It is more common everyday. A man buys a house, the market collapses and suddenly his house is worth less than the mortgage, then he loses his job until, as a single father, he finds himself in foreclosure with no place to raise his two preteen daughters. It’s a case made for the Occupy Wall Street movement to swoop in and right wrongs, right? Maybe not because the OWSers in New York stole this poor guy’s home away from him in order to give it to one of their own members. Confused? Read on.

A Brooklyn man living in an apartment with his two daughters was alerted to the fact that his in-foreclosure-home had been broken into and occupied by Occupiers, as in Occupy Wall Street activists. When he rushed to his home he found a group of strangers that had broken into his home claiming to have “reclaimed” the house and given it to another family.

“They’re trying to take a house and say the bank is robbing the people because the mortgage is too high — so contact the owner!” fumed Wise Ahadzi, 28, who owns the home at 702 Vermont St. in East New York.

Apparently Ahadzi had bought the house in 2007 for the princely sum of $424,500 but during the housing bubble of 2009 the house ended up being worth only half that. Then, when he lost his job and got behind on the mortgage, the bank foreclosed on the property.

Enter — illegally, mind you — Occupy Wall Streeters who discovered the home in foreclosure and decided that they’d steal it away from “the bank” with the ostensible goal of helping the needy.

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Michael Barone in The Washington Examiner:

This result is a rebuke to Barack Obama, but it is a rebuke as well—a stinging one, perhaps more stinging—to Senator Charles Schumer. He represented much of this district for 18 years. The now-disgraced Anthony Weiner was his staffer and pretty obviously Schumer’s chosen successor as congressman when he ran successfully for the Senate in 1998. In addition, Schumer has made it his special project to win back white middle class voters in places like metro New York for the Democratic Party.

In January 2007, just in time for the new Democratic majority in Congress, he published a book, Positively American: Winning Back the Middle-Class Majority One Family at a Time. It is a thoughtful essay on how Democrats can win the votes of the kind of voter Schumer himself has won over in his career as a congressman and senator, with specific policy recommendations as well as public relations advice. As one of the three Democratic leaders of the Democratic majority in the Senate—and by common reckoning the one who outshines in intellect the other two put together—Schumer has played an important role in fashioning Democratic policies, including but not limited to the 2009 stimulus package and Obamacare.

This vote is a startling repudiation of those policies by just the voters Schumer was hoping to win over.

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America is the most prosperous nation the world has ever known. Any nation where obesity is considered an epidemic, cannot really claim to have a high poverty rate. In fact, during the middle ages, Heaven was often depicted as a place where everybody is fat.

I have a bit in my act where I’ve said as much: There is nobody starving in America. If there were, it would be in the papers. The last people I remember reading about actually starving the death in America, were Lindsay Lohan and Mary Kate Olsen. If there were really people starving in America, you wouldn’t see people in parks feeding the birds; in fact, you wouldn’t see birds.

So imagine my surprise, when a couple friends sent me this article. Apparently there is a group of people living in Brooklyn, who relies on stray animals for their sustenance. It is truly a vision reminiscent of the Great Depression, camps of poor people living on the fringes of society, being harassed by police.

As rounds of trillion-dollar stimulus failed to reinvigorate the economy, and have only served to create a debt crisis, I fear that there is still a bottom we have yet only grazed. Perhaps that is the ultimate plan of Michelle’s Childhood Obesity Program: to prepare parents of soon to be emaciated children by substituting their remorse, with a feeling of accomplishment.

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The Battle For Brooklyn, a documentary about one man’s fight to stop a private developer from using eminent domain to take his home, recently opened in select theaters in New York City after a successful film-festival run.

In 2003, billionaire real estate developer and New Jersey Nets owner Bruce Ratner decided to move the team to Brooklyn, with the intention of building an arena, an affordable housing project, and bringing desperately needed jobs to the borough of Brooklyn. Ratner’s friend and fellow billionaire, Michael Bloomberg, enthusiastically put the weight of top-down government planning behind the project. That included using the city government’s extensive powers of eminent domain, despite the fact eminent domain is supposed to be used only in cases where development is for public uses such as schools and roads. And despite the fact that the construction of what became known as the “Atlantic Yards” project would displace many thriving businesses and homes.

Graphic designer Daniel Goldstein fought for nearly seven years to keep his home out of the hands of Ratner’s company, Forest City Ratner. Goldstein’s quixotic struggle is the centerpiece of The Battle For Brooklyn.

Reason.tv sat down with co-directors Michael Galinsky and Suki Hawley to discuss eminent domain abuse and political perceptions of their film. Galinsky and Hawley insist their film is not a polemic, but rather an all-too-common story of a single person fighting an injustice against figures whose power and influence drawf his own.

Produced by Anthony L. Fisher. About 4.40 minutes.

Go to http://reason.tv for downloadable versions, and subscribe to our YouTube Channel to receive notifications when new material goes live.

Related video: Billionaires vs. Brooklyn’s Best Bar: Eminent Domain Abuse and the Atlantic Yards Project.

BigGovernment.com and BigJournalism.com have reported throughout the morning about the emergence of new details in the Weinergate saga, after a young woman came forward with new information that tends to undermine severely the theory that Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) was the victim of a “prank” or a “hack.”

The following photograph, reminiscent of that posted by former Rep. Chris Lee (R-NY) on Craigslist earlier this year, was allegedly sent to the young woman on Friday, May 20, 2011 via a Yahoo! email address that she claims was an alternate alias for Rep. Weiner:

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Earlier this morning, BigGovernment.com and BigJournalism.com revealed that a woman had come forward with what she claims are intimate photographs, chats, and emails that she allegedly exchanged with Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY).

The following photograph was allegedly sent to the young woman from AnthonyWeiner@aol.com via BlackBerry on Wednesday, May 4, 2011, under the subject, “Me and the pussys” (note cats in background):

Keep following BigGovernment.com and BigJournalism.com throughout the day for more photographs and details.

‘It’s Me’: Rep. Weiner Sends Playful Photo to New Friend

Earlier today, BigGovernment.com and BigJournalism.com revealed that a woman had come forward with what she claims are photographs, chats, and emails she exchanged with Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY).

The following photograph was allegedly emailed to the young woman in question from AnthonyWeiner@aol.com on Thursday, May 5, 2011, via BlackBerry:

The woman has indicated that Rep. Weiner allegedly sent the photograph after she asked him to confirm that he was taking photographs contemporaneously, in conjunction with their apparent online communications.

Keep following BigGovernment.com and BigJournalism.com throughout the day for more photographs and details.

A new woman has come forward with what she claims are photographs, chats, and emails with Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY). These appear to undermine severely Rep. Weiner’s explanations that he was the victim of  a “prank” or a “hack.”

The detailed new information suggests that the Brooklyn- and Queens-based representative and the young woman in question were involved in an online, consensual relationship involving the mutual exchange of intimate photographs.

BigGovernment.com and BigJournalism.com were approached regarding this information more than a week prior to the separate, independent event of Friday, May 27, 2011, when a link to the now-infamous “gray underwear” photograph appeared publicly on Rep. Weiner’s Twitter feed.

We will be updating BigGovernment.com and BigJournalism.com throughout the day with photographs, timelines, and other clarifying details. However, we will not be releasing all of the material because some of it is of an extreme, graphic nature.

What happened last month at the Brooklyn census office was indeed unfortunate. But let us not be naive: Data collection inaccuracies and falsifications are happening throughout the entire New York Regional Area and possibly the entire nation, though perhaps on a smaller scale than in Brooklyn.

There are many luxury rental and condominum buildings where real estate management companies have a strict “no enumerator” policy, as well as tenement buildings  and brownstones where it is impossible to gain access. There are also one or two family houses where it is unclear how many people live there and a knowledgeable proxy could not be located.

For these units, some enumerators went to public search records on the Internet or merely wrote the names off the mailboxes. The mid and upper level census managers encouraged field staff to use techniques to “guesstimate,” creating major operational ambiguity for the once in a decade headcount.

What was acceptable inside the questionnaire was another problem. Most enumerators tried to get all the information but those who went to a proxy who gave them little, no, or inaccurate information, finished their areas quickly. These same field staff were rewarded with more work and allowed to clean up districts that were lagging behind.

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[Ed: This excerpt is the second in a series of articles originally reported at City Hall. Go here for Part I in the series. Lead reporter on City Hall investigation was Edward-Isasc Dovere.]

The Working Families Organization, a tax-exempt 501(c)4, was legally created with a certificate of incorporation filed with the New York Department of State on July 12, 2006. Despite the similarities in the names, this paperwork established the Working Families Organization as a legally separate entity.

That certificate lists four initial directors, starting with now-White House political director Patrick Gaspard, who was then a board member of the Working Families Party. The other three were ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis, Robert Master of the Communications Workers of America and Sam Williams of the United Auto Workers. These three also were and remain the three co-chairs of the Working Families Party.

Kevin Finnegan, who is now the political director for the 1199 Service Employees International Union, but who was then an attorney at Levy Ratner PC, signed the document as the incorporator. Finnegan is also the notary on the official Party rules filed with the Board of Elections and the lawyer who set up Data and Field Services.

The incorporation forms and other documents, like the Organization’s paperwork filed with the IRS, must be made public as a condition of its tax-exempt status. However, the process takes years, meaning that the most recent forms that are completed and available are from 2007.

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Last month, New York’s highest court heard oral arguments in the case of Goldstein v. New York State Urban Development Corporation. At issue was the state’s controversial seizure of private property on behalf of a 22-acre development project known as the Atlantic Yards. Situated in central Brooklyn, this taxpayer-subsidized boondoggle was the brainchild of real estate tycoon and New Jersey Nets owner Bruce Ratner, who wants to build an “urban utopia” complete with more than a dozen office and apartment towers, a 180-room hotel, and a fancy new basketball arena for Ratner’s Nets to call home.

Real Estate Tycoon Bruce Ratner and ACORN's Bertha Lewis

To get his way, Ratner turned to his buddies in big government, specifically the Empire State Development Corporation, a controversial state agency with the power to bypass zoning laws and seize private property via eminent domain. In other words, this is a classic case of eminent domain abuse. Ratner isn’t building a bridge or a tunnel or any other legitimate public project that might justify the forceful taking of private property by the state. He wants to build a basketball arena, sell tickets to the games (not to mention broadcast rights, concessions, and luxury boxes), and collect a big fat profit.

So what in the world is ACORN, a self-described champion of “social and economic justice” and “low- and moderate-income people” doing in bed with a shady corporate powerbroker like Bruce Ratner? Let’s follow the money.

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Media coverage of ACORN and that organization’s illegal activities in New York, California and elsewhere has largely ignored one of ACORN’s most successful projects; New York’s Working Families Party (WFP). 

Because of the unique nature of New York State election law, candidates are allowed to be endorsed and appear on the voting machine ballot as the candidate of multiple parties, winning the cumulative total of all votes cast for that candidate on multiple party lines.  Minor parties such as the Conservative, Liberal and Right to Life Party have played significant roles in New York politics.

The Working Families Party is not about working people or families and it isn’t really a party.  The WFP is a wholly owned subsidiary of ACORN.  Bertha Lewis co-chair of the Working Families Party is the Executive Director of New York ACORN.  New York ACORN leader, Steven Kest was the moving force in forming the party and WFP headquarters are located at the same address as ACORN’s national and New York office at 88 Third Avenue in Brooklyn, New York. 

WFP is essentially a money funnel which pays for an aggressive door to door canvas.  Largely funded by unions, the WFP is ACORN’s “political arm” in New York State.  Candidates supported by the Working Families Party and issues supported by ACORN are both advocated on the door steps of target voter homes as they share one major voter canvas. 

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