Fake Outraged Republicans and Cowering Spineless Democrats

Digby at Hullabaloo says:

This whole ACORN mess breaks my heart. They've been out there doing some of the toughest grassroots political work imaginable for years and years, hiring from the neighborhoods, expanding the voting franchise, helping the neediest people in our country. And they have been the very convenient target of the racist right wing during all that time, for all the obvious reasons. It's painful to see the Democrats cut and run when the right finally gets some wingnut porn to run with.

ACORN is rightly thanking one of the few defenders they've had in the media, Rachel Maddow, whose work on this has been magnificent.

WATCH: Maddow Puts ACORN Scandal In Perspective!

If you would like to thank her too, ACORN has created a page to do it, here.

Jeremy Scahill, author of "Blackwater" succinctly explained to Rachel that the legislation that Congress has enacted against Acorn is merely "politicial and not about upholding the law."

If upholding the law was even remotely involved in the "Defund Acorn Act" then the Republicans would be joining the Democrats in their outrage against the defense contractors Blackwater, KBR, Amor Group, DynCorp, Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin.

Liars' Loans

The video below is an interview from Bill Moyer's Journal on April 3, 2009.

The financial industry brought the economy to its knees, but how did they get away with it? With the nation wondering how to hold the bankers accountable, Bill Moyers sits down with William K. Black, the former senior regulator who cracked down on banks during the savings and loan crisis of the 1980s. Black offers his analysis of what went wrong and his critique of the bailout.

William K. Black suspects that it was more than greed and incompetence that brought down the U.S. financial sector and plunged the economy in recession — it was fraud. And he would know. When it comes to financial shenanigans, William K. Black, the former senior regulator who cracked down on banks during the savings and loan crisis of the 1980s, has seen pretty much everything.

Now an Associate Professor of Economics and Law at the University of Missouri, William K. Black tells Bill Moyers on the JOURNAL that the tool at the very center of mortgage collapse, creating triple-A rated bonds out of "liars' loans" — loans issued without verifying income, assets or employment — was a fraud, and the banks knew it.

And while there is no law against liars' loans, Black points out that there are, "many laws against fraud, and liars' loans are fraudulent. [...] They involve deceit, which is the essence of fraud."

WATCH:

Read Full Transcript HERE.