Media Matters Freaks Out Over Coverage of White House Advisor’s ACORN Ties

 

 

By Matthew Vadum

September 30, 2009

 

For amusement sometimes I read the Media Matters for America website.

If Media Matters, the left-wing character assassination factory with strong ties to liberal uber-funder George Soros, is denouncing something, chances are it’s something that ought not be denounced.

Take for example Media Matters’s apoplexy over the richly deserved pounding the radical activist group and crime syndicate ACORN has been taking in the media lately.

Look at the shrieking headlines from the Media Matters website:

• Latest fact-check fail: Fox News runs with claim that White House official worked for ACORN
• Conservative media raise ACORN bogeyman to baselessly cast doubt on Franken’s campaign victory
• Maddow takes down right-wing media’s attempted smear of Gaspard
• Like a dog that’s been beat too much

And it goes on and on and on.

Particularly hilarious is a new writeup on the site about ACORN news coverage.

This gem runs more than 2,200 words!

Media Matters quotes Glenn Beck saying that President Obama “is surrounded by these people.”

On “Fox & Friends,” Beck said, “What’s really weird is [Obama senior advisor Patrick Gaspard] was also one of the top guys at SEIU. Oh, my goodness. SEIU, ACORN, the same organization in — right — he holds the Karl Rove position at the White House. The president has zero credibility when he says, ‘I haven’t been following this ACORN thing.’ This is his army — SEIU and ACORN.” Beck also said that Obama “is surrounded by these people. He’s surrounded by SEIU, and he’s surrounded by ACORN. While ACORN may have — be back one step, SEIU and ACORN are the same.”

What’s the big deal?    Beck happens to be right on all counts.

http://newsrealblog.com/2009/09/30/media-matters-freaks-out-over-coverage-of-white-house-advisors-acorn-ties/

 

Additional article relating to this:

The Politico Gets Played By ACORN

By Matthew Vadum on 9.29.09

One thing that journalists don’t seem to get about ACORN is that it is a strange, complex creature with tentacles that reach into the highest levels of the United States government, the Democratic Party, corporate America, the labor movement, the nonprofit world, the media, foreign governments, and academia.

ACORN has a confusing structure and its network of who-knows-how-many taxpayer-funded tax-exempt nonprofit affiliates. As I’ve written ad nauseam, this is deliberate.

Understandably, given the complexity of the ACORN network, it is a constant struggle to educate my fellow journalists about ACORN.

The Politico‘s Ben Smith is a living case study showing what happens when sincere, well-meaning journalists write about something they do not understand.

ACORN, quite predictably, claims Patrick Gaspard who is now an extremely close advisor to President Obama, didn’t work for it.

Smith just got played by ACORN — big time.

I didn’t publish all the evidence I have of Gaspard’s ties to ACORN.

Here’s a question for skeptics like Smith: If Gaspard isn’t part of ACORN, why did he sign a letter to the editor of the Nation magazine (dated July 2, 2001) on behalf of ACORN affiliate the Working Families Party of New York? (In case you don’t believe the party is part of ACORN read ACORN’s website which states that in 1998, “ACORN members spearhead[ed] formation of the Working Families Party, the first community-labor party with official ballot status in New York state in more than 50 years.”)

Lest someone accuse me of journalistic malfeasance, I produce the entire text of Lewis and Gaspard’s letter to the Nation here:

New York City

■ Doug Ireland’s offhand comments about the Working Families Party’s role in the upcoming municipal elections in New York City were inaccurate and hurtful ["Those Big Town Blues," June 4]. He wrote that the WFP “could have played a role in recruiting Council candidates” but did not because the progressive unions took no initiatives and ACORN was distracted by its fight against the Edison Corporation.

Speaking for two affiliates of the WFP-ACORN and SEIU/1199-I say that this is dead wrong. We have been involved in a marvelous WFP-initiated process that has included scores of neighborhood and borough meetings, a remarkable series of interviews with more than 100 potential candidates, worksite presentations on the issues by WFP workplace captains, the ongoing recruitment of neighborhood captains and much more. We had more than 1,000 people at a WFP mayoral forum and have won concrete commitments on our living-wage bill from candidates across the city. Until the WFP, there was no group trying to pull together a community-labor-religious coalition to move ideas, people, money and energy in contests from Nassau County to Niagara Falls.

The WFP slate for this year’s city elections will have more union members, community activists and progressives than any slate in memory. We hope Nation readers will vote for, work for and send money to all the WFP endorsed WFP endorsed candidates for primaries and the general election.

BERTHA LEWIS, ACORN, WFP

PATRICK GASPARD, SEIU STATE COUNCIL, WFP

[emphasis added]

Understanding ACORN’s family tree takes time and a great deal of perseverance but after studying ACORN intensively for more than a year, I think I have a handle on how it works.

The part relevant to our story here today goes like this:

*The Working Families Party of New York is an affiliate of both ACORN and SEIU Local 1199, according to current ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis and her protégé Patrick Gaspard.

In other words, the Working Families Party is ACORN. There may be fine legal distinctions, they may file disclosure documents with different government agencies, but they are one and the same. I’ve been saying this for the past year and it’s gratifying that people are finally listening.

Incidentally, the letter to the editor also reveals that SEIU Local 1199, which no one denies Gaspard used to work for, is also apparently an ACORN affiliate. At least that’s what the wording used by Lewis and Gaspard suggests.

Read the entire article HERE.

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