The Lansing State Journal reported yesterday that the ACORN office in Lansing, Michigan is closing its doors after receiving a threatening phone call (H/T Eric B. at Michigan Liberal):
An angry voice mail laced with a racial epithet was the final straw for Carrie Guzman.
An anonymous caller to the local Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, office, left the message. No complaint was filed with police, but the office will close next week…when Guzman, the local ACORN financial justice coordinator, thought she could no longer guarantee a safe working environment for her volunteers, she decided it was time to call it quits.
This was a group that did some damn good. According to the article, last year the Lansing ACORN office:
- Registered 8,500 voters
- Helped 400 low-income families complete tax forms free of charge
- Worked with 200 homeowners in danger of losing homes
Now, thanks to the actions of a handful of ACORN employees in a different location, this office which has no history of malfeasance is closing up shop. The worst part of this story might actually be the comments the article received. Here’s a sampling and they look like they come right off the pages of the Free Republic (I checked, they haven’t linked the article…yet):
I have worked with people that deal with ACORN. You might as well just consider them the biggest organized evil and dishonest group to exist in the United States. You would have to be a fool to believe anything that they say. They have NO problems even admitting to lying about people or even physically intimidating them. Disgusting people. Sadly these vermin will pop up again organized under a different name. Like rats they are scattering now light has been shined on them.
GOOD RIDDANCE!!! GET A REAL JOB!!! OR LEAVE MICHIGAN!!!
COMMIE-CRATS ABANDON LOUSY ACORN Even Bwarney Fwrank abandoned ACORN on Thursday — after MESSIAH dumped ACORN on Monday. http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitol-briefing/2009/09/barney_frank_vs_bill_oreilly_o.html?hpid=moreheadlines Change — how cool.
GEE !!!! What are the prostitutes of Lansing going to do now there is no more ACORN? Too funny !!!!!
And, finally, this classy bit of fecal matter:
Is it a job requirement that you must be Morbidly Obese to run an Acorn branch? The proofs in the pudding as they say, maybe they just want branch management to look like Acorns, if so it’s worked. Why is it f@t white women seem to love O so much? Oh yeah that’s just the way they roll RIGHT?
Lansing is a town hit hard by this recession. There are multiple General Motors plants there (or were.) The unemployment rate is 12.7% which includes East Lansing where there’s a major university so the numbers in Lansing proper are probably considerably higher. This is very much a blue-collar town and services like the ones offered by ACORN are in high demand. If this weren’t so hurtful to people who really need these services, I would actually laugh at the right wingers who spend so much time and energy railing on ACORN. This is the comment that I left on the LSJ article:
The vast majority of anti-ACORN comments on this article are a stunning display of grade school-level childishness coupled with an almost comical level of ignorance. It’s truly shameful and I’d be embarassed to be part of a group that you’re affiliated with, political or otherwise. To those who REALLY think that ACORN was responsible for the victory of Barack Obama last fall: I encourage you to continue to tilt at that windmill. In fact, I think you should spend even MORE of your time chasing after ACORN in 2010 & 2012. What you’ll find is that ACORN had a neglible impact on the election and the organization that was assembled to get Obama elected in 2008 is going to clean your clocks in the upcoming elections. But you go ahead and blame ACORN all you want. That only helps those of us who wish to see progressive liberals voted into every office they can. We’re glad you have something else to occupy your minds and time with while we get to the business of winning elections.
I believe this and I do think it’s laughable that so much of what the right detests is laid at the door of ACORN. That said, a good organization doing good things is now closed. And that makes us all just a bit poorer.
I’m just sayin’…
