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August 3, 2008
A Proper Relationship with the Host?
Noticing New York looks at Consumers Rights League (“CRL”) June report, "ACORN's Hypocritical House of Cards":
"ACORN's business model involves choosing a corporate target, attacking it, reaching a financial settlement, and then beginning the cycle again with a different target. The organization's own manifesto says: "ACORN's lifeblood is conflict with targets outside the organization," according to an internal document. This strategy has been very effective in the case of mortgage lenders. A magazine sympathetic to ACORN notes dryly, "AHC exhibits a unique ability to develop relationships with institutions, including some with which ACORN was previously in conflict."Ergo, thinking about it this way, if ACORN’s final goals in launching an attack on a corporate target are a partnership and money for organizing then ACORN has much in common with a parasite- It never wants to kill the host; it wants the host to live so it can coexist with it. Ultimately, it adopts the host's goals as its own.
What that would mean is that in making its judgements about something it has attacked, ACORN would not be asking whether something bad should end, or whether there is a balance that should be struck. ACORN would always stop short of ending a bad thing or striking a proper balance if it would kill the host or partnership opportunities.
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I can’t say whether what is alleged is true in other contexts. I observe that, in the case of Atlantic Yards ACORN’s alleged “Business Model” model fits.
Posted by amy at August 3, 2008 11:08 AM