ACORN Watch: More criminal enterprise antics

Michelle Malkin 

By Michelle Malkin  •  November 20, 2009 02:34 PM

Photoshop credit: Leo Alberti

Eric Zimmerman at The Hill has new details on mismanaged federal DOJ grants to ACORN and its affiliates:

ACORN and its affiliates received $200,000 in Justice Department grants between 2002 and 2009, according a report issued today by the department’s Inspector General.

No DOJ grants went directly to ACORN, but a handful of grants were awarded either to ACORN affiliates or to other organizations that sub-contracted with ACORN.

The report, requested by House Judiciary Committee ranking member Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), also found a few instances of ACORN mismanagement of federally contracted work.

…For example, ACORN received a $20,000 sub-contract to do community outreach on crime prevention in New York. The organization that contracted with ACORN has not released the funds yet, claimimg that ACORN submitted reimbursements “outside the scope of the agreement,” including “fringe benefits” for the salaried staffer working on the project.

In another instance the city of Phoenix contracted with the “ACORN Institute” to receive about $9,000 to canvass citizens and raise awareness about a tax credit and a tax assistance program. The city hasn’t paid ACORN yet due to “poor reporting by the ACORN Institute regarding another project not related to DOJ grant funds.” Phoenix is trying to terminate the contract with ACORN.

Meanwhile, BigGovernment’s ACORN watchdogs introduce you to ACORN racketeer/prostitution enabler Lavelle Stewart.

Breitbart calls on Holder to investigate.

GOP Rep. Jim Jordan calls on Ohio to investigate.

And Patterico roasts the ACORN enablers at the LA Times.

‘Rules for Radicals’ and civilian trials for terrorists

Ethel C. Fenig

Although the former editor of the Harvard Law Review and instructor at the University of Chicago Law School and his Attorney General didn’t seem to see this coming, certainly a former community organizer who carefully studied and practiced Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals could have predicted it. As reported  by AP,  according to their lawyers, the accused 9/11 terror masterminds will admit their guilt but plead not guilty because they plan to use their forthcoming trial in a federal civilian court as a platform to tell the entire world “why they did it” and explain “their assessment of American foreign policy.”

Certainly the community organizer , Alinsky loving president still remembers

“The third rule of ethics of means and ends is that in war the end justifies almost any means….” p.29″The tenth rule… is you do what you can with what you have and clothe it with moral garments…. It involves sifting the multiple factors which combine in creating the circumstances at any given time… Who, and how many will support the action?… If weapons are needed, then are appropriate d weapons available? Availability of means determines whether you will be underground or above ground; whether you will move quickly or slowly…” p.36

Certainly the community organizer president would realize that a civilian trial would allow the defendants to continue to follow Alinsky’s rules especially

4. “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules. You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.”

5. “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It is almost impossible to counteract ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage.”

6. “A good tactic is one your people enjoy.” (snip)

11. “If you push a negative hard and deep enough, it will break through into its counterside… every positive has its negative.”

and of course

13. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. In conflict tactics there are certain rules that [should be regarded] as universalities. One is that the opposition must be singled out as the target and ‘frozen.’…

“…any target can always say, ‘Why do you center on me when there are others to blame as well?’ When your ‘freeze the target,’ you disregard these [rational but distracting] arguments…. Then, as you zero in and freeze your target and carry out your attack, all the ‘others’ come out of the woodwork very soon. They become visible by their support of the target…’

“One acts decisively only in the conviction that all the angels are on one side and all the devils on the other.” (pps.127-134)

Oh. The Community Organizer in Chief does remember Alinsky, his rules and his philosophy. Ooooh!

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/rules_for_radicals_and_civilia.html at November 23, 2009 – 06:19:23 PM EST

ACORN dumps documents; Breitbart has them and will release

Clarice Feldman

Following the release by Breitbart’s Big Government website of a video showing employees at ACORN’s San Diego County office offering to assist in the transportation and exploitation of underage prostitutes from abroad, the Attorney General of California announced an investigation into ACORN’s operations. Nights before the visit, ACORN dumped thousands of documents in a dumpster. Breitbart obtained them, says they are shocking evidence of ACORN’s illegality and promises to release them bit by bit over time:

Documents shared with BigGovernment.com include information exposing not only the inner workings of ACORN in California, but also personal, sensitive information belonging to employees, members and clients of ACORN. ACORN and its few remaining defenders insist that the “good” ACORN provides outweighs the transgressions exposed in the recent undercover video sting. But, ACORN’s massive dumping of these documents and the cavalier manner in which it betrayed the trust of its supporters betrays that talking point. (Unlike ACORN, we have redacted sensitive and personal information.)

ACORN’s political agenda is also exposed, with thousands upon thousands of documents revealing the depth of the political machine that is ACORN, and its disturbing ties to not only public employee labor unions but some of the most radical leftist organizations.

The laws governing how sensitive, personal information such as social security numbers, driver’s license numbers, immigration records, tax returns, etc. must be treated are very stringent, and thus it seems as if ACORN may have committed serious violations in that department alone, with thousands upon thousands of potential plaintiffs.

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/acorn_dumps_documents_breitbar.html at November 23, 2009 – 06:16:39 PM EST

Lawyer: 9/11 defendants want platform for views—Critics of Attorney General Eric Holder’s decision to try the men in a New York City civilian courthouse have warned that the trial would provide the defendants with a propaganda platform.

Lawyer: 9/11 defendants want platform for views

By KAREN MATTHEWS (AP) – 12 hours ago

 

NEW YORK — The five men facing trial in the Sept. 11 attacks will plead not guilty so that they can air their criticisms of U.S. foreign policy, the lawyer for one of the defendants said.

 

Scott Fenstermaker, the lawyer for accused terrorist Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, said Sunday the men would not deny their role in the 2001 attacks but “would explain what happened and why they did it.”

 

The U.S. Justice Department announced earlier this month that Ali and four other men accused of murdering nearly 3,000 people in the deadliest terrorist attack in the U.S. will face a civilian federal trial just blocks from the site of the destroyed World Trade Center.

 

Ali, also known as Ammar al-Baluchi, is a nephew of professed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

 

Mohammed, Ali and the others will explain “their assessment of American foreign policy,” Fenstermaker said.

 

“Their assessment is negative,” he said.

 

Fenstermaker met with Ali last week at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. He has not spoken with the others but said the men have discussed the trial among themselves.

 

Fenstermaker was first quoted in The New York Times in Sunday’s editions.

 

Critics of Attorney General Eric Holder’s decision to try the men in a New York City civilian courthouse have warned that the trial would provide the defendants with a propaganda platform.

 

Dean Boyd, a spokesman for the Department of Justice, said Sunday that while the men may attempt to use the trial to express their views, “we have full confidence in the ability of the courts and in particular the federal judge who may preside over the trial to ensure that the proceeding is conducted appropriately and with minimal disruption, as federal courts have done in the past.”

 

Last week, the Senate Judiciary Committee questioned Holder for hours about his decision to send the five 9/11 suspects to New York for trial.

 

Critics of Holder’s decision — mostly Republicans — argued the trial will give Mohammed and his co-defendants a world stage to spout hateful rhetoric. Holder said such concerns are misplaced, and any pronouncements by the suspects would only make them look worse.

 

“I have every confidence that the nation and the world will see him for the coward that he is,” Holder told the committee. “I’m not scared of what Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has to say at trial — and no one else needs to be, either.”

 

The attorney general said he does not believe holding the trial in New York — at a federal courthouse that has seen a number of high-profile terrorism trials in recent decades — will increase the risk of terror attacks there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Obama Courting Danger with Terrorist Trials

November 23rd, 2009

Andrew McCarthy, New York Daily News

 

 

Obama is bringing the Gitmo Boys to New York

 

The prosecution team I led in 1995 convicted the notorious Blind Sheikh and 11 others for conspiring to wage a terrorist war that included the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and attempting (unsuccessfully) to attack New York City landmarks. Consequently, some observers seem puzzled that I’m a vocal critic of civilian trials for our terrorist enemies. But they are confusing litigation success with national-security success. So is the Obama administration in deciding to transfer Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four other 9/11 plotters to federal court in Manhattan.

 

We certainly can convict terrorists in civilian court. We’ve done it too many times for that to be a serious issue. It’s also indisputable that the U.S attorney’s office in Manhattan, where I was privileged to work for 18 years, is without peer in the expertise needed for such complex prosecutions. I have every confidence the Justice Department could convict KSM & Co.

 

The problem on this ride is not the destination; it’s the journey.

 

We are in a hot war, overwhelmingly authorized by Congress, against vicious enemies still plotting attacks that could dwarf the carnage of 9/11. To deal with war crimes, Congress in 2006 endorsed military commission trials, which have a rich pedigree in our history, are fully consistent with our Constitution, and better enable us to withhold intelligence methods and sources.

 

Indeed, the Obama administration concedes that military commissions are sound: Attorney General Eric Holder has announced that the bombers of the warship Cole will face one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gitmo detainees will use trials as “platform” to bash America

Michelle Malkin 

Lead Story

Gitmo detainees will use trials as “platform” to bash America

By Michelle Malkin  •  November 22, 2009 10:13 PM

One of the Gitmo defendants’ lawyers confirms the obvious: The civilian trials for 9/11-linked enemy combatants are nothing more than a grand excuse to use our legal system to bash America and spread the jihadi virus on the world stage.

The five men facing trial in the Sept. 11 attacks will plead not guilty so that they can air their criticisms of U.S. foreign policy, the lawyer for one of the defendants said Sunday. Scott Fenstermaker, the lawyer for accused terrorist Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, said the men would not deny their role in the 2001 attacks but “would explain what happened and why they did it.”

The U.S. Justice Department announced earlier this month that Ali and four other men accused of murdering nearly 3,000 people in the deadliest terrorist attack in the U.S. will face a civilian federal trial just blocks from the site of the destroyed World Trade Center. Ali, also known as Ammar al-Baluchi, is a nephew of professed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Mohammed, Ali and the others will explain “their assessment of American foreign policy,” Fenstermaker said.

“Their assessment is negative,” he said.

Bleeding-heart Barack Obama and interest-conflicted Eric Holder are all too happy to serve as executive directors for the 9/11 show trials.

Hey, why not turn them into a Broadway play while you’re at it, White House?

***

Just a reminder of what Obama wrote about the 9/11 jihadists eight days after the attack left 3,000 innocent men, women, and children dead on American soil:

“We must also engage, however, in the more difficult task of understanding the sources of such madness. The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers: an inability to imagine, or connect with, the humanity and suffering of others. Such a failure of empathy, such numbness to the pain of a child or the desperation of a parent, is not innate; nor, history tells us, is it unique to a particular culture, religion, or ethnicity. It may find expression in a particular brand of violence, and may be channeled by particular demagogues or fanatics. Most often, though, it grows out of a climate of poverty and ignorance, helplessness and despair.”

My response last year:

As for Obama’s continued delusion about the “climate of poverty and ignorance” that supposedly breeds Muslim terrorists, can American politicians ever rid themselves of this unreality-based trope? This belief is part and parcel of the same idiocy that lead the State Department to embrace “spa days” for Muslims to “build bridges” with the Arab world and President Bush to open up our aviation schools to more Saudi students to “improve understanding.” John McCain also alluded to education-as-cure for Islamic terrorism at the L.A. World Affairs Council in March, when he declared that “In this struggle, scholarships will be far more important than smart bombs.” Just what we need: more student visas for the jihadi-infested nation that sent us the bulk of the 9/11 hijackers.

Author and National Review Online blogger Mark Steyn’s sharp rejoinder to McCain then applies to Obama now: “There’s plenty of evidence out there that the most extreme ‘extremists’ are those who’ve been most exposed to the west – and western education: from Osama bin Laden (summer school at Oxford, punting on the Thames) and Mohammed Atta (Hamburg University urban planning student) to the London School of Economics graduate responsible for the beheading of Daniel Pearl. The idea that handing out college scholarships to young Saudi males and getting them hooked on Starbucks and car-chase movies will make this stuff go away is ridiculous – and unworthy of a serious presidential candidate.”

Ayman al-Zawahiri didn’t need more education or wealth to steer him away from Islamic imperialism and working toward a worldwide caliphate. He has a medical degree. So does former Hamas biggie Abdel Rantissi. Seven upper-middle-class jihadi doctors were implicated in the 2007 London/Glasgow bombings. Suspected al Qaeda scientist Affia Siddiqui, still wanted by the FBI for questioning, is a Pakistani who studied microbiology at MIT and did graduate work in neurology at Brandeis.

And as I’ve reported before and must reiterate again for the hard of hearing in Washington, lowering academic standards at American colleges helped al Qaeda mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed further the jihadi cause. In the early 1980s, he enrolled at tiny Chowan College in Murfreesburo, N.C., which had dropped its English requirements to attract–ahem–wealthy Middle Easterners. At Chowan, Mohammed bonded with other Arab Muslim foreign students known as “The Mullahs” for their religious zeal. Mohammed then transferred to North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, where he earned his degree in mechanical engineering along with 30 other Muslims. Mohammed applied his Western learning to oversee the 1993 World Trade Center bombing plot (six Americans dead), the U.S.S. Cole attack (17 American soldiers dead), and the September 11 attacks (3,000 dead). He has also been linked to the 1998 African-embassy bombings (212 dead, including 12 Americans), the plot to kill the pope, the murder of American journalist Daniel Pearl, and the Bali nightclub bomb blast that killed nearly 200 tourists, including two more Americans.

Perhaps bleeding-heart Obama thinks a master’s degree in social work would have convinced poverty-stricken, helpless, ignorant, despairing Mohammed to change his mind?

Terrorism under the radar

Rick Moran

A great piece by Praveen Swamiin in India’s the Hindu that lists the dozen or so terrorist busts in the US in the last few months that included plans to attack not only the United States but other countries as well.

What struck me as I read this article was that we have not seen this kind of “big picture” coverage of terrorism anywhere in the American media that I have noticed. When examined from the standpoint that these arrests can be seen as diligent attempts by al-Qaeda and their offshoots to inflict large scale attacks on America, you realize what a huge mistake the Obama administration is making in downplaying the very idea of a “War on Terror.”

Ever since February, authorities have detected almost a dozen jihadist operations targeting the United States – or using it as a staging post for attacks elsewhere. In March, at least 20 men were reported to have returned home to fight with the Islamist group al-Shahab – recruited by a Somali-American cell operating out of Minneapolis. Four men were held in May for planting inactive explosives, provided by a police informant, outside synagogues in New York. The next month, seven North Carolina men were held for planning attacks in Israel and Pakistan.September saw the detection of three major plots. Inspired by Islamists at a Flushing mosque, and his imagination fired by the Indian televangelist Zakir Naik, Afghan-born and Pakistan-trained Najibullah Zazi is alleged to have been preparing to set off several improvised explosive devices. Jordanian Hosam Maher Smadi and Illinois resident Michael Finton were also held for attempting to set off car bombs which had been provided to them by undercover agents.

In October, the Federal Bureau of Investigation held David Coleman Headley and Tahawwur Rana. First held on charges of planning an attack on the Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten in Copenhagen, the two men are now thought to have played a role in the reconnaissance which preceded the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai.

In the weeks after the Headley-Rana arrests, U.S. authorities held Boston resident Tarek Mehanna and Ahmad Abousamra for conspiring to provide material support to terrorists. The men were allegedly planning attacks on shopping malls, using automatic weapons.

Also, at the end of October, “FBI agents killed Detroit mosque leader Luqmaan Ameen Abdullah, after an exchange of fire with members of Ummah” – a radical group based here that sought to open training camps to arm jihadists.

What is going on here? First, it is apparent that law enforcement – national, state, and local – is doing a good job of identifying threats and snuffing them out before the plans of the terrorists can be carried out. That part of the story is somewhat comforting.

But as Swamiin points out, most of these threats along with other arrests prior to this year, mostly point to one nation where the jihadis train and organize; Pakistan. What Swamiin calls “autonomous jihad” in America was largely born and bred in the terrorist training camps of Pakistan.

Looking at this “big picture” highlights the danger to America. And the old saw about terrorism – “Terrorists only need to get lucky once” – rings especially true when you realize that the odds are shortening in the terrorists favor.

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2009/11/terrorism_under_the_radar.html at November 23, 2009 – 01:04:41 PM EST

Best Buy Muslim Holiday Pass it on

Check this out. Its kind of hard to see in the link but next to the “Happy Thanksgiving” print there is a blurb stating “Happy Eid al-Edha”. Some sort of Muslim holiday. Does anyone else besides me think that the traditional holidays such as Christmas and Easter are soon to be a thing in the past as being recognized socially because it might offend somebody. I figure in my lifetime I will not be getting the traditional holidays off from work but rather a certain number of personal days will be given to each employee to take off as their religion or belief indicates.
Check this out. Its kinda hard to see in the link but next to the “Happy Thanksgiving” print there is a blurb stating “Happy Eid al-Edha”. Some sort of muslim holiday. Does anyone else besides me think that the traditional holidays such as Christmas and Easter are soon to be a thing in the past as being recognized socially because it might offend somebody. I figure in my lifetime I will not be getting the traditional holidays off from work but rather a certain number of personal days will be given to each employee to take off as their religion or belief indicates.

http://bestbuy.shoplocal.com/bestbuy/default.aspx?action=entryflash&adref=header
 

click on the 4 day only ad and it will come up where you can read it

  

I hope they have enough Mulims to offset

 those of us who will never buy from best

 Buy again

Obama Thanks Hollywood With Coveted Invites To First White House State Dinner

Obama Thanks Hollywood With Coveted Invites To First White House State Dinner

By Nikki Finke |

EXCLUSIVE: If tradition stands, the details of the guest list will be revealed only a few hours before the Obama administration’s first state dinner tomorrow. The welcome for India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will be the biggest social event of the Obama White House. Already the Washington DC press corp is buzzing about the “got-to-be-there” fever. But this first dinner is primarily a thank you to the Obamas’ most important political supporters. So I’ve learned that, among the Hollywood contingent asked to attend, are onetime DreamWorks partners David Geffen, Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg; Sony Pictures Entertainment chairman Michael Lynton; and WME Entertainment Agency co-CEO Ari Emanuel. 

Spielberg’s inclusion is interesting since he was a much ballyhooed Hillary Clinton supporter during the first months of her primary campaign when she looked like a sure thing, then quietly threw his clout behind Obama after he became the clear winner. But, given that the guest of honor is India’s highest ranking statesman, Spielberg’s new financial relationship with India’s giant corporation Reliance more than explains his presence. Geffen was an early Obama backer who publicly took on the Clintons with pointed criticism at the start of the primary season. Katzenberg was not an early bird, but he became a faithful fundraiser. Both he and Geffen were considered Obama’s biggest Hollywood bundlers during the campaign.

Lynton was a longtime supporter primarily because of the influence of his wife Jamie whose Chicago family has longtime political connections to the Obamas. Her mother Joanne Alter, the first female Democrat elected in Cook County, talent-spotted Obama in 2003 and convinced her daughter to support him. As a result, Lynton co-hosted an early fundraiser for Obama’s Senate bid in 2004 in addition to hosting one of the earliest Hollywood campaign events for him when most showbiz types were still supporting Hillary. (Will.i.am, who composed the viral video for the Obama campaign anthem “Yes, We Can,” met the candidate during a fundraiser at the Lyntons’ home.)

And Chicago native Emanuel not only was one of Obama’s first Hollywood political and financial backers, but, like duh, his brother Rahm is the White House chief of staff. They’ll join the President and First Lady and 400 guests in an elaborate tent erected on the South Lawn. As for who has been chosen to provide the evening’s entertainment, this White House has shown eclectic taste: Stevie Wonder already has played a concert in the East Room, Marc Anthony already took to the South Lawn for an evening of Latin music, and the Foo Fighters played the Fourth of July party.