ACORN Folds

by Joshua Malbin on Mar.22, 2010, under Politics

As I’ve said before, community development groups will be careful to steer clear of politics from now on, leaving poor people more politically disengaged than they would otherwise be. This continues to suck big-time.

Incidentally, the O’Keefe video that started all this has been exposed as a hoax. Not that you’d ever have known it from the papers.

The BRAD BLOG also has a PDF account of the work ACORN did over the last decade and won’t be around to do anymore.

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6 Comments for this entry

Josh K-sky
March 22nd, 2010 on 5:32 pm
I’ve been thinking about James O’Keefe and what I would hope for him. Jail time seems unlikely, even with the Landrieu invasion; my guess is he’ll get some community service sentence that he’ll work off by doing some work for deserving white children. I would wish poverty on him, and hey, it could happen, but I wouldn’t count on it. Something tells me the conservative gravy train will swoop in for old James. (As far as I can tell he doesn’t come from any particular vein of wealth.)

So this is my wish for James O’Keefe: I hope you get evicted. I hope you know what it’s like to suddenly realize that the floor beneath your feet and the roof over your head is not really yours. I know how nervous I get whenever I think my landlord is plotting against me, even though I could make it through an eviction all right.

I think that feeling might make O’Keefe appreciate, for however long he lived in that stomach-churning uncertainty, what it was that ACORN actually did for people — they have been among the best poor people’s housing advocates anywhere — and why what he did had consequences beyond feeding the paranoia and sadism of his fan base.
Joshua Malbin
March 22nd, 2010 on 11:07 pm
If only, like Angel, he could be cursed with a soul.
Joshua Malbin
March 23rd, 2010 on 9:41 am
A more optimistic take from one of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s commenters:

ACORN … evolved into a hybrid… It had local chapters, but it also had a separately incorporated national organization, and the lines of authority grew hazy. The numerous subsidiaries set up to accept federal funding tended to be incorporated nationally, and were run along more conventionally corporate lines, but set up shop with local chapters in a way that often blurred lines. Ultimately, neither the local memberships nor the national board appeared to be actually in control.

The Proskauer solution to this was actually simple – convert ACORN into a pair of national non-profits. Run them like corporations. Bring in outside members on the board. There’s actually a word for this – demutualization. Proskauer was urging ACORN to complete the journey along the course it has recently followed, leaving behind its roots as a participatory group, and to become instead a national non-profit, capable of competing for and receiving government and foundation grants, and signing up ‘members’ to help in its fundraising, volunteer, and lobbying efforts. And that path is indeed open.

But there’s an alternative, that this bankruptcy filing would seem to confirm. ACORN can return to its origins as a membership federation, decentralize, and devolve power back to its chapters. Some of the largest state chapters have already become independent. If the organization has a chance at revitalization, I suspect it lies along this second path. It was always what made ACORN unique, anyway – there are a host of other Washington lobbying groups focused on urban issues, but none with ACORN’s breadth of active and participating members.

Which makes James O’Keefe no less of a douchewad.
Josh K-sky
March 23rd, 2010 on 10:24 am
I think that’s right. Look forward to right-wing claims that ACORN is more sneaky and powerful than ever, and unfairly failed to completely fold when they said they did.
John Emerson
March 23rd, 2010 on 11:44 am
The shameful thing is the way the Democrats folded immediately. That’s one of the reasons I’ve essentially given up.
rob helpy-chalk
March 23rd, 2010 on 11:48 am
I think we should put together a badly edited, obviously fraudulent video claiming the Heritage Foundation aids crystal meth dealers. If the media treated the right the way it treats the left, the Heritage foundation would be out of business in six months.