I've been full circle on this ACORN story.
To start with, after the raid here in Las Vegas, I wrote a diary expressing my suspicion of Republican "dirty tricks" --
http://www.dailykos.com/...
While I still believe that Republicans are plenty willing to stretch the truth or outright lie to make hay with the ACORN situation, it's become pretty clear that ACORN spokespeople aren't being as straightforward as they could be. And there are some aspects of the way they treat their employees that I just cannot support.
As I followed the news stories, one very upsetting aspect was ACORN's quota system imposed on their workers, and ACORN's vociferous denial that such a quota system existed. Local TV news here in Las Vegas mentioned quotas regularly, as did the affidavit that was filed in order to obtain a search warrant:
the full document in pdf:
http://media.lasvegassun.com/...
But ACORN repeatedly denied the quota system; here, CBS News gets the denial, and refutes it:
http://www.cbsnews.com/...
"Do you have quotas that people have to fill every day?" Keteyian asked Lewis.
"No," she said. "We pay people by the hour. And also, we train folks on a daily basis."
But CBS News has talked to nearly two dozen ACORN workers who all said they were pressured to increase their number of registration cards - to the point of copying names out of phone books, signing up inmates, and registering the dead.
"They just have to maintain 25 cards a day," Borges said. "That's a quota, as far as I'm concerned."
Then, in the discussion thred of an ACORN diary, I ran into a fellow Kossack who had worked for ACORN, and who was posting in their defense. According to him, ACORN's denial of quotas is a lie:
http://www.dailykos.com/...
You get fired for consistently bringing in cards in the low teens, or for one day with under 10 cards.
You get a bonus for getting over 100 cards in a week, which means you meet quota all 5 days, or work Saturday. It's rare people get the bonus, a lot more people get fired.
So, we've established that ACORN's spokespeople lie to cover the use of quotas, and that they squeeze their subsistence-wage staff mercilessly to get the most bang for their employment buck.
The question tht remains is, why?
It's useless to ask ACORN, as we know they lie.
And we already know the common, everyday reason that employers treat employees as shabbily as ACORN treats its work-force:
Thr Profit Motive.
Gullible Dems fund ACORN. ACORN squeezes its staff for numbers (even invalid numbers will do). As the election bureauceacy is woefully ill-prepared to get ACORN's numbers straight, ACORN can claim hugely inflated numbers for their registration drive, and can claim far more credit than they are due for a Democeatic turnout. Senior staff grow fat on Dem money, even if it's only their institutional salary.
Not everybody is embezzling a million dollars, like Dale Rathke, the brother of ACORN's founder Wade Rathke.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
I won't even think about the mortgage business. I don't blame poor folks who want a home for the financial meltdown, but I am starting to believe there are some amoral bastards at ACORN who will steal anything that isn't tied down.
I'd love to be wrong. For ACORN to prove me wrong, they can start by coming clean about their quota system.
UPDATE: Not that it means anything, but here's McCain speaking at a gathering cosponsored by ACORN and SEIU (a service employees' union organized by ACORN founder Wade Rathke).