Aldrich testified about his volunteer efforts on behalf of the Democrat party, which included knocking on doors and handing out brochures.  McDonough’s defense attorney, Brian Premo, pointed out that Aldrich’s name is on 13 of the allegedly fraudulent ballots.  Aldrich however, said that “He was not involved in any wrongdoing, and had no reason to believe anything illegal was happening…”

Perhaps more intriguing was the testimony of James Welch, Chairman of the Rensselaer County WFP.  A 2009 report by the Times Union indicates that some of the absentee ballots were returnable either to Democrat or WFP operatives, including Welch and Aldrich.  In a statement at that time, Welch claimed that “my conduct was strictly proper”.

However, on January 26th, State Police Investigator John Ogden testified that Welch was given a cooperation agreement to testify in the case.

Despite such lofty status as Chairman of county WFP, Welch apparently had little idea of how the rules involving absentee ballots worked, even though it would impact the integrity of his party’s ballot line.

From the Troy Record:

James Welch, the chair of the county Working Families Party at the time of the primary, rounded out Monday’s testimony. Welch said that on the morning of the primary, John Brown called him to ask if he could put Welch’s name on the “release to” line on five absentee ballot applications. Welch said he didn’t understand what Brown meant, since he wasn’t familiar with the applications, but said that Brown assured him it was a good move because “it would look better” to have a WFP member’s name in that slot instead of a Democrat’s name.

He said he asked Brown if that was allowed, and when Brown assured him it was, he agreed. Brown pled guilty to a felony late last year and is looking at six months behind bars.

John Brown was a former Democrat Councilman.

Welch went on to state that he received a phone call later in the week, in which Brown suggested that “We should get our stories straight.”  Welch responded, “It sounds like you’re asking me to commit perjury in a courtroom setting.”

The question is, why would Welch or any member of the WFP need a cooperation agreement to testify?  If they were truly simply ignorant of the process, naive pawns in the voter fraud being schemed by the Democrats, then why wouldn’t their honest testimony be enough.

Worse, Welch seemingly isn’t the only member of the WFP who was ignorant of the voter fraud being perpetrated upon innocent people using their ballot line.  Karen Scharff, co-chair of the Capital District WFP at the time, the branch which controlled Welch’s Rensselaer County arm, had this to say:

It’s extremely troubling that local Democrats in Troy appear to have committed fraud in an attempt to win a primary fight with Troy Republicans for our ballot line.”

The really troubling matter with Scharff’s WFP is that they’re a stone’s throw away from the influence of the
New York Communities for Change – formerly known as ACORN.  At the time that this ballot fraud in Troy was allegedly being carried out, the two organizations had several ties:

As for Scharff, who co-chaired the Capital District Branch and thus oversaw Welch’s county branch, she also shares a history with the uber-corrupt ACORN:

Welch’s testimony is scheduled to resume on Wednesday.

Rusty can be contacted at the Mental Recession

According to a recent Fox News report, Anthony Renna, a Democrat guilty of second-degree forgery, and Anthony DeFiglio, a Democrat guilty of first-degree falsifying business records, are trying to drag all local politicians, regardless of party affiliation, down with the ship.  Thus far, eight people have been charged in connection with the ballot fraud investigation, four of which have pleaded guilty.

Reports emerging from the investigation indicate that the Democrats are trying to implicate Republicans of the same conduct they have been charged with.  According to the state police, Renna and DeFiglio both claimed that, ”voter fraud is an accepted way of winning elections, and faking absentee ballots was commonplace.”

Renna explained that the process of handing in forged ballots and fake votes ensures that “ballots are voted correctly.”  He adds, “‘Voted correctly’ is a term used for a forged application or ballot.”

DeFiglio added that such fraud is actually “an ongoing scheme and it occurs on both sides of the aisle.  What appears as a huge conspiracy to nonpolitical persons is really a normal political tactic.”

Local Republicans, presumably the party being referred to on the other side of the aisle, are vehemently denying that ballot fraud was,or is, a normal political tactic.

James Gordon, Chairman of the Troy Republican Committee said, having been a part of the election process for a number of years that he has, “never heard or seen anything resembling these actions.”

He added, “In fact, after the Democrats were caught in 2009 the records at the Board of Elections were searched.  More cases of fraud were found dating back to 2007 or 2008, all attributed to Democrat candidates and operatives.  Nothing from any GOP members.”

One particular case involved former Troy City Clerk, William McInerney, who resigned from his position after being implicated for falsifying absentee ballots dating back to 2007, the year he helped Democrats seize control of the Council.

Recent Troy Mayoral candidate and former Troy City Councilmember, Carmella Mantello, also denied that these election tactics were ever commonplace in the GOP.

“This ‘practice’ was never part of the electoral process.”

With eight Democrats facing charges in the investigation, Gordon sums up the situation by saying, ”Democrats wanted to win and it appears at any cost.”

“This was greed, ignorance, lack of ethics, and laziness.  Bad people doing bad things.”

Rusty can be contacted at The Mental Recession

Astro-turfing campaigns can generate big money, and ACORN’s lucrative protest-for-profit program is nothing new. As I note in my book, Subversion Inc.: How Obama’s ACORN Red Shirts are Still Terrorizing and Ripping Off American Taxpayers, ACORN has acquired great expertise in manufacturing so-called grassroots protests.

Left-wing billionaires Herb and Marion Sandler, the founders of World Savings Bank, gave ACORN affiliates close to $11 million to manufacture mobs to protest their competition in subprime mortgage lending. The United Federation of Teachers paid ACORN $500,000 to create a spontaneous uprising against charter schools in Manhattan.

The SEIU-funded Working Families Party, a front group for ACORN, placed a want ad on Craigslist dated Sept. 26. The ad indicates that WFP was recruiting activists to carry out “direct action,” leftist argot for a variety of activities aimed at forcing sociopolitical change.

The line between direct action and violent terrorism can become blurry. Extreme forms of direct action can lead to bodily injury and sometimes death. The labor movement is no stranger to assault and killings. Left-wing activists David Gilbert and Kathy Boudin participated in an attack on an armored car that left two police officers and a security guard dead. Two anarchists tried to disrupt the 2008 GOP convention with Molotov cocktails. The eco-terrorist Sea Shepherd Conservation Society admits both to attacking whaling ships with acid and sinking them.

WFP’s ad is titled, “FIGHT TO HOLD WALLSTREET [sic] ACCOUNTABLE NOW! MAKE A DIFFERNENCE [sic] GET PAID!” It states:

The WFP is seeking immediate hires.

You must be an energetic communicator, with a passion for social and economic justice.

Only outgoing, articulate dedicated, determined candidates will be considered for the positions.

For those candidates that qualify WFP offers substantial paid-training provided by senior leadership, on varied issues such as: advocacy, public speaking, mobilizing, fundraising, networking and organizing. We invest in passionate people with excellent communication skills and a full benefits package is offered to those candidates that qualify. In addition, there is opportunity for advancement and travel to our satellite chapters and out of state affiliates.

This is not a policy job! Through direct action you will be shaping NY state politics for the next 20 years.” [emphasis added]

As previously reported, WFP has been involved in organizing the Occupy Wall Street protests since the beginning.

As radical journalist Laura Flanders reported, WFP organizer Nelini Stamp has “been here since day one and she is part of the organizing team and the outreach team that has managed to bridge the distance between that first day and this day and between the grassroots folks here and the labor movement.” Stamp said the protests are aimed at “trying to change the capitalist system” and bringing “revolutionary changes to the states.”

WFP organizer Matthew Cain also acknowledged the party’s involvement on Oct. 5th and helpfully provided a photograph of party staffers bearing a blue and white WFP banner during a march in lower Manhattan. Across from Foley Square,

several WFP field staff were standing on the steps. For some of the staffers, it was their first time at the square, but for many others they had already spent nights sleeping in the park. Even those who have been there for two weeks or more have not seen their spirits diminished – they’re every bit as committed as they were when they first showed up.

Of course WFP executive director Dan Cantor, a longtime ACORN operative, is pleased with Occupy Wall Street so far. Cantor told supporters in an email that “the spirit of Wisconsin and Tahrir Square is alive and well in New York City.”

Nowadays WFP goes to great lengths to try to convince onlookers that it is separate from ACORN, the disgraced Saul Alinsky-inspired activist group. The shell corporation that ran the 370-plus affiliate strong ACORN network filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy last November, but its state chapters changed their names and continue to operate. The vote-manufacturing nonprofit Project Vote, which used to employ Barack Obama as an organizer, is still in business. So is ACORN Housing, which changed its name to Affordable Housing Centers for America.

But the Working Families Party is ACORN. The minor political party shares an office address with ACORN a mile away from the Brooklyn Bridge. Among the party’s co-founders are ACORN’s former national chief organizer, Bertha Lewis. Her former right-hand man, Democratic National Committee executive director Patrick Gaspard, formerly an SEIU 1199 official and Obama White House political director, also goes way back with the party.

WFP’s confusing, ACORN-like organizational structure has been known to frustrate even the most dedicated investigators, allowing the party to keep some distance from ACORN.

Through the party’s multiple arms, WFP enjoys the “benefits of a political party (legitimacy in voters’ minds, ballot line), a non-profit (tax-exemptions, uncapped donation limits and tax deductions) and a for-profit (no disclosure requirements, ability to collect fees backed by taxpayer-supported matching funds from candidates),” notes Edward-Isaac Dovere of New York’s City Hall News.

The party has sister WFP-branded parties in Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, Oregon, South Carolina, and Vermont. Like ACORN, WFP advocates more government spending, higher taxes, universal government-run healthcare, campaign finance restrictions, free universal higher education, rent control, same-sex marriage, an immigration amnesty for illegal aliens, and “greening” the economy by creating heavily subsidized union jobs in the energy sector.

Meanwhile, new front groups created by ACORN are also deeply involved in the Occupy Wall Street movement. They include New York Communities for Change, Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, Action United (Pennsylvania), Organize Now (Florida), and New England United for Justice (Massachusetts).

The protests, which have spread to several large U.S. cities, are part of what ACORN’s neo-communist founder Wade Rathke calls an “anti-banking jihad.” ACORN allies are also involved in the protests, which aim to destabilize the nation’s financial system. SEIU board member Stephen Lerner said he wants to “bring down the stock market” through a campaign of disruption. He said last week that SEIU plans to terrorize bank executives at their homes.

With paid professional assistance from ACORN, Lerner’s work has become that much easier.

(This article was originally published by Front Page Magazine.)

* * * * *

Americans need to know that ACORN is restructuring in time to help re-elect President Obama in 2012. Obama used to work for ACORN and represented the group in court as its lawyer. These radical leftists who use the brutal, in-your-face, pressure tactics of Saul Alinsky want to destroy America as we know it and will use any means to do it.

Buy my book Subversion Inc. at Amazon and in Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million bookstores. Visit the Subversion Inc. Facebook page. Follow me on Twitter.

The protests, which have spread to several other large U.S. cities, are part of what ACORN’s neo-communist founder Wade Rathke calls an “anti-banking jihad.”

Working Families Party (WFP) organizer Nelini Stamp has “been here since day one and she is part of the organizing team and the outreach team that has managed to bridge the distance between that first day and this day and between the grassroots folks here and the labor movement,” Flanders said at the protest in lower Manhattan.

We are “actually trying to change the capitalist system we have today because it’s not working for any of us,” Stamp told Flanders in an interview. Demonstrators are asking “how do we really reform and bring revolutionary changes to the states?”

As I note in my book Subversion Inc.: How Obama’s ACORN Red Shirts are Still Terrorizing and Ripping Off American Taxpayers, the WFP is part and parcel of ACORN. In 1998 the party was officially recognized in New York State. WFP’s headquarters is at the same address as ACORN on Nevins Street in Brooklyn. WFP’s executive director is longtime ACORN operative Dan Cantor.

One of the SEIU-funded party’s co-founders is ACORN’s former national chief organizer, Bertha Lewis. Democratic National Committee executive director Patrick Gaspard also contributed to the creation of the party and sat on its board. Gaspard was a political director in the Obama White House and is a former SEIU executive. Gaspard was also an organizer for the radical New Party in the early 1990s. That party’s membership consisted largely of individuals from the Democratic Socialists of America, SEIU, and ACORN. The party endorsed Barack Obama when he ran for the Illinois State Senate.

WFP takes credit for raising taxes both in the city and state of New York and for pressuring the state’s congressional delegation to oppose Social Security reforms. The party has sister WFP-branded parties in Connecticut, Delaware, Massachusetts, Oregon, South Carolina, and Vermont.

Working with its radical friends at SEIU, WFP advocates more government spending, higher taxes, universal government-run health care, campaign finance restrictions, free universal higher education, oppressive rent control, same-sex marriage, amnesty for illegal aliens, “greening” the economy by creating heavily subsidized union jobs in the energy sector, and mandatory paid sick leave for all workers.

In 2009 Connecticut WFP sent busloads of thugs to confront American International Group Inc. (AIG) executives at their homes. The protests were calculated to intimidate executives who had been receiving death threats after the company reportedly paid out bonuses using taxpayer bail-out funds.

ACORN allies are also involved in protests aimed at destabilizing the nation’s financial system.

SEIU board member Stephen Lerner has vowed to do his part to drive a stake through the heart of capitalism. Lerner says he wants to “bring down the stock market” through a campaign of disruption. He said last week that SEIU plans to terrorize bank executives at their homes.

Last year George Goehl, executive director of Chicago-based National People’s Action, said that “the banking crisis” was “the next big thing,” and “the way to build a big economic justice movement in this country.”

Meanwhile, ACORN’s new front groups are also deeply involved in the Occupy Wall Street movement.

In Pennsylvania, Action United said it plans to participate in Occupy Pittsburgh on Oct. 15. Organize Now will be occupying Orlando, Florida, on the same day.

New York Communities for Change (NYCC), led by longtime ACORN lobbyist Jon Kest, is one of the major protest groups leading the demonstrations in lower Manhattan. Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment is leading the Occupy L.A. protests.

New England United for Justice, which is headed by former ACORN national president Maude Hurd, is participating in the related “Take Back Boston” protests in Massachusetts, according to watchdog group Judicial Watch. Hurd is a close political ally of Boston mayor Thomas Menino.

The influence of ACORN on the Wall Street protests should have been clear by the unhinged nature of much of the demonstrations. The question is really only whether the radical outfit will push the mob into more and more extreme behavior. Determining the answer to this question will likely not be pleasant.

(This is a modified version of an article that was first published in Front Page Magazine).

* * * * *

Americans need to know that ACORN is restructuring in time to help re-elect President Obama in 2012. Obama used to work for ACORN and represented the group in court as its lawyer. These radical leftists who use the brutal, in-your-face, pressure tactics of Saul Alinsky want to destroy America as we know it and will use any means to do it.

Buy my book Subversion Inc. at Amazon and in Barnes & Noble and Books-A-Million bookstores. Visit the Subversion Inc. Facebook page. Follow me on Twitter.

I regret to inform you that you are not the “99 Percent.”

The 99 Percent dislikes big banks, but also dislikes big government–and big messes.

The 99 Percent does not occupy property it does not own, public or private.

The 99 Percent does not steal from local businesses, does not attack police officers, does not storm national museums, and does not defecate in public.

Flyer at #OccupyWallStreet - the address for donations is a small building in Washington, DC shared by Code Pink and other "progressive" organizations

The 99 Percent does not rank people’s views based on their skin color, gender, or socioeconomic status.

The 99 Percent does not repeat, zombie-like, every word it hears out of a leader’s mouth.

The 99 Percent would not deny a veteran civil rights leader and member of Congress the opportunity to speak when he had asked to do so, even if it disagreed with him.

The 99 Percent understands the difference between a mob in the street and our democratic Republic.

The 99 Percent does not belong to a labor union or an anarchist hacker collective.

The 99 Percent does not want to raise taxes, to let the government withhold freedom of the press, to open the nation’s borders to anyone who wants to cross, to deny workers a secret ballot in labor union elections, to spend trillions of additional taxpayer dollars on transportation and the environment, or to forgive all existing debts.

No, you are not the 99 Percent.

We know who you really are.

You are the Democrats.

You are the Working Families Party.

You are the Democratic Socialists of America.

You are Big Labor–the Service Employees International Union, the AFL-CIO, the Teamsters, and so on.

You are the institutional radical left–Media Matters for America, ThinkProgress, MoveOn.org, and various other George Soros-funded organizations.

More than anything else, you are the anti-war movement.

That’s why you can gather thousands of Americans–without displaying a single American flag, which you could “could just as easily have burned” (your words).

That’s why you have the support of those Ron Paul fans who are less interested in election than insurrection.

That’s why you are taking marching orders from anarchists like Lisa Fithian.

That’s why you have the drum circles, the hippies, and the joiners who have no idea why they are there.

Many wondered where you, the anti-war movement, had gone for the past few years.

After all, President Barack Obama has done many of the same things that the anti-war movement had complained about when President George W. Bush was in power.

Worse, Obama went to war without the permission of Congress, and has now started targeting and killing American citizens with drone attacks.

And yet you had been strangely, suddenly, and stubbornly silent.

The Obama administration and the institutional left asked you to be quiet, once they had achieved “change” you could believe in.

But they soon realized that they could not survive without you.

Their health care campaign, their war against the rich, their attacks on Republicans over the debt ceiling–all failed without you.

And so Obama, the Democrats, and the unions came back to you–the anarchists, organizers, and online activists of the anti-war brigades.

And they bought your support–cheaply.

President Obama, slow to embrace the protests of the Arab Spring, sprang to embrace your cause.

And yet look carefully at the price you are paying.

While you get arrested, and spend weeks in the open, the Democrats are raising money off your backs.

Your ideals have been reduced to policies that resemble the party platform at the Democratic National Convention.

Do you know what you stand for? Do you know why you are doing this? Did you ever?

My fellow Americans (and somewhat antisemitic Canadians), you are not the 99 Percent.

You are the co-opted.

According to Human Events, federal campaign records show that, during the last four congressional election cycles, Congresswoman DeLauro’s campaign transferred $1.2 million to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), the branch of the House Democrats that deals with fundraising and recruitment. During that same period of time, the DCCC engaged Stanley Greenberg, Ms. DeLauro’s husband, and his firm, for polling and other services pertinent to its political campaigns. Stanley Greenberg’s company was reportedly paid $1.9 million for services rendered to the DCCC. Note the incestuous cycle whereby Ms. DeLauro gives money to the Democratic party, which hires her husband, and, ultimately, gives the money back to Ms. DeLauro’s personal household.

For those who don’t know her, Ms. DeLauro is a powerful, liberal, close friend of Nancy Pelosi, the House Minority Leader. Despite her position, the congresswoman is often difficult to follow when she speaks. In the video below, she responds to a question about why she was vacationing in Italy while her district was under water and without power following Tropical Storm Irene. Good luck.

While something here smells “rotten in Denmark,” stories such as this often evoke cynical responses, such as, “Everybody does it,” or “It’s hard to control who people are married to and what they do for a living,” or “It’s not illegal, it’s just unethical.”

The fact is conflicts of interest do occur across the political spectrum, but I am always struck by how much more often they occur in government and public life without any consequence for them. Show you’ve engaged in what appears to be a conflict of interest of this magnitude in the private sector, and you’re fired, arrested, dismissed, reprimanded, etc., etc.

But, in Rosa DeLauro’s congressional district, apparently you’re re-elected.

Ms. DeLauro was first elected to Congress in 1990, and has since been re-elected to her seat easily. She has a 100% rating from NARAL for her entirely pro-abortion platform, including total favorability for partial birth abortions (2000), and a vote against declaring harming a fetus a federal crime while committing other crimes (2001). She has a 100% rating from the NEA, demonstrating total support for unions. The congresswoman votes with her party nearly 99% of the time, and is considered to have an anti-business voting record.

According to Human Events, Congresswoman DeLauro has amassed great wealth, both personally and politically, as judged by her position in the top 10 percent of the wealthiest members of Congress. In addition, the Friends of Rosa DeLauro are among the DCCC’s top contributors, a factor which has, no doubt, contributed to Ms. DeLauro’s powerful position as co-chair of the Democratic Steering Committee, a role- given to her by her friend and colleague, Nancy Pelosi- which gives her the prime job of making committee assignments. For the past four years, Ms. DeLauro has also been vice chair of the DCCC.

But, that’s not all. Ms. DeLauro is a member of the Working Families Party and the Congressional Progressive Caucus, both with links to the Democratic Socialists of America, and the Communist Party USA. In recent news, the co-chairs of the Congressional Progressive Caucus have just announced their support of the newly hatched Occupy Wall Street “movement.”

On Congresswoman DeLauro’s website, she is currently touting the results of a recent poll she conducted, which indicates that jobs are the number one priority for voters. No kidding. But I’m skeptical whether the voters in her district truly believe that. They keep re-electing her, despite the fact that Ms. DeLauro’s voting record demonstrates more support for unemployment benefits and the nanny state than it does for jobs. Someone should tell her that you have to create an environment that is friendly to business if you want business to provide jobs.

I hope some of her constituents tell her that, and a few other things.

Following the governor’s threats of thousands of layoffs, the concession package, as anticipated, was overwhelmingly approved on the second vote on Thursday by 14 of the 15 unions. Ironically, the union representing corrections officers, AFSCME, which had rejected the package originally, approved it wholeheartedly this time, despite the fact that corrections workers have solicited membership in the National Correctional Employees Union (NCEU), charging that they were misrepresented by the vote to change the bylaws.

Upon ratification of the contract, the governor released the following statement:

“We have achieved something the skeptics said was unachievable: we’ve made the relationship between the state and its workforce sustainable. And, unlike in most other states, we did it without going to war with public employees. We’ve shown what’s possible when management and labor work together in a respectful fashion. Sure, this agreement took a few extra months to achieve – but so what? Those extra months are a small price to pay for the billions of dollars that extra time will save taxpayers, the critical services that time will preserve, and the peace of mind that comes from understanding the state now has a sustainable relationship with its employee base…”

The agreement calls for a two-year wage freeze and some changes to pension benefits and healthcare, such as required annual visits to a physician. In exchange, the unions obtained no layoffs for four-years and a pledge they would not be required to take unpaid furlough days. According to Mr. Malloy, the changes will save the state an estimated $1.6 billion over the next two years and $21.5 billion over the next two decades. As of July 1st, the governor’s budget plan called for “shared sacrifice” from taxpayers, who have consequently experienced the largest tax increase in the history of the state, including a hike in the income tax, retroactive to January 1st.

While Governor Malloy is self-congratulatory on the approval of the concessions, SEBAC officials downplayed the need to change the bylaws in order to obtain rank and file approval. Instead, they blamed the first rejection vote on “lack of clarification” of the anticipated changes to healthcare, and to a case of email sabotage by the conservative think-tank, Yankee Institute for Public Policy.

Many state workers who initially voted against the concession package said they were fearful that the plan would force them into the state’s anticipated Sustinet universal healthcare plan, Connecticut’s version of Obamacare. Not surprisingly the unions were extremely supportive of Sustinet for everyone else, while they maintained that their members should continue with “Cadillac” healthcare plans paid for by Connecticut taxpayers. Union officials “educated” their members about the true nature of the healthcare changes, at meetings that state employees were paid to attend, at the direction of the governor’s administration.

In what appears to have been an effort to save face while taking a jab at conservatives, SEBAC also charged the Yankee Institute with hacking into the state employees’ email database for the purpose of spreading misinformation about the concession package. Yankee Institute welcomed a review to prove the charge was false, and won its battle last month when state Attorney General George Jepsen cleared the think tank of any illegal involvement in the unions’ failed effort to ratify their contract concessions.

Connecticut Democrats appear to be following in-step with their liberal counterparts in Washington D.C. Remember how House and Senate Democrats wanted to “deem” a bill passed, just to get it passed? Remember Nancy Pelosi, on passing Obamacare: “We’ll go through the gate; if the gate’s closed, we’ll go over the fence; if the fence is too high, we’ll pole vault in; if that doesn’t work, we’ll parachute in…”

Connecticut Democrats and their union buddies: If we don’t pass it the first time, we’ll change the rules so we can pass it the next time…then blame conservatives for not passing it the first time.