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ACORN's problem is similar to what many other non-profit organizations who depend on volunteers face: how to keep discipline and accountability when people work for little or no money. The idea that somehow they were part of a grand scheme to manipulate national elections is nothing more than a fantasy by some of the fringe right.
The cases cited last year in relation to voter registrations were actually cases where acorn was the victim: they paid people on the basis of people registered, people made up registrations and got the money, ACORN flagged those cases they suspected of fraud and turned them in to the govt. By law they couldnt simply toss them out, but all of the ones caught were actually caught by acorn itself, who turned them in themselves.
Now, the issues in the OP are more serious, but I doubt they will find any sort of direct acorn policy encouraging that. Supervision in those positions is so low, and compensation too, that there is really no way for an organization like that to prevent this from happening.
Now, Im not saying this to excuse acorn's problems. Im doing it to show that the real problem is that it is a crappy bureaucracy with significant problems with accountability and supervision at the low level. Not that different from other similar organizations. Half a mile from my home is a donation center for goodwill. They are supposed to check what you are donating, see if it works, and fill out the receipt. Instead, the guy just sits there, tells you to drop whatever you are dropping off at the end of the hallway, and gives you a blank receipt. I've seen him offering to sell blocks of receipts to people.
The idea that this bureaucracy would be the mastermind in a plan to manipulate elections and the census is nonsense.
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