September 22, 2009

ACORN Defunding Bill Could Also Defund Blackwater

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Ryan Grim has a blockbuster story over at Huffington Post explaining that the bill “defunding” ACORN is written so broadly that it actually forbids the government from giving money to a whole bunch of other groups, too—including most of the military-industrial complex:

[I]t applies to “any organization” that has been charged with breaking federal or state election laws, lobbying disclosure laws, campaign finance laws or filing fraudulent paperwork with any federal or state agency. It also applies to any of the employees, contractors or other folks affiliated with a group charged with any of those things.

That means almost any company in the Project on Government Oversight’s contractor misconduct database could conceivably be barred from receiving federal funds under the new law. Grim focused on the huge defense companies that top POGO’s list, but also prominent in that database are private military contractors like Blackwater/Xe, DynCorp International, and G4S, whose ArmorGroup subsidiary employeed the contractors gone wild at the Kabul embassy. How do so many military contractors run into trouble with the law? Maybe because there are just 14 people monitoring the Pentagon’s entire contracting operation.

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We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

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