Topic category:  Government/Politics

On December 21, 2009, John McCormack posted this chilling message on The Blog at weeklystandard.com:

"Exclusive: ACORN Qualifies for Funding in Senate Health Care Bill

"Senator Roland Burris is claiming credit for a provision in Harry Reid's 'manager's amendment,' unveiled Saturday morning, that could funnel money to ACORN through the health care bill.

"On December 9, Burris, an Illinois Democrat, pledged that he would filibuster a health care bill without a public option. 'If we have to get 60 and it comes back and it does not have a public option in it, I will not vote for it,' he said. Then early last week he said he could vote for the bill if there were changes made to achieve the goals of the public option: 'until this bill addresses cost, competition, and accountability in a meaningful way—it will not win [my vote].'

"Asked last night before the Senate voted why he was planning to support a bill without a public option, Burris said: 'We have a great bill--the best we could get. And it also covers most of our concerns: competition, cost, and accountability.' But had anything specifically changed in the text of the bill that helped him change his mind? Burris told THE WEEKLY STANDARD: 'It was the disparity provision that was put in, which we had something to do with, in terms of making sure that diabetes and the other diseases that are affecting minorities are really studied by HHS in all of these pilot programs.'

"The provision he cites, found on pages 240 through 248 of the manager's amendment, requires that six different agencies each establish an 'Office of Minority Health.' The agencies are the 'Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Health Resources and Services Administration, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.'

"According to page 241 of the amendment: 'In carrying out this subsection, the Secretary, acting through the Deputy Assistant Secretary, shall award grants, contracts, enter into memoranda of understanding, cooperative, interagency, intra-agency and other agreements with public and nonprofit private entities, agencies, as well as Departmental and Cabinet agencies and organizations, and with organizations that are indigenous human resource providers in communities of color to assure improved health status of racial and ethnic minorities, and shall develop measures to evaluate the effectiveness of activities aimed at reducing health disparities and supporting the local community. Such measures shall evaluate community outreach activities, language services, workforce cultural competence, and other areas as determined by the Secretary.'

"According to a Senate legislative aide, the scandal-plagued Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now could qualify for grants under this provision. ACORN would also qualify for funding on page 150 of the underlying Reid bill, which says that 'community and consumer-focused nonprofit groups' may receive grants to 'conduct public education activities to raise awareness of the availability of qualified health plans.'

"Earlier this year, Congress passed and the president signed into law a ban on federal funding for ACORN, but a judge ruled that that law was unconstitutional. If a higher court reverses that ruling, ACORN may be prohibited from receiving funds through the Office of Minority Health earmark. But according to the Senate legislative aide, ACORN would still 'absolutely' qualify for federal funding through the provision in the underlying Reid bill because the anti-ACORN appropriations amendment would not apply to funds provided through the health care exchanges.

"A spokesman for Sen. Harkin, chairman of the HELP committee, wrote in an email that he 'will look into' which organizations qualify for funding under these provisions. Spokesmen for Senators Reid and Dodd did not immediately reply to emails."

People who have been paying attention are not surprised.

In "Stop Obamacare by Stopping ACORN" (December 2, 2009) (http://www.webcommentary.com/php/ShowArticle.php?id=gaynorm&date=091202), I explaned:

"The truth is that (1) whether it's called Hillarycare, or Obamacare, or Pelosi-Reidcare, it's long been critical part of the radical ACORN agenda to 'fundamentally transform' America and (2) as soon as a presidential candidate backed by ACORN is elected, mislabeled 'healthcare reform' becomes a top legislative priority in the effort to socialize America.

"When Bill Clinton finished his speech accepting the 1992 Democrat presidential nomination, the first person to congratulate him was Zach Pollett, ACORN's political director since its creation in 1970."

I also warned:

"The ACORN-Obamacare connection is a little appreciated, but potentially decisive, part of the current health care debate.

"Opponents of Obamacare should forthrightly make a 'game-changing' argument against the threatening health care 'reform': Obamacare is a key part of corrupt ACORN's (and Obama's) radical agenda and thus a key part of why ACORN illicitly cooperated with the Obama presidential campaign to elect Obama to socialize America, beginning with health care.

"Now publicly exposed and disgraced ACORN is NOT out front on Obamacare (even though ACORN expects to be a big beneficiary of it).

"That's because ACORN is now even more toxic than Obamacare."

BigGovernment's Kyle Olson lamented, in "Congress Back to Finding Ways to Fund ACORN" (December 23, 2009) (http://biggovernment.com/2009/12/23/congress-back-to-finding-ways-to-fund-acorn/):

"ACORN’s friends, with a fresh court ruling backing the organization, are finding new ways to send taxpayer dollars to it....

"Additionally, according to the Weekly Standard, the original bill itself contains language creating funding opportunities for 'community and consumer-focused nonprofit groups' to 'conduct public education activities to raise awareness of the availability of qualified health plans.'

"And what if another judge overturned Judge Nina Gershon’s ruling declaring the congressional action to ‘defund’ ACORN? They needn’t worry: funding provided by the health care legislation would go through exchanges, which aren’t covered by the ‘Defund ACORN’ bill.

"Whew! That was close, wasn’t it ACORN?!?

"This all underscores the fact that like the stimulus bill, socialized medicine is just another giveaway to liberal groups. That’s change we can believe in!"

Olson's right to connect Obamacare and socialized medicine, but Obamacare is NOT "just another giveaway to liberal groups." It's a key part of the wealth redistribution strategy and a dangerous expansion of government designed to perpetuate the power of the Far Left as well as a "giveaway" to ACORN, SEIU, La Raza and other subversive entities.

What all this underscores is that it is ACORN's subversive agenda and corrupt political ties that need to be exposed, not the willingness of ACORN employees to help with prostitution, illegal immigration, tax fraud and bank fraud.

If the "Pimp and Pro" ACORN sting had been conducted only in the District of Columbia and the 38 states in which one-party consent is legal and then used as a springboard to expose ACORN's subversive agenda and corrupt political ties, it would have been much more effective and only put ACORN in legal jeopardy.

It will take more that bluster and bluff to stop Obamacare now, but stoppable, it STILL is, IF ACORN's true nature as a subversive and corrupt organization and status as an unofficial arm of the Democrat Party and sponsor of President Obama are made public knowledge.

Michael J. Gaynor

Biography - Michael J. Gaynor

Michael J. Gaynor has been practicing law in New York since 1973. A former partner at Fulton, Duncombe & Rowe and Gaynor & Bass, he is a solo practitioner admitted to practice in New York state and federal courts and an Association of the Bar of the City of New York member.

Gaynor graduated magna cum laude, with Honors in Social Science, from Hofstra University's New College, and received his J.D. degree from St. John's Law School, where he won the American Jurisprudence Award in Evidence and served as an editor of the Law Review and the St. Thomas More Institute for Legal Research. He wrote on the Pentagon Papers case for the Review and obscenity law for The Catholic Lawyer and edited the Law Review's commentary on significant developments in New York law.

The day after graduating, Gaynor joined the Fulton firm, where he focused on litigation and corporate law. In 1997 Gaynor and Emily Bass formed Gaynor & Bass and then conducted a general legal practice, emphasizing litigation, and represented corporations, individuals and a New York City labor union. Notably, Gaynor & Bass prevailed in the Second Circuit in a seminal copyright infringement case, Tasini v. New York Times, against newspaper and magazine publishers and Lexis-Nexis. The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed, 7 to 2, holding that the copyrights of freelance writers had been infringed when their work was put online without permission or compensation.

Gaynor currently contributes regularly to www.MichNews.com, www.RenewAmerica.com, www.WebCommentary.com, www.PostChronicle.com and www.therealitycheck.org and has contributed to many other websites. He has written extensively on political and religious issues, notably the Terry Schiavo case, the Duke "no rape" case, ACORN and canon law, and appeared as a guest on television and radio. He was acknowledged in Until Proven Innocent, by Stuart Taylor and KC Johnson, and Culture of Corruption, by Michelle Malkin. He appeared on "Your World With Cavuto" to promote an eBay boycott that he initiated and "The World Over With Raymond Arroyo" (EWTN) to discuss the legal implications of the Schiavo case. On October 22, 2008, Gaynor was the first to report that The New York Times had killed an Obama/ACORN expose on which a Times reporter had been working with ACORN whistleblower Anita MonCrief.

Gaynor's email address is gaynormike@aol.com.