Despite having 16 federal indictments pending for corruption. ACORN, that has already been selected to be part of the National census process,will apparently receive millions of dollars if Senator Christopher Dodd's(aka Kennedy bill) Health Care bill is eventually passed. If you can believe Senate majority leader that the bill will not be voted on before the August recess.
Washington (CNSNews.com) – Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.), the man who is shepherding the health-care reform bill through the Senate, says he doesn’t know for sure, but the controversial Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) could qualify to receive health-care grants under a provision of the bill that provides money for groups that are members of a “national network of community based organizations.”
Mr. Dodd has been filling in for his friend, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, who is battling brain cancer.
The grants are designed to fund groups that will "measure" people's health-related behavior on the community level, including whether they are gaining or losing weight, eating the right foods, getting exercise, using tobacco, or engaging in other personal behaviors targeted for federal monitoring by the secretary of health and human services.How this will contribute to reducing the cost of health care eludes me. Any results will be years in coming! Sounds like another "government job that can be pointed to as jobs created or saved by Obama and his sycophants!
Under the “Creating Healthier Communities” provision of the bill (found on page 382), grants could be awarded to only three types of "entities:" state governments, local governments and groups that are members of a “national network of community-based organizations."
But when CNSNews.com asked, Dodd could not rule out that the controversial group ACORN could benefit from this provision in his bill.
“I’m not saying yes or no, I just don’t know. I don’t think it’s a blanket thing that anyone applies necessarily,” he told CNSNews.com. “There would have to be criteria by which an organization qualifies to receive those grants.”
He reiterated: “There obviously has to be some criteria by which organizations could receive the grants, and I don’t know if there’s just a blanket (criterion) for any organization out there,” he added “That would be an overstatement.”
ACORN--a national association of community based organizations--has come under fire in recent years over voter its voter registration activities. The state of Nevada filed criminal charges against the organization in May for allegedly illegally paying canvassers to register voters before the 2008 election. ACORN has denied the charges.
The organization has also come under scrutiny because of its partnership agreement with the U.S. Census Bureau to help in the 2010 Census count.
The language of the the Senate Health committee's bill does not specify that any particular national networks of community based organizations will receive the grants that the bill would create, but leaves the awarding of the grants to the discretion of the secretary of health and human services through the director of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
CNSNews.com asked Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who is a top Republican on the committee, if he knew which community based organizations would be eligible to become grantees under the Creating Healthier Communities provision. He said he did not know.
“Well, I don’t know to be honest with you,” Sen. Hatch told CNSNews.com. “I don’t know which organizations will qualify.”
It is no wonder that Senators do not know what is in the 1000 plus page bill!
Senator Orin Hatch is concerned that money in the bill will also go to fund organizations that perform abortions--like Planned Parenthood.
The grant program in question envisions that grantees, including those representing national networks of community based organizations, will work “to implement a variety of programs, policies, and infrastructure improvements to promote healthier lifestyles.”
When will the government stop trying to dictate what we eat and how much we eat. It seems to me that if women have a "right to choose" whether they have a baby or have an abortion. We ought to be able to at least decide what we put in our bodies! It appears to me that it is about power and control, not about producing better health.
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