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March 20, 2009

Washington Times Editorial on Acorn counting heads in census

In the way of a follow-up to our earlier post on March 18 titled, "Incredibly stupid: ACORN to have a role in 2010 census," there's an excellent editorial today at the Washington Times on the topic in which it says that having ACORN count heads in the census is "like Santa trusting a child to tell him how many times he or she has been good in the past year" and that they "could write a book on the false voter registrations submitted by ACORN." In other words, they obviously believe as we did, that allowing ACORN to participate in the counting of the census destroys the chances of the census being bipartisan. Clearly, the Obama administration has its hands all over ACORN:

[...] For a nonpartisan organization such as the Census, ACORN's political connections are also troubling. Last year, the Obama campaign paid ACORN $800,000 to register voters and do other work. ABC News' Jake Tapper caught Obama campaign officials in numerous attempts to hide Mr. Obama's past connections with ACORN. Mr. Obama also gave ACORN money when he served on the board of the Woods Fund in Chicago. For all the work that he has done for ACORN over the years, Investor's Business Daily called Mr. Obama "ACORN's Senator."

ACORN is a "bipartisan" organization in name only. Giving it any type of official role in the process, including making it a so-called "Census Bureau partner," is disturbing. We worry about how ACORN may misuse this affiliation in representing itself to others.

What is at stake from an accurate census is huge. The allocation of seats in Congress, and ultimately questions of who controls it, depend on an accurate count. Much of the money Congress spends is allocated based on the census. Requiring that the census be non-partisan is the first requirement that must be met.

Disturbingly, the Census Bureau was unwilling to answer any questions on the record, and was only willing to talk off the record to try to dissuade the Times from writing this editorial. We wish that we could share the off-the-record responses with our readers. The only official response was a short one-sentence email that any concerns were "baseless." If the concerns are so "baseless," why won't the people at the Census discuss the issue on the record?

Posted by Hyscience at March 20, 2009 6:56 AM

• Washington Times Editorial on Acorn counting heads in census - Mar 20, 2009