Shirley Sherrod & Pigford V. Glickman

[Conan71]

I don't know the veracity of this, but supposedly Breitbart was only scratching the surface with the Sherrod video:

"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 of this year, something shocking happened in relation to that original judgment. In 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 verified census data, the total number of black farmers throughout America is only 39,697. Oops.

Well, gosh – how on earth did 39,697 explode into 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" but whose family received the highest single payout (approximately $13 million) from that action – Shirley Sherrod. Oops again."

http://hummersandcigarettes.blogspot.com/2010/08/sherrod-and-pigford-v-glickman-obama.html

[Gaspar]

Holy Sheep, Batman.

I enjoy the occasional trap, but that's a monster.  I wonder if the president is going to un-apologize?

[guido911]

This may be a bit o/t, but Keith Olbermann did one of his "special comment" on the Sherrod racism/redemption matter. I am not much of a Beck fan, but his take on it is pretty darn funny.

[Conan71]

I'm trying to liberate shreds of truth about Pig v. Glick

"Pigford v Glickman — more commonly known as "the black farmers' lawsuit" — was brought up during Wednesday's House Agriculture Committee hearing. Despite a $1.25 billion settlement between the USDA (which was accused of entrenched racism in the case) and claimants being announced in February, those eligible for payment have yet to see a penny.

"What's the status on the Pigford case?" asked Georgia Rep. David Scott of USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack.

"My understanding is that Congress, under the settlement, is required to appropriate the money to satisfy the agreed upon amount," replied Vilsack. "Under the system you've engaged under pay-go, there's a responsibility to identify offsets or designate that settlement as an emergency, which would supersede pay-go responsibilities.

"The challenge is that when Pigford was reopened by activity in the 2008 farm bill, you made the determination not to make the judgment fund available for payment. If you were trying to reverse that — say, 'now that we think about it, we'd like to use the judgment fund' — our understanding of your rules is that legislative action triggers pay-go.

"So, we're working ... to identify precisely the course of action that will allow Congress to move forward and appropriate the money."

For more on the case, see http://deltafarmpress.com/legislative/black-farmers-settlement-funding-date-0326/index.html and http://deltafarmpress.com/legislative/black-farmers-0219/index.html. "

http://deltafarmpress.com/legislative/pigford-glickman-update-0423/

Out of the just under 40,000 black farmers in America, 86,000 of them are slated to get paid now:  

"Seventy-thousand+ applicants in addition to the 16,000 already compensated now means that over 86,000 people are slated to be paid.

The U.S. Senate and Shirley Sherrod

Which brings us up to today, when two current events suddenly thrust this otherwise little-known case into the spotlight. First, the Senate stripped funding for the settlement out of an unrelated war appropriations bill, as they had done several times in the past. Second, it was revealed today that "A farm collective founded by Shirley Sherrod and her husband that was forced out of business by the discriminatory practices received a $13 million settlement as part of Pigford last year, just before she was hired by the USDA."'

http://pajamasmedia.com/zombie/2010/07/27/pigford-v-glickman-86000-claims-from-39697-total-farmers/

On Breitbart's Big Government, Ben Shapiro suggested that Sherrod received money from litigation "fraudulently." Conservative columnist and radio host Ben Shapiro wrote in a July 22 post on Breitbart's Big Government:

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to interview Congressman Steve King (R-Iowa) for my radio show, "The Ben Shapiro Show," which broadcasts every Sunday 1-4 PM ET in Orlando, FL. The topic of Shirley Sherrod came up, and in particular, the topic of the so-called Pigford Farms settlement.

For background, the Pigford Farms case is a class-action lawsuit filed against the federal government on behalf of black farmers and black wannabe farmers, who say they were discriminated against in loan proceedings. The federal government settled Pigford Farms for an unbelievable $1.15 billion. An incredibly high percentage of those receiving awards under this settlement have done so fraudulently.

Shirley Sherrod was not only an initiator of the Pigford Farms case, she received a chunk of change for her company, New Communities, Inc. To be accurate, she received the largest chunk of change for New Communities -- $13 million. New Communities was a bankrupt commune-type land trust held by Sherrod and her husband. She and her husband personally received $150,000 each to compensate them for "pain and suffering."

http://mediamatters.org/research/201007230029