Bloated “Stimulus” Plan to Fund Left-Wing Causes

Earlier today, I wrote about how Senators are busy “larding up the bloated ‘stimulus’ plan with more welfare” by proposing added government spending on frills such as taxpayer-financed “mortgage counseling.”

Commenting on that post, Michelle Malkin noted that left-wing groups like ACORN and La Raza would likely receive much of the money for such “counseling,” and that their counseling is likely to duplicate existing mortgage programs.

It’s not the first time these groups have received subsidies at the public’s expense. Consumer class actions lawsuits are often brought in the California courts. The lawyers choose to bring them in California in part because California state courts permit them to divert settlement proceeds to left-wing groups allied with the lawyers themselves.

A big recipient of those proceeds has been La Raza, which gets money from consumer class actions even though most of its legal activities have nothing to do with consumers. (For example, it sued Avis Rent-A-Car System on behalf of its illegal alien employees in Aguilar v. Avis Rent-A-Car System (1999)).

Chances are, a consumer class action lawsuit has been brought in your name in the California courts. Almost all of us have received one of those routine class-action notices in the mail at one time or another, resembling a piece of junk mail. The notice tells you that a settlement has been reached in a class action lawsuit against some company you bought a product from in the past, and that you and thousands of other people may be entitled to some coupon or small dollar amount if you take the time to fill out some claim form (while the lawyers who brought the lawsuit receive millions). So you may already have helped fund La Raza.