President Barack Obama has won praise from the media — and from himself — for putting the White House visitor logs online. Yet the visitor logs may hide more than they reveal.

The White House is still holding back “tens of thousands” of visitor logs, according to congressional testimony last week by Tom Fitton, President of Judicial Watch, who also added that “the Obama administration is less transparent than the Bush administration.”

We also know that some of the most important presidential visitors don’t even walk into the White House. The administration meets K Street lobbyists at Caribou Coffee, and holds secret meetings in Jackson Place townhouses where there are no visitor logs.

The visitor logs that have been released are problematic, because they are simply lists of names, with no way to verify whether a specific name belongs to a particular person.

When the first names were released on Oct. 30, 2009, late on a Friday afternoon, then-White House “ethics czar” Norm Eisen noted the lists included “false positives” — “names that make you think of a well-known person, but are actually someone else.” According to Eisen, these included ordinary visitors named “Michael Jordan, William Ayers, Michael Moore, Jeremiah Wright, Robert Kelly (“R. Kelly”), and Malik Shabazz.”

A number of conservative bloggers noticed the names, but not Eisen’s blog post. With speed and precision suggesting direct coordination from the top, ThinkProgress, the core of the heavily funded John Podesta/George Soros “progressive” world, gleefully attacked its ideological foes for reporting “false positives.” The next release included “Louis Farrakhan” and “James Taylor,” but this time conservatives were more careful.

Yet there is no way to prove that the “false positives” really are false, because the White House refuses to reveal identifying information about visitors. In December 2009, citing visitor logs, Big Government reported that ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis had likely visited the White House on a special “staff tour” on September 5. The timing of Lewis’s visit — as the far-left regrouped in the aftermath of the health care town halls — seemed suspicious.

Ben Smith of Politico then reported that an anonymous White House source said we had the wrong Bertha Lewis. I asked Smith why, if that were the case, the White House would use an anonymous flack to put down our report, rather than busting us cleanly. Smith agreed it was weird. The next day, the official emerged, but the newly revealed Jen Psaki refused to say who the real Bertha Lewis was, citing “privacy concerns.”

With no way to verify, there is no real transparency. Of course, with Andrew Stern, the former president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), who visited the White House over twenty times through October 2009, there is little doubt that he is the Andy Stern. That information helped establish the credibility of the visitor logs. Yet there are three “Andrew Sterns” who visited with group tours–are they just “false positives”?

What is the point of listing hundreds of thousands of tourists, if not to help create “false positives”? Eisen and the White House have created a haystack that can hide a needle. Considering that Eisen, a major Obama bundler in 2008, was responsible for smearing former Inspector General Gerald Walpin, and was elevated to an ambassadorship through a shady recess appointment, that hardly seems impossible.

Evidence has emerged to suggest the White House tried to manipulate media coverage of the visitor logs to create an impression of transparency. Indeed, Fitton reported to Congress that in the fall of 2009, Eisen “encouraged [Judicial Watch] to publicly praise the Obama administration’s commitment to transparency, saying it would be good for them and good for us.” Yet the White House still refused to provide all of the visitor logs.

In the name of “transparency,” the White House has turned the guest list into the “guess list.” Tragically, the media seem fine with that. Last week, representatives from Sunshine Week — funded by the hapless American Society of News Editors, among others — tried to give the president a “transparency” award. It was postponed — but when they hold the event, bloggers reporting the news the “real” journalists won’t report ought to beware: the Newsweek reporter in the visitor logs may not be that “Tunku Varadarajan.”

**UPDATE: ASNE has indicated that it declined to participate in the transparency award, and that the open-government activists at the White House last week did not represent Sunshine Week as an organization.

If you read between the lines, it also seems to mean Citigroup agrees the panel is a sham.

Eve, senior vice president of Global Consumer Group, Community Relations, at Citigroup, quit after the National Legal and Policy Center pressed Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit to cut ties with ACORN.

In a letter to NLPC president Peter Flaherty, Citigroup announced Eve’s resignation from the panel.

“We too are deeply concerned about the recent media reports regarding ACORN and, because of those reports, have suspended our charitable financial support and program relationships with ACORN, and we are awaiting the results of the independent audit of ACORN activities now underway,” wrote Natalie Abatemarco, Citigroup’s vice president, Global Community Relations.

“On a related topic, please be advised that Eric Eve has resigned his position on the ACORN Advisory Council,” she added.

Citigroup is a Big Government lovers’ bank that funds just about every trendy left-wing cause in America.

Long before it started drowning in red ink, the poster child for so-called corporate social responsibility was a longtime donor to left-wing pressure groups such as Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH Coalition and Bush Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s Nature Conservancy. In tax year 2003, Citigroup’s foundation gave 20 times more money to groups on the left than to groups on the right, according to Capital Research Center’s 2006 study of Fortune 100 foundation giving. (Foundation Watch, August 2006.)

Citigroup’s foundation has given a staggering $1.4 million to the alarmist World Resources Institute, as well as $509,000 to ACORN in recent years. The ACORN funding included a $500,000 grant to ACORN’s American Institute for Social Justice, which offers Saul Alinsky-style training in community organizing. Other donations to liberal groups include the Aspen Institute ($762,500), Rainbow/PUSH ($750,000), Nature Conservancy ($380,000), Rainforest Alliance ($200,000), and the Council on Foreign Relations ($50,000).

For her part, former ACORN national board member Marcel Reid never believed the council would accomplish anything. Reid and board member Karen Inman were expelled from ACORN by chief organizer Bertha Lewis for asking too many questions about the $1 million embezzlement perpetrated by ACORN founder Wade Rathke’s brother and then covered up for eight years.

When Reid, who is now a member of a reform group called ACORN 8, first heard of the panel, she told me this:

As former members of the Interim Management Committee elected by the national board of ACORN, we say that all of the things that this so-called independent panel is going to examine are things that we tried to accomplish. We called for all of these things –an audit, examination of the books, restructuring of the organization— all of this was already demanded by us.

And because we were trying to exercise due diligence as duly constituted directors of ACORN, we were relieved from our positions, forced out by the board under Bertha Lewis’s direction.

We have no idea how an independent, thorough audit of ACORN can be conducted by these people who were not selected by ACORN’s national board but were put in place by the same senior staff who conspired with Wade Rathke to cover up his brother’s embezzlement for eight years and who subsequently silenced any voice that called for truth, transparency and accountability.

Meanwhile, the remaining members of the council are ACORN allies and funders.

Former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger is leading the investigation. He’s a former president of the left-leaning group Common Cause.

The other members are

* John Podesta, President and CEO, Center for American Progress

* Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Board Member, RFK Foundation, former MD Lt. Governor

* Andrew Stern, International President, Service Employees International Union

* Henry Cisneros, Executive Chairman, Cityview (and a former HUD secretary)

* John Banks, Vice President of Government Relations, Con Ed

* Harvey Hirschfeld, President, Lawcash

*Dave Beckwith, Executive Director, Needmor Fund

Podesta helped manage Obama’s presidential transition team and heads the aggressively left-wing Center for American Progress. The center is heavily funded by George Soros and the subprime mortgage hucksters Herb and Marion Sandler.

Podesta has always been there for ACORN in its time of need. When ACORN got hit with a new wave of election fraud-related charges in May, the Center’s “Progress Action Fund” invited liberal and radical groups – including Harshbarger’s Common Cause – to a meeting in Washington, D.C., to plan how to use rhetorical misdirection to take the focus off ACORN’s increasingly well publicized corruption.

Andy Stern of SEIU is a longtime crusader for something called “social justice.” Social justice is when you have more toys than your friends, so your friends hit you over the head and take some of your toys away. That way everyone is equal. That’s social justice.

SEIU is intimately connected to ACORN but since the undercover sting videos surfaced showing ACORN employees giving advice on how to break the law, it’s trying to distance itself from the group.

Good luck with that, SEIU.

Lewis noted that ACORN’s advisory council would assist her in choosing an outside auditor, former Massachusetts Attorney General Scott Harshbarger. The ACORN advisory council includes John Podesta, head of the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank; Andrew Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union; and former Maryland Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend.

“As a result of the indefensible action of a handful of our employees,” Lewis said in a statement, “I am, in consultation with ACORN’s Executive Committee, immediately ordering a halt to any new intakes into ACORN’s service programs until completion of an independent review.” Mind you, these are the same senior staff and executive committee members who concealed and covered up a million dollar embezzlement, but who themselves were never terminated.

Besides, ACORN already had its chance to do the right thing following the Rathke embezzlement when the board of directors appointed an interim management committee to investigate this fraud and reorganize ACORN. So what happened the last time that ACORN claimed to put in place its own internal management committee?

Last year, the national board of directors installed an Interim Management Committee (IMC) following a million dollar embezzlement by Dale Rathke and subsequent cover up by the ACORN executive committee, senior staff and co-founder Wade Rathke. The national board appointed Karen Inman (Legal Affairs), Carol Hemmingway (Financial Affairs) and Marcel Reid (Governance) to the IMC.

The national board authorized the IMC to hire independent professionals to investigate and reorganize ACORN following the million dollar Rathke embezzlement. While the ACORN board of directors took prompt corrective action after learning about the misappropriations, the IMC desired to take even more definitive remedial actions, including a complete accounting of all ACORN assets, a forensic examination of the known embezzlement and an independent audit of ACORN and it related entities.

These were all professionally prudent recommendations under the circumstances; unfortunately, 38 of 50 board members were swayed by the executive committee and ACORN insiders into condoning the cover up and removing the IMC board members who attempted to exercise their fiduciary obligations. Nevertheless, eight courageous board members banded together and formed the ACORN 8, LLC to reform the once venerable organization.

The ACORN 8 were the first to identify the nebulous Citizen’s Consulting Inc. (CCI) and attempted to “follow the money” at ACORN; the first to seek a forensic examination and independent audit of ACORN and its related organizations; the first to seek injunctions against ACORN, the Rathkes and CCI; the first to call for a national boycott of all charitable donations, federal funding and member dues; and the first to file Civil Rights and RICO complaints against ACORN’s corrupt management. Consequently, Louisiana Attorney General James “Buddy” Caldwell issued subpoenas and is investigating ACORN and Rathke.

Lewis also said that ACORN would name an independent auditor and investigator to conduct a wide-ranging “top to bottom” review of the organization.

Really?!? We’ve heard that one before; the IMC objected to ACORN’s duplicitous assertion that an “independent auditor” would be engaged following the Rathke embezzlement.  When ACORN senior staff hired Mesirow Financial Services (not a licensed CPA firm) to conduct a review of ACORN’s financial controls, ACORN insiders presented this review as an “independent audit” to the board. Don’t be fooled: a review is not a forensic examination or an independent audit.

Worse still, the senior staff and executive committee members who were implicated by the embezzlement and continuing fraud cannot be the same individuals who hire the “independent auditors” to investigate – it is an inherent conflict of interest. If ACORN hopes to survive then the know nothing, see nothing, do nothing board of directors must by replaced by individuals with the strength, courage and capabilities to fulfill their fiduciary obligations. ACORN needs a qualified audit committee to formally engage truly independent outside auditors.

“ACORN has a long history of serving those who most need help, and giving voice to those who have been left behind.” Townsend said in a statement. “We will take the necessary steps to ensure that ACORN functions with the highest levels of ethical standards and competence.”  But how is that possible when ACORN won’t terminate ACORN senior staff and executive board members who concealed a million dollar embezzlement and then ousted the board members who attempted to investigate the fraud?

Last week SEIU international secretary-treasurer Anna Burger dropped this political bombshell that has been ignored by the mainstream media.

In response to a question from Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) posed during a meeting of the House Financial Services Committee, Burger casually noted that her union “cut all ties to ACORN.”

In an interview Monday night I asked SEIU spokeswoman Michelle Ringuette what Burger meant when she said SEIU had cut all ties with ACORN.

Ringuette replied, “We have suspended all contracts and active work with ACORN,” pending the results of a panel of inquiry looking into ACORN. SEIU boss Andy Stern sits on that supposedly independent panel.

Of course, SEIU –which is President Obama’s favorite union– could still be providing help to ACORN behind the scenes even if it publicly distances itself from the embattled activist group. Longtime lovers often sneak around together during messy breakups.

I’m skeptical that the two actually split up given the strong ties between ACORN and SEIU over the years. It’s gotten to the point that ACORN and SEIU overlap so much that they are virtually indistinguishable. 

The full article is available at American Spectator.

Since it’s a fairy tale, let me tell the story the fairy tale way:

Once upon a time there was a group called the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN). It was run, and continues to be run today, by very bad people who do very bad things while they pretend to make America a better place.

They get very upset when people point out the bad things they do. They always lie about those things and call those people who speak against them nasty names like “racist” so those people will get scared and run away. Often it works.

They carry out voter registration drives strictly with a view to meeting predetermined quotas. They don’t give a farthing’s cuss if their canvassers register Mickey Mouse or the dead to vote; in fact, they encourage it. As long as the big fat checks keep coming in from billionaire leftist George Soros and Herb and Marion Sandler everything is OK in their eyes.

They always throw temper tantrums. They blackmail corporations and hold sit-ins at banks until they get their way. They take over forums and congressional hearings by force. When the police get involved they say that they are the real victims: Why are you arresting us? That’s not fair! They pretend to want to help the poor and then throw them overboard by taking massive “grants” from wealthy real estate developers.

Years ago Wade Rathke and his brother Dale Rathke did terrible things that were far worse than all the other things they’d done. Dale, who worked for ACORN, stole close to $1 million. Big brother Wade covered up the whole thing and the senior management at ACORN helped him.

Bertha Lewis, a lady who is now ACORN’s chief organizer, helped the Rathkes cover up Dale’s theft, but she was only one of the management people who helped out. Others helped their boss too.

When Dale’s embezzlement was discovered last year, Wade was forced out of ACORN by ACORN’s national board. It told Wade to stop affiliating himself with ACORN but he didn’t listen. He’s still chief organizer of ACORN affiliate SEIU Local 100 in New Orleans and he’s still trying to bring community organizing to far away places like India and Kenya. Maybe he’ll help President Obama’s half-brother, George Hussein Onyango Obama who lives near Nairobi. That would be nice, wouldn’t it? George is very poor.

Anyway, back when Wade was kicked out of ACORN the group’s national board appointed three board members to investigate the bad things that Wade and Dale did. Together the three people were called the Internal Management Committee (IMC). One of them is a very smart lady named Marcel Reid. Marcel’s father wanted a boy so he gave her that name. She likes her name even though it is a boy’s name.

Marcel started asking questions about the embezzlement, which is what the board told her to do. But when she asked to look at documents related to the embezzlement, management said no. She tried and tried and tried but they still said no. They got very upset with Marcel. Eventually they threw her out of ACORN even though she didn’t anything wrong. They called her a traitor. She was sad.

Now Bertha Lewis, who helped Wade and Dale cover up Dale’s embezzlement, wants the same kind of committee packed with corrupt friends of ACORN to whitewash all the institutional corruption that is the essence of the ACORN network. The network consists of, um, well, nobody knows how many hundreds of individual affiliated groups.

Bertha says that the panel will include

* John Podesta, President and CEO, Center for American Progress

* Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Board Member, RFK Foundation, former MD Lt. Governor

* Andrew Stern, International President, Service Employees International Union

* Henry Cisneros, Executive Chairman, Cityview

* John Banks, Vice President of Government Relations Con Ed

* Eric Eve, Senior VP of Global Consumer Group, Community Relations, Citigroup

* Harvey Hirschfeld, President, Lawcash

*Dave Beckwith, Executive Director, Needmor Fund

Bertha says the panel will be independent and will do a really good job recommending what should be done to fix ACORN. The problem is Bertha, who is only a figurehead anyway, has been lying for so long she might not even know what’s true and what’s false. That happens when you lie a lot, so you should always tell the truth.

The panel is filled with hardcore leftists who don’t like America’s Constitution and free markets. They want America to be more like France where they eat cheese, or maybe a little like the old Soviet Union where they ate each other. They hate freedom and will do anything to stamp it out. They believe the ends justify the means.

Hey, that’s just like ACORN and its spiritual grandfather, Saul Alinsky, isn’t it? He was very sneaky and very smart.

There’s John Podesta, who was President Clinton’s White House chief of staff. He’ll do anything that needs to be done to protect ACORN because ACORN is very important to progressives. If ACORN were to disintegrate, it would be like losing several army divisions when you’re fighting a war. That would be bad, liberals think.

Kathleen Kennedy Townsend is not very nice. She is mean. When she ran for governor in Maryland, an overwhelmingly Democratic state, she managed to completely mess things up. She loves calling people racists. It’s what she does. It’s one of the reasons people didn’t like her in Maryland even though she’s a Kennedy, and everybody loves Kennedys.

Andy Stern of SEIU is a longtime crusader for something called “social justice.” Social justice is when you have more toys than your friends, so your friends hit you over the head and take some of your toys away. That way everyone is equal. That’s social justice.

Marcel Reid isn’t buying any of this.

Marcel, who is now a member of a reform group called ACORN 8, told me this earlier today:

As former members of the Interim Management Committee elected by the national board of ACORN, we say that all of the things that this so-called independent panel is going to examine are things that we tried to accomplish. We called for all of these things –an audit, examination of the books, restructuring of the organization— all of this was already demanded by us.

And because we were trying to exercise due diligence as duly constituted directors of ACORN, we were relieved from our positions, forced out by the board under Bertha Lewis’s direction.

We have no idea how an independent, thorough audit of ACORN can be conducted by these people who were not selected by ACORN’s national board but were put in place by the same senior staff who conspired with Wade Rathke to cover up his brother’s embezzlement for eight years and who subsequently silenced any voice that called for truth, transparency and accountability.

You can see that Marcel doesn’t like Bertha very much. Bertha doesn’t like Marcel very much either. Oh well. Not everybody can be friends.

Meanwhile, my friend Phil Kerpen of Americans for Prosperity writes that another phony-baloney panel has been created.

The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission is headed by Phil Angelides who has deep ties to ACORN.

Whatever Angelides does, you can be sure he won’t blame ACORN for any of America’s problems.

And his commission’s report will be a fairy tale too.

THE END