Rightwing lawlessness revealed, again

by Kai Wright on 01/27/2010 @ 09:09am

Here's a bizarre trait a friend of mine likes to point out about America's privileged class: The accusations too many of its denizens hurl down at poorer, usually darker people say more about themselves than anything else. Those raging against the entitlement programs that form our social safety net are some of the most entitled, underserving people in our society. People obsessed with perversion are among the most morally depraved you'll meet. And those who see crime and fraud lurking around every corner rarely have much respect for the rule of law. Which brings us to James O'Keefe.

O'Keefe, you'll recall, was the "investigative journalist" who posed as a pimp, alongside his faux-hooker friend, to make a celebrated gotcha video revealing ACORN's purported crimes. Now comes this news: The FBI arrested O'Keefe and three co-conspirators on Monday for posing as telephone workers, seemingly in order to bug the New Orleans office of Louisiana Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu. An FBI agent's affidavit charges all four with entering federal property under false pretense for the purpose of interfering with the phone system -- a felony. If convicted, they face up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, according to the Washington Post.

Read on...

Justice Department Targets ACORN But Ignores GOP Voter Suppression

By Steven Rosenfeld, AlterNet. Posted October 23, 2008.

On the eve of the 2008 election, the Department leaks a FBI probe of ACORN but remains silent on widespread voter intimidation tactics.

Partisan considerations still appear to be contributing to the Department of Justice's actions when it comes to enforcing the nation's voting rights laws.

With Election Day less than two weeks away, proponents of more tightly regulating the voting process -- this time led by congressional Republicans -- have gotten their desired response from the nation's guardian of civil rights' laws: a FBI investigation into ACORN, the low-income advocacy coalition that registered 1.3 million new voters in 2008.

Last week, two FBI officials told reporters an ACORN investigation was underway, violating Department rules for disclosing information on cases that could impact an election. The Obama campaign's response was to ask the Attorney General to include that leak in a special prosecutors' investigation of the U.S. attorney firing scandal. No response to that request has been forthcoming.

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This is what happens when you politicize the justice department. The U.S. election has a lot of similarites to the Zimbabwean election. Tom