ACORN — the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now — is stinking up Washington.

And this is far more significant than if a suspiciously large number of operatives for a purely “private” outfit had been found systematically bending and breaking the law, because ACORN receives and spends taxpayer money — lots of it — and had carried the imprimatur of official partnerships with the IRS, the Census Bureau … the kind of “cred” that in the political world comes only from “who you know.”

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With less than a week to go before Iran delivers its formal answer to the West’s offer of a peace deal over its nuclear programme, it is tempting to think that the diplomatic net is finally closing on Tehran. That is certainly the impression given by the suggestion that Russian President Dmitri Medvedev is prepared to support a further round of sanctions, which would most likely target Iran’s oil and gas industries.

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There was an international uproar when, on Sept. 4, in Afghanistan’s Kunduz province, an American fighter jet under NATO command bombed a group of Taliban fighters who had hijacked two fuel tanker trucks. The trucks exploded, the fighters were killed, and so were a still-undetermined number of Afghan civilians.

With four months left to meet its self-imposed deadline for closing the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, the Obama administration is working to recover from missteps that have put officials behind schedule and left them struggling to win the cooperation of Congress.

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Poll after poll shows the public has real concerns about the health care proposals working their way through the Congress, as well as the President’s handling of the issue. Even the latest CBS News/New York Times poll – whose 22/37 Republican/Democrat split has probably not been seen in an actual election since 1936 – shows a confused and divided public.

The announcement that Iran has been hiding a second uranium enrichment facility from the IAEA may seem like a “gambling in the casino” moment. But it is, I would argue, more important than that: it is a clarifying moment in which we will discern President Obama’s true mettle. We will discern that in three ways.

Graham Allison, a Harvard professor who is one of America’s leading security strategists, likes to speak of the U.S.-Iranian nuclear confrontation as “the Cuban missile crisis in slow motion.” Well, on Friday morning, that slow-mo process started moving a little faster, as President Obama issued a stark warning about a secret Iranian project that poses a “direct challenge” to the international order.

Confidence in the $787-billion economic stimulus package approved by Congress in February has reached a new high. Thirty-six percent (36%) of likely voters now say the package has helped the economy, according to the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.

That’s up three points from August and is the highest level measured since Rasmussen Reports first posed the question in late May.

Longtime Republican Senator Charles Grassley has a nearly two-to-one lead over his likeliest Democratic challenger Bob Krause in the first Rasmussen Reports Election 2010 telephone survey of Iowa voters.

Grassley leads Krause 56% to 30%. Seven percent (7%) favor some other candidate, and seven percent (7%) are undecided.

Appointed U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand holds a narrow lead over former Governor George Pataki in a hypothetical match-up for New York State’s 2010 Senate race.

The first Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of the campaign shows Gillibrand with 44% of the vote and Pataki with 41%.

A new Election 2010 survey in the state shows Paterson running even with former GOP Congressmen Rick Lazio, with both men capturing 38% of the vote. Lazio, who unsuccessfully challenged Hillary Clinton for the U.S. Senate in 2000, formally announced his candidacy on Tuesday.

Paterson trails former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani 50% to 39%, although Giuliani who unsuccessfully sought the Republican presidential nomination last year has not declared his candidacy for the gubernatorial race. The new numbers are a slight improvement for Paterson who was down 55% to 33% to Giuliani in July.

President Obama is scheduled to be the first U.S. chief executive to chair a meeting of the Security Council, but the views most U.S. voters have of the United Nations remain largely unchanged.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 29% of voters see the United Nations as an ally of the United States, while 15% regard the international organization as an enemy. For 47%, the U.S. falls somewhere in between the two.

A new Rasmussen Reports Election 2010 survey of the contest in California shows Boxer now beating former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina by 10 points 49% to 39%. Four percent (4%) like some other candidate, and eight percent (8%) are not sure how they will vote.

Next year’s U.S. Senate race in Ohio is a neck-and-neck battle for Republican Rob Portman no matter which Democratic candidate he faces, according to the first Rasmussen Reports Election 2010 survey in the state.