Vast Variety

Ever since Obama was elected Michele Bachmann (R- MN) has been pushing the boundaries of sanity and common sense to the breaking point. If she isn’t suggesting that FEMA is building hidden concentration camps around the US, or suggesting that the swine flu is some sort of Democratic crisis tool, she is claiming that Obama and the Democrats are plotting with ACORN, in order to usurp the will of the Real Republican loving American people.

Politifact adds not one but two more “Pants on Fire” awards to Bachmann’s record.

The first one comes from a Washington Times interview that she did  on June 17th. She said…

Now ACORN has been named one of the national partners, which will be a recipient again of federal money

…

And they will be in charge of going door-to-door and collecting data from the American public. This is very concerning because the motherload of all data information will be from the census. And, of course, we think of the census as just counting how many people live in your home. Unfortunately, the census data has become very intricate, very personal (with) a lot of the questions that are asked.

As Politifact points out, ACORN is 1 of nearly 30,000 organizations that the Census Bureau uses to spread information to individuals about temporary census jobs. These organizations get no money for this and have no say in the employment terms of the workers, as they work directly for the Census Bureau.

In the very same interview Bachmann says…

And I know for my family the only question that we will be answering is how many people are in our home. We won’t be answering any information beyond that, because the Constitution doesn’t require any information beyond that.

Not only is she wrong, but if she does exactly what she says she is going to do, then she will be violating the law.

Here is what the constitution says about the census.

Representation and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several states which may be included within this Union, according to their respective numbers…the actual enumeration shall be made within three years after the first meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent term of ten years, in such manner as they shall by law direct.

The constitution doesn’t explicitly say what questions are asked in the census. Our founding fathers knew when they were writing the constitution that they could in no way ever cover every possible need the nation may have in the future, so they often created openings like this. In this clause, the “they”, means congress. So according to the constitution its up to congress to determine the content of the census. Even the nation’s first census in 1790 asked more than just how many people lived in the household, and according to the laws passed by congress in regarding to the census, every American is required to answer all of the questions of the census and failure to do so carries with it fines ranging from $100 to $5000.

Come on Minnesota, how on earth do you folks keep electing this woman?

Personally I think the woman is just plain…

• February 18, 2009 -- Bachmann at it again (0)
• October 23, 2008 -- Down and Out? (0)
• October 20, 2008 -- McCarthyism Reborn (2)