Saturday, July 05, 2008

Obama Campaign Event Held At Fort Wayne Fire Station

Fort Wayne Observed identifies a message which went out to supporters of Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign this morning telling them to show up for a voter registration drive at Fire Station 12 in Fort Wayne. The message was sent by Francis Iacobucci, who is identified as Regional Field Director for the Obama campaign. Somebody needs to explain why a fire station was allowed to be used for partisan campaign purposes. Mitch Harper, a Republican Fort Wayne city councilor, is the editor of Fort Wayne Observed.

17 comments:

Wilson46201 said...

Obama supporters worked the downtown Indianapolis 4th of July Celebration registering voters: a fine patriotic activity!

Vox Populi said...

From the message you write about:

We’ll be canvassing the surrounding neighborhoods and signing up people to volunteer, as well as registering new voters!

Seeing as the firemen are probably already registered, and not many people walk up to a fire station, it seems the fire station is just a place where canvasers are likely going to park before going out.

But I'm sure you already thought of that.

Anonymous said...

It was registering people to vote - people that could vote either way in November. You cannot guarantee the people they registered to vote will actually vote for Obama over McCain. Thus, how can you objectively state that the first station was "used for partisan campaign purposes." I am sure they would have let McCain's campaign register voters as well at the fire station, but that would require McCain's campaign to actually have some unpaid foot soldiers in Indiana like Obama has throughout the Country.

Just my thoughts on the subject.

Gary R. Welsh said...

The Obama campaign is an offshoot of ACORN--the most corrupt political voter registration organization in the history of the U.S. They have no business having volunteers meet in a government building to get their marching orders. This is a partisan event to benefit Obama. You people think our government institutions exist for your partisan benefit. It's a part of your culture. Sadly, you Obama supporter all have one thing in common--a total inability to see anything your campaign does as wrong. The rule-breaking by Obama's campaign is complete. He will become the first candidate in modern politics to be nominated by his party after receiving fewer votes than his nearest competitor. Cheating and intimidation to win caucus elections and ignoring the principle of one man one vote in Michigan and Florida will forever be a blemish on the democratic process and be a valid basis for questioning the legitimacy of his nomination.

Gary R. Welsh said...

From the No Quarter blog:

Obama’s most questionable tie is to a leftist organization called ACORN. His connection to this group begins with a woman named Madeleine Talbot. She embraced Obama and taught him the ropes. He remained a part of this group’s training cadre. Obama taught leadership conferences for the group while working for Miner, Barnhill & Galland. His connections don’t end there. Obama actively sought and received the endorsement by ACORN for his local campaigns. He has now done the same in his bid for the USA presidency.

According to its web site ACORN (an acronym for Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), is the nation’s largest community organization of low- and moderate-income families, working together for social justice and stronger communities. At first glance, this organization seems to be benign. This is not true since it uses very aggressive tactics to get its work done.

Some recent reports about their activities include the following things. They have disrupted and blocked activities within the Chicago City Council during living wage discussions. In Baltimore, MD, they burst into the scene of a private law dinner. They bussed four loads of protesters to the site of a mayor’s house, where they spewed profanities at the mayor and his family. And these are just the ones we know about. Their thuggery is over the line by far.

These are not their only questionable actions. In the past they have been tied to illegal voter registration in at least three states. These three states are Washington, Missouri, and North Carolina.

In Missouri, the voter fraud case was tied to at least one campaign, the senate campaign of Claire McCaskill.

In 2004, the Washington state Secretary of State described ACORN’s illegal activity as the “largest case of voter fraud in the state’s history”.

They were fined $25,000 and promised to instruct their paid canvassers on the state election requirements. In 2005, according to the complaint filed with Mecklenberg County, North Carolina, the voter fraud involved the registration of homeless people. ACORN agrees they break the law but said “no one told us”. In 2006, in Kansas City, MO, five low-level operatives were charged with voter fraud. Four pleaded guilty, with the fifth person released because it came out that an ACORN worker had stolen her identity.

This is just the first layer of radicalism. According to Sol Stern’s 2003 City Journal article, “ACORN’s Nutty Regime for Cities,” this group is the key modern successor of the 1960 ’s “New Left” with a 1960’s-bred agenda of anti-capitalism to match. While ACORN still uses the old tactics of the National Welfare Reform Organization to get things done, the targets and strategy have changed. They prefer to fly under the radar, taken their tactics to liberal urban areas like Chicago and now here in Kansas. Their national goals are municipal “living” wage laws, targeting big companies like Costco, rolling back welfare reform, and regulating banks.

ACORN drives companies like Costco from urban areas that actually need jobs. Their opposition to welfare reform tends to keep the people in poverty in these areas, while causing family breakdown. The worst of their tactics is the regulation of banks. They protest “predatory lending,” putting pressure on banks to make large donations to them to finance their “non-partisan motor voter drives.” Stern says that these tactics tend to be “undisguised authoritarian socialism.”

Don’t let its tactics fool you though. According to Kurtz, “ACORN is a savvy and exceedingly effective player.” They prefer to take over the system from within rather than overthrowing the system from without. Stern calls this a political version of the Invasion of the Body Snatchers. In Chicago, where the largest organization exists, an ACORN member won a seat on the Board of Alderman as candidate of the leftist New Party.

Obama in his pre-law days was a community organizer. He was supposed to teach the residents to press for improvements in places like their parks which were eyesores back in his day. Part of Obama’s employment was to organize demonstrations, much in the same way groups like ACORN do. Some of Obama’s claims, in his book Dreams from My Father, about his actions to remove asbestos are false. It was actually a woman named Hazel Johnson who discovered the asbestos problem and who led the removal efforts.

Once again, Madeleine Talbot, Obama’s ACORN mentor, reappears on our radar screens. It turns out Talbot was in some sense responsible for the attempted unsuccessful coup of the Chicago City Council meeting on the living wage issue in 1997. Two hundred ACORN supporters were present. While the actions did disrupt the meeting, six members were arrested that night, charged with “mob action and disorderly conduct.” Among those six was Talbot, Obama’s ACORN mentor.

artfuggins said...

In Indiana, voter registration is a nonpartisan event. We do not register by party and volunteers must register anyone. Voter registration drives are historically done in public buildings and private businesses. There are many voter registration activities scheduled for the next couple of months in Indiana. They are even done in our schools, at our jobs, in our churches etc. By Indiana law, the only place a voter registration can NOT be done is in a tavern or bar.

artfuggins said...

I forgot to mention that voter registration is done at license branches, township offices and food stamp offices as well as several other governmental offices.

Anonymous said...

Yes, look at this corrupt business engaging in organized voter registration drives:

http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/UFCvideo/


I can tell they are some hardcore bunch of people.

Downtown Indy said...

Magician's are well-trained in the art of forcing selections (Hmmm, 'art' 'forcing' 'selections', 'artfuggins').

Are political groups' 'registration drives' neutral or do they select their targets? While they are required by law to sign up anyone who asks, the question remains: "Do they bias their efforts one way or the other?" This can be easily done by chosing who you call out to, by a subtle and careful interview to discover if its someone your party 'wants' to sign up and bypassing those it does not.

Just like a magician can control the selection of a card chosen by an unknowing member of the audience who thinks they made a choice through their own free will.

Anonymous said...

So, are you saying John McSame is a magician who has caused you to unwittingly follow him, downtown indy?

Jeff said...

They also registered voters in the Democrat strong hold of....Hamilton County. Not sure why they held it at a Firestation but I sure see them trying to register everyone.

Peace

artfuggins said...

An old time campaign co-ordinator, Matt Reese, once said that when you are picking cherries that you go where the cherries are.....if you are volunteering for the Democrats or a specific candidate then you go where the strongest support is...the republicans do the same. That is why republicans troll the evangelical churches for voter registrations. The problem in Marion County is that the republican organization is in such chaos that it is barely functioning. They failed to have a candidate in my state senate or state representative district. Their congressional candidate in my district quit because the party was not going to support him and he was afraid he was going to lose. My city councilor last year had no opposition. You cant win a ball game if you dont play and if you dont play then you need to quit complaining.

Downtown Indy said...

Peculiar thinking on your part, that I must be (in your terminology) 'following' McCain.

From what do you derive that conclusion?

Jon E. Easter said...

Fire Department buildings are taxpayer-funded and government-funded buildings. It's the same as meeting in a school parking lot or at City Hall. There's no fire here. As long as the fire house would be open to organizing a McCain voter reg. drive, then what's the problem. Problem is, no one is fired up about McCain!

The Obama opposition is getting so desperate that they are resorting to claims like this. They know there is no Republican record to run on, so they are resorting to these amateurish tactics.

Jon E. Easter said...

One more thing...

Even though both political parties register voters, it's officially a non-partisan activity in Indiana.

David C Roach said...

speaking of political prostitutes..(mr. Harper,not anyone in the obama campaign, of course)-
since your previous post was about police , and political prostitutes.
I take full credit, and responsibility for saying this factual statement about Mr. Harper. I know him personally, and the moniker fits him to a "T".
He never fails to mention his blog at publicly televised city council meetings whenever possible. of course- what do you expect from an allen county republican?

Anonymous said...

That particular fire station has a community room that is open to anyone of the public who wants to use it for any legal function. B-day parties, craft bazaar, neighborhood meeting, etc. No one is actually going inside the fire station quarters just the community room.