|
Lie Pie Title: Breitbart, Sherrod and Pigford vs. Glickman
Lie Pie Classification: lie sausage
UPDATE: The Senate approved payment of the $1.15 billion legal settlement between the USDA and black farmers by unanimous consent Friday, November 19, 2010. Read about it right here. --Granny, 11/19/2010.
Editor's Note: If you haven't the foggiest idea who Andrew Breitbart, Shirley Sherrod and Pigford are, thank your lucky stars. You managed to avoid a TV and Radio Talker stampede that wasted everyone's time and diverted our attention away from the robber barons and banksters looting the treasury and plundering America's resources. If you want to get up to speed, read about the Shirley Sherrod stampede at Factcheck.org.
Let's address the stinking load of viral email B.S. below. We'll start off with the claim that Andrew Breitbart intended all along to trick the media into exposing the Pigford settlement with his seemingly inept handling of the edited Sherrod speech. Well, according to Breitbart himself, Shirley Sherrod and the Pigford settlement had nothing to do with his decision to release the edited Sherrod video. He says his only target was the NAACP. When specifically asked whether the Pigford settlement factored into his attempted expose of Shirley Sherrod, Breitbart replied in an email message, "No. Seriously. On everything I hold dear." See Breitbart's comments to TPM Muckraker here. So unless Breitbart is a liar, he didn't have Pigford in mind when he released the edited Sherrod tape.
Second, the links serving as evidence below are nothing but the rantings of a couple of bloggers making ignorant assumptions about the Pigford case. Sure, it was clever to go to the U.S. census and look up the number of black farmers and compare that figure to the number of Pigford claimants. That puzzling discrepancy would have made for a great question to look up or personally ask of the USDA. Instead of asking the question and getting the answer, the bloggers chose to make unfounded claims of fraud and corruption.
There are reliable bloggers, and there are unreliable bloggers. A reliable blogger tracks down answers instead of making ignorant accusations. For example, a good place for a blogger with questions to start would have been this 2006 Government Accountability Office report. Right on the first page you can see that the court didn't rely on the census to determine Pigford claimant eligibility:
As used in this report, the phrase “African-American farmers” refers to the class as defined by the court and not a more general definition. The certified class was defined as all African-American farmers who (1) farmed or attempted to farm between January 1, 1981, and December 31, 1996; (2) applied to USDA during that period for loans or benefits and believe they were discriminated against in USDA’s response to that application; and (3) filed a discrimination complaint on or before July 1, 1997, regarding USDA’s treatment of their applications.
Anyone who wanted a full understanding of how exactly 400 farmers exploded into 86,000 before blogging like a juvenile knee-jerk lunkhead could have read this transcript of the 2004 Judiciary Committe hearing on the "notice" provision in the Pigford vs. Glickman consent decree. Honey, I know it's 300 pages, but if you can't take 10 minutes to skim through it, you don't have any business blogging about it.
Another report that would have been helpful to a blogger looking for answers is this April 21, 2010 Congressional Research Service report. This report details the evolution of "Pigford II" which was launched by the 2008 Farm Bill. Don't thank Barack Obama for Pigford II, thank Republican Senator Charles Grassley for sponsoring this bill in the 110th congress, or thank Republican Senator George Allen for sponsoring it in the 109th congress.
If you wanted to blog accurately about Pigford you could have also interviewed an actual claimant. You can read such an interview at Salon.com.
Apparently collecting the facts is too difficult an exercise for some folks. No, after making wild accusations and relying on a couple of irresponsible paranoid bloggers for "facts," the tinfoil-hat-wearing author of the viral email below makes stabs at both NPR and Snopes.com. Ain't that something? A proven ignoramus and/or liar attacking NPR and Snopes.com for not reporting on his load of made-up black farmer census conspiracy B.S.
Honey, I hope you'll take a couple of lessons away from this unfortunate episode. First off, don't get caught up in these ridiculous TV and radio talker stampedes. Second, learn how to spot liars, frauds and nincompoops trying to pass themselves off as investigative reporters. --Granny, 8/10/2010
WATCH YOUR STEP: STEAMING VIRAL EMAIL B.S. STARTS HERE
Not sure who the author is, but the facts as verified by reading the links attached speak volumes!
No wonder the USDA acted so fast to attempt to make Shirley Sherrod history!
Please read all the way to the end and check the links.
Another layer of the onion peeled away from our President, the Attorney General & Shirley Sherrod
Please read this entire document-- it is shocking and that is no BS.
We have been had!
The media recently portrayed poor Shirley Sherrod as a victim and discussed the doctored tape put forth by Andrew Breitbart.
Now the whole story is out and where is the media?????????
It seems poor Shirley also forgot to mention $13 million that her FAMILY RECEIVED in payments from the Dept of Agriculture in the Pigford vs Glickman Case in which she was a key player while working for the USDA.
This screams for a BIG, BIG INVESTIGATION
This is in response to the WSJ article published July 28, 2010 : "Our Divisive President", by Cadell & Schoen , both Democrats by the way, on Obama dividing America on race.
There is no need to make any other comment other than pass along this mind boggling new information...
Andrew Breitbart is a media genius!!!
He proved it originally with his brilliant handling of the ACORN 'hooker' scandal which he skillfully manipulated so that the corrupt media was forced, against its will, to broadcast corruption in one of Obama's most powerful political support groups. But Breitbart's handing of that affair is nothing compared to his brilliant manipulation of the Shirley Sherrod 'white farmer' scandal.
It all began last Monday, July 22, 2010. As the country watched in horror, Breitbart released a snippet of a tape on his "Big Government" site which showed an obscure black female official of the Dept. of Agriculture laughing to a roomful of NAACP members about how she'd discriminated against a destitute white farmer and refused to give him the financial aid he desperately needed. As she smirked to the room, she'd sent him instead to a white lawyer - 'one of his own kind' - for help.
The black woman was Shirley Sherrod - and she almost immediately she became the center of a firestorm of controversy which exploded throughout the country.
Within a day of the release of that infamous tape, the head of the Dept. of Agriculture, spurred on by Obama, demanded - and received - Sherrod's resignation.
Breitbart had won.
But then seemingly Breitbart's actions began to explode in his face.
As Sherrod screamed in protest, FOX News released the entire text of her speech last March to the NAACP. And there on tape Sherrod was shown supposedly repenting of her racism against a white farmer and instead championing his fight to win funds to keep his farm afloat.
Within hours of that entire tape being revealed, the entire world turned against Andrew Breitbart .
Conservatives throughout the country were enraged that he'd endangered their reputations by releasing a 'doctored' tape.
Breitbart, they thundered, had dealt a fatal blow to the conservative media.
I confess that I also was horrified at what I saw as the clumsiness and stupidity of Breitbart in 'doctoring' a tape to make a supposedly innocent woman look guilty. But now I discover I have been as guilty of haste to judgment of Breitbart as the Dept. of Agriculture was of Ms. Sherrod .
Only now am I realizing the real purpose for Breitbart's release of that tape snippet. It was to allow him to cunningly trick the media into exposing one of the most shocking examples of corruption in the federal government - a little known legal case called "Pigford v. Glickman".
Check the facts for yourself at yourself:
<link to blog redacted>
In summary here is what Pigfrod vs Glickman ( now Pigford vs Vislack is about)
Pigford vs Glickman
"In 1997, 400 African-American farmers sued the United States Department of Agriculture, alleging that they had been unfairly denied USDA loans due to racial discrimination during the period 1983 to 1997."The case was entitled "Pigford v. Glickman" and in 1999, the black farmers won their case.
The government agreed to pay each of them as much as $50,000 to settle their claims.
But then on February 23, 2010, something shocking happened in relation to that original judgment:
In practically total silence, the USDA agreed to release more funds to "Pigford".
The amount was a staggering...... $1.25 billion.
This was because the original number of plaintiffs - 400 black farmers - had now swollen in a class action suit to include a total of 86,000 black farmers throughout America .
There was only one teensy problem:
The United States of America doesn't have 86,000 black farmers!
According to accurate and totally verifiable Official USDA 2007 Census data, the total number of black farmers throughout America is only 39,697.
Hmmm... by the Official USDA 1992 Census data the US had only 18,816 black farmers!!
Oops!
Well, gosh - how on earth did 39,697 explode into the fraudulent 86,000 claims?
And how did $50,000 explode into $1.25 billion?
Well, folks, you'll just have to ask the woman who not only spearheaded this case because of her position in 1997 at the "Rural Development Leadership Network", butwhose family received the highest single payout (approximately $13 million) from that action - Shirley Sherrod.
Oops again!
It appears that Ms. Sherrod had just unwittingly exposed herself as the perpetrator of one of the biggest fraud claims in the United States - a fraud enabled solely because she screamed racism at the government and cowed them into submission. And it gets even more interesting.
Ms. Sherrod has also exposed the person who aided and abetted her in this race fraud. As it turns out, the original judgment of "Pigford v. Glickman" in 1999 only applied to a total of about 16,000 black farmers. But.... in 2008, a junior US Senator got a law passed to reopen the case and allow more black farmers to sue for funds. The Senator was Barack Hussein Obama .
Because this law was passed in dead silence and because the woman responsible for spearheading it was an obscure USDA official, American taxpayers did not realize that they had just been forced in the midst of a worldwide depression to pay out more than $1.25 billion to settle a race claim.
But Breitbart knew. And last Monday, July 22, 2010 , he cleverly laid a trap which Sherrod - and Obama + his cronies- stumbled headfirst into which has now resulted in the entire world discovering the existence of this corrupt financial judgment.
As for Ms. Sherrod ? Well, she's discovering too late that her cry of 'racism' to the media which was intended to throw the spotlight on Breitbart has instead thrown that spotlight on herself - and the huge corruption.
Sherrod has vanished from public view. Her 'pigs', it seems, have come home to roost.
Oink!
The perpetrator of that law, leading to unlawful claims & corruption..... passed in essentially dead silence is still trying to fool all of US.
IMPORTANT
Google Pigford vs. Glickman and Pigford vs Vislack and read for the backround for yourself.
Apparently this was common knowledge back on July 21, 2010. Did anyone hear about this twist from the major networks or print media? I doubt NPR will spend much time on it---
check this blog:
Forty Acres & a Mule -- Sherrod Style? see <link to blog redacted>
see also <link to blog redacted>
and finally check this link, covering the USDA statement about paying out the 1.2 billion in Feb of this year, he name of the case has migrated to a citation title "Pigford vs Vislack" . (USDA Press Release No. 0072.10)
<link to blog redacted>
How fast can you send this on to your mailing list? Even the most liberal of readers can't buy into this type of CHANGE!
by there way there is no mention of it in Snopes, just another coincidence I guess.
|
