama has sought to lie and run away from his association with the group.

And it’s not just something that happened in the past that should scare you. It’s the implication of ACORN actions that have contributed to the current crisis, and Obama’s connection to ACORN’s agenda combined with his own words that should scare you. Because the socialist program will undermine an already weak economy and our cherished freedoms.

Or maybe Barack Obama has just spent his career using and lying to ACORN and has no intention of forwarding its socialistic agenda. That wouldn’t really inspire confidence in the man’s character.

I won’t be covering tonight’s final Presidential debate (thankfully!) , but you can watch some other wiseacres from the People’s Press Collective provide their live, MST3K-style commentary. If all works as promised, you should be able to watch the video below as the debate is going on:

Update: Live embedded feed removed

Update: Audio embedded

The campaign for Amendment 49, the Ethical Standards initiative, has released a new 30-second radio ad featuring former U.S. Senator Hank Brown:

Here’s the text of the ad:

Both the Rocky Mountain News and the Denver Post urge you to vote Yes on Amendment 49. 49 stops government from being the bagman for special interests and lobbyists. This is Hank Brown, and I’m thrilled that nearly every newspaper across Colorado agrees: Yes on 49. The Pueblo Chieftain, the Grand Junction Sentinel, the Colorado Springs Gazette, and yes, the Boulder Camera, just to name a few. Join me and Bill Owens in voting Yes on 49. 49 keeps lobbyists in line. Paid for by EthicalStandardsNow.com.

I’m not sure if there is any other initiative on this year’s Colorado ballot that has received such a wide range of major newspaper endorsements.

(Full disclosure: I also happen to work for the Independence Institute, which has backed the Ethical Standards Now campaign.)

We may never know just how authentic the “Educate the Idiots” document is (it’s the word of a young, independent man with nothing to lose vs. a web of heavily-funded, Left-leaning organizations with their power and credibility at stake). But, as Jessica Fender’s article in today’s Denver Post demonstrates, the Colorado Democracy Alliance provides a teachable moment about the Left’s sophisticated political organization, and how the conservative side has waited too long to wake up and get it.

I am on the same page with Alan Philp on this one:

A dearth of lasting conservative infrastructure and more limited resources mean Republicans won’t see anything as sophisticated or coordinated for “some time to come,” said Alan Philp, who led the state GOP’s failed 2006 attempt to synchronize electioneering efforts.

“We believe people should be able to give freely . . . with full disclosure,” he said. “That mindset is challenged by the reality of how the Democratic apparatus works.”

The Denver Post‘s center-Left editor Dan Haley is in agreement, too. Transparency is the issue of the future. If Republicans in Colorado have half a brain, they will latch onto it and ride it as far as it will go. At least that’s my humble two cents’ worth.

Dave Ohmart, the unofficial “non-union rep” for Colorado state government, finally has his Colorado Loses website up and running. Look for newsletters, events, and relevant legal information pertaining to employee rights in state government.

Colorado Loses is the clever foil to the Colorado WINS union organizing coalition:

Colorado WINS, the big state employee union, recently held a convention. Union loyalists were shown a video depicting flood and famine – images from the Gulf Coast of slums, Hurricane-ravaged homes and the like. The moral of the story: state employees are the only line of defense Colorado has against, uh, Hurricanes. No, floods. Wait, I’m confused.

Hurricane Katrina was a tragedy, but it has nothing to do with our state government. Nor does the healthy dose of Bush-bashing members partook in, either. It’s OK for Colorado WINS to acknowledge openly that it exists to play politics. What’s another word for “representation” before government? Oh, right, “lobbying.”

Invoking real tragedy as a cover for raw politicking stoops pretty low.

Kind of makes you want to support the good government initiatives Amendment 49 and Amendment 54, doesn’t it?

Anyway, I’ll stick with Dave Ohmart and Colorado Loses.

ACORN’s systemic problems with voter registration fraud have led to the filing of a RICO action lawsuit in Ohio (H/T Maggie Thurber). RICO refers to cases of racketeering and organized criminal activity – the stuff of John Gotti and company. The stakes have been raised.

Also from Ohio, an independent Cleveland newspaper documents Barack Obama’s associations with ACORN and his campaign’s attempts to cover up the facts and rewrite history.

I may have to rethink my dislike for Ohio.

Wondering what’s going on with the current crisis in the financial markets? Friedman Foundation senior fellow Greg Forster channels the late great economist Milton Friedman via an article written by William F. Buckley during the stock market tumble of 1987. It’s worth a read. I’d like to believe Friedman’s assessments then apply to today’s situation. He’s been right about so many other things.

But Julia Dunraven at Slapstick Politics has a more pessimistic view, with a lot of the numbers to back it up.

Then again, maybe they’re both right.

Nick Kliebenstein is one of the more impressive candidates I’ve seen this year. Running for the Colorado State House in District 33, which includes Broomfield and surrounding areas, Nick came up with this creative piece of Web advertising:

At least I don’t have to pronounce his name as I’m writing this post, but I am looking forward to hearing more about Nick Kliebenstein’s independent conservative leadership in the state legislature for years to come.

ACORN, the increasingly notorious voter fraud group, is part of the Colorado C-3 Roundtable going around “educating” voters about various ballot initiatives.

Among the initiatives ACORN hates and opposes (and which the Roundtable won’t invite supporters to share their side of the debate) is Amendment 49, the Ethical Standards initiative. This amendment “will prohibit governments from bundling money from public employees’ paychecks and delivering the funds to special interests, like unions. These special interests use the money to lobby the same politicians who just delivered the cash to them.”

So why is ACORN part of the virulent opposition? We could start with its own ethical lapses, which include not only voter fraud but also an ongoing investigation for misusing our tax dollars for partisan purposes (PDF).
(more…)

Though they couldn’t bring themselves to identify ACORN’s connection with Barack Obama and the Democratic Party (via Powerline):

2,100 voter registrations in one county, and they are ALL fraudulent? Has Barack Obama answered any questions about ACORN?

Colorado’s Amendment 54 proponents have taken their case to the airwaves for the first time [Video Updated]:

The case of state senator Abel Tapia receiving hundreds of thousands in no-bid government contracts over 10 years was first brought to light by the Denver Post back in April. But as the ad correctly points out, Amendment 54 would create an electronic database of no-bid government contracts searchable by Colorado citizens.

You can find the explanation for my endorsement of Amendment 54 and thumbnail explanations of all the measures on my guide to the 2008 Colorado ballot.

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Update: The story has been picked up in the Denver Post. Conservative activist Tom Graham of Arvada is the culprit. Not the best tactical approach from my point of view. Why? Because now we have to watch and make sure that government public relations teams don’t make Mr. Graham the election issue instead of the burdensome tax hike. Also, a copy of the booklet is viewable online.

Voters in Jefferson County, have you seen the official published arguments for Jeffco Schools 3A, a $34 million-per-year property tax increase to fund Colorado’s largest school district? I looked in vain for a copy of the voter booklet on the Jefferson County Elections Office web page, but little Eddie has helped us out by typing out a copy and providing his own clever take.

Six-digit salaries for new teachers? Relocating senior citizens into smaller homes? Promoting a “Socialist utopia”? These are the arguments FOR 3A? Well, of course, someone has played a clever joke. We had a hearty laugh at our dinner table. If you don’t live in Jefferson County and have a copy of the voter guide yourself, you should check out Eddie’s blog.

In his Sunday column, Denver Post editor Dan Haley discussed “cloak-and-dagger” Democrats:

The once-stealth cadre, united under the name Colorado Democracy Alliance, has not only heavily influenced state politics, it’s become a model Democrats want to replicate nationally. Nothing they’re doing is illegal, or at least it doesn’t appear to be, but it has changed politics and policy-making in Colorado for years to come.

Republicans last week could only stand by, slack-jawed and jealous. It was the type of operation they figured Democrats had.

Only bigger.

Politically speaking, the operation is genius, as it funnels money from wealthy donors — sometimes tax-free — to push political causes. But, ultimately, all of this skirting of campaign finance laws is bad for a transparent and open democracy.

Except for questioning Haley’s claim that nothing the Colorado Democracy Alliance has done is illegal (check this out), I agree wholeheartedly.

Here is Dan Haley’s terrific – if not original – idea:

But wouldn’t it be easier if instead we stripped out all of the do-gooder campaign finance laws that have lessened accountability and made campaigns even nastier, and allow people to donate as much as they want as long as it’s instantly transparent? Donors’ names and occupations, along with their spouses’ information, could be posted on a website for all to see within hours of their donation.

We would know who’s donating and why. Those folks who fund scurrilous attacks could no longer hide behind 527s with benign-sounding names like Coloradans for the Children.

I propose we launch the citizens’ campaign here and now: a 2010 amendment repealing the campaign finance Amendment 27 of 2002 and enacting a simple transparent system in its place. It looks like we might be able to count on the Denver Post‘s endorsement.

The Left is salivating this weekend over Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s so-called “Troopergate” investigation. (Powerline dissects the report to show there really isn’t any “there” there.) But the usually satirical Scott Ott has written a column making a rather serious and profound observation about how the narrative could be turned around:

The so-called Troopergate investigation report, released Friday by a panel in Alaska, is the best thing to happen to the McCain-Palin campaign since the Arizona maverick chose the Alaskan hockey Mom as his running mate.

Republicans should embrace it as a way of telling the story of why government must be reformed. It is the perfect picture of how government bureaucracies shield the incompetent and immoral among them, and waste taxpayer dollars trying to nail concerned citizens who cry ‘foul’.

Ott makes the public suggestion that the McCain-Palin use the story to its advantage. I don’t know. It’s probably too late for that. But Sarah Palin could pick it up herself and run with it on the way to a possible 2012 presidential run.

The people vs. the bureaucracy … I kind of like the sound of that.

A few days ago I highlighted the connections between Barack Obama and ACORN, the group infamously known for two things:
1. Lawsuits that blackmailed banks and other financial institutions into making untold amounts of bad loans, a practice that fed the cancer underpinning the current market crisis.
2. Massive voter fraud in key election battleground states.

Barack Obama used to work for ACORN, filed at least one lawsuit on behalf of ACORN, and gave $800,000 from his campaign to ACORN. Yeah, some skeptics say, but really how connected are they?

Compliments of Elmumfo – by way of Okie Campaigns – we are treated to further enlightening of what Obama thinks of ACORN:

In December of 2007, Obama told ACORN activists: “…but let me even say, before I get inaugurated, during the transition, we’re gonna be calling all of you in to help us shape the agenda. We’re gonna be having meetings all across the country with community organizations so that you have input into the agenda for the next presidency of the United States of America.”

And here’s the video:

Middle-of-the-road voters in this election are looking for the lesser of two evils. John McCain fits the bill.