This week, the New York Times reported that “tens of thousands of eligible voters in at least six swing states have been removed from the rolls or have been blocked from registering in ways that appear to violate federal law.” But instead of expressing concern about tens of thousands of potentially disenfranchised citizens, what are conservatives up in arms about? The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), which announced that it had registered 1.3 million new voters.

Seizing on a couple of reports of apparently fraudulent voter registrations, conservatives began a chorus of accusations, claiming that the “purpose” of ACORN is to commit “voter fraud.” Watch a compilation:

It’s important to highlight a couple of facts to correct the right-wing rhetoric:

- Fraudulent registration forms do not constitute voter fraud.

Voter fraud only occurs if someone tries to improperly cast a vote. “It’s not voter fraud unless someone shows up at the voting booth on election day and tries to pass himself off as ‘Tony Romo.’ And who would try to do that?” wrote Rep. Jesse Jackson (D-IL). The Brennan Center for Justice noted that “there are no reports that we have discovered of votes actually cast in the names of [false] registrants.”

- In many states, organizations like ACORN are required by law to turn in every registration card they receive.

As the Wall Street Journal reported, “New Mexico law requires Acorn to turn in all applications, no matter how suspicious-looking, within 48 hours. Elections officials do their own quality control on registrations.” In fact, “under most state laws, voter registration organizations are required to turn in all the forms they receive.” Furthermore, ACORN explained in a statement that “for the past 10 months, any time ACORN has identified a potentially fraudulent application, we turn that application into election officials separately and offer to provide election officials with the information they would need to pursue an investigation or prosecution of the individual.”

When a department store calls the police to report a shoplifting employee, no one says the department store is guilty of consumer fraud. The same principle applies here. The small number of staffers who have submitted fraudulent forms are violating ACORN’s mission. Anyone caught defrauding should be prosecuted, and ACORN says it is assisting in that effort. ACORN should work harder to catch these employees and ensure that they are held responsible.

After years of enacting policies catering to the wealthy, the right-wing seems to be fearful of millions of new low-income voters casting their ballot in favor of progressive policies.

Cross posted at ThinkProgress.

In an address given before a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) roundtable two days ago, Chairman Christopher Cox said that “the current credit crisis has shown the importance of transparency to a healthy marketplace — and how costly hidden risk can be.”

To that end, the SEC – which is mandated to “protect investors and the markets” – released an outline of the “decisive actions” it has taken “to address the extraordinary challenges caused by the current credit crisis.”

However, the SEC left a large part out of its document: the ways in which the agency’s actions actively contributed to the crisis. In fact, some of the moves that the SEC is now touting were necessary because the agency was previously lax in its oversight. Here is a roundup of the SEC’s actions and the reality behind them:

Action: Adopted a package of measures to strengthen investor protections against naked short selling.

Reality: The SEC once before banned naked short-selling. It never effectively enforced the ban, and allowed short-sellers to relentlessly pound the stock market.

Action: Announced emergency plans for a rule to ensure public disclosure of short selling positions of hedge funds.

Reality: The SEC once tried, and failed, to register hedge funds, and have them open their books periodically to SEC examiners. The registration rule was tossed aside by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, due to legal complications. Cox chose not to appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Action: Began a study on mark-to-market accounting standards.

Reality: The removal of mark-to-market accounting is a proposal put forth by conservatives like Newt Gingrich, and was part of an alternative bailout bill put forth by conservative house members – led by Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) and Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA). The suspension of mark-to-market would let financial institutions pretend “that the value of long-term assets are more valuable than the market says.”

Action: Cox has asked Congress to provide the statutory authority necessary for government oversight of the $58 trillion credit default swaps market.

Reality: Cox has arrived to the credit default swaps game extremely late. Trading in credit swaps is what caused insurance giant AIG to fall, leading to the company receiving two federal government loans – one for $85 billion and another for $37.8 billion.

It’s not surprising that the SEC is looking to prove that it has a handle on the financial crisis, since it failed so miserably in its oversight during the crisis’ buildup. This week, Bloomberg news reported that the SEC both ignored warning signs that Bear Stearns was going to fail, and then censored a report by its own Inspector General noting the regulatory failure. Furthermore, the SEC totally eliminated regulations like the net-capital rule and the uptick rule, which could have tempered the irresponsible actions of financial institutions.

In the end, it seems that decisive action is indeed necessary – to save the reputation of the SEC.