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October 31, 2006

George Bush intentionally misleads about John Kerry Iraq comment

Speaking in Georgia about an hour ago, president Bush intentionally distorted John Kerry's earlier comments about Iraq. Yesterday, speaking at Pasadena City College, Kerry said this:

"You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq."

The explanation is that he meant to say this:

"I can't overstress the importance of a great education. Do you know where you end up if you don't study, if you aren't smart, if you're intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq."

Under that explanation, the ones who are uneducated are not our troops, but those in the Bush administration.

While that puts me on the same side as Taylor Marsh (who?), I strongly favor this interpretation, and not the interpretation offered by GOP hacks (also: 1,2,3,4,5,6)

Here's Kerry video reply.

There's dirty campaigning, and then there's being outright misleading to your readers. Hopefully those who didn't learn about this BushBot tactic in 2004 will remember it now and will remember who's engaging in it.

UPDATE: Insty continues to push what is clearly a lie. Note also that his first link above goes to this article. While I don't quote everything here either, one might expect Insty to have quoted this bit:

Do Republicans really believe that Kerry wasn't talking about Pres. Bush? (We believe that Kerry was referring to Bush because he's used a similar formulation in our presence before and quite clearly meant to call Bush a dummy.)

Posted to Politics at 02:47 PM | Comments (7)

"Heavy coverage at midterm favors Democrats, study says"

From this:

Network news coverage has favored Democratic candidates in the midterm election, and the page scandal involving former congressman Mark Foley has been the main story line, drawing almost as much coverage as Iraq and terrorism combined, a new study finds.

An analysis by the Center for Media and Public Affairs of midterm election stories aired on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts Sept. 5-Oct. 22 found that 2006's coverage has been almost five times as heavy as in the 2002 midterm elections: 167 stories, compared with 35 four years ago.

The study found that three out of four evaluations of Democratic candidates' chances of winning — such as sound bites — were positive, compared with one out of eight for Republicans...

Posted to Politics at 02:45 PM | Comments (0)

Debbie Stabenow voted for Social Security for former illegal aliens

This site reprints a press release from the Michigan Federation for Immigration Reform and Enforcement.

On May 18, 2006 Senator Debbie Stabenow cast the deciding vote to kill an amendment, No. 3985, to the McCain-Kennedy Amnesty Bill S.2611. That amendment would have prevented illegal aliens from collecting Social Security benefits on wages earned using fraudulent numbers. Using fraudulent numbers is a common practice among illegal aliens and is a crime.

The vote to table this Social Security protecting amendment to the amnesty bill passed 50-49. Senator Stabenow cast the deciding vote to prevent this amendment from being part of the bill. There is no question that Stabenow voted to allow illegal aliens, those who commit identity theft, to gain access to our Social Security funds.

The purpose of the amendment to S.2611, the "Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006," as stated by the Secretary of the Senate, was as follows:

"Reduce document fraud, prevent identity theft, and preserve the integrity of the Social Security system, by ensuring that persons who receive an adjustment of status under this bill are not able to receive Social Security benefits as a result of unlawful activity."

Posted to Immigration at 01:00 PM | Comments (1)

Hazleton sued by far-left illegal immigration supporters (Part 2)

This page has a round-up with links to the ordinances, complaint, etc.

UPDATE: That was quick. A federal judge (James Munley of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania and a Dem) has issued a temporary restraining order forbidding Hazelton from enforcing their new laws. It extends for two weeks, and:

In a 13-page opinion, Munley said immigrants risked "irreparable injury" by being evicted from their apartments if the law is enforced. He also said he was not convinced by the city council's argument that illegal immigration increases crime and overburdens social services... "Defendant offers only vague generalizations about the crime allegedly caused by illegal immigrants but has nothing concrete to back up these claims," Munley wrote...

Previously: Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission party to Hazleton suit?

Pahrump anti-illegal immigration ordinance; bucks rotting in the banks?

Local immigration news: Cook County, Mesa, Houston, Beaufort County, Carpentersville

Posted to Immigration at 11:36 AM | Comments (1)

October 30, 2006

New York Times wrong about immigration (Part #4952234, "The Fence Campaign")

The New York Times offers an editorial called "The Fence Campaign". Let's take a quick look at just three misleading statements that the NYT makes:

A. Whatever they want to call it, the Senate bill would be perceived as an amnesty by millions of prospective illegal aliens around the world, and they'd come a-running. Saying "it's not an amnesty" doesn't mean a thing if everyone else thinks it is.

B. Those "immigrants" wouldn't get to the back of the line: they'd still get to live here and they'd be ahead of those in foreign countries who've been (legally) waiting to come here.

C. The MSM has been quite successful in painting those who support our laws as "extremists" (e.g., Randy Graf) and those who want to reward law-breakers with "comprehensive" "reform" as "moderates" (e.g., Gabrielle Giffords). If you actually look at what, for instance, the Senate bill would do, it's clear that those who support it are in favor of a truly radical policy that would do tremendous damage to the U.S.

It should be noted that I in no way wish to give the impression that the NYT only made three misleading statements; no doubt there are many more.

Posted to Immigration at 08:27 PM | Comments (5)

A smarter voting policy (Andrew Sullivan)

Sully offers a letter from a reader that says in part:

...Our country is certainly headed in the wrong direction, our spending has spiraled out of control, we have brave young men and women dying in Iraq, and those in power only want to talk about illegal immigration (and not seriously reform it) and wedge issues like gay marriage that only further divide these "United States..."

After the letter, Sully offers the following advice:

Next Tuesday, as part of that process of reform and renewal, whether you are a conservative or a liberal or sick of both labels, vote Democrat or abstain.

First of all, the letter gives an inaccurate portrayal of the "immigration debate". On the one side you have those who favor a quasi-open border (Bush, the Dems, Big Business, churches, far-left/racial power groups, etc.), and on the other side you have a few House Democrats, a fairly large number of House Republicans, and 75% or so of the American public. The latter group doesn't want to just talk about illegal immigration, they want to do something about it. And, they would if it weren't for those on the other side who offer a strong opposition. While those on the other side occasionally somewhat oppose illegal immigration (such as Bush with the fence bill), that decision is only to advance their wider aims. So, what the letter writer tries to claim is just hot air is actually a bit of a struggle.

As for Sully's voting advice, you can do better. There are several GOP members that oppose those who do not have America's best interests at heart, and they deserve your support.

UPDATE: That wacky Sully! Right after the letter, he had a sentence encouraging voters to vote for Democrats or just stay home, and that's what my last paragraph is refering to. But, now it's gone. I guess it was a technical glitch, or something. Luckily, this other blogger replied to it too.

Posted to Politics at 08:13 PM | Comments (0)

Senator Barbara Mikulski sneaks H-2B visa increase into defense bill

This site has part of a FAIR newsletter containing this:

Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) used back-room negotiations to slip language into the Department of Defense Authorization bill, signed into law on October 18, 2006, that potentially doubles the H-2B visa cap for unskilled workers. This language added to the defense bill is similar to the H-2B amendment Senator Mikulski offered to S.2611, the Senate guest worker amnesty bill that the House refused to take to conference committee. Senator Mikulski was successful in including the H-2B language to in the Defense Authorization bill despite statements from Armed Services Chairman John Warner (R-VA) that he would not allow any extraneous provisions to be added to that bill. In contrast, before Congress adjourned for the November elections, House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) waged a public battle to attach his own immigration provision to the same defense bill. Speaker Hastert’s provision would have prohibited alien gang members from entering the U.S. and allowed for the detention and deportation of alien gang members already within the country. Chairman Warner, however, refused the Speaker’s request to include the alien gang language. Last week, as the President signed the Defense Authorization bill into law, Senator Mikulski released a statement stating she would not have been successful in her effort to pass the H-2B provision without the help of Senator Warner.

Posted to Immigration at 12:53 PM | Comments (3)

Dave Mejias on immigration (Peter King, NY-03)

Democrat Dave Mejias (daveforamerica.com) is running against Republican incumbent Rep. Peter King in New York's CD-3. The unattributed (not even a free email) site mejiaswatch.blogspot.com points out that back on April 30, 2006 he stood in solidarity with the foreign citizens who marched through our streets demanding rights to which they aren't entitled:

"Some politicians say they will support the [May 1] boycott. Nassau County Legis. David Mejias (D-Massapequa) said he plans to close his law office in Hempstead out of respect for the Latino community."

Mejias is the son of Cuban refugees, and thus has little in common with those who snuck over our borders or who overstayed their visas.

And, from this article with an unknown date:

As more and more Hispanic and Latino immigrants move to the suburbs and lack the ability to access transportation, a disproportionate number have been involved in car-pedestrian and bike accidents... That is why for the past several years, Legislator Dave Mejias has launched a drive to collect donations of bike helmets to be dispersed to various community-based organizations to educate and assist new immigrants.

There's no indication given of the legal status of those "new immigrants", but one might imagine that a large number are illegal aliens. The better solution would be to discourage very low-wage workers from moving to his area. Instead, Mejias wants to help them, which has the ultimate effect of helping their employers continue to employ them at low wages. If child labor were still an accepted practice, people who think the same way wouldn't want to stop it, they'd just want to give the kids nice lunchpails.

And, in the included picture he's standing next to Reverend Allan Ramirez. Mexico's local consul (Arturo Sarukhan) declared him to be a "friend" for his defense of the local day laborers. Ramirez also refered to Steve Levy's attempts to shut down day laborer flop houses as "ethnic cleansing". It's not known whether the picture was taken before or after those statements. Others involved in the bike equipment giveaway are: La Casa Communal, Marianela Jordan, Executive Director of Nassau County's Coordinated Agency for Spanish Americans ("CASA"), and the Central American Refugee Center.

And, you can see Mejias' stock spiel on immigration around the six minute mark of the interview WABC's Diana Williams did here. Although her questions weren't that bad, she didn't call Mejias on the finer points of what he said.

He says he'd give citizenship to illegal aliens who've been here for five years.

Five years? Not even Teddy Kennedy wants to go that quickly.

Let's assume that he just wants to put illegal aliens on the "path to citizenship" as long as they've been here for five years.

That will lead to people coming here illegally or overstaying visas knowing that all they need to do is keep their heads down for five years, and they'll be started on the "path to citizenship" by Mejias. And, it will also lead to illegal aliens getting fake documents showing they've been here for five years.

But, it may all be moot because the Senate immigration bill lets "guest" workers stay here at least three and as much as six years, and they can start on the "path to citizenship" after four years. Not really what most people would call "guests".

And, Mejias says those illegal aliens should pay back taxes. In fact, the Senate bill forgives 2 out 5 tax years, and in any case many of them will end up receiving a tax refund because of the EITC.

And, Mejias says those illegal aliens should go to the back of the line. That's also highly misleading. The Senate bill allows them to continue to stay in the U.S. *and* puts them ahead of those in other countries who've been patiently - and legally - waiting for their chance at citizenship.

Posted to Immigration at 11:37 AM | Comments (1)

Let's help Andrew Sullivan use Google! (Casey, Sudan)

Andrew Sullivan's post "The Desperation of Santorum" directs us to this article in which Sen. Rick Santorum says the following about his opponent Bob Casey, the current Treasurer of Pennsylvania:

"Bob Casey has invested Pennsylvania pension funds in companies with ties to terrorist-sponsoring states and states that engage in genocide... Bob Casey is aiding and abetting terrorism and genocide."

Now, certainly, "aiding and abetting" might be a bit strong, but one wonders what those who happen to live in, say, the Darfur region of Sudan or Iran might think. Would they care that Santorum's language is too strong, or would they care that some U.S. states - perhaps including Pennsylvania - are in effect helping to prop up those regimes?

So, feel free to help Sully look into this matter by trying to determine which countries PA has directly or indirectly invested in, what if anything Bob Casey has done about this, and so on.

As for me, I took a look through a couple Google searches. First, the group mentioned in the article is the Center for Security Policy; they might have a link to a software company that sells products used to determine links to terrorism-sponsoring companies, but as long as that's disclosed and there are no associated shenanigans I don't see an issue.

Then, we've got this:

Nonetheless, the Sudan divestment push is making inroads... Harvard University, which was slow to rid itself of investments in companies doing business in South Africa, has led the way in the academic world with regard to Sudan. Its $23 billion endowment agreed last month to sell its stake in PetroChina, a Chinese oil and gas company with operations in Sudan... Student-led divestment campaigns have begun on campuses including Duke University in North Carolina and the University of Pennsylvania...

And, from April 2006:

In Pennsylvania, State Rep. Josh Shapiro is pushing to toughen a 2003 law requiring state authorities to report on state holdings in companies operating in terror-sponsoring countries. Similar bills have been introduced in Alaska and Tennessee; lawmakers in Arizona passed a bill requiring the state’s pension funds to report on all their holdings in American companies active in terrorism-sponsoring countries.

Then, we've got something quite interesting. While Bob Casey became Treasurer in 2005, issues have been known since at latest January 2001:

Last Sunday's edition [1/21/01] of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review ran a blockbuster expose of the Pennsylvania State Employees' Retirement System -- "one of the nation's oldest and largest public pension funds" -- for causing, according to the article's opening sentence, "The retirement savings of more than 200,000 Pennsylvanians [to help] enslave Christians in Southern Sudan, build long-range missiles in Iran and smuggle automatic rifles from China to the United States." ...Under the headline "Pennsylvania Pensions Bankrolling Violence," Tribune-Review reporter Thomas Olson reveals the ways in which "global bad actors" have been penetrating the Commonwealth's SERS portfolio thanks to the Retirement System's woefully inadequate political risk assessment and its over-reliance on the flawed judgment of external fund managers -- including, in many cases, representatives of the same Wall Street firms that are responsible for bringing these bad actors' stock and bond offerings to the U.S. market...

So, if this issue has been known about for over five years, and Bob Casey is still investing in such companies, is Santorum's language too strong or not strong enough?

Related: See my video about Bob Casey.

UPDATE: One of the benefits of being a GOP insider is you get access to all the best information. Reporting on the press conference which had not yet happened, the "Captain" says:

Santorum will point to a bill passed by the Pennsylvania House in 2003 (HR 263), a direction from the legislature to PSERS, SERS, and the State Treasury to identify those investments that had any connection to companies or nations doing business in Iran, as well as Libya, Syria, Sudan, Iraq, and North Korea. It's clear that the legislature wanted Pennsylvania to redirect their investments away from such companies and projects. However, Casey apparently has done nothing to keep Pennsylvania funds from supporting companies that do business with the same nations that threaten us.

Posted to Politics at 10:58 AM | Comments (0)

Ron Brynaert of RawStory downplays NAU

Taking anything found at RawStory with a very large grain of salt is recommended, but aside from that one wonders why Ron Brynaert would seek to downplay the NAU (10/25/06, "Minutemen 'expose' Bush's 'shadow government'"). Skepticism is generally good, and fact-checking is great. But, cheerleading is definitely something to wonder about:

SPP was launched in March of 2005 as a trilateral effort by the United States, Canada and Mexico to increase the security and improve the quality of life of North Americans through greater cooperation and information sharing. Many conservative critics view the trilateral initiative as a threat to U.S. sovereignty...

The documents can be viewed on the Minuteman Project's Stop the Security and Prosperity Project page, but there's no mention of any particular "smoking gun" which could proves the contention that the White House has created a shadow government. The anti-immigration group appears to consider the mere existence of communications among bureaucrats from the three countries as proof of their assertions...

...A RAW STORY examination of documents related to the "steel strategy" as presented at the Minuteman Web site did not turn up anything untoward...

While it doesn't matter that much, I wonder what their game is. Is it because they reflexively oppose the MMP or Jerome Corsi? Or, is it something else?

Posted to NAU at 09:51 AM | Comments (4)

October 29, 2006

Anti-North American Union resolution introduced

Republican Reps. Virgil Goode Jr. (VA), Tom Tancredo (CO), Walter Jones (NC), and Ron Paul (TX) have introduced a resolution (487):

Expressing the sense of Congress that the United States should not engage in the construction of a North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) Superhighway System or enter into a North American Union with Mexico and Canada...

...Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That--

(1) the United States should not engage in the construction of a North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) Superhighway System;

(2) the United States should not enter into a North American Union with Mexico and Canada; and

(3) the President should indicate strong opposition to these or any other proposals that threaten the sovereignty of the United States.

Jerome Corsi is working with Howard Phillips (Conservative Caucus Chairman) and Phyllis Schlafly as part of a coalition that wants a Congressional investigation of the NAU. Says Corsi:

"We'd like to see both the House and the Senate in the 110th Congress conduct a serious investigation and get full disclosure from SPP of all documents... If the Bush administration wants to continue to deny that we're on the same track that Europe went on to create the European Union and the euro, then there should be no harm in full disclosure... [otherwise] I'm charging they are secretly on the path to create a North American Union, a new currency – the amero – along the same stealth path that was used in Europe, keeping everything below the radar, by administrative decree, making it to late to stop before the American people finally realize what's gong on."

Posted to NAU at 10:25 PM | Comments (3)

Stop the SPP releases more FOIA documents

The new site Stop the SPP has more documents on the Security and Prosperity Partnership (precursor to the North American Union) obtained under a FOIA request.

Posted to NAU at 04:11 PM | Comments (1)

Peter Wallsten: the GOP can't win without opening the borders

Peter Wallsten of the Los Angeles Times offers "Latino and black voters reassessing ties to GOP". As with another article he wrote, it contains conventional "wisdom" in support of illegal immigration. While he's to be commended for bringing George Bush's Aztlan video to our attention, the non-corrupt wing of the GOP might want to consider whether his advice is in their best interest.

The Latino backlash has grown so intense that one prominent, typically pro-Republican organization, the Latino Coalition, has endorsed Democrats in competitive races this year in Tennessee, Nebraska and New Jersey. The coalition is chaired by Hector Barreto, the former administrator of the Small Business Administration under Bush; its president is a former strategist for the Republican National Committee...

But in recent months, Democratic activists watched with amazement as Republicans pushed into law a 700-mile fence along the Mexican border and tried to make it a felony to migrate illegally or to help undocumented immigrants. The latter provision did not become law, but it especially angered some church leaders, who said it would have criminalized their religious duty to help the least privileged in society.

Despite Bush's lobbying for an immigrant guest-worker program, favored by many Latinos, conservative lawmakers in the House refused to bend, forcing Bush to endorse the fence legislation and dimming his popularity among Latinos...

Needless to say, Wallsten takes at a given that the problem is with those House Republicans and not with Bush or those "many Latinos". Perhaps those Latinos who don't support our immigration laws out of racial power grounds or similar should be considered the outliers, and not those elected U.S. representatives who want to enforce our laws. And, his statement that HR4437 would make it a felony to "help undocumented immigrants" is false. Rather than calling those far-left "religious leaders" on their lies, Wallsten repeats them.

The article also contains this misleading statement:

Bush won an estimated 44% of the Latino vote in 2004. While polling numbers vary, many analysts said that represented about a 9-percentage-point improvement from 2000, suggesting that Latinos might become a substantial pillar upholding a durable Republican majority.

Posted to Immigration at 02:04 PM | Comments (1)

Tim Dickinson/Rolling Stone's misleading, pro-illegal immigration propaganda

Tim Dickinson of Rolling Stone offers his list of the 10 worst Congressmen. As you might expect from that publication, it's biased (9 of 10 are Republicans) and their complaints consist mainly of lightweight analysis and smears. Let's take a look at their entry on Rep. Tom Tancredo. It includes a great deal of name-calling, and it starts with a quote from the Council for Conservative Citizens supporting him; the reader will note that the recommendation is not reciprocated and this is thus the logical fallacy of Guilt by Association. (RS readers: did Dickinson not know this argument was fallacious, or did he think that you wouldn't know it was fallacious?)

Then:

Elected to the House in 1998, Tancredo has not only led the fight to deport every undocumented worker in America -- a proposal that would cost at least $200 billion -- but has called for halting all immigration, legal and otherwise. In one unforgettable move, Tancredo wanted to deport the family of an undocumented high school boy who was profiled in The Denver Post for his perfect grades.

* Tancredo doesn't support the mass deportations that Wilkinson implies that he supports; he support attrition through enforcing our laws.

* The $200 billion figure refers to the Center for American Progress study "Deporting the Undocumented". That study uses a highly-flawed methodology described at the link.

* The word "halting" might be misleading; Tancredo has called for a moratorium, not a permanent end to all immigration.

* And, there's much more to the last sentence than Wilkinson lets on; for instance, the Denver Post collaborated with the Mexican government to run a profile of said high school student.

Rolling Stone readers are encouraged to get their news from a more accurate source.

Posted to Immigration_piipps at 12:52 PM | Comments (0)

Robert Rector: "Importing Poverty"

Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation has a long article entitled "Importing Poverty". Here's just one paragraph, read the rest for much, much more:

[...] ...the roughly six million legal immigrants without a high school diploma will impose a net cost of around a half-trillion dollars on U.S. taxpayers over their lifetimes. The roughly five million illegal immigrants without a high school diploma will cost taxpayers somewhat less because illegal immigrants are eligible for fewer government benefits. However, if these illegal immigrants were granted amnesty and citizenship, as proposed by the Bush Administration and legislated in a recent Senate-passed immigration bill (S. 2611), they could cost taxpayers an additional half-trillion dollars. In total, all immigrants without a high school education could impose a net cost on U.S. taxpayers of around one trillion dollars or more. If the cost of educating the immigrants' children is included, that figure could reach two trillion dollars... [...]

Posted to Immigration at 11:47 AM | Comments (1)

Ramos/Compean: smear? CBP head won't criticize prosecution

The latest on the case of Border Patrol agents Ramos and Compean - who appear to have been railroaded by our government - includes the Commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, Ralph Basham, refusing to "criticize [their] prosecution" (link). Regarding the letter that twelve House members sent asking for an investigation, Tony Snow says:

"Let's wait and see what the hearing produces... I believe you have 12 people who want to have a hearing, and we'll be interested in seeing what those hearings provide."

On Friday, Snow also said this regarding his earlier "nonsensical" comment:

"I wasn't trying to embarrass anyone," Snow told Joseph Farah, editor of WND. "It's just that I am not permitted even to discuss pardons – to comment on them. This is the president's call alone."

And, from the "most likely a sleazy smear" department comes "Report: Agents 'out to shoot Mexicans'".

Department of Homeland Security officials told four House members last month that two Border Patrol agents convicted of shooting a drug smuggler admitted to supervisors that they were "out to shoot Mexicans" the day of the shooting, but have yet to provide proof the agents made such statements.

In an effort to convince four concerned congressman that the El Paso, Texas, trial, conviction and sentencing of Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean were warranted, representatives of the Homeland Security Office of Inspector General met privately with the congressmen to assure them of Ramos' and Compean's guilt.

...Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, one of the congressmen at the private meeting, said he and three of his House colleagues were told by the OIG's office that the agents "were out to shoot Mexicans" and that the Department of Homeland Security had other damning information about Ramos' and Compean's actions the day that Aldrete-Davila was wounded.

...Those officials, however, did not provide proof of the agents' supposed confession. Instead, they said they would provide the information after last week's sentencing hearing, according to the congressmen.

Two of the congressmen, along with National Border Patrol Council President TJ Bonner and Andy Ramirez, chairman of the Chino-based Friends of the Border Patrol, now are demanding that the OIG immediately provide the evidence promised. Both organizations have publicly supported Ramos and Compean.

Officials at the DHS Office of Inspector General did not return phone calls for comment.

"They will provide us the information we requested," Poe said. "They will either provide it informally or they will be doing it formally." ..."These outrageous fabrications were clearly intended to derail the congressional investigation into the circumstances underlying the prosecution of two innocent Border Patrol agents," [National Border Patrol Council President TJ Bonner] said...

There's even more, including the possibility that prosecutor Johnny Sutton was caught in a lie.

Previously:
Ramos/Compean case: sentenced to 10+ years, no mistrial
Send an email about Ramos/Compean Border Patrol case
Justice for the Border Patrol (Compean/Ramos)
"Legal defense fund started for convicted Border Patrol agents"

Posted to Immigration at 09:31 AM | Comments (0)

Tan Nguyen: Sanchez did first translation; given heads-up on raid

This is completely and utterly unsourced, but at a rally for Tan Nguyen yesterday this was reportedly "announced at the rally by Tan and some other speakers"

* Loretta Sanchez' office produced the initial, incorrect translation. When asked about it, she smiled and said "oops."

* Loretta Sanchez' office was give a heads up of the raid on Tan's office so it could be photographed.*

Although nothing incriminating has been found, state police refuse to return the computers, which have important campaign information on them.

And, Nguyen is reportedly "calling for an investigation".

Isn't it odd how candidates who oppose illegal immigration tend to have major problems like this?

UPDATE: From this:

...Then the candidate – dubbed "The Tan Man" by one supporter – hopped onto a pickup and declared that the letter at the center of state and federal investigations wasn't meant to intimidate Hispanic voters and wasn't illegal.

He also accused his opponent, U.S. Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D-Garden Grove, of possibly having a hand in the Oct. 20 raid on his home and campaign office during a criminal voting rights investigation.

"Ms. Sanchez's fingerprints are all over this," Nguyen declared. "… Ms. Sanchez then stood by smiling while the campaign office of her opponent – who was winning the election – was raided."

Sanchez's campaign was unable to field a response by press time. The Democrat is widely believed to be well ahead of her opponent...

Posted to California at 06:11 AM | Comments (1)

October 28, 2006

How many silver dollars would it take? (Nancy Pelosi, Dianne Feinstein picture)

nancy pelosi dianne feinstein mint coins

Their caption: SAN FRANCISCO / Dawn of shiny new life for Old Mint / Feinstein, Pelosi preside over ceremonial minting of coins to fund its reincarnation
Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Rep. Nancy Pelosi each struck a commemorative silver dollar and told a bit of the Old Mint's rich history. Chronicle photo by Michael Macor

Your caption will no doubt be different. There are other Nancy pics here.

Posted to WackyHumor at 01:15 PM | Comments (1)

Will James Webb oppose illegal immigration?

The sometimes-credible Weekly Standard offers "Tangled Webb", discussing how Democratic senatorial candidate Jim Webb (running against incumbent Republican George Allen) is a bit more conservative than one might think from the "D" beside his name. It ends with this:

...Webb's right-wing populism and the liberalism of today's Democratic party make for an abrasive fit, and hints of it showed the other morning at Cecilia's, a Latin restaurant on Columbia Pike, in Arlington. Walter Tejada, Arlington's leading Hispanic politician and the man responsible for making Democrats of the county's growing immigrant population, arranged for Webb to attend a small rally with what Tejada calls "the community." [He's also a former LULAC leader; 1, 2, 3;waltertejada.blogspot.com]

...Webb's views of immigration, like many of his positions on questions of domestic policy, are unformed. It's not hard to imagine where his populism and ethnic allegiance would lead him, though. One thing that all economists agree on--those who favor the present influx of immigrants and those who don't--is that mass immigration lowers the wages of unskilled, uneducated native-born workers; "my people," as Webb calls them. A quick way to raise those wages would be to cut off the future flow of unskilled immigration. Yet this step toward "economic fairness" is not available to a Democratic candidate these days (or to many Republicans either).

In a brief and uncomfortable stump speech, Webb told the Hispanic crowd that he was against a guest-worker program. "We must first define our borders," he said. "And then we must ensure corporate responsibility, because a lot of this is going to come down to the employers."

The crowd seemed puzzled. Later reporters asked Webb to clarify his position. With Tejada next to him, he said he favored some path to legalization and citizenship for the illegals already here. Tejada nodded solemnly. But what about the future? a reporter asked. Would Webb favor tough economic sanctions against businesses that employ illegals, as a way of drying up the tide of immigrants?

"Yes," Webb said, "there needs to be corporate enforcement. We've had no corporate enforcement for six years! There's got to be employer sanctions, otherwise you're going to keep wages down. We have got to get a handle on this."

Tejada glanced at the ceiling. Punishing employers who hire illegals is not, needless to say, part of the game plan for the community, or for Arlington Democrats...

Posted to Immigration at 01:05 PM | Comments (2)

October 27, 2006

Houston Chronicle does part against border fence

The Houston Chronicle's James Pinkerton offers "Border barrier could put chill in Valley ecotourism, wildlife". It features the thoughts of just four people predicting disaster for the fence itself, the region, wildlife, and various other calamities.

Farmer Fred Schuster says the fence will wash away in the rains. Oliver Bernstein from the Sierra Club handles the wildlife section of the article, without mentioning the environmental disaster of all the trash left behind by illegal aliens. Similar thoughts are expressed by Jimmy Paz, manager of the Sabal Palm Audubon Sanctuary. Nancy Millar, VP of McAllen's Convention and Visitor's Bureau, handles the tourism chores.

While we're told that "[t]ourist bureaus, wildlife refuges and farm and ranch operations" had worries, those are the only ones quoted in the article.

Posted to Immigration at 09:41 PM | Comments (2)

John DeStefano linked to Mexico collaborators (CT governor race)

New Haven mayor and Democrat John DeStefano [1] is running for governor of Connecticut against Republican incumbent M. Jodi Rell. DeStefano has several links to a New Haven group called "JUNTA for Progressive Action" [2], a group which is collaborating with the Mexican government. [3] That group also has links to several other organizations and community leaders.

Perhaps the closest link is that DeStefano's campaign manager is married to the head of JUNTA [4]:

The headquarters of Mayor John DeStefano Jr.'s gubernatorial campaign is beginning to resemble City Hall, with the announcement Monday that another former City Hall staffer will be joining the campaign... Henry Fernandez LAW '94 will become the mayor's campaign manager, after his resignation in March from his position as New Haven's economic development administrator, a position he had held for seven years. Fernandez joins Derek Slap, who in February switched from serving as the mayor's spokesman in City Hall to become the mayor's campaign trail spokesman... [...Fernandez] also helped bring IKEA to the city and was responsible in part for the expansion of Tweed-New Haven Airport. His wife, Kica Matos, is executive director of Junta for Progressive Action, an antipoverty agency based in Fair Haven...

From the Yale Daily News (link) (April 27, 2006, "Candidates court growing Hispanic vote"):

DeStefano's campaign has formed a group named Amigos de DeStefano, whose first house party at the home of Kica Matos, the director of New Haven's JUNTA for Progressive Action, drew 90 guests... the DeStefano-led City Hall is generally considered responsive to the needs of the city's Latino population, Yale professor Alicia Schmidt Camacho said. Camacho, who teaches in the American Studies Department, also serves on the board of Junta, a local Latino service agency... Camacho said her colleagues at Junta appreciate that the mayor is working on a plan to give municipal identification cards to all city residents. New Haven also launched "Hablamos Espanol" last year, a program that translates city documents into Spanish...

From this city page:

The New Haven Economic Security Coalition (NHESC) was formed in 2002 in partnership with Mayor John DeStefano, Jr., the IRS, and local organizations to provide free tax preparation and raise awareness about the Earned Income Tax Credit. Partners include: Community Action Agency, JUNTA for Progressive Action, Yale University, Spanish American Merchants Association, Empower New Haven, National Student Partnerships, and NewAlliance Bank.

More groups are listed here:

The New Haven Economic Security Coalition (NHESC) is a coalition of the Office of the Mayor of the City of New Haven [DeStefano's office], the Internal Revenue Service, Fleet Bank, Yale Law School, Quinnipiac Law School, Community Action Agency of New Haven, Student Health OUTreach, JUNTA for Progressive Action, Community Builders, the Spanish American Merchants Association, with support from the City of New Haven, Empower New Haven, and the Annie E. Casey Foundation.

JUNTA also received a $25,000 grant from Citizens Bank of Connecticut and WTNH-News Channel 8 [5]

From the New Haven Register [6]:

Junta is working with city police and Mayor John DeStefano Jr.'s administration on convincing banks to allow the undocumented to open savings accounts so they won’t be such easy prey for thieves.

He also spoke an illegal immigration rally in New Haven on 4/10/06 [7]:

"Amnistia para todos" — "Amnesty for All" — read a sign affixed to the onstage public address system as an estimated 1,500 to 2,000 people, many of them Latin American immigrants, listened to Latin-Ka, a Latino rock band, a Mexican-American mariachi band and dozens of speakers ranging from immigrant rights and union leaders to Mayor John DeStefano Jr. to Auxiliary Bishop Peter Rosazza of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Hartford.

His plan to give city IDs to illegal aliens was announced, withdrawn, and then studied [8]:

Over the past year or two, Junta has worked with Unidad Latina to promote rights for the undocumented, encouraging Mayor John DeStefano to issue a municipal identity card, among other ideas... That proposal slipped out "prematurely" last year, said Rob Smuts, DeStefano's deputy chief of staff and another member of last night's panel. He promised that the mayor is still planning to issue the cards, once the administration works out some of the bureaucratic kinks involved, because DeStefano believes it's not good to have a shadow population...

That proposal continues [9]:

...Immigrant rights groups, such as Fair Haven-based Junta for Progressive Action, are working with the city's police department to establish a policy that would forbid police from asking about the legal status of immigrants who are crime victims or turning over any such information to federal immigration authorities. And City Hall has spent the past year slowly developing a plan to provide all New Haven residents with city ID cards, which would allow immigrants to open bank accounts and avoid carrying the large amounts of cash that often make them targets of violent crime... [... "Danbury Eleven" matter...] ...The plan to provide ID cards is still being developed, as are plans, also announced last year, to develop an order for the New Haven Police Department that would forbid officers from asking individuals about their immigration status, according to officials in City Hall who have been working on the proposals. The police policy is already practiced, for the most part, by officers, said John Buturla, the city's chief administrative officer, and the challenge now is just to clarify it and put it in writing... [Matos] said Junta is also working on a program with Southern Bank, located just down the street from the organization's Fair Haven headquarters, on a program to offer financial literacy education to immigrants and help them open accounts... DeStefano policy analyst Kate McAdams worked on the project until she left New Haven three weeks ago; since then, the mayor's legislative assistant, Paul Nunez, picked up where McAdams left off, though [John Buturla, the city's chief administrative officer] said no meetings have yet been held on the subject. Nunez said he is planning to meet with the city's new budget director at the end of this week to discuss funding options, and he hopes that the program will be in place by January... Chief Franciso Ortiz was unavailable for comment, but NHPD spokeswoman Bonnie Winchester confirmed that Ortiz is working on the proposal...

Junta also advises or funds the Tides Foundation's "Death Penalty Mobilization Fund" [10]

[1] destefanoforct.com
[2] juntainc.org
[3] From newhavenindependent.org/archives/2006/10/id_for_life.php ...Laura Huizar, the program coordinator for economic development at JUNTA, greeted one of the nearly 100 people who came to the auditorium of the Fair Haven Middle School on Thursday night for a meeting with Mexican consular officials... Mexican consular official Eduardo Penalosa presented a kind of workshop in how to obtain the MCAS. The MCAS (Spanish initials for matricula consular de alta seguridad), Huizar, explained, is recognized by hundreds of cities, police departments, and financial institutions across the country as a valid ID. It's the Mexican government's official ID for its nationals living abroad, incorporating holograms and other embedded technology designed to prevent forgery. Which is why JUNTA has been cultivating a relationship with the Mexican Consulate; in past visits to Fair Haven in 2004 and 2005 the consulate provided approximately 400 Mexican nationals with these consular IDs. However, many other applicants were turned away. After such informational sessions, Huizar hopes the consulate will return in the months ahead and many more consular IDs can be issued...
[4] "DeStefano names campaign manager", 4/4/06, Sarah Mishkin, link
[5] From citizensbank.com/au/news/ctz/2005/07_08_05_ct_champion.aspx Citizens Bank of Connecticut and WTNH-News Channel 8 today named Junta for Progressive Action, Inc. (JUNTA) as its first Champion In Action the new name given to the program formerly known as the Community Champions Program. As a champion, JUNTA will receive a $25,000 grant, media coverage and extensive promotional and volunteer support for its outstanding work in the area of youth support programs... As the Champion in Action, JUNTA will receive... A $25,000 contribution in unrestricted funds from the Citizens Bank Foundation... Media coverage from WTNH-News Channel 8, including public service announcements and television profiles... Volunteer support from Citizens and WTNH-News Channel 8 employees... Extensive public relations support... Promotional support, highlighting the "Champion in Action" in all Citizens Bank branches and on its ATMs; and... Exposure on both Citizens Bank and WTNH-News Channel 8 Web sites... Citizens Bank of Connecticut is a $4 billion bank with 48 branches and 60 ATMs in Connecticut It is headquartered in New London. It is a subsidiary of Citizens Financial Group, Inc., a $137 billion commercial bank holding company headquartered in Providence, R.I.
[6] "City aldermen hear of immigrants' needs", 9/19/2005, Mary E. O'Leary, NH Register: juntainc.org/en/news/Register_09.19.05.php
[7] "Politicians, Residents, Bishop Rally for Immigrant Rights", 4/11/06, Mark Zaretsky, NH Register: juntainc.org/en/news/PoliticiansResidentsBishopRallyforImmigrantRights.php
[8] "Living in the Shadows" juntainc.org/en/news/LivingintheShadows.php
[9] "Activists lobby for immigrants", 10/4/06, Sarah Mishkin, Yale Daily News: juntainc.org/en/ActivistsLobbyforImmigrants-10.2006.php
[10] link

Posted to Immigration at 01:12 PM | Comments (2)

Bob Casey: $50 billion in benefits for illegal aliens

Pennsylvania Senatorial candidate Bob Casey is trying to unseat Rick Santorum and is issuing highly misleading statements as part of his attempt. One of those is the claim that he doesn't want to give Social Security benefits to illegal aliens. If you parse that statement in the legally-correct, Clintonian way it's true.

What he fails to note is that under the Senate amnesty bill (which he supports), many millions of current illegal aliens would be suddenly declared to be legal residents, and then they'd suddenly be eligible for up to $50 billion worth of "federal benefits such as the earned income and child tax credits, Medicaid, and Social Security" (WaPo on the CBO estimate).

Please send this video around:

UPDATE: In an earlier version I said "all" current illegal aliens would be legalized under the Senate bill. That actually wouldn't include "all", just the vast majority. And, it would also most likely include new illegal aliens who came here and obtained falsified documents "proving" that they were covered under the Senate amnesty.

Posted to Immigration at 10:45 AM | Comments (0)

"Doubts linger on feasibility of barrier" (border fence)

From this:

Both proponents and opponents of 700 miles of fences along the U.S.-Mexico border question whether the Bush administration can deliver the barriers -- whose exact location, price tag and construction start date remain unknown.

The Secure Fence Act, signed yesterday by President Bush, does not require the government to show any results of fence construction until May 2008 and while it does specify where along the 1,951-mile U.S.-Mexico border the barriers should go, there's no guarantee they ever will.

State legislatures, governors, and city and county governments, along with Indian tribal councils, have veto power over fencing locations...

T.J. Bonner of the National Border Patrol Council says it will "do nothing" and will act only as a "speed bump". One possible motivation for his remarks is that he wants to get more BP agents. And, of course it will do something, and have a deterrent effect, especially if advertised correctly in Mexico.

Posted to Immigration at 06:52 AM | Comments (5)

David Broder offers conventional wisdom on Arnold Schwarzenegger's left turn

I think this column might be a week or two old, but it's just now being printed in the Houston Chronicle, so let's take a look at the thoughts of David Broder in "California's model for the middle":

...In 2005 [Arnold Schwarzenegger] declared war on the Democratic legislature and the public-employee unions and forced a special election on four initiatives designed to cripple the unions' influence and strengthen his hand as governor. Voters rejected all of them and drove his approval ratings into the basement.

Oddly enough, Broder doesn't mention that Arnold's campaign for his initiatives sucked. He let the unions define him as a meanie and about all he could reply with were a few TV ads at the end of the campaign. I might be wrong about this, but in one of them he was dressed in a sweater. In any case, those commercials were indeed Carter-esque.

Arnie's Bush-linked advisors think "moderates" like Rudy Giuliani, John McCain, and Mitt Romney could compete for California using the same corrupt formula:

...The contenders would not have to go as far as Schwarzenegger has in embracing Democratic issues. The state might respond to a candidate who combines fiscal prudence and avoiding higher taxes with a progressive attitude on the environment and such social issues as immigration and civil rights...

Of course, immigration is much, much more than just a "social issue", but one wouldn't expect someone who defines "progress" as encouraging illegal immigration and collaborating with extremist-linked groups to understand that.

Posted to Politics at 03:30 AM | Comments (0)

October 26, 2006

NBC report on border fence features Juan Jose Gutierrez

Tonight's NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams featured a report on the border fence bill being signed. For the thoughts of the Hispanic community, they turned to... Juan Jose Gutierrez. You know, the guy who organized a 1996 march that was led by the Mexican Army's band. In 1994, he took part in a protest - along with current CA Assembly speaker Fabian Nunez - that included a U.S. flag with just 13 stars. Nowadays, he's still organizing marches and he's linked to ANSWER.

The footage looked like it was shot in a studio, and it also looked like it was provided by an affiliate. Nonetheless, are NBC's NYC producers unable to use those search engine things?

There are at least two levels to this: the fact that JJG is a bit of a Hispanic "leader", and also the fact that NBC considers him to be a leader and presents him as such. In order to do something about the first, please do something about the second by contacting your local NBC affiliate and suggesting that they contact their HQ with some constructive criticism.

Posted to Immigration at 07:27 PM | Comments (1)

Bush signs border fence bill; on to "comprehensive immigration reform"!

Our president George Bush has signed the "Secure Fence Act", which might result in 700 miles worth of fencing on the Mexican border. A White House fact sheet is at whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/10/20061026-1.html

In case it wasn't clear already, that "fact sheet" shows that the fence is just an excuse to get what Bush really wants. Be suspicious of those questionable sources (Bill Frist and other politicians, GOP hacks such as Insty, Cap'n Ed, etc.) who promote the fence, because they only see it as one part of the equation:

"This bill will help protect the American people. This bill will make our borders more secure. It is an important step toward immigration reform." - President George W. Bush, 10/26/06

Today, President Bush Signed The Secure Fence Act - An Important Step Forward In Our Nation's Efforts To Control Our Borders And Reform Our Immigration System. Earlier this year, the President laid out a strategy for comprehensive immigration reform. The Secure Fence Act is one part of this reform, and the President will work with Congress to finish the job and pass the remaining elements of this strategy.

Comprehensive Immigration Reform Begins With Securing The Border. Since President Bush took office, we have:

...This Act Is One Part Of Our Effort To Reform Our Immigration System, And We Have More Work To Do

Comprehensive Immigration Reform Requires That We Enforce Our Immigration Laws Inside America. It is against the law to knowingly hire illegal workers, so the Administration has stepped up worksite enforcement...

Up from 4 to 8 cases! (numbers approximate).

Comprehensive Immigration Reform Requires That We Reduce The Pressure On Our Border By Creating A Lawful Path For Foreign Workers To Enter Our Country On A Temporary Basis. A temporary worker program would meet the needs of our economy, reduce the appeal of human smugglers, make it less likely that people would risk their lives to cross the border, and ease the financial burden on State and local governments by replacing illegal workers with lawful taxpayers. Above all, a temporary worker program would add to our security by making certain we know who is in our country and why they are here.

Since he admits that that situation is unsafe, why has he allowed it to get worse by refusing to do real workplace enforcement?

Comprehensive Immigration Reform Requires That We Face The Reality That Millions Of Illegal Immigrants Are Here Already. The President opposes amnesty but believes there is a rational middle ground between granting an automatic path to citizenship for every illegal immigrant and a program of mass deportation...

Whatever he wants to call it, it will be perceived as an amnesty by millions of prospective illegal aliens around the world, and they'll come running. Note also the stock false choice; another choice would be to start enforcing our laws, encouraging many illegal aliens to return home and discouraging others from coming here.

Comprehensive Immigration Reform Requires That We Honor The Great American Tradition Of The Melting Pot. Americans are bound together by our shared ideals, an appreciation of our history, respect for the flag we fly, and an ability to speak and write the English language. When immigrants assimilate and advance in our society, they realize their dreams, renew our spirit, and add to the unity of America.

Meaningless blather. Karl Rove has shown a willingness to reach out to far-left forces that oppose assimilation.

UPDATE: There's a handy list of who voted against this bill here.

Posted to Immigration at 10:20 AM | Comments (4)

Mexico, 27 OAS nations declare opposition to border fence

From our who cares department:

Mexico, supported by 27 other nations, made a declaration at the Organization of American States slamming U.S. plans to build hundreds of miles (kilometers) of fence on its southern border.

The declaration, read aloud Wednesday at the OAS headquarters in Washington, said the barriers would not solve the immigration problem and urged the U.S. government to rethink its position, according to press releases from the OAS and Mexican foreign ministry.

The 28 nations express "deep concern regarding the decision adopted by the United States of America to build and extend a wall on its border with Mexico, considering it to be a unilateral measure that goes against the spirit of understanding," it said in the declaration, which was read out by Mexico's Ambassador Alejandro Garcia Moreno...

In a surprisingly gutsy move, the U.S. representative to the OAS decided against supporting the declaration. Mexico will also take its complaints to the United Nations.

Mexico's co-signers are:

Antigua, Argentina, Barbados, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Granada, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, San Kitts and Nevis, San Lucia, San Vicente, Suriname, Uruguay and Venezuela

Posted to Immigration at 10:14 AM | Comments (4)

October 25, 2006

"Clarification" letter sent to Hispanics (Tan Nguyen, MALDEF, NCLR, NALEO)

california secretary of state mcpherson maldef nclr naleo

Secretary of State Bruce McPherson's office has sent a letter to the 14,000 people who had been sent the Tan Nguyen letter. It's good that he's clearing things up. It's not so good that he's carrying the water - in an official state document under the California state seal - for far-left groups that support illegal immigration. From the PDF file with the letter:

The official election information letter, in English and Spanish, was mailed by the Secretary of State's Office in collaboration with the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) and the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO).

Why is the Secretary of State "in collaboration with" far-left groups, at least two of which have supported illegal immigration in the past? Isn't this in effect an endorsement of those group's agendas? The SoS didn't really need any others to be involved, but if they were going to enter into collaborations shouldn't they have also sought out more conservative Hispanic groups that haven't supported illegal immigration?

Why is the State of California carrying these groups' water?

I called the number given in the letter trying to get answers and I was told that the person listed would call me back. If anyone has better luck, let me know.

UPDATE: The MSM hacks who've discussed this story have not once to my knowledge offered a legal analysis of the letter from qualified experts. Hopefully eventually someone will do that, and they might even be able to answer whether this "Memorandum of Agreement" regarding the "Help America Vote Act" ("HAVA") qualifies as the computerized match system mentioned in the original letter: usdoj.gov/crt/voting/hava/ca_moa.htm

Also, Bruce McPherson is up for re-election on Nov. 7, and I'm reluctantly urging everyone to vote for Debra Bowen. She's the only one with a chance to beat him, and as the letter he sent shows he is unfit for office. If you can't bring yourself to do that, choose anyone else from this list.

Posted to Immigration at 02:22 PM | Comments (4)

October 24, 2006

Tan Nguyen: the Manchurian candidate?

BoiFromTroy raises the possibility (at the site run by Chris Nolan) that Tan Nguyen is a Democratic plant designed to increase their GOTV effort:

I say that Nguyen's letter was either the stupidest or the most nefarious political act this year because part of me wonders whether he's some sort of "Manchurian Candidate" planted by Democrats to pull this October stunt - and have it dragged out by the media going into the election. (Of couse, that's Cold War thinking - Vietnam, where Nguyen was born isn't the same as China for all kinds of reasons.)

OK, now that he's gone first, I'll admit that while I had thought of similar things before, I hadn't given them much weight because there's still the possibility that he might be charged or sued. And, it's going to be difficult for him to run again as either an R or a D.

However, what I have considered is that the shadowy office manager or the shadowy LAPD officer involved in the letter might have been plants. And, since illegal immigration is a multi-billion dollar industry, it's not just the Democratic Party that would profit from a possible attempt to smear the CCIR or those opposed to illegal immigration in general. All the facts aren't available yet, and there's no guarantee at all that CA AG Bill Lockyer - a Democrat - will perform a full investigation and look at all possibilities.

Bonus: La Opinion (Spanish-language rag in Los Angeles) misquoted part of the letter, trying to make it look worse than it was. Wrap these lines to read the details:
blogs.ocweekly.com/blotter/
why-is-la-opinion-changing-the-tan-nguyen-letter

The publisher of La Opinion, Monica Lozano, has links to MALDEF and the National Council of La Raza ("The Race").

Posted to California at 02:38 PM | Comments (8)

Michael Bloomberg: possible illegal alien taxi drivers isn't dangerous

Michael Bloomberg has yet again let his outright support for illegal immigration interfere with his job of protecting New Yorkers. Via this we find this:

The city's plan to stop asking prospective taxi drivers to provide proof that they are legal residents will not endanger the security of New Yorkers, a spokeswoman for Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday.

Cab drivers would no longer need to show immigration documents under changes the Taxi and Limousine Commission is set to vote on tomorrow. Instead, they will need to provide a Social Security card and driver's license...

His spokeswoman informs us:

"To suggest that this regulatory streamlining effort in any way represents a risk to the public is erroneous"

Social Security cards and numbers can, of course, be faked. And, several states give driver's licenses to illegal aliens. NY used to be one of those states, and there were hundreds of thousands of questionable DLs issued. The New York Times' Nina Bernstein and other groups fought tooth and nail to continue allowing illegal aliens to get New York driver's licenses, but that was blocked in July (PDF file):

The Appellate Division of the New York Supreme Court this week upheld new regulations adopted by the State of New York that make it extremely difficult for illegal aliens to obtain driver's licenses. The decision was a victory for the Washington Legal Foundation (WLF), which filed a brief urging the court to uphold the regulations.

Posted to Immigration at 02:02 PM | Comments (2)

Jennifer Talhelm, Arthur Rotstein, Terry Tang mislead about Randy Graf

Jennifer Talhelm, Arthur Rotstein, and Terry Tang (reporting from... Scottsdale) of the AP offer a superficial, misleading, pro-Democratic Party article called "GOP Shuns Immigration Hardliner in Ariz." The headline is the first part that's wrong in that Graf is opposed to the illegal variety of immigration and wanting to enforce our laws is not a "hardline" position. It continues:

Randy Graf is a tough-on-immigration [a false statement] Republican in a district that is fed up with people pouring illegally across the border and hasn't elected a Democrat to the House in two decades... Yet Graf's national party is turning its back on him, the retiring Republican congressman he wants to succeed has disavowed his candidacy and he's finding trouble getting traction beyond the most secure GOP voters _ and a border militia that's backing him.

Calling the Minuteman Project a "militia" is an attempt to conjure up images of compounds in Idaho and the like. I hadn't seen an MSM source say something similar for a while, but either I haven't been paying attention or they're repurposing their old smears for the 2006 season.

And, prominent GOP members have not "turned their back on him." While the pro-illegal immigration Kolbe has not supported him, McCain and others have, and Hastert will be campaigning for him next week.

As for why the national GOP leaders would "turn their backs on him", Talhelm, Rotstein, and Tang don't try to find out what might really be behind that. Is it because of the stated reason that they think he can't win? Or, is it because they think he might win and if he does he'll cost those companies - GOP donors - that profit from illegal immigration money?

Then, flanked by an AP picture of Gabrielle Giffords, we get this article's "man-on-the-street/voice-of-reason":

Voters such as Sue Malusa, a mother of four from Tucson, think Graf and his supporters go too far. Graf is backed by the Minutemen, self-appointed border-watchers. Malusa will vote for a candidate who supports "a humane and fair way of controlling the border," she said. "That's important."

As detailed in the past many times, anything that allows illegal immigration to continue is not humane, and what Giffords supports will allow illegal immigration to continue. Malusa needs to think with her head and not buy what those who hide behind "compassion" try to sell.

Then, we get to the smears:

Graf made waves last week defending a state lawmaker who endorsed reinstatement of a 1950s federal deportation program called "Operation Wetback" and sent supporters information from a white separatist group... In a candidates' debate, Graf said the lawmaker, state Rep. Russell Pearce, is a friend and they agree on how to control the border.

As previously discussed just recently, the word "reinstatement" is a lie. As for the second smear, he realized the error right away and sent a followup email. Only the most delusional Democratic hack could think that he would have sent that article if he'd read the whole thing or knew about the group involved.

It continues, but it's clear that Jennifer Talhelm, Arthur Rotstein, and Terry Tang of the AP are willing to mislead in order to support either Giffords or illegal immigration. And, it's clear that they aren't willing or able to dig into a story and discover what's really going on.

Posted to Immigration at 01:46 PM | Comments (2)

Atlanta: Radio hosts fired after lawsuit by Hispanic DJs

"The Regular Guys Show" - previously featured on WKLS-FM in Atlanta Georgia ("96Rock") and consisting of Eric Von Haessler and Larry Wachs - has been taken off the air and the hosts fired after two Hispanic hosts of a sister station show filed a lawsuit. The animosity between the two shows stretches back to the pro-illegal immigration marches, when the Regular Guys invited "Yogi and Panda" (Juan Tapia and Jose Carias from Viva 105.7) to appear on their show and discuss the rallies. Yogi and Panda were apparently encouraging their listeners to join the boycott (one of the organizers of that boycott is a former Mexican consul general). Those hosts complained to their employer repeatedly that they were "disrespected", then:

...Tapia and Carias said in the suit that Regular Guys co-host Larry Wachs secretly taped their conversations while they were in restroom stalls in the Clear Channel office building Oct. 9, then aired them Oct. 10.

Tapia and Carias also said they complained to management on numerous occasions about "incendiary comments" the Regular Guys made about their "alleged sexual orientation, race and nationality" but "these complaints have largely been ignored."

Wachs says they knew he was there and were "yelling insults" at him.

This probably isn't about the money and despite outward appearances it probably isn't personal either. It's probably an attempt to obtain racial power and try to prevent other hosts from opposing illegal immigration and associated marches. If anyone has any information on whether any politicians or similar are involved in the lawsuit or have links to Yogi and Panda, please leave a comment.

Also, please forward this news to any local talk show hosts that oppose illegal immigration.

Posted to Immigration at 11:43 AM | Comments (4)

Former Border Patrol agents: no amnesty

Around two hundred members of an apparently new organization called the "National Association of Former Border Patrol Agents" have issued a position paper calling for:

* securing the border and tight screening of those permitted to enter;

* opposition to any legislation that would allow aliens to remain in the country who have entered illegally and remained illegally;

* meaningful employer sanctions;

* a guest worker program with tight restrictions.

As for the latter, the restrictions would have to be very tight in order to avoid the issue of "guests" having U.S. citizen children, making deporting them very difficult. And, I'm a bit worried that the Pence amnesty scheme sounds like it could be hammered into their framework. Nevertheless, I'm willing to listen, but I haven't been able to find their site.

I'm also concerned because on June 6, 2006, John Tierney of the New York Times wrote a paean to the Bracero program ("Securing the Border (Again)", tinyurl.com/yyp4fz), using NAFBPA member Buck Brandemuehl as a starting point. Another member of the organization is Hugh Brien.

And:

Many of the signers participated in the administration of the 1986 amnesty program. They say the problems with it included:

* Rampant fraud

* Judicial extension of the program

* The effects of chain migration – whereby six family members ultimately follow to join each alien who achieves legal status.

Posted to Immigration at 06:34 AM | Comments (1)

Tony Snow asked about Ramos/Compean case, dodges question

On Monday, Les Kinsolving asked Whitehouse spokesman Tony Snow about the case of the two Border Patrol agents who appear to have been railroaded by our own government. He specifically asked whether Bush would give them a pardon. Here's Snow's response:

"That's an unanswerable question, Les. The president is the person who is responsible for pardons. You can tell the network, which made you ask that question, that it is nonsensical."

Posted to Immigration at 02:22 AM | Comments (0)

October 23, 2006

Democrats offer Tan Nguyen letter of their own [satire]

The latest from the Tan Nguyen campaign is that he says the infamous letter was mistranslated from English to Spanish; a copy of the stated original version is here.

In response, the Democrats have come up with their own version of the letter that they're demanding be sent to all Democratic voters in California:

---------------------------------------
Dear voter:

You are receiving this letter because you recently registered to vote. If you are a citizen of the U.S. we encourage you to participate in the democratic process.

However, if you are here illegally or are just a resident with a green card, you should be advised that voting in any Federal Election is a crime and may result in imprisonment, and WILL result in deportation.

Also, do NOT register your pets. There's almost zero chance that voting on behalf of "Fluffy" will get you into trouble, but just do not DO IT. Also, if you have multiple personality disorder, DO not register each of your personalities. For all you know, they might vote for non-Democrats!

And, DO not register space aliens, fictional characters, dead people, names you just made up, words you saw on billboards, or anagrams of any of the preceding. They check these registrations closely (except on Wednesdays), so be very careful. Once again: you might get caught. There's almost zero chance of anything bad happening to you, but you never know. If you're the one in a billion people that they prosecute for supporting our cherished causes, it could happen. It just has almost zero probability of happening.

Signed,

/sig/
The Mexican Consul General of La Habra

/sig/
Dr. Gov. Howard Dean M.D.
---------------------------------------

Posted to WackyHumor at 09:05 PM | Comments (0)

Yvonne Wingett: "Language used to sway voters in immigration debate"

Yvonne Wingett of the Arizona Republic offers the titular article, which contains the seeds of its own evisceration. Let's see how she uses language to try to sway the voters in an open borders direction:

...The tipping point came last month, when Rep. Russell Pearce, R-Mesa, suggested that "Operation Wetback," a 1950s mass-deportation program, be reinstated to help combat illegal immigration.
The term "wetback" is offensive to Latinos and is typically used to refer to a person who is an undocumented immigrant...

Pearce's use of the word and suggestion that the program be reinstated insulted minority, religious and community leaders who called for lawmakers to reject such divisive language...

Here's what Pearce actually said:

"We know what we need to do. In 1953, Dwight D. Eisenhower, put together a task force called 'Operation Wetback.' He removed, in less than a year, 1.3 million illegal aliens. They must be deported."

So, Wingett is lying about him wanting to "reinstate" that program. "Reinstate" is defined as "to put back or establish again, as in a former position or state", and specifically refers to the previous program. What Pearce suggested was something similar to OW. He wasn't calling for taking OW and starting it over again.

And, one can find thousands of cases of Mexicans or Spanish-speakers using the word "mojados", the equivalent of "wetbacks".

And, of course, "undocumented immigrants" are actually illegal aliens.

As for those who were "insulted", that's highly questionable considering that all of the media reports discussed at the second link were based only on the remarks of the Arizona Democratic Party and two people from the same group (Somos America, a group that organized some illegal immigration marches in Arizona).

Posted to Immigration at 04:02 PM | Comments (2)

Bill Winter on immigration

Bill Winter is running for Congress against Rep. Tom Tancredo. Like other Democrats, he supports the Senate amnesty, and thus everything said about that horrible bill applies. Moreover, his page on immigration has several questionable or misleading statements:

1. His page twice refers to the "INS", an agency that hasn't existed since March 2003. While this might seem like a minor error, if whoever wrote that page doesn't even know that the INS no longer exists it tends to raise questions whether the other proposals on that page have been thought through as well.

2. He complains about the Republican leadership cutting funding for the Border Patrol and ICE, without disclosing that the Republicans are split into two camps on this issue: the more open-borders Bush camp (which is aligned with the Democrats) and the pro-borders camp, including Rep. Tancredo.

3. The page includes a picture of - and references - China's Great Wall, without stating that what Winter calls a "wall" is not a wall but a fence, and the fence is similar to fencing already in place on the border.

4. The page falsely states that "Tancredo maintains that we need to corral all 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States and deport them". As Tancredo has pointed out, he prefers attrition and not mass deportations. In fact, the article that section links to ("CBS4 Examines Illegal Immigrant Costs In Colorado") does not state what Winters claims, and instead refers to Tancredo's attrition plan. Under that plan, increased border and workplace enforcement would lead to a large number of illegal aliens leaving voluntarily as well as prospective illegal aliens deciding not to come.

5. The page refers to a study concerning the costs of deporting all illegal aliens from the liberal Center for American Progress. The page does not discuss the ludicrous methodology used in the study, which assumed that the deportations for one year represented a best-case effort, and then divided the number of aliens deported by the agents' salaries. Obviously, the enforcement being done now is not in any way a "best-case effort".

6. The page claims that failing to pass "comprehensive immigration reform" - what most refer to as an amnesty and which would result in somewhere between 20 and 60 million new legal immigrants over 20 years - makes the U.S. more vulnerable. However, the GAO admits that the USCIS is already stretched to the limit and won't even have a fraud management program in place until 2010. And, considering that most of those former illegal aliens who would be made legal workers under the plan Winter supports come from countries with high levels of corruption and low-tech record keeping, the "reform" he supports is a massive recipe for disaster not just because of fraud but also because of the possibility of terrorist infiltration.

7. Winter claims that raising the minimum wage "will take away the incentive to hire illegal workers in the first place". In practice, that's false because that will make illegal labor more attractive and allow current and future illegal aliens to underbid legal workers. (Maybe he got this idea from the Drum Major Institute or from... Michael Dukakis.)

Winter also blogs at... bill-winter.dailykos.com.

Tags: Bill Winter, Tom Tancredo, Tancredo

Posted to Immigration at 10:20 AM | Comments (1)

October 21, 2006

Arnold Schwarzenegger gives power to far-left (immigration letter)

Shortly after the now-infamous Tan Nguyen letter warning "immigrants" against voting surfaced, our Rove-influenced governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, completely capitulated to demands that had not yet been made:

[Arnie] called the letters "racist" and "despicable," and argued the perpetrators should be tried for a hate crime.

Now, he's had his words regurgitated by those who don't have the U.S.'s best interests at heart:

State Democratic Chairman Art Torres said party leaders were planning a rally for Orange County on Tuesday. "It's a hate crime as far as we are concerned," Torres said.

(If the letter is a "hate crime", I wonder what we should call Torres' decade-old quote that "[Proposition 187] is the last gasp of white America in California.")

This incident shows the folly of the GOP trying to be like or giving in to or trying to play the same game as those on the far-left. If Arnold had issued a more moderate statement that included all possibilities and had not included the "hate crime" bit, racists like Torres might still say the same things, but Arnold would not have preemptively given their statements legitimacy and might have even been able to appear as the voice of reason.

Now, he appears to be the same as the racial demagogues on the far-left. And, this will make legitimate attempts to point out that non-citizens can't vote even more difficult and tarnish attempts to investigate possible cases of non-citizens voting. And, it will make the GOP even more beholden to far-left, self-appointed Hispanic "leaders".

For more on the far-left feeding frenzy, see "Many parties pitch tents in Nguyen opposition camp" or "Governor may try to mend fences after G-O-P letter scandal".

The Torres quote is from yet another biased AP article by Peter Prengaman, and its biases might be featured here later. So too with "Nguyen's campaign office raided" by Norberto Santana Jr. and the LAT's "Raids Widen 'Immigrant' Letter Probe" by Jennifer Delson, Christopher Goffard and Mai Tran. The latter contains this intriguing bit:

According to a source close to the investigation, the attorney general's office has determined that an LAPD officer, who is a friend of a worker in Nguyen's office, paid $4,000 on a credit card for the bulk mailing of the letter and used an alias.

Posted to California at 11:49 AM | Comments (6)

Democratic Texas/Mexico/Aztlan flyer confirmed?

I'm sure you all remember this classic:

texas democrats return texas to mexico aztlan

That flyer - showing Texas and Mexico rejoined - was supposedly passed out at the April 9, 2006 illegal immigration march in Dallas. At the time, I wondered whether it was a real poster or a fake.

Now, someone has sent an email to one Sarah from dallasdemocrats.org and says they've received the following reply:

"Yes it is likely one that we produced. I can't seem to get to the part of the site that explains the context of why they showed it though."

Not exactly a full admission, and they might backtrack, but at the very least we can say they haven't disowned it.

Posted to Immigration at 10:55 AM | Comments (2)

Kafka-Wiener race down to wire

From this:

Lydia Wiener is running under the Republican ticket for the job of state representative, 8th Norfolk District. When asked what drove her to make this choice Wiener says it all began with the vote on immigration by current incumbent state Rep. Louis Kafka, D-Stoughton.

Could you please make your own joke in comments? Feel free to insert as many literary allusions as possible, since someone from the GOP or the Democratic Party or even the MSM might accidentally stumble across this blog and I want them to think this is a classy site. Thanks.

Posted to WackyHumor at 07:59 AM | Comments (4)

October 20, 2006

Tucson Citizen endorses former MEChA member Raul Grijalva

The Tucson Citizen has endorsed U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva in his reelection bid for Arizona's Congressional District 7. He's running against Ron Drake (Republican) and Joe Cobb (Libertarian).

Grijalva is not just a former MEChA member, he's proud of his membership in that group. MEChA wants to "liberate" "Aztlan" (the supposed homeland of the Aztecs, which just happens to coincide with the U.S. southwest and parts of Mexico). And, of course, he's a Democrat.

Even Los Angeles' "Mayor Reconquista" Antonio Villaraigosa has (somewhat) renounced that group, saying that he doesn't support their goals. Apparently Grijalva does support their goals.

Grijalva's past affiliations might be a good conversation starter if anyone ever runs across Howard Dean or another leader of the Democratic Party somewhere.

Posted to Immigration at 05:22 AM | Comments (4)

October 19, 2006

ICIRR in suit against Terry Goddard over Western Union wire transfers

The Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights ("ICIRR") is "sponsoring" a class action lawsuit against Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard over that state's program that tries to stop human smuggling by seizing Western Union wire transfers that meet certain criteria. ICIRR is "sponsoring" three nobody plaintiffs - at least one of whom is a legal resident - who had money seized and couldn't get it back because they couldn't prove that the transfers were legitimate. The attorney is Matt Piers; another attorney who may have just filed the papers is Tim Eckstein (azstar).

As detailed at the first link, ICIRR was one of the organizers of the big March 10 Chicago illegal immigration rally as well as of the one on May 1. And, after the first rally, their president Juan Salgado spoke at Los Pinos, the Mexican White House. They were also involved in the smear against Jim Oberweis. Salgado was also appointed to a state commission by Chicago governor Rod Blagojevich. Another group involved in the suit is the Instituto del Progreso Latino, whose Executive Director is Juan Salgado.

But, wait, there's more:

[ICIRR Executive Director Josh] Hoyt acknowledged his organization has received grants in the past from Western Union, and confirmed that some of the information for the lawsuit came from the company. But he said the interest of his group is solely to protect the rights of individuals.

It's like a giant spider's web of sleaze, isn't it? From this:

...Goddard said the company also sent letters to clients, asking those who had funds seized to contact Instituto del Progreso Latino... "They solicited people" for the federal lawsuit, Goddard said. "It's Western Union trying to protect their profits." ...Sherry Johnson, corporate director of media relations for Western Union, said in an e-mail that "while we do have a long-standing relationship with this group, I can assure you that this is a completely independent action by the ICIRR."

As for the POV of "our" representatives, State Rep. Steve Gallardo - naturally a Democrat - nuances his way into supporting illegal immigration (azstar):

"We should not just be using the $500 threshold," he said, but instead require proof of some sort of pattern or other evidence of criminal activity... Goddard said the state provides that proof to the judge who issues each of the damming warrants... Gallardo also said the state's offer to refund funds improperly taken is insufficient because it requires people to go to a government office to prove their ownership in order to get their money back... "That's intimidating for those folks who perhaps may be here undocumented," he said, and simply want to send money home to relatives.

As for Matt Piers, he appears to be a civil rights-style attorney from Chicago. In 2000 or so he was on the other side: suing money transfer companies over hidden fees. He defended the Benevolence International Foundation on a terrorism-related charge. Daniel Drezner appeared on a TV show with him in relation to that. He was involved in another terrorism-related case in the late 90s (ncarl.org/newsletter2004.html). And, in 2001 he was apparently planning to sue both the U.S. and Mexico over monies due Bracero Program workers that had disappeared.

On a slightly related note, see "Maricopa County Attorney: Mexico trying to block Arizona law".

Posted to Immigration at 09:16 PM | Comments (1)

Ramos/Compean case: sentenced to 10+ years, no mistrial

The two Border Patrol agents who appear to have been railroaded by our own government have been sentenced to 10+ years each. Before the sentencing, they filed a last minute motion:

...Mary Stillinger, the lawyer for Border Patrol agent Ignacio Ramos, filed a motion Tuesday to have the verdict set aside and a new trial ordered for the two agents after three jurors said they were coerced by other jurors into finding the agents guilty.

The Daily Bulletin interviewed two of the jurors in late August, after Ramos and his family broke their 18-month silence about the case in an exclusive interview with the newspaper. Robert Gourley and Claudia Torres told the Daily Bulletin they voted guilty because they did not believe Judge Kathleen Cardone would accept a hung jury.

A third juror, Edine Woods, told Stillinger that the three were still voting not guilty after two days of deliberations. The three said they were misled into finding Ramos and fellow agent Jose Compean guilty, according to Stillinger's motion...

This will most likely be a part of whatever appeal is planned.

Posted to Immigration at 03:45 PM | Comments (3)

Western Growers gives Senator Feinstein a big green thumbs up

From their press release:

Western Growers, one of California's largest and most prominent agricultural trade associations, today announced its endorsement of Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) for reelection to the United States Senate.

"Senator Feinstein has represented California with great integrity, honor and skill," said Tom Nassif, President and CEO of Western Growers. "She has been an outstanding member of the United States Senate and has proven that she is a true friend of our industry. Senator Feinstein has consistently supported California agriculture and has been a strong leader for the industry on critical issues such as immigration reform..."

...Western Growers is an agricultural trade association whose 3,000 members grow, pack and ship 90 percent of the fresh vegetables and nearly 70 percent of the fresh fruit and nuts grown in Arizona and California, about one-half of the nation's fresh produce. For more information, visit wga.com

Meanwhile, in older news:

Shortly before Thanksgiving last year, Tom Nassif did something few law-abiding citizens would ever think to do: He called the U.S. Border Patrol here and suggested agents stop manning a highway checkpoint intended to keep illegal immigrants out of the country.

A former U.S. ambassador and currently the president of a powerful farming association, Mr. Nassif told officials that the agency couldn't have picked a worse time to beef up enforcement. Didn't they know it was lettuce season?

Dianne Feinstein, valiantly protecting the U.S. from the specter of mythical $10 a head lettuce by trying to make the Senate amnesty even worse.

In addition to Nassif, a few other favorites serve on the board of the Western Growers Association: Luawanna Hallstrom of Oceanside's Singh & Sons (what harm could illegal aliens do on a Marine Base anyway?) and perennial "crops rotting in the fields" quote source Jon Vessey. Use the search function to find many more quotes from Dianne Feinstein's strong supporters.

Posted to Immigration at 09:10 AM | Comments (3)

ACLU, PFAW, businesses sue Riverside NJ over immigration law

Riverside, New Jersey is one of the cities that have adopted "Hazleton-style" ordinances, and like other cities they're being sued by far-left, pro-illegal immigration organizations such as the ACLU. While this does cost those cities money, and the far-left foundations that support those far-left organizations have very deep pockets, at the end of the day the ACLU and their fellow travelers can only file so many suits.

In the current case, one of the ACLU's helpers is People for the "American" Way. Let's hope that their legal filings are a bit more precise than their misleading press release:

A coalition of Riverside business owners and landlords and residents will file a lawsuit today against the Township of Riverside in state court, contending that the recently adopted Illegal Immigration Relief Act oversteps the city's authority, is too vague, unfairly puts businesses at risk and violates civil rights under state law.

The plaintiffs are represented by attorneys from the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, People For the American Way Foundation, Spear Wilderman, P.C, American Civil Liberties Union Foundation Immigrants' Rights Project, American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey and Ragonese Albano & Viola.

The ordinance is one of the most restrictive of the recent wave of anti-immigrant legislation passed by local governments across the nation. It attempts to ban immigrants from renting, residing, using property or being employed in Riverside. The ordinance, in very broad terms, applies to actions that "aid or abet" undocumented immigrants anywhere in the United States.

"This ordinance is so vague and overbroad that it's virtually impossible to obey and appears to ban a large amount of innocent conduct," said Elliot Mincberg, Vice-President and Legal Director for PFAW Foundation. "Even a hospital or church that allows an immigrant on its premises could be charged with a violation."

Come on, it's OK now, we're all friend here: you can say "illegal".

New Jersey Appleseed and the Seton Hall Law School Center for Social Justice will be filing amicus briefs, and another person involved is David Verduin, "a Riverside business owner and a plaintiff". He's identified here (also here) as the president of the "Coalition of Business Owners and Landlords". That also says that Franco Ordonez, owner of the "King Chicken" (probably "Chicken King") restaurant is another member. (See the "ghost town"-style propaganda piece here from Summer Harlow of Delaware Online in which an employee of that company is quoted and the Coalition is mentioned, but no link between the company and the Coalition is noted.) This page identifies another member as Steve Marino; he's identified as a "landlord" here. A copy of an earlier letter identifies one of the lawyers for the ACLU-IRP as Omar C. Jadwat, Esq., which rings a bell for some reason. And, this page says:

O empresário americano David Verduin lidera uma coalizão de empresários americanos e brasileiros que entrou na Justiça contra a lei antiimigrante de Riverside. Ele morou 20 anos no Brasil e se considera brasileiro de coração. Também sofreu ao ver os brasileiros serem ofendidos.

I take that to say in part that he lived in Brazil for 20 years and considers himself Brazilian in his heart, but I'd appreciate an accurate translation.

I don't know about the members of the CBOL, but obviously a fair number of business owners and landlords in Riverside are making money off illegal immigration. And, if the ACLU wins that would help said business owners and landlords to keep making money off illegal immigration.

I wonder what your average donor to the ACLU thinks of their constant support for illegal immigration? While the ACLU is infamous for accepting a few very unpopular clients, when they're always on the same, wrong side of one issue people have to begin to wonder what's going on.

Posted to Immigration at 05:25 AM | Comments (1)

October 18, 2006

Hispanic voter suppression letter: from a Republican???

This is Part Three of the story of Hispanics in Orange County having received a supposed voter suppression letter, the "WTF Edition".

Looking at the limited amount of evidence available and the attempts by Democrats and illegal immigration supporters to take advantage of it, it seemed very unlikely that the letter could have come from the GOP or an opponent of illegal immigration. Yet, Attorney General Bill Lockyer is now saying that he's focusing on "one or more Republican candidates for office", and sources tell the LAT and the OCR that one of those campaigns is that of Tan Nguyen. He's running against Loretta Sanchez in the 47th Congressional District.

Who would have thought that whoever sent this letter out would do so via bulk mail instead of, for instance, printing it out on an old untraceable printer and putting it into envelopes while wearing gloves (just blue skying here)? Yet, that's what appears to have been done, and the mailing was more extensive than previously considered: around 14,000 letters were supposedly sent out. If Nguyen or another Republican did this, they will have given the Democratic Party a terrific GOTV tool and an issue that will probably be brought up in future Democratic campaigns.

But, bear in mind that Nguyen hasn't been charged with anything and has not issued any sort of a statement.

Also bear in mind that me refering to those in the previous post as "Hacks" still stands: given all of the evidence available, the strong possibility that this was a smear should have been considered, but those sources did not do that.

10/19/06 3pm UPDATE: The latest is that Nguyen blames his since-fired office manager. He refers to "her", but the only paid staffer someone can find is a "he", Ryan Flynn, who's identified as his campaign manager here. Despite that, it could have been a volunteer. The bulk mailing center (Mailing Pros) owner says he didn't deal with Nguyen on the mailer, but OC GOP chairman Scott Baugh says sources there and at the AG's office say Nguyen called to expedite the mailer. However, calling to expedite the mailer doesn't necessarily mean he knew what it contained.

And, you can see the letter here:
maldef.org/pdf/AlbertoGonzales10172006.pdf

Note that that link seems to be accusing CCIR of sending the mailer, something that they deny. Given the current facts, unless there's a link between Nguyen and/or his mystery office manager and CCIR, they were not involved.

Whether MALDEF has libeled CCIR or not remains to be seen.

If you find any examples of people continuing to definitely state that CCIR, the other groups mentioned in the letter, or those opposed to illegal immigration in general were involved in the mailing, please leave the details in comments.

UPDATE 2: On a note related to media bias and the language used in the infamous letter, the NYT's "County G.O.P. Asks Candidate to Withdraw Over Letter Threat" from October 20 2006 by Cindy Chang falsely states: "The candidate, Tan Nguyen, who is running on an anti-immigration platform..." (Despite that wording, I'm positive that Cindy Chang is not the mystery office manager.)

Posted to Immigration at 11:32 PM | Comments (7)

YouTube trackbacks issue: political or technical?

Each YouTube video page has a "Links to this video" section and, even when there are assuredly a large number of such links that have generated massive amounts of traffic to that video, there may be no links at all or the links that are shown seem a bit funky. A case in point is the George Bush Mexican flag waving video linked to from here. I'd imagine that that video has received a dozen or so hits from my post, and most of the rest of the 383 views are from the link at the Human Events page. Yet, at post time, no links are showing.

Alternatively, consider the David Zucker/Madeline Albright ad which has over 700,000 views. The five links shown at post time are 162 clicks from this, and 7, 1, 1, and 1 clicks from various Myspace sites. Yet, one would think that tens or hundreds of thousands of those views were generated by the Drudge link.

And, someone else else has noticed this and says that as of two days ago that Zucker video had no trackbacks showing. Search for "hits back from youtube" at this page.

One will note that in the link to the Bush video I put the URL of the post in urlencoded format like so (line broken up intentionally):

youtube.com/watch?v=PdLqcOt470s
&eurl=http%3a%2f%2flonewacko.com%2fblog [etc.]

I've seen their videos linked plain (youtube.com/watch?v=PdLqcOt470s) and with an empty eurl (youtube.com/watch?v=PdLqcOt470s&eurl=), and I thought that putting the url in the eurl would do the trick.

Whether this is a technical issue or some sort of political filtering is not known.

Posted to Bloggage at 12:04 PM | Comments (3)

Kerry Healey vs. Deval Patrick on illegal immigration

From this:

[Massachusetts gubanatorial candidate] Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey opened a fresh wave of attacks on [fellow candidate] Deval Patrick over the issue of illegal immigration yesterday, launching a TV ad and appearing at a pier in Charlestown to call for illegal immigrants to be denied driver's licenses.

Healey said Patrick's support of driver's licenses for illegal immigrants would lead to fraud and abuse...

...The Patrick campaign said Healey's claim was moot, because a federal law passed last year prohibits the state from issuing driver's licenses to illegal immigrants...

Huh? As discussed in the same article, Patrick supported that which he calls moot earlier this year, and he even supported it just three weeks ago in their big "debate".

Healey also opposed granting in-state college tuition to illegal immigrants, which Patrick, the Democratic nominee, supports. A legislative proposal to grant the tuition break also requires the students to graduate from high school in Massachusetts.

She could end his candidacy and even have some impact on his future career if she would use the right phrasing to explain why that's a bad thing.

Posted to Immigration at 06:54 AM | Comments (1)

Gabrielle Giffords campaign tries to have Minuteman PAC ads pulled

The Minuteman PAC is airing ads in Arizona in support of Randy Graf and in opposition to Gabrielle Giffords. A lawyer from her campaign has sent a letter to the station running the ads trying to get them pulled. He appears to only have problems with one statement from the ad:

AD: "AND GIFFORDS EVEN THINKS ILLEGAL ALIENS SHOULD GET SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS."

FACTS: Giffords' attorney's letter claims that Ms. Giffords "believes that only United States citizens should receive Social Security benefits." However, this letter then contradicts that position, saying that the candidate supports the Kennedy-McCain "immigration reform bill." Both McCain and Kennedy voted against an amendment to that bill introduced by Senator John Ensign that would have stopped illegal aliens from collecting Social Security payments based on their illegal work in the United States. (For more, see Washington Times, May 19, 2006 http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20060518-114132-2456r.htm) It is clearly fair to say, based on her support of that bill, that Ms. Giffords opposes the Ensign Amendment and therefore supports Social Security for Illegal Aliens.

This is a highly semantic area. If the phrase "illegal aliens" is taken to mean "those who are currently illegal aliens but who would be legalized", then the ad is correct. However, if Giffords wants to play games, she could claim that she doesn't want to give SS benefits to "illegal aliens", but only to "legal workers who used to be illegal aliens".

This is further complicated by both the portion of the McCain-Kennedy amnesty and the Ensign amendment, as well as the existence of the proposed Totalization Agreement, which is a separate matter.

The best course of action would be to change the ad to say something like, "she thinks millions of current illegal aliens should be legalized and get Social Security benefits for work performed when they were illegal aliens and might have been using someone else's Social Security number" (or words to that effect). I believe that statement is completely correct.

And, of course, there's the possibility that there's some loophole in one of the bills or agreements somewhere that would in fact give social security to illegal aliens while they still are illegal aliens.

Posted to Immigration at 03:13 AM | Comments (2)

October 17, 2006

Hispanic voter suppression letter: evidence, Arnold, hacks

[UPDATE in Hispanic voter suppression letter: from a Republican???]

This is a follow-up to the story of Hispanics in Orange County having received a supposed voter suppression letter.

In this post I'm going to:

present evidence that the letter was sent by an illegal immigration supporter...
discuss how Arnold Schwarzenegger has been politically emasculated and how his handlers don't have the U.S.'s best interests at heart...
illustrate a PIIPP that the AP has fashioned from the story (no, really)...
and, discuss those hacks who promulgated this story and who have shown that - even with what we know now - they have little journalistic integrity and that their future reports should not be trusted.

** EVIDENCE **

The first possible evidence is to look at who profits from this letter. Clearly, there's very little chance that the sender thought that the letter would not be released to the news media. Because of that, one has to look at those who ultimately profit. This letter is a wonderful Get Out The Vote recruiting tool for the Democratic Party, and even though on its face the letter might be taken as a way of suppressing the Hispanic vote, it will probably increase it. In fact, here's a quote from John Trasvina, "interim president and general counsel for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund": "A lot of people will get angered by this and say, 'No you can't take away my right to vote'". [1] Neither the GOP nor those opposed to illegal immigration profit from this, only those on the other side.
And, one looks at all the coverage that the story has received: the AP, LAT, OCRegister, and several blogs. Certainly, news stories can be written fairly quickly, but this one reads almost like it was written as a script.
For evidence of greater weight, CCIR's Barbara Coe says she's gotten "dozens" of calls from supposed recipients of the letter. What percentage of recipients would feel the need to call? At the most, it would appear that one or two hundred letters were supposedly received. Yet, one of the recipients is one Nellie Diaz [2]. She's not only the wife of Garden Grove City Council candidate Benny Diaz, but she [3] and her husband [4] are both members of the illegal immigration-supporting racial power group LULAC. He also appears to be the California state treasurer of the organization. [5] What are the chances that one of the recipients of what appears to be a small mailing just happens to be a member of a national group that supports illegal immigration?
Here's another excerpt from the letter [6]; see if you can spot a rather curious phrase:
"Be advised that the government of the United States is installing a new computer system to verify the names of all registered voters ... Anti-immigration organization can ask for information from this new computer system."
Which groups use the phrase "anti-immigration"? Almost all groups that are opposed to illegal immigration are very careful about making the distinction between legal and illegal immigration, and take offense at the use of such phrases. In fact, the ones who almost always try to use similar phrases are the MSM and those who support illegal immigration. Even if the writer did not have a full grasp of colloquial Spanish or did a machine translation, they would have had to exclude the "illegal" part of that phrase to begin with. While there's certainly the possibility that the letter came from someone who is opposed to all forms of immigration, the use of the same phrase that supporters of illegal immigration use is very strong evidence that the letter was a joe job.

** ARNOLD **
California's governor - almost certainly based on advice from either Maria or his Rove-linked advisor - has gone overboard and called the letters "racist" and "despicable," and argued the perpetrators should be tried for a hate crime. [7] In his statement, there was no consideration given to the possibility that the letter might be a hoax, yet obviously not only can that possibility not be denied, it seems more than likely. What he's done is not only helped portray those who oppose illegal immigration in a false light, he's also given ammunition to the far-left grievance industry by reflexively taking their side instead of considering all possibilities. This gives far-left, mostly anti-American groups like LULAC and MALDEF even more power and puts his own party even more at the mercy of such groups.

** REPURPOSING PROPAGANDA **
The AP's Peter Prengaman has even taken this story and fashioned a PIIPP out of it [8]:

They've been naturalized U.S. citizens for nearly 20 years, but Benny Diaz says he and his wife felt intimidated when they each received a letter over the weekend warning that some immigrants could be jailed or deported for voting next month.

The letter, written in Spanish and sent to an unknown number of Hispanics in Orange County, also says the government has developed a computer system to track down the names of immigrant voters.

"A lot of Latino families have called me to say they ripped up the letter because they felt so insulted," said Diaz, 49, who is originally from Peru. His wife, Nellie, is from Mexico...

** THE HACKS **
Even if the letter turns out to have been sent by an opponent of (illegal) immigration, the hacks who've promulgated this story have shown that they have little journalistic integrity because none but one of them have considered the possibility that it could have been a joe job, and that single person completely dismisses the possibility. Even with what little we know now about this matter, that is inexcusable, and I suggest that we keep this story in mind when encountering their other tales. These are the hacks:

the AP has at least two stories, both of which were written by Peter Prengaman [1] [9]
the Los Angeles Times' Jennifer Delson [2]
the OC Register's Norberto Santana Jr. [10]
Metroblogging OC's Michael Randall, who dismisses the joe job possibility as in the "whacked out conspiracy theory department".
RawStory (links to AP report; had story at top of page for a while)
"Avedon" posting at Atrios
Ezra Klein at TAPPED
"Alternate Brain"
"On Topic" With Doug Krile"
"Holy Coast"
MoJo
Bakersfield's KGET

** FOOTNOTES **
[1] AP/Peter Prengaman/"Intimidating letter to OC Hispanics being investigated"/link
[2] LAT/Jennifer Delson/"State Investigating Intimidating Letter Sent to O.C. Latinos"/link
[3] Nellie Diaz is listed as the contact for the Garden Grove Council of LULAC here: lulac.net/about/nsearchcouncillsstate.asp?TxtBuscado=CA
[4] According to his bio, Benny Diaz is the president of the Garden Grove Council of LULAC: bennydiaz.com/informed/about_benny_bio.php
[5] calulac.org
[6] ibid 1
[7] ibid 1
[8] ibid 1
[9] AP/Peter Prengaman/"Note warns Calif. Hispanics on voting"/link
[10] OCRegister/Norberto Santana Jr./"Mailer targets immigrants"/link Note also that he says the letter was "sent on letterhead from the California Coalition for Immigration Reform", yet according to the LAT's article in [2], the "letterhead resembles that of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform".

UPDATE: As pointed out by 'eh' in comments, the Los Angeles Times' Jennifer Delson is also the author of another recent pro-illegal immigration piece, the one that discussed "Food Stamps in Four Hours".

And, the TV station KGET has been added to the end of the "Hacks" list for their extremely biased report at the link, which includes this: "The letters were printed on stationary from the strident anti-illegal-immigration organization, the California Coalition for Immigration Reform, whose website has a video that attributes disease in the U.S. to immigration." The video has a statement from CA Democratic Party chairman Art Torres; needless to say, they don't mention his comment from a decade or so ago that "Prop. 187 was the last gasp of white America in California".

There's a slightly-legible video of the letter at that link, and the questionable line discussed above is "Organaciones en contra de la emigracion..." As discussed above, the word "illegal" doesn't appear in that sentence.

There also appears to be a filename at the lower left of the letter, but only the last part of it is legible. It might be revealing to find the rest of that filename, and determine whether it's from the organization that sent it or from a print out from one of the websites of someone who received it or a state agency or similar.

Posted to Immigration at 09:01 PM | Comments (11)

Griffith Park Observatory re-opening tonight (only for "special people")

Los Angeles' famous Griffith Park Observatory has been closed for renovations for a few years. However, it's re-opening tonight... but only for "special people". This dispatch filed by our Roving Bike News Team:

I drove up Hillhurst behind a very, very slow older tour bus with Wyoming plates. It was apparently too wide for the road, and had to even drive partway on the center median, destroying a large portion of the grass surface. I assumed it was for a band or something, and, after I finally got around it I thought nothing of it.

The RBNT biked up the road and soon saw signs saying "O.C.D.", then began seeing television trucks and the like. TV fans probably know what's coming next! Yes, indeed, it was an outside shoot for the television program "Monk". It would have been possible to perhaps see some shooting or something, but our team deciding to keep peddling since we've never seen the show and didn't really care.

Then, after almost completing our loop and stopping outside the locked gate for the Observatory, who should show up but the tour bus we saw earlier. From the conversation he had with the guard, combined with various messages over the guard's walktie-talkie as well as personal reportage by speaking to the mostly non-English-speaking guard we gleaned that the Observatory is opening tonight. But, he said we couldn't go in, since it was just for "councilmembers", people who've "donated millions of dollars", and in general, just for "special people". The buses were going to be ferrying said "special people" from the parking lot below up to the landmark, and they were making a dry run to familiarize themselves with the route. Of course, there's only one route so we suspected they were just going to do some sightseeing.

Our team also gleaned that the VIPs and other "special people" wouldn't start arriving for 45 minutes. Rather than waiting so long for a possible glimpse of Leonard Nimoy or "Mayor Reconquista" (former MEChA member Antonio Villaraigosa), we decided to peddle down the hill for an enjoyable downhill. I hope that TLB HQ is not upset with this decision.

No, not at all. In fact, we would have done the same thing.

The Observatory re-opens for we the hoi polloi on November 3. Let's hope Mayor Reconquista and the other "special people" get their fill tonight and decide to take a pass on that day's festivities.

Posted to Los_Angeles at 05:05 PM | Comments (0)

"Bush Buys Land in Northern Paraguay"

In the past, I've joked about Bush fleeing to some small Latin American country, and I even have a site jokingly suggesting that some people should leave the U.S. However, if questionable reports are to be believed, the Bush family might already have an exit strategy planned.

From this (also here):

Buenos Aires, Oct 13 (Prensa Latina) An Argentine official regarded the intention of the George W. Bush family to settle on the Acuifero Guarani (Paraguay) as surprising, besides being a bad signal for the governments of the region.

Luis D Elia, undersecretary for the Social Habitat in the Argentine Federal Planning Ministry, issued a memo partially reproduced by digital INFOBAE.com, in which he spoke of the purchase by Bush of a 98,842-acre farm in northern Paraguay, between Brazil and Bolivia.

The news circulated Thursday in non-official sources in Asuncion, Paraguay...

The presumed reference doesn't have anything.

From this via this:

The Governor of Alto Paraguay, Erasmo Rodríguez Acosta has admitted to hearing that George Bush Sr. owns land in the Chaco region of Paraguay, in Paso de Patria. Acosta says that rumor has it that Bush owns near to 70 thousand hectares (173,000 acres) as part of an ecological reserve and/or ranch. However, the governor said he had no documents to prove the rumor. Acosta said that some stories credited the land to the Fundacion Patria, which Bush would be a member of. The spokespeople of the organization were not available to comment. Supposedly, Timothy Towell, the U.S. Ambassador in Asuncion (the capital of Paraguay) is the present administrator of the land. First accounts signaled that Bush had acquired 40,000 hectares (99,000 acres) in the Chaco zone of Fuerte Olimpo, near the Bolivian Border. A spark of the interest in this property may have been Jenna Bush's private visit to Paraguay with Unicef, which started Saturday, October 7, 2006. Supposedly Jenna will travel to the ranch to ''observe'' several indigenous villages are located on the property.

Unless documents surface, I suggest considering this just a rumor.

Posted to Miscellania at 01:06 PM | Comments (1)

How the "California Hispanics vote suppression" story will end

raw story trustworthy

Several Orange County CA Hispanics have received a letter (written in Spanish) telling them in part:

"You are advised that if your residence in this country is illegal or you are an immigrant, voting in a federal election is a crime that could result in jail time..."

The AP version of this story has received wide distribution, even as far as France. However, the fullest treatment is that from the Los Angeles Times' Jennifer Delson in "State Investigating Intimidating Letter Sent to O.C. Latinos".

At times like these, it's best to do not as the MSM does and ask, "cui bono?" If anything, this letter will encourage Hispanics to vote, and who profits from such a GOTV effort? Could this be a "false flag operation", with the letter actually having been sent by a Democratic Party operative or supporter or just a regular old supporter of illegal immigration? That possibility can't be denied, but it's one that the Los Angeles Times doesn't explore. (For an example, Karl Rove reportedly did something similar a few decades ago; search for 'letterhead' here.)

The letterhead resembles that of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform, a group that advocates tightening the border, among other things. But the group's founder, Barbara Coe, said she believed it was fraudulent. She said she did not know the person who signed the letter, "Sergio Ramirez," that she did not authorize it and was unaware of anyone in her group who did... [the letter] does not have the group's logo - an outline of the state of California - but has a variation of an eagle logo used on the group's website.

While there's certainly the possibility that the CCIR or an illegal immigration opponent inspired by the CCIR sent out the letter, based on who's trying to profit from the letter I tend to suspect that this was sent out by someone who wanted to both smear CCIR and encourage Hispanics to vote.

And, it's also questionable whether the part of the letter quoted above is false or not. Can "immigrants" really vote? That is, once someone becomes a naturalized citizen, are they no longer an "immigrant"? Aren't they more correctly refered to as a "naturalized citizen who used to be an immigrant"?

Needless to say, the Los Angeles Times (readers.rep *at* latimes.com) doesn't consider those points, prefering to take things at face value.

Those up in arms include MALDEF and Sen. Gloria Romero (D-Los Angeles). And, state Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer (a Democrat) is investigating.

If this letter turns out to have been sent by an illegal immigration opponent, expect them to be tried and sentenced on live television broadcast around the world. If, however, it turns out to have been sent out by an illegal immigration supporter, expect it to be quietly swept under the rug.

UPDATE: There's a barely-legible supposed picture of the letter here. Gosh, it sure looks like this letter is being used as a GOTV tool. I wonder who could have sent it out?

Posted to Immigration at 10:46 AM | Comments (1)

Imagining a "continental future" on your dime

From this:

The master plan for merging the U.S., Mexico and Canada is being devised in American University's Center for North American Studies whose faculty is subsidized by the U.S. State Department through the Fulbright Program.

For example, joining the center this fall as a visiting chairman in North American studies is Canadian Donald Avery, professor emeritus in the history department at the University of Western Ontario. He arrives at American University through the Fulbright Program, funded through the U.S. State Department.

The university's Center for North American Studies is headed by Robert A. Pastor, the architect of a plan for a North American Union modeled after the European Union – complete with its own currency, the Amero, replacing the dollar.

"The Center for North American Studies (CNAS) at American University aims to educate a new generation of students to begin a North American journey comparable to that begun in Europe five decades ago," explains the center's website. "The center examines the differences and shared characteristics of Canada, Mexico and the United States; compares the North American experiment with Europe's; and challenges students and faculty to imagine a continental future."

Their site is at american.edu/ia/cnas

Posted to NAU at 05:23 AM | Comments (2)

October 16, 2006

George Bush, the reconquista president (Mexican flag waving video)

president george bush waving mexican flag video

In 2004, the Bush reelection campaign mailed out a video to Latinos, and the article "Bush's Immigration Message Undermines His Message on Terrorism" informs us that you can see it here. This is the video that was discussed in "Bush uncovered: he doesn't know what country he runs", and it features our president waving the flag of Mexico, apparently at a (Mexican) Independence Day festival in 1998. The circumstances under which it was shot don't matter so much considering that it's on a video designed to appeal to "Hispanics" and that part of his appeal includes a shot of him waving another country's flag. This isn't his only use of that country's flag to appeal to "Hispanics"; his Spanish-language site included the flags of Mexico and various Central American countries.

Not only that, but the video includes the putative U.S. president saying this right at the beginning:

"About 15 years before the Civil War, much of the American West was northern Mexico. The people who lived there weren't called Latinos or Hispanics. They were Mexican citizens, until all that land became part of the United States. After that, many of them were treated as foreigners in their own land."

A full treatment of the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo is beyond the scope of this post. However, if they were then U.S. citizens, then it may be true that some of them were indeed treated that way. On the other hand, if they were still Mexican citizens, then it was no longer their land. I have a feeling that Bush thinks its "their own land" regardless of their citizenship status.

In any case, this is an especially "liberal" point of view, and it crosses well over into "reconquista" territory. (I note also that the L.A. Times quote of what he said on the video didn't include the last sentence above.) On the video, Bush extols the virtues of "Hispanics"; one wonders whether he's also released videos extolling the virtues of other races or ethnic groups. Perhaps the GOP should reconsider how far down Bush's Gramscism and identity politics road it wants to go, since the Dems will always be able to underbid them.

Posted to Immigration at 10:55 PM | Comments (3)

More on the NCLR-linked racial separatist charter school (LAUSD)

Judicial Watch has obtained some documents shedding more light on the "Academia Semillas del Pueblo" (a charter school approved and funded by the Los Angeles Unified School District) and their anti-American agenda.

The more damning aspects are in the PDF file, including an interview with KABC's Doug McIntyre. Despite having a clearly anti-American agenda they were approved by the LAUSD.

And, they've also received funding from the National Council of La Raza (aka National Council of The Race).

Posted to Los_Angeles at 04:20 PM | Comments (1)

Legal, illegal immigration and young Americans losing jobs

Andrew M. Sum (director of the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University) and Paul E. Harrington (their associate director) offer "Two kinds of immigration":

...The overall effects of new immigrant inflows from 2000 to 2005 on American labor markets are unprecedented. Between 2000 and 2005, the total number of employed workers 16 and older in the nation increased by 4.8 million. Over the same time period, the number of new immigrants entering the nation and finding work was estimated to be 4.13 million. This means that new immigrants accounted for 86 percent of the total gain in employment that the nation experienced over the past five years. Our analysis suggests that close to two-thirds of these new immigrant arrivals were unauthorized. Among males, all of the net growth in employment between 2000 and 2005 was attributable to new immigrants. This extraordinary finding casts serious doubt on the common contention that new immigrants simply take jobs that Americans do not want. Can anyone seriously claim that, of the nearly 2.8 million new jobs obtained by male immigrants, not one would have been taken by an American male?

Worse still, the impact of this displacement of native-born workers and established immigrants was concentrated among young people. The total number of native-born people ages 16 to 34 has increased over the past five years, while the number of these young people who reported being employed has fallen by 4.2 million. At the same time, the number of new immigrants ages 16 to 34 who found work between 2000 and 2005 increased by 2.7 million...

Posted to Immigration at 04:16 PM | Comments (1)

Chicago Mexicans want to be "fully binational" (assimilation, melting pot, transnational progressives)

Countless cheap labor pimps have told us that today's immigration is just like yesterday's (a recent example), a statement that's demonstrably false. The latest example of how false that is is provided by "Some Latinos promote dual Mexican-American citizenship" from Lennox Samuels of the DMN:

...As President Bush and others call for assimilation of Latino immigrants, some Hispanics in [the Chicago neighborhood of Little Village/La Villita centered around 26th and Pulaski] and other parts of the country, including North Texas, are on what could be a collision course, pushing to be fully binational, with equal rights in Mexico and the United States and grounded in both societies.

"We're never giving up our Mexican roots," said Maria Cantu-Dougala, assistant vice president of Second Federal Savings [offers ITIN home loans explicitly to illegal aliens] and an American citizen. "I still consider myself Mexican. That's where we're so different from other immigrants. We just can't give it up."

...The United States must avoid "balkanization" and has to maintain its national identity, common culture and common English language "or we will follow the path to the ash heap of history like the Roman Empire," said Rep. John Culberson, R-Texas.

"Arrogant nationalistic attitudes like this, which are blatant violations of American law, along with the uncontrolled mass migration and marching with Mexican flags have combined to push this country over the tipping point in favor of aggressive immigration law enforcement and strict border security," said Culberson, who has criticized White House immigration policy as lax.

He's right, and we not only have a right but a duty to make sure that groups cannot construct nations within our nation. Of course, many Democrats would disagree, a few for ideological reasons and the rest simply because they're corrupt. Then, it's over to the thoughts of someone who appears to be a "transnational progressive" or simply one of those with "binational" inclinations:

...["Migration expert" Jonathan Fox of UC Santa Cruz] calls the phenomenon of Mexicans striving to be members of both U.S. and Mexican societies "civic binationality." It is one of several practices that suggest immigrants are finding new ways to integrate into the U.S., he said...

Then, they discuss "hometown" organizations:

In the U.S., the growth in the number and sophistication of associations that link immigrants to their hometowns in Mexico has helped the immigrants participate more fully in American civic life while maintaining close relationships with the mother country, experts said.

Then:

[U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo], a longtime immigration foe [note: that's a false statement], said that even the notion of dual citizenship is "an oxymoron," and that being an American citizen means renouncing all prior allegiances and loyalties.

But the issue is not one of loyalty, said Paula Cruz Takash, a sociology professor at the University of California at Los Angeles.

"Anyone who understands that we have to be thinking about global citizenship will appreciate this notion of civic binationality," she said. "Any country that understands and encourages the acquisition of not just one other language but maybe others will be at an advantage as globalization goes ahead."

Obviously, the question is indeed one of loyalty: when the chips are down, which side is someone going to be on? If we have a dispute with Mexico, is someone with dual citizenship going to support the U.S., or Mexico?

Then:

A majority of Latinos, 57 percent, believe immigrants have to speak English to be part of American society, according to Pew, while 41 percent say they do not.

It's good what the majority said, but obviously 41 percent is a very large minority opinion and one that should be worrisome. Then, it's over to a somewhat curious statement from a senator:

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said some in Mexico may "have visions of the North American Union . . . where borders become less important."

"But I see zero support for that in the United States. I think our history and traditions are so strong, and our identity as unique people would never allow that to happen."

Posted to Immigration at 05:49 AM | Comments (0)

Congressional subcommittee has dire report on border security

On Tuesday, the House Committee on Homeland Security's Subcommittee on Investigations will release a report on border security with highly troubling conclusions. The only information I can find on it is in this video report, which says that 100 737's worth (I guess that would be around 15,000) illegal aliens cross the Mexican border each day. The report also says that drug cartels control all traffic coming from Mexico over the border and that we might be catching as few as 1 in 10 illegal aliens coming over the border, and also only a fraction of the drugs.

That doesn't mean, however, that those cartels "control the border". The U.S. still - to a certain extent - has control over the U.S. side of things, but of course, that control is weakened due to actions taken by the GOP and the Democrats.

The report also says that those cartels have infiltrated Mexican law enforcement. I'm absolutely positive that the report doesn't consider the possibility that some "Americans" might have been corrupted. Unfortunately, due to all the money involved and due to the actions various "Americans" take, that possibility isn't as outrageous as it might seem. For the most outrageous possibility of all, see this for some interesting links between George Bush and some interesting people.

Posted to Immigration at 02:48 AM | Comments (1)

October 15, 2006

Political TV ads in California

Here's a recent round-up of California political ads from the television:

1. Ad from Republican Steve Poizner (or friends) in opposition to Democrat Cruz Bustamante for Insurance Commissioner. Shows the back of a balding person (presumably Cruz) holding out a large bag while people walk by dumping cash in the sack while winking. Not-so-subtle subtext: Cruz is dirty. Compare with this March 30 2006 article:

Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, the leading Democratic candidate for state insurance commissioner, has taken large contributions and accepted free meals and travel from the industry he seeks to regulate... In the past year, Bustamante has received more than $120,000 in campaign donations from insurance companies, their trade groups and individual brokers, records show... He and top aides also have accepted from those in the insurance industry hundreds of dollars in free meals and travel expenses at restaurants and resorts in Pebble Beach, Las Vegas and San Diego -- some of which Bustamante did not report on his disclosure statements, according to records.

Meanwhile, the former MEChA member seems to be preparing for a life after politics as a still-guru weight loss guru: startwithcruz.com. That's listed as the official site for his campaign: aroundthecapitol.com/IC/Elections

2. Former California governor Jerry Brown - nicknamed "Moonbeam" for his occasionally outrageous proposals and antics - has an ad calling his opponent for Attorney General, Chuck Poochigian, "too extreme for California". The ad is fact-checked here. While this site isn't exactly an opponent of JB, many people would call him the "extremist", not the other way around. And, those featured in the ad making them claim are:
- Jason Fox, a "Sargeant of Police" from "San Francisco" (he's with the SFPD, see below)
- Randy Hayes, founder of the Rainforest Action Network
- Kathy Kneer, president of Planned Parenthood of California
- Lisa Seitz, "Scientific Researcher"
The announcer makes the claim as well, while a black & white of Poochigian being embraced by George Bush plays for several seconds.

In California terms, PP and RAN might be considered the "extremists", but things are different here. As the fact-check above says, "Seitz is a former Brown appointee to the Oakland Public Ethics Commission... Hayes once held a top appointed post in Brown's mayoral office." Her husband, meanwhile, is the guitarist for a hitherto unheard-of rock 'n' roll band called the NakedBarbies, featuring the attractive Patty Spiglanin.

Note also that Fox' employer (SFPD) is not provided, since apparently that's against state law. That law, and another ad about the weapons Fox discusses, is discussed here.

3. Now we come to one of the strangest - in the pathetic sense - ads that I've ever seen. It has to be seen to be believed, featuring the back of a "young Phil" looking at a poster saying "Dump Nixon". The narrator intones: "In 1972, a young man from California saw a sign that changed his life forever..." Supposed facts are presented, but the music is what makes this special: "Let Your Love Flow (Like a Mountain Stream)" which, if it had been the original Bellamy Brothers version would be bad enough. However, in this case it appears to have been performed by the World's Worst Bread Cover Band. The ad hits squarely onto a major demographic in California: those who are still stuck in the 70s. Phil is one of you.

Posted to California at 05:14 PM | Comments (2)

Diana Furchtgott-Roth vs. George Borjas

Diana Furchtgott-Roth - "a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, where she directs the Center for Employment Policy. From 2003 to 2005 she was chief economist of the U.S. Department of Labor" who appears to be a cheap labor pimp along the lines of Tamar Jacoby - offers an attempted takedown of George Borjas' black unemployment study in "The Borjas Blame Game".

She discusses several issues that I'm going to defer to economists who've studied these issues. I note, however, that she bases some of her article on studies by David Card (University of California, Berkeley) and Giovanni Peri (University of California, Davis).

Instead, let's concentrate on the parts where I know (rather than just suspect) that she's wrong:

To take a simple example, if a construction firm cannot find plasterers or stucco masons, an occupation overwhelmingly performed by foreign-born workers, it can do fewer jobs than a firm that had these immigrants on the payroll. With fewer jobs, employment of both immigrants and native-born Americans declines. Of course, some might say that the construction firm just needs to offer more money to plasterers and stucco masons, and then more native-born Americans would take the jobs. But since the price would be higher, fewer projects would be completed. So employment for native-born Americans could decline.

Given a fixed amount of money spent on house building, there will be a fixed amount of demand for stuccoing. With fewer stuccoers, that firm will need to raise wages. If those raised wages ripple upwards to the cost of houses, demand for house building might fall. It probably won't have enough of an effect, and those workers will have more disposable income. If it does have too much of an effect, that firm will need to come up with an alternative, such as an alternative to stuccoing or someone will invent a stuccoing machine. Having access to a large pool of "foreign-born workers" reduces the possibility that such a machine will be invented, retarding innovation.

Just as Italians and Germans assimilated and produced generations of tax-paying Americans and many Nobel prizewinners, so the same will undoubtedly happen with immigrants from other parts of the world.

Of course, there are huge differences between today's immigration and past immigration. That includes such glossed-over matters as Italy never having owned any part of our country, Germany being thousands of miles away instead of right next door, "multiculturalism", and on and on. Since there's no way to hold Furchtgott-Roth or her descendents responsible if she's wrong, perhaps we should do a cost-benefit analysis and determine whether the rewards from what she promotes is worth the possible costs if she's wrong.

Blaming immigrants for the incarceration rates of African-Americans is a sign of desperation.Will they next be held responsible for Iraq and Hurricane Katrina?

That would be a cute statement if it weren't for the fact that after Katrina the former residents were moved out and illegal aliens were moved in to take jobs that they should have been doing. The American public not only paid to warehouse Americans in Atlanta and Houston, they paid inflated multi-level contracts to connected contractors. And, we continued to offer welfare to NO's underclass rather than trying to get them working in, for instance, construction trades. And, those illegal aliens worked with lesser regard to safety regulations, perhaps resulting in future health problems.

In the universe of people like Furchtgott-Roth, that's considered a "market".

Posted to Immigration at 01:00 PM | Comments (3)

October 14, 2006

"Food Stamps in Four Hours" (Mexican consul+USDA)

From the LAT:

Though it goes against the conventional wisdom of anti-illegal immigration supporters, those who enroll the poor in the federal food stamp program say they've struggled for years to get immigrant Latino families signed up.

Now a Spanish-language news report and television ad campaign have spurred thousands of immigrants in Orange County over the last several weeks to contact a nonprofit organization that offers a Spanish-language class called "Food Stamps in Four Hours." [offered at the El Modena Community Center in Orange]

..."They won't come on their own," said Jerry Sanders, food bank manager of the nonprofit Community Action Partnership of Orange County in Garden Grove.

...A Los Angeles County Department of Social Services task force is looking at ways to find eligible families to enroll. County workers have signed up families at food banks with only minor success.

...In 2004, Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Service and the Mexican Embassy agreed to jointly disseminate brochures and create the public service announcements.

The agreement led Mexican Consul Luis Miguel Ortiz Haro to tout the food stamp program on Univision's KMEX Channel 34 six weeks ago. The newscast included the partnership's phone number. More than 1,200 people called the partnership in the following days, Sanders said.

Then, two weeks ago, the Department of Agriculture [lead by illegal immigration supporter Mike Johanns] began to air a monthlong series of ads on Spanish-language television in Southern California and three other markets in the U.S.

...In Orange County, several of those attending a recent "Food Stamps in Four Hours" class said they were convinced it was legitimate when they saw Ortiz Haro on television.

[The Mexican consul said on TV:] "This program is not welfare. It won't affect your immigration status... The program is a right, and if we don't use it, it's a privilege that will pass you by."

One of the selling points/lies that cheap labor pimps use is that mentioned in the first paragraph: that illegal aliens are not big users of public welfare. You've probably heard something like, "we're/they're just here to work, not to get welfare." This article shows that it's not because they won't take it, they're just afraid of being deported or of jeopardizing an immigration application. But, once someone they trust (a Mexican leader) tells them it's safe, they'll take it. As I type this, some of the pimps are scratching yet another lie off their list of talking points.

What this program boils down to is a massive subsidy to those who employ those illegal aliens at low wages. It's also a massive subsidy to the Mexican government which doesn't have to take care of their own people, they can push them off on the sucker country next door. And, it's also a boon to the Democratic Party, which has a new set of people who'll become dependent on the welfare state and who will vote Democratic in order to keep their "rights" flowing.

While there's probably little that can be done to stop this program, it and all the other points raised at this site can and should be used to discredit those who explicitly or implicitly support illegal immigration. Discrediting them is easy, the only problem is finding a way to do it in as public a fashion as possible. The current campaign season provides a wonderful opportunity to try to ask tough questions of candidates, so please tell everyone you know to get out there and start discrediting those on the other side.

Posted to Immigration at 05:29 AM | Comments (5)

October 13, 2006

Jim Kolbe's... camping trip... with pages?

Normally such possible smears wouldn't be featured at a high-minded site like this, but considering that Jim Kolbe is an open-borders loon, I'm making an exception: "Feds probe trip that Kolbe made with pages":

Federal prosecutors in Arizona have opened a preliminary investigation of a camping trip Congressman Jim Kolbe, R-Ariz., took 10 years ago that included two teenage congressional pages, a Justice Department spokesman told NBC News. NBC News first reported on the camping and rafting trip on Tuesday...

...As NBC News first reported, Kolbe took a tour down the Grand Canyon in July 1996 with a group that included two 17-year-old males who had recently left the congressional page program.

National Park Service employees also were on the three-day trip, along with several Kolbe staffers and the congressman's sister. Kolbe, the only openly gay Republican legislator in both houses of Congress, had not acknowledged his homosexuality publicly at the time...

Posted to Politics at 03:59 PM | Comments (1)

October 12, 2006

Bush's latest open borders hot air

President Bush's latest open borders blather is even more incoherent than usual. If not for the use of words like "truncated", "abutting", and "leverage", I might think he was retarded. Maybe it's not so much something like that as a combination of the fact that he can't think up any new ways to try to sell "the folks" on something that they don't want and also the fact that he doesn't think that many of "the folks" are bright enough to figure out that he's a corrupt liar.

To make it even more incoherent, I've removed the paragraphs (source: whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/10/20061011-5.html):

Yes, we're going to do both, Joe. We're just going to make sure that we build it in a spot where it works. I don't -- DHS said they want a virtual wall. I don't believe that's the only thing they've said. I think you might have truncated their statement, because we're actually building fence, and we're building double fence in particular -- in areas where there is a high vulnerability for people being able to sneak in. You can't fence the entire border, but what you can do is you can use a combination of fencing and technology to make it easier for the Border Patrol to enforce our border. I happen to believe, however, that in order to make sure the border is fully secure, we need a guest worker program, so people aren't sneaking in in the first place. And so I look forward to not only implementing that which Congress has funded, in a way that says to folks, the American people, we'll enforce our border, but I'm going to continue to campaign and work for a comprehensive bill so that whatever we do in terms of equipment and manpower works better. If somebody is not trying to sneak in to work, in other words, coming through in a way where they're showing a temporary worker pass, where they're not using coyotes to smuggle across, where they're not going through tunnels, it's going to make it much easier for us to do our job, Joe, and that's enforce the border. And so my judgment is, if the people want this country secure, we've got to do -- have a smart border, which we're in the process of developing now. It's a combination of fencing and technologies -- UAVs, sensors. I don't know if you've ever been down there, but it's a pretty vast part of country down there. It's hard to enforce that border. You've got some rugged country; you've got stretches of territory where you don't even know where the border is. You've got urban areas, like El Paso, or Southern California, where people have been able to sneak in by use of urban corridors. And so, therefore, fencing makes sense there. I went down to Arizona, the Arizona sector, and saw a place where there's literally neighborhoods abutting the border, and people come -- a hundred of them would rush across the border into a little subdivision, and the Border Patrol would catch two or three, and 97 would get in. And they're asking, what are you going to provide to help us do our job? And in this case, those who are in charge of coming up with the proper strategy to enforce the border said, we need double fencing with space, so that the Border Patrol can use that fencing as leverage against people rushing into the country. And my only point to you is that the strategy to develop this border requires different assets based on the conditions -- based upon what the terrain looks like. And that's what we're doing. But I repeat to you, when you've got a situation where people are sneaking in to do jobs Americans aren't doing, it's also going to keep a strain on the border. And so, therefore, a temporary worker plan, to me, makes sense, and it's a much more humane program -- approach, by the way. It will certainly help stamp out all these illegal characters that are exploiting human beings. You know, these coyotes that stuff people in the back of 18-wheelers for money is just -- that's not in character with how this nation works. And I think we ought to -- I think a good program that helps us enforce our border also will see to it that people are treated more humanely. Thank you for your interest.

Posted to Immigration at 11:33 PM | Comments (4)

Atlanta Federal Reserve tries dodge on indirect support for illegal activity

Yesterday Lou Dobbs covered (alternate) the story of the U.S. Federal Bank trying to profit from indirect illegal activity by making it easier for illegal aliens to send remittances back to Mexico:

The Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank, which runs the Directo a Mexico program, says immigration laws are not its area of focus.

Congress oversees the Federal Reserve, and if one of their banks tries to pass the buck in this way then they should either be sued or Congress should make sure that they understand the "illegal" part of "illegal immigration".

Please write your representatives and demand that they take actions to make the Fed drop this program. If you contact your reps, leave their responses below.

Posted to Immigration at 02:35 PM | Comments (1)

Mexican group allegedly funding Hezbollah terrorists

From Reuters:

Mexican and U.S. agents are investigating a group in Mexico that they believe is funding Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas, two newspapers reported on Thursday.

Mexico started the investigation three months ago on a request from the United States, which is helping in the probe, the daily El Universal said.

The alleged cell is suspected of financing Hezbollah rather than planning attacks itself, according to the Milenio newspaper.

Milenio said the attorney general's office in Mexico has compiled a list of people and companies it believes have provided funds to support Hezbollah, but no names were given.

Lebanon's ambassador was critical.

"This is part of a fear campaign from those who believe they are fighting against terrorism," Nouhad Mahmoud told Reuters. He said he knew nothing about an investigation of a Hezbollah cell in Mexico: "We have no idea, we only saw this in the newspapers."

Posted to Immigration_terror at 12:46 PM | Comments (1)

Peter Bagge is an idiot (Reason Magazine open borders cartoon)

The Reason Magazine cartoonist offers a fine slab of pro-open borders propaganda in the cartoon ending here. Let's take a look at a few of his points and see what he doesn't know or isn't telling his readers. (I'm fisking a cartoon?)

The cartoon ends with a plea to literally erase the borders, oddly enough just like the "delete the border" loons and just like the North American Union proposals. The last pane starts with this:

Our current "leaders" continue to wallow in factoids, demonization, and xenophobia when it comes to this issue. Here are some of the most overused arguments against allowing poor people to enter our country:

It's odd how libertarian open borders supporters frequently use the same race-card tactic as "liberals" and those on the far-left.

"There are terrorists among them!" The 9/11 attackers flew first class. They didn't get here by swimming across the Rio Grande! ...Why would any terrorist choose to sneak across the U.S.-Mexican [sic] border? They may be crazy, but they ain't stupid!

It would be extraordinarily stupid to assume that just because one set of terrorists arrived here legally then all future terrorists will do the same. In fact, if we close loopholes that allow them to come here legally or more closely scrutinize those who come here legally, then terrorists may choose to sneak over one of our borders (or through a port; see the guy who was caught in a shipping container).

As for the hijackers, some of their visa applications had gaping holes, such as lacking a real address ("Visas that Should Have Been Denied"). The same mindset that encourages illegal immigration may have been involved with those who enabled "Visa Express". See "Open Door for Saudi Terrorists", "Visas for Terror", and... this Reason page. And, see "9/11 hijackers were illegal aliens; Senate bill would have given them a loophole".

See the 9/11 Commission Staff Report for past examples of terrorists being very well aware of our immigration laws. While they prefer legal entry, the report touches on possible illegal entry to the U.S. and past instances of terrorists bribing border officials or entering illegally in other countries. See also "U.S. Fears Terrorism Via Mexico's Time-Tested Smuggling Routes", "Study: Terrorists Exploit Immigration Laws", "Immigration Laws Might Have Stopped Sept. 11 Plot", and pretty much every post in my terrorism and immigration category.

But, wait, there's more: the 9/11 hijackers took advantage of the illegal immigration infrastructure to help them remain here. One of the 9/11 hijackers used a "feature" designed for use by illegal aliens to obtain a CA DL. Two other 9/11 hijackers obtained VA DLs with the help of an illegal alien and the illegal immigration infrastructure that corrupt politicians have allowed to develop.

Much more could be said, but let's move on to this:

"They want to reclaim the southwest for Mexico!" I can't believe how much traction this "Reconquista" conspiracy theory gets, given that only a handful of lunatics with incoherent websites are advocating it [picture is of sweating blogger viewing aztlan.net-style website] Why would any Mexican immigrant want the place he just moved to become [sic] part of the economic basketcase he just fled from?

Several prominent Mexican-"American" politicians are former members of the racial separatist group MEChA, the group that says they want to "liberate Aztlan". Those include: Los Angeles' mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, CA State Senator Gil Cedillo, CA Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, and even a U.S. Representative, Raul Grijalva. And, it's not just that they're former members of a group with an extremist, anti-American, "reconquista" ideology. It's also that due to "liberalism" and corruption, the Democratic Party, the MSM, and even the GOP refuse to take them to task for their past involvement. That enables such ideologies to flourish and spread under the radar of most Americans.

And, that same "liberal" mindset enables "reconquistadores" to hide behind "race shields" and encourages race-based power and solidarity. Given a critical mass, racial demagogues like those in the California legislature could take advantage of that to start the process towards some form of secession, encourage closer ties with Mexico, and the like. Bagge might want to read up on past ethnic nationalism movements, specifically those in Europe in the last century. Someone like Villaraigosa or Cedillo - or even more extreme younger people schooled in Ethnic Studies - wouldn't sell their plan as making California into Mexico, it would just end up that way.

Posted to Immigration at 11:08 AM | Comments (3)

Pahrump anti-illegal immigration ordinance; bucks rotting in the banks?

The city of Pahrump Nevada - former home to Art Bell - is considering a "Hazleton-style" ordinance, but with the additional twist of trying to block banks from doing business with illegal aliens. In response, Timothy Pratt of the Las Vegas Sun offers a slab of pro-bank propaganda in "Bank on it becoming more difficult if Pahrump's anti-immigrant act passes". The story was picked up by the AP, and there's more on the author below.

The whines from the banks quoted in the article are somewhat reminiscent of the same whines emanating from growers in the long line of "crops rotting in the fields" propaganda:

"How do I do business in Pahrump with an ordinance like this?" said Bill Martin, president of Nevada State Bank, which has two branches in the fast-growing town an hour's drive west of Las Vegas. [...later in the article he says:] "If somebody pays a landscaper with a check, and it's a good check, and the landscaper comes in to cash the check, are we breaking the law if we cash the check? ...If they (customers) look Hispanic, do I ID them? Can I profile? I don't think so... [ordinances like the current one] has been done around the country... They've actually seen businesses pick up and leave. Some of the towns ... have suffered because of these ordinances."

And, there's a threat to get banking associations involved:

Kirk V. Clausen, regional president of Wells Fargo Nevada - and whose bank was among the first to accept the consular ID cards to open accounts - said not accepting the cards "would be a huge concern."

Clausen said he would look to the bankers association for guidance and intends to let the group know that "there's a conflict here, we need to resolve it."

And, of course, there's the expected bias:

The card, nearly 106,000 of which have been issued by the consulate in the last four-plus years, is not an immigration document and confirms only the identity and current residence of its bearer.

First, he doesn't name the "card", but of course he's refering to Matricula Consular cards, often called "IDs for illegals". That old card was revived for use by illegal aliens and if someone has that card it's a very strong indicator that they're an illegal alien because legal immigrants have no use for that card when doing business in the U.S. And, Mexican consuls freely admit that they hand them out to their citizens irrespective of their immigration status. In brief, Timothy Pratt isn't telling the whole truth about the cards.

Which brings us back to the reporter and/or editors at his newspaper. The third link above has more on a previous article in which he portrayed a far-left group as moderate. In a previous report (original article here) he failed to disclose a key affiliation of a pro-illegal immigration protester; that affiliation was disclosed not just in the related AP report (!) which drew on the LV Sun article, but also in an earlier, more human interest Pratt article.

Posted to Immigration at 05:19 AM | Comments (1)

October 11, 2006

The latest "Dirty" Harry Reid scandal

The AP says:

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid collected a $1.1 million windfall on a Las Vegas land sale even though he hadn't personally owned the property for three years, property deeds show.

In the process, Reid did not disclose to Congress an earlier sale in which he transferred his land to a company created by a friend and took a financial stake in that company, according to records and interviews.

The Nevada Democrat's deal was engineered by Jay Brown, a longtime friend and former casino lawyer whose name surfaced in a major political bribery trial this summer and in other prior organized crime investigations. He's never been charged with wrongdoing - except for a 1981 federal securities complaint that was settled out of court...

Those with an interest in accountancy can read the rest. Those with an interest in seeing DailyKos trying to chalk this up to just not filling out a form and offering Reid's side of things can click here. Note that Kos only answers the disclosure part, and doesn't discuss the backstory and whether there was a quid pro quo that resulted in this windfall.

And, indeed, the windfall appears to have come about because of legislative actions that Reid took regarding the Coyote Springs development project. Reid put a lot of effort into a allowing a developer (Harvey Whittemore) to build a housing project on a large parcel an hour outside Las Vegas. And, he and his sons received tens of thousands in donations from that developer. And, it appears that this windfall involves that developer. More on that here. And, here are several more links about "dirty" Harry Reid.

UPDATE: The AP has a video report here, including audio of "dirty" Harry hanging up the phone on them when asked about the deal.

Posted to Politics at 08:44 PM | Comments (3)

Young Britons want to be chipped?

Could anyone be in so much of a hurry to consume that they would want to have a chip installed subcutaneously in their body in order to make check out so much more convenient? Apparently, if we're to believe an industry-conducted survey, the youth of Britain have been so cowed that they would accept this:

Some customers are willing to have microchip implants as a means of paying in stores, a report out today says.

Teenagers are more open to the idea of having a high-tech shopping experience, the Tomorrow's Shopping World report suggests.

Around 8 per cent of 13 to 19-year-olds were open to the idea of microchip implants while 16 per cent wanted trolleys to be fitted with SatNav systems.

This compared to just 5 per cent and 12 per cent respectively for adults asked the same questions. Two thirds of teenagers and 62 per cent of adults questioned for grocery think tank IGD's report wanted self-scanning systems at shop check-outs.

Some 7 per cent of people in both age groups were willing to use biometric iris or retina recognition payment systems...

As discussed elsewhere in this category, several schools in the U.S. and England use similar schemes for mundane tasks such as paying for lunches. While promoters and useful idiots discuss how convenient it is, or how it's for safety, the bottom line is to obtain control and to make money. And, since those who are now adults would tend to resist such invasions of privacy, they're willing to get children used to the idea so that, as shown by this study, they'll go along with it as they get older.

Posted to Privacy at 03:58 PM | Comments (0)

U.S. Federal Reserve to enable illegal immigration

There's a lot of money to be made off illegal activity, and the U.S. Federal Reserve (FAQ) is trying to get a piece of the pie. The subscriber-only WSJ article "U.S. Banks Woo Migrants, Legal Or Otherwise" has this preview:

As U.S. leaders craft policies to curb illegal immigration from Mexico, the U.S. Federal Reserve is devising programs to extend banking services to undocumented immigrants. A new remittance program aims to bring Mexican migrants who send money home into the mainstream U.S. financial system, regardless of their immigration status.

Dubbed "Directo a Mexico," the remittance program enables U.S. commercial banks to make money transfers for Mexican workers through the Federal Reserve's own automated clearinghouse, which is linked to Banco de Mexico, the Mexican central bank.

To use the service, a Mexican need only possess a matricula consular, an I.D. issued...

Expect the crooks behind this program to use everything they've got to support it should it meet any opposition. That will include everything from playing the race card to playing the terrorism card. But, the bottom line is that they're willing to put making money ahead of everything else, including their loyalty to this country.

The federal government profiting from, enabling, and encouraging illegal activity is an extraordinarily dangerous situation and undermines our entire political system.

I urge everyone to try to bring this program to wider attention through the internet, calling in to radio shows, attending speeches by politicians and trying to get them to publicly oppose this scheme, and similar.

UPDATE: A longer excerpt is here. See also the April 16, 2004 speech "Financial Access for Immigrants: The Case of Remittances" by Ben Bernanke. At the time he was a governor of the Fed, now he's the chairman. It discusses "immigrants", but does not contain any instances of "illegal alien" or even "undocumented". However, this quote makes clear that he is considering both legal immigrants and illegal aliens under the same "immigrants" banner:

...Concern that opening a bank account may require proof of legal residence may inhibit some immigrants from doing so (in fact, many banks now accept foreign-provided documents such as the matricula consular); but lack of knowledge about the services banks offer and the fees they charge is likely an important factor as well...

UPDATE 2: The Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond's "Region Focus" magazine from Summer 2006 puts a bright smiley face on illegal activity with "The (Illegal) Immigrant Effect" by Doug Campbell of the bank. He's also the author of "Searching for the Hidden Economy" from their Spring 2005 edition. While both articles discuss the downsides of illegal activity and studies such as those from Borjas, one is struck by, shall we say, the lack of a moral compass. And, the first article also contains this whopper:

Perhaps the only thing that can be said with certainty about immigration's economic impact is in identifying its main beneficiaries: They are the immigrants themselves, people like Javier.

I guess it boils down to how you define "main". Obviously, those who employ illegal aliens are making scads of money, as are those who are trying to tap into the flow such as major banks and even the Federal Reserve.

Posted to Immigration at 05:16 AM | Comments (3)

October 10, 2006

NYT: Border fence to be built, jaguars hardest hit

The New York Times has an interesting piece in their Science section on jaguars returning ("Gone for Decades, Jaguars Steal Back to the Southwest"). It's similar to a 2005 Smithsonian article ("Return of the Jaguar?"). However, as with, oh just as an example, Communist regimes, contemporary threads designed to enlighten and inform are woven into the NYT's article:

...And then there is the fence. If the Border Patrol builds a 700-mile barrier in the region to deter illegal immigration, the natural corridors used by jaguars and other migratory wildlife will be cut off...

...An environmental group based in Tucson, however, the Center for Biological Diversity, does not think enough is being done to protect the jaguar. When the United States Fish and Wildlife Service announced in July that it would not declare parts of New Mexico and Arizona critical habitat for jaguars — arguing that the animals do not breed there — the group filed an intent to sue. The matter rests in federal court.

Of course, if the Border Patrol built an effective barrier in the mountains where jaguars cross into the United States, "it'd be all over," said Jon Schwedler of the Northern Jaguar Project. "You could kiss the jaguar goodbye."

While the CBD isn't quoted in the article as specifically opposed to the fence, they were featured in an article called "Experts say border fence would hurt bighorn sheep".

Between the jaguars and the bighorn sheep, "liberals" have all the lawsuit fodder they need to keep the cheap labor flowing for years.

Posted to Immigration at 11:47 AM | Comments (5)

Miranda Vagg transcribes growers pining for cheap labor

Miranda Vagg of the "Greater Niagara Newspapers" group (printed in New York's "Lockport Union-Sun & Journal") offers a slab of pro-illegal immigration propaganda called "IMMIGRATION RAIDS: Local farmers reeling from busts". It bears many of the hallmarks of similar stories:

* growers whine about crops rotting in the fields due to immigration enforcement and complain about losing money...
* it fails to note at least two key affiliations of someone quoted...
* Godwin's law is invoked.

It starts:

Crops are rotting as a consequence of recent immigration raids in Orleans, Niagara, Monroe and Genesee counties.

"I'm probably going to end up leaving $2 million worth of crop in the field and it's adding up every day," said Maureen Torrey, who owns Torrey Farms, located in Orleans, Niagara and Genesee counties...

Vagg doesn't disclose two of Torrey's key links: she's co-chairman of United Fresh Produce Association, and on September 13 she and Senator Larry Craig (R-ID) held a rally on Capitol Hill in support of the AgJobs amnesty, something that Torrey Farms has also endorsed.

Then, we get to the misunderstanding/overacting/drama queen part of the article:

Torrey likened her recent experience with immigration officials to war.

"It's a dirty job and we stand next to them, working together, and then to see these people chased, you feel like it's Germany all over again," she said.

Watching those she works with every day get taken away is like having a death in the family, Torrey added...

She wasn't likening it to "war", she was likening it to Nazi Germany, with ICE in the role of the Gestapo. A similar statement from a cheap labor pimp is in this post, which links to other pimps saying similar things. One wonders whether Vagg wasn't paying attention or whether she just needs extra help to understand how inflammatory Torrey was trying to be.

Apparently despite her influence, Torrey was raided, and she makes some perhaps exagerated claims regarding that. Then, we get this interesting note:

Torrey said she was raided once before, in 1997. The workers at Torrey Farms are referred to her by the NYS Department of Labor.

If that's true, and if some of those refered workers turn out to be illegal aliens, does that mean that the NYSDL isn't checking immigration status of those they refer, or did they check but they put them through anyway? Maybe a real reporter should check that out.

And:

[Robin Roberts, owner of Lynnette & Sons in Kent] and other local growers have requested a meeting with Attorney General Eliot Spitzer to discuss the reasons why the government is targeting agriculture workers.

He'll probably be sympathetic to their "plight"; the last link has a quote from him verging on him supporting declaring New York state to be a sanctuary for illegal aliens.

Previously in this long series: Crops rotting in the fields... enforcing immigration laws to blame?

Posted to Immigration_piipps at 05:38 AM | Comments (4)

October 09, 2006

Democrats Sam Zamarripa, Pedro Marin at march organized by former Mexican consul

Yet another illegal immigration march was held on Saturday. This was in Atlanta and only an estimated 2000 people showed up. One of the organizers of the march was a former Mexican consul general. Two local Democratic Party elected officials led the march. This is yet another link between the Democratic Party and the Mexican government or institutions.

According to the report "Latinos call for legalization":

State Sen. Sam Zamarripa (D-Atlanta), state Rep. Pedro Marin (D-Duluth), Tisha Tallman, regional counsel for the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and Jerry Gonzalez of the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials walked arm-in-arm at the head of the march.

An AP report from Saturday ("Another immigration legalization rally held in Atlanta", link) included the news that one of the organizers of the march was Teodoro Maus, former Mexican consul in Atlanta.

What, you might ask, are two Democratic Party leaders doing marching at the front of a rally organized by a former Mexican government official and designed to support massive illegal immigration? It would be nice if someone would ask someone like, for instance, Howard Dean that question. Once again: until the Democratic Party purges itself of people like Zamarripa and Marin, should it be considered an American party at all?

Posted to Immigration at 05:36 AM | Comments (1)

October 08, 2006

John McCain endorses Randy Graf

Senator John McCain has given the Arizona Daily Star a statement, saying in part:

"Randy Graf's record as a state representative has demonstrated his commitment to the values important to the people of Arizona... His voting record on issues such as supporting our military, reducing taxes and reining in election and welfare fraud bodes well for his future in the U.S. Congress... I urge the voters of the 8th district to support him on November 7th. It would be a pleasure to work with him in Washington."

Note that Graf supports our immigration laws and McCain, of course, is working with Teddy Kennedy to flood the U.S. with millions of legal immigrants.

The endorsement may be de rigeur, but McCain may also see it as an attempt to reach out to conservatives. And, it may help Graf with Dems, independents, and even Republicans, especially those who've bought the media lies about Graf. And, because McCain is the MSM's favorite Republican, it might also help forestall further MSM lies about Graf.

Posted to Immigration at 10:04 PM | Comments (1)

October 06, 2006

New film claims Cardinal Roger Mahoney assisted pedophile priest

From this:

...[A] former priest, who lives in Ireland, said he was able to continue abusing children in part because of actions by Cardinal Mahony, who now heads the country's largest Roman Catholic archdiocese, here in Los Angeles, and is among the church’s most influential American leaders. Mr. O'Grady says in the film that as bishop in Stockton, the cardinal moved him from parish to parish in the face of abuse accusations.

"The film does certainly charge the atmosphere here in Los Angeles," said William Hodgman, the top deputy of the target crimes division of the Los Angeles District Attorney's office, who coordinated prosecutions of priests in Los Angeles.

The film also "will fuel ongoing consideration as to whether Cardinal Mahony and others engaged in criminal activity," Mr. Hodgman added...

Read the rest for all the claims and counter-claims.

Related: Mexico detained lawyers, alleged victim of priest sex abuse (Cardinal Roger Mahony)

Regarding Mahoney's other mission of encouraging illegal immigration, see among others:

"Seeking Biblical Principles to Inform Immigration Policy"

Should Cardinal Roger Mahony cost the Catholic Church tax-exempt status?

Posted to Miscellania at 11:15 PM | Comments (4)

Democrats vs. assimilation

Yesterday, Arnold Schwarzenegger issued yet another "controversial" statement, this one about Mexican immigrants assimilating. I had two initial thoughts: a) I'm not carrying Arnold's water anymore, and b) few could quibble with his pro-American comments that are similar to ones stated by leading academics. Needless to say, the Democratic Party has proven me somewhat wrong, trotting out a few supporters of illegal immigration and massive immigration from Mexico and opponents of assimilation to try to help the MSM make a "controversy" where a serious policy discussion should exist instead.

Here's what Arnie said:

"And that is very difficult for some people to do especially, I think, for Mexicans because they are so close to their country here so they try to stay Mexican but try to be in America so there's this kind of back and forth and what I'm saying to the Mexicans is you've got to go and immerse yourself and assimilate into the American culture become part of the American fabric. That is how Americans will embrace you. That was my, I think, the secret, if there is one, to success."

Now, let's compare that with "Can We Still Afford to Be a Nation of Immigrants?" by Stanford Professor of History David M. Kennedy [1]. Harvard's Samuel Huntington made a similar point [2]. Other scholars have said much the same, see "Multiculturalism, Immigration, and Aztlan".

Now, for the other side's take, KGO's Nannette Miranda offers "Activists Find Governor's Comments Offensive". It only quotes two people, an activist and an activist professor:

Luis Arteaga, Latino Issues Forum: "I'm offended because once again, this governor is making these blanket generalizations about the Mexican community that comes in so many different shapes, sizes and beliefs. And yet he wants to couch us all as un-American."

That, of course, misrepresents what Arnold said. The only other quote is from Prof. Melissa Michelson of California State University East Bay (homepage)

"I think he put his foot, his ankle and his entire lower leg in his mouth. He really seems to have a misunderstanding about how Mexican immigrants see themselves and their place in this country."

Wait, it gets worse. Here's the chairman of the California Democratic Party, Art Torres:

"Californians of all backgrounds are living the California dream while maintaining their culture, customs and languages... It is not the governor's place to dictate to new Californians how much of their language to speak, how much of their culture to keep or how quickly to assimilate."

It isn't enough to simply live the "California dream". As a country, we have a duty to demand that those who come here do assimilate. Without that, we're simply a territory. (Torres' quote comes from a Los Angeles Times blog from one Robert Salladay discussing the "controversy". Needless to say, he can't find America with both hands.)

It hardly comes as a surprise that the leader of the California Democrats would say something like this, especially considering one of his past quotes:

"[Proposition] 187 was the last gasp of white America in California."

This page has more quotes:

"It is not the governor's place to tell immigrants to abandon their culture and language," declared LA Congresswoman Hilda Solis on a conference call hosted by the Democratic Party. Solis insisted that Schwarzenegger is trying to "appeal to his right-wing base."

Here's an earlier quote from her:

"We are all Americans, whether you are legalized or not"

Back to the Democratic Party's conference call:

Bay Area Congressman Mike Honda said we "should forget the melting pot concept." In a comment certain to stir the "reconquista" fears of nativists, Honda declared that Schwarzenegger misunderstands "the history of the Southwest. The Southwest was part of Mexico."

Clearly, many leaders of the Democratic Party do not support the concept of America, prefering instead to push corporate pluralism, irredentism, and Gramscism. While not all Democratic leaders are anti-American, many are. Until they purge themselves of their anti-American leaders, should the Democratic Party be considered an American party at all?

Naturalized citizens who are offended by the remarks of the Democratic Party leaders, but who are also opposed to Arnold's other Bush-friendly illegal immigration-related moves should consider a protest vote for Art Olivier.

UPDATE: Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has commented on Arnold's comments, saying among other things: "The vast majority of Mexican immigrants who come here.. come here to be a part of the American dream..."

If you translate "American dream" as "making money", then he's right. If you translate it in the more, shall we say, Capra-esque way, then he's not right in the use of "vast majority". And, while Tony Villar isn't an immigrant, it's helpful to note that he's a former campus radical and a leader of the racial separatist group MEChA. FOOTNOTES:

[1] Kennedy writes:

All prognostications about these possibilities are complicated by another circumstance that has no precedent in American immigration history: the region of Mexican immigrant settlement in the southwestern United States is contiguous with Mexico itself. That proximity may continuously replenish the immigrant community, sustaining its distinctiveness and encouraging its assertiveness. Alternatively, the nearness of Mexico may weaken the community's coherence and limit its political and cultural clout by chronically attenuating its members' permanence in the United States, as the accessibility of the mother country makes for a kind of perpetual repatriation process.

In any case, there is no precedent in American history for these possibilities. No previous immigrant group had the size and concentration and easy access to its original culture that the Mexican immigrant group in the Southwest has today. If we seek historical guidance, the closest example we have to hand is in the diagonally opposite corner of the North American continent, in Quebec. The possibility looms that in the next generation or so we will see a kind of Chicano Quebec take shape in the American Southwest, as a group emerges with strong cultural cohesiveness and sufficient economic and political strength to insist on changes in the overall society's ways of organizing itself and conducting its affairs.

[2] We'll have to settle for this review, which says:

Because of geographic proximity, [Huntington] writes, Hispanic immigrants are more likely to remain in "intimate contact" with friends and families in their home countries; more likely to enter illegally; and more likely to stay regionally concentrated in the Southwest--that is, in areas that in 1835 were part of Mexico proper. The result, Huntington argues, is that "the Southwest could become the United States' Quebec."

Posted to Immigration at 12:30 PM | Comments (15)

Fence bill has huge, Bush- and Mexico-friendly holes

The recently-passed fence bill has loopholes that give the Bush administration discretion over how to spend the money and whether to spend it constructing a real fence, a "virtual" fence, or on something else entirely:

...shortly before recessing late last Friday, the House and Senate gave the Bush administration leeway to distribute the money to a combination of projects, not just the physical barrier along the southern border. The money may also be spent on roads, technology and "tactical infrastructure" to support the Homeland Security Department's preferred option of a "virtual fence."

What's more, in a late-night concession to win over wavering Republicans, GOP congressional leaders pledged in writing that Native American tribes, members of Congress, governors and local leaders would get a say in "the exact placement" of any structure and that Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff would have the flexibility to use alternatives "when fencing is ineffective or impractical."

The loopholes leave the Bush administration with authority to decide where, when and how long a fence will be built, except for small stretches east of San Diego and in western Arizona. Homeland Security officials have proposed a fence half as long, lawmakers said...

...In this case, it also reflects the GOP's political calculations that voters do not mind the details, and that key players - including the administration, local leaders and the Mexican government - oppose a fence-only approach, analysts said...

Related: Cornyn: border fence won't happen, just a "symbolic gesture"

UPDATE: Speaking on KFI, Rep. Dana Rohrbacher thinks the nuanced fence bill was a necessary compromise. However, both Rep. Gary Miller and Rep. Ed Royce think the bill is air tight and the article is basically the WaPo trying to stir up trouble.

Posted to Immigration at 04:07 AM | Comments (5)

October 05, 2006

Is Nick Inzunza (mayor of National City) a slumlord?

Here's a quick look at two SDUT stories. From October 1 2006's "National City named sanctuary city":

Mayor Nick Inzunza declared National City an immigrant sanctuary in a proclamation he presented to immigrants rights activists during dueling rallies that brought about 400 people to City Hall yesterday.

Democratic Party-linked Enrique Morones was there. That city already translates city council meetings into Spanish and accepts Mexico's Matricula Consular cards, which are widely used by illegal aliens.

Now, let's look back to December 15, 2005's "Landlord of opportunity/National City mayor's units have made him millions while tenants fight vermin, disrepair":

Nick Inzunza, mayor of National City and candidate for state Assembly, passionately talks about how hard he works to improve the lives of poor people by giving voice to their struggles.

He has publicly taken credit for investing the millions he has made in real estate "to create affordable housing in the inner city."

What Inzunza never mentions, though, is that nearly all of the properties, with more than 100 rental units, have been the subject of lawsuits, complaints by tenants and code enforcement investigations.

...Asked recently about the condition of the properties, Inzunza said they belong to his wife, and that he hasn't "stepped foot on them in years." The mayor's name, however, is on all of the deeds except two, one of which he transferred solely to his wife this week, after being told The San Diego Union-Tribune examination of his properties was about to be published...

Posted to Immigration at 09:37 PM | Comments (1)

Attacks on illegal immigration protesters

Here are just some:

* 10/4/06, downtown Denver: a group of Colorado Minutemen were videotaping day laborers when a group of the laborers got angry and one or more of them appear to have assaulted one or more of the cameramen. One of those involved is currently out on bond charged with trying to steal the camera. A video news report from Jeremy Hubbard of FOX31 is here. On that report he says: "Immigration rights advocate Polly Baca says the Minutemen share responsibility because they shouldn't have been taping the men in the first place", and she says on tape: "The minutemen are acting in a totally un-American fashion... it is not their place to enforce our laws, it is the place of our police officers, our safety officers to enforce our laws." Baca is linked to Western Union, a company that profits when illegal aliens send money home. And, of course, what's "un-American" is suggesting that it's acceptable for people who are lawfully videotaping on U.S. streets to be attacked. Perhaps Hubbard should have mentioned her affiliation in order to give his viewers a better idea of why she might say something like that.

* 10/4/06, NYC: Lefties from the International Socialist Organization, the Chicano Caucus, and other groups storm the stage in an auditorium at Columbia University shortly after invited guest Jim Gilchrist of the MMP begins speaking. They unfurl a couple banners, fights break out, and the speech is called off. They had disrupted an earlier speaker. Video here, more here, here, and here. The lightweights at Gawker respond with "Minuteman Event at Columbia Ruined by Brown People" (tinyurl.com/h2h7k); in their rush to be continually irrelevant, they missed the chant the protesters did outside: "Asian, Black, Brown and White, we smashed the Minutemen tonight!" An anonymous protester : "I don't feel like we need to apologize or anything. It was fundamentally a part of free speech. ... The Minutemen are not a legitimate part of the debate on immigration." They believe in free speech, just so long as those speaking are "legitimate parts of the debate".

* 7/8/06, Hollywood CA: at a MMP march in Hollywood, the protesters clashed with the LAPD. The AP's headline didn't make those involved clear, and may have given some the false impression that the MMP were involved in the melee.

* 5/25/05, Garden Grove CA: Violent lefties protest outside a speech by Jim Gilchrist. They swarm cars, and cans full of marbles are found.

* 5/14/05, Baldwin Park CA: Counter-protesters at the SOS protest of a public monument turned violent, including throwing a full bottle of water at someone in the SOS group. David Pierson and Patricia Ward Biederman of the Los Angeles Times covered up for the violent lefties.

(There are many more which will be added later.)

Finally, at the end of the post, I've provided the condemnation of these attacks from the ACLU and other anti-MMP organizations:

Posted to Immigration at 11:44 AM | Comments (5)

Jorge Castaneda, Fifth Columnists, and the Los Angeles Times

Yesterday former Mexican foreign minister Jorge Castaneda spoke as part of the Los Angeles Public Library-associated Zocalo program. I attended (after first going to the library where I thought it would be and then rushing over to the Music Center where it actually was) and was able to ask him whether Mexico had a "Fifth Column" inside the U.S. His answer was somewhat in line with what you'd expect; feel free to skip ahead to read it.

Our host for the evening was Los Angeles Times editorial page editor Andres Martinez; that paper publishes Castaneda's column and the two were quite chummy.

JC discussed the political situation in Latin America and, among many other points, said he thinks there are two forms of leftism there: that represented by Castro, Hugo Chavez, and others, versus the other form represented by Lula, Bachelet, and others. He's not in favor of the former group, but he thinks LA needs more of the latter. (Later on he said, in effect, that it's good that there's a needler like Chavez around, but that no one had really appointed him to the role he fills.)

Then, he moved to the topic of immigration:
* Thinks that Fox's making of immigration "accord" one of his key issues was necessary, not just to get the accord but to prevent a "wall" from being built when Fox first started pushing it. He thinks a "wall" would have been built without Fox taking such a pose.
* Thinks Fox was right about going for an all-inclusive approach (what JC called "the whole enchilada" and what "our" politicians call "comprehensive").
* Thinks it's hypocritical for the U.S. to have its only migration treaty (emphasis on the bilateral nature of treaties) with their "top" enemy Cuba, but not to have one with their "best" friend to the south.
* Thinks the Senate massive amnesty scheme is "good".
* Is "relatively confident" that the "wall"/"fence" (he switched back and forth between those terms, as others do) won't be built.
* Thinks 9/11 gave the Bush administration a pretext to pull back from previous joint statements they'd made with Mexico vis-a-vis immigration.

THE QUESTION

I asked him about this blurb from 2002:

[Mexico's foreign minister Jorge] Castaneda said Mexican officials will begin rallying unions, churches, universities and Mexican communities... "What's important is that American society sees a possible migratory agreement in a positive light," Castaneda said. "We are already giving instructions to our consulates that they begin propagating militant activities -- if you will -- in their communities."

I mentioned that some of the organizers of the recent immigration marches have links to the Mexican government, and specifically refered to a non-organizer, the ACLU, being part of a group with other groups that have such links. (Later, from the floor, I mentioned that one of his former consuls also organized a march.)

AFAIK, the only paper that published the blurb above was the Houston Chronicle, and it was on the same page as two other blurbs. (The page where it was returns a 404, but you can find it by signing in and searching their archives for parts of the text). However, he refered to something appearing in the New York Times and said that Bush and Powell had been upset about what he said, and Powell had spoken to him about it. Since this was four years ago, he may have been confused over which quote this was.

In any case, he went on to defend the quote, saying that he doesn't think there's a Fifth Column in the U.S. and that he's not aware of any links between the Mexican government and the immigration march organizers. (I made it clear later from the floor that I wasn't saying those organizers were directed by Mexico, only that there were links). He supported Mexico's right to defend their people. He also supports the country of Mexico working with groups in the U.S., and he said that when Powell complained about his statement he told him that "I'm working for you on this matter": by getting such groups involved he could help acheive the "accord" that both Mexico and the U.S. government (just not most of the governed) want.

He thinks attempts to look for a Fifth Column are "barking up the wrong tree". He thinks it's OK for Mexico to be involved with U.S. groups provided it's done in an aboveboard, open, legal fashion. (The only problem is that, because of the corrupt press, such links aren't being publicized.)

Then, he engaged in a tu quoque argument, refering to U.S. meddling in Latin America.

In retrospect, there wasn't really much use in asking this question, aside from the fact that it probably made Andres Martinez a little uncomfortable to have someone mention facts that his newspaper, given its druthers, would rather not mention. As foreign minister, Castaneda was just doing his job. The question above, and many others, need to be asked of our elected officials and find out why they aren't doing their jobs.

Posted to Immigration at 04:22 AM | Comments (3)

October 04, 2006

Mohawk Carpet RICO class action suit can proceed

As previously discussed, several American workers are suing Mohawk Carpet under RICO (the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act), claiming that that major carpet manufacturer conspired to replace them with illegal aliens.

The U.S. Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled in the plaintiff's favor regarding a technical matter, so the case can proceed.

Legal details here, non-technical overview here:

Former and current workers at Dalton-based Mohawk Industries claim they received lower wages than workers at other companies in the Dalton area, which is known as the ``Carpet Capital of the World'' and home to carpet plants for Shaw Industries, Interface and other companies.

Posted to Immigration at 09:53 AM | Comments (0)

Cornyn: border fence won't happen, just a "symbolic gesture"

From this:

Sen. John Cornyn, a Texas Republican and key liaison to the White House on immigration, said Tuesday that 700 miles of fencing approved by Congress will probably not be built because of a lack of money and other practical considerations.

"It's one thing to authorize. It's another thing to actually appropriate the money and do it," he told reporters.

Cornyn predicted that some fencing would be built as part of a comprehensive strategy that includes more Border Patrol agents, more technology, more detention facilities and various physical barriers.

Uh huh. No doubt that "comprehensive" strategy would include all the other things normally associated with that term, including a massive amnesty and a "guest" worker program.

Then, like Lionel Hutz informing us that there's the truth and there's the "truth":

"There's different kinds of fencing ... there's the old fence post and barbed wire, and then there's the virtual fence which is a combination of physical barriers, people, and technology and I think, in the end, that will probably be how this is addressed," he said.

Then, almost as if he was reading it from the same card as all the others:

Cornyn added that 700 miles of fencing would not solve the problem of illegal immigration because it would still leave about 1,300 miles of unfenced border.

Then, he informs us that this was all just for show:

Cornyn defended the Senate vote for the fencing, saying that it was an important symbolic gesture to show that Congress is serious about protecting the border.

Use the search function to find other posts about this senator, such as:

Sen. John Cornyn comes out against North American Union, but...

Should you trust anything Sen. John Cornyn says?

Posted to Immigration at 04:39 AM | Comments (2)

No taxation [of illegal aliens] without representation

Expect "logic" like the title to be one of the next major arguments that supporters of massive illegal immigration will use. The barely coherent story "Patrolman's union wants change to HPD's illegal immigrant policy" has this at the end:

"We believe [Houston's new policy about working with ICE] will make immigrants fear police. They pay taxes and are entitled to police services," said Maria Jimenez a longtime social justice activist... Public safety, Jimenez said, without distinction.

From earlier in the year, see "Gloria Romero's revolution" for quotes from California Democrats comparing the May 1 illegal immigration march to the Boston Tea Party.

And, of course, consider all the articles pointing out all the taxes that illegal aliens pay.

Posted to Immigration at 02:30 AM | Comments (3)

October 03, 2006

"Citizen" Saul Arellano, Luis Gutierrez give letter to Bush staffer outside WH gates

As previously discussed, Saul Arellano - seven-year-old son of holed-up-in-a-Chicago-church after ordered to appear to be deported Elvira Arellano - flew to Washington to try to speak to president Bush. He was assisted by the group Centro Sin Fronteras as well as a supposed American representative, Luis Gutierrez.

Thankfully - or maybe not so thankfully - they gave Saul's handwritten plea "to a White House staffer outside the gates". While it's good to keep "Americans" like Gutierrez as far from the White House as possible, a photo op with Bush would have been priceless. Before handing off the letter, SA was a guest at a Hispanic Congressional Caucus Institute function.

The letter has one of the leading arguments against the "guest" worker programs Bush supports:

"I want you to know that there are more than 3 million children like me. We are U.S. citizens but the government is taking away our mothers and fathers."

As has been pointed out here many times, our "guests" would have children, and that would make it very difficult to send them home if they refuse to go back.

Posted to Immigration at 11:21 PM | Comments (3)

Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission party to Hazleton suit?

Stephen Glassman, chairperson (he doesn't like "chairman") of the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission, claims that his organization - a state agency - is one of the parties suing Hazleton over their IIRA (Illegal Immigration Relief Act). (A previous version of the suit didn't have them on board.)

The article "Panel slams illegal immigration law" contains that claim buried within a description of the biased panel at King's College in Wilkes-Barre, which in addition to Glassman also consisted of a wide range of Latino, church, and other pro-illegal immigration groups.

I haven't confirmed his claim, but it's certainly plausible considering that, as shown by both links, Glassman is a real piece of work. Not just far left, but in a fashion that I as a non-professional would term pathologically so:

Glassman – who during the question-and-answer period said the U.S. was "infected with racism," that institutionalized racism "permeated" the country and that the U.S. couldn't "merely get rid of slavery is a couple of hundred years – claimed PHRC was party to the suit filed against IIRA. He said the commission was confident of winning. Glassman also took on what he termed "English-only" laws such as Hazleton's. Noting that Pennsylvania laws used to be printed in both English and German during the 18th and 19th centuries, he said official English laws ran contrary to the commonwealth's "multi-lingual principles." Again, he claimed they were race-based and targeted at Spanish speakers. "Unfortunately, primarily Hispanics are the ones being vilified, with epithets thrown at them in places like Hazleton," Glassman said, though he did not discuss any specific incident.

The author of the article, L.A. Tarone, oddly enough for the source, appears to get it to a slightly greater degree than larger papers would:

After the forum concluded, a woman who declined to give her name told a Standard-Speaker photographer she wished the panel had been "more balanced."

Note that Glassman was appointed to the PHRC by former Republican governor Mark Schweiker, but he was made "chairperson" by current governor and Democrat Ed Rendell, America's most anti-American governor ("The only ones I want to hear speaking up and complaining about immigration are the Native Americans who we screwed.")

Rendell also appointed both Agapito Lopez ("We will acculturate, we will adapt to your rules, we will follow your laws, but we will never assimilate") and Anna Arias ("[Hazelton is] the first Nazi city in the country") to the Governor's Advisory Commission on Latino Affairs.

Posted to Immigration at 11:08 PM | Comments (7)

Payasos con Drogas

Actually, I like their title better: "Cocaine found on touring clown bus"

HIDALGO - Clowns are not usually a party to large drug investigations.

But on Sunday, customs inspectors at the Hidalgo-Reynosa International Bridge found more than 500 pounds of cocaine on a private tour bus in which a Latin Grammy-nominated musical group of clowns was riding.

About 40 minutes later, an additional 600 pounds of cocaine was seized from another tour bus entering the United States Officials said the two drug seizures were not related...

...Los Payasonicos are popular in the Monterrey area, where they have a television program that airs three times a week. In 2005, they were nominated for a Latin Grammy Award for best Latin Children's Album.

On Monday, an employee in charge of booking the Los Payasonicos for events said the group had sold the bus that was seized at the border six months ago. However, he did not give a specific date or the name of the buyer...

The singing clowns are now being questioned...

Posted to Immigration at 08:48 PM | Comments (2)

Progressives: Tikkun links pro-American immigration article

Back in April, Rabbi Lerner of Tikkun linked to an excerpt of this article by David Podvin. Send it to all your "progressive" friends and see if anything in there resonates with them.

Posted to Immigration at 06:41 PM | Comments (0)

WaPo: "Border Fence Called Impractical"

The Washington Post offers "Border Fence Called Impractical", a slight rewrite of the Tim Gaynor/Reuters article previously eviscerated. Visitors from the WaPo are encouraged to use the search function on each page to search for past instances of the WaPo supporting illegal immigration.

Posted to Immigration at 01:12 PM | Comments (1)

Local immigration news: Cook County, Mesa, Houston, Beaufort County, Carpentersville

In Cook County Illinois (home of Chicago), Commissioner Roberto Maldonado's attempt to declare the county an illegal alien sanctuary has passed a subcommittee 3-2 and now goes to the full Board. Its chance of passage is unknown. Those on the American side were Tony Peraica (R) and Jerry Butler (D). Those joining Maldonado on the other side were Joseph Mario Moreno (D) and Mike Quigley (D). One of the two alleged incidents that are used as partial justification was not even reported to the police.

In Arizona, Mesa Vice Mayor Claudia Walters has drafted a "scathing" letter "scolding" Arizona's congresspeople for not passing "comprehensive" immigration "reform".

It includes this bit that - needless to say - Mike Cronin of the AZ Republic didn't call her on:

Walters conveyed the story of one Mesa businessman who sent paperwork about several immigrants he hired to the U.S. Social Security Administration. Six years later, Social Security officials called him and told him those immigrants' paperwork was not valid... "Six years!" Walters said. "And that gentleman was trying to be a good employer."

Of course, if Cronin were doing his job - or at least being what some consider a good journalist which is probably not the same thing as what the AZ Republic wants him to do - he would have pointed out that nowadays such information can be obtained very quickly over that internet thing.

Then, he goes on to present the AZ Dems' smear against Russell Pearce; the fact that the latter isn't exactly helping his case doesn't excuse the fact that both Cronin and Walters pretend to be unable to understand the difference between refering to "Operation Wetback" as the name of a past program, and using that word in other contexts. Needless to say, instead of calling Walters on her attempt to rewrite history, he supports her efforts to mislead.

Then:

Councilman Kyle Jones said the draft letter "for the most part" reflects a National League of Cities resolution on immigration reform that he helped write. Jones served on the league's ad hoc committee on immigration reform. The league passed its resolution July 21.

On the good news front: "Houston Police Given OK to Ask Suspects' Immigration Status"

And, in Beaufort County, South Carolina, their City Council is considering a Hazelton-style ordinance:

This same ordinance has faced legal challenges in other communities that have tried similar ordinances.

Well, that's one way to defund the ACLU.

UPDATE: In the still-hopeful column comes "Thousands see suburb delay immigration discussion" about Carpentersville (IL) considering a Hazleton-style ordinance. The town council delayed discussion of the matter because a crowd of 3000 - mostly protesters and probably many bused-in - showed up and they need to make sure that everyone can attend the meeting because of a state law.

Posted to Immigration at 12:46 PM | Comments (0)

Canadian sheep ready to be chipped

The headline is a bit of a low blow, and the article is so short and devoid of facts that I really should look into what the poll actually says, but anyway:

Most Canadians do not understand what biometrics are, but think the government should use them to prevent prospective immigrants from using bogus identity documents to enter the country, according to a poll obtained by the Globe and Mail.

Fraudulent identity documents are a "very serious problem" and biometrics should be used to prevent people from abusing government programs, including the immigration and refugee systems, said more than half the respondents in the Ipsos Reid survey conducted for the agency Citizenship and Immigration Canada.

There are far easier and less intrusive ways to prevent such abuses, so one is forced to conclude that the same forces that encourage immigration in order to make money are encouraging the use of biometrics in order to have better control over the populace and in order to make more money.

Related: RFID implants for "guest" workers?

Posted to Privacy at 12:18 PM | Comments (1)

"[USCIS] Whistle-blower let go"

From this:

An immigrant application screener who spoke out earlier this year about his agency's security failures has lost his job, despite a recent decision to extend the contracts of hundreds of other employees like him.

Sultan Farakhan, an immigrant benefits application adjudicator, was terminated from employment Friday at the National Benefits Center in Lee's Summit, Mo., one of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services' largest immigration application processing centers...

Farakhan -- who according to USCIS evaluations had a nearly flawless performance record during his four years as a "term," or temporary, employee -- was one of hundreds of agency employees who received a $500 bonus Sept. 19 for helping reduce the agency's application backlog.

...[Chris Bentley, a spokesman for the Department of Homeland Security's Citizenship and Immigration Services] would neither confirm nor deny that Farakhan was the only term employee terminated at the Missouri center. He also would not say if Farakhan was the subject of any disciplinary action...

Posted to Immigration at 11:04 AM | Comments (0)

Patrik Jonsson promotes illegal immigration in Stillmore, Georgia

Patrik Jonsson of the Christian Science Monitor offers "Crackdown on immigrants empties a town and hardens views", which is so highly similar to the story discussed in "Russ Bynum/AP promotes illegal immigration (Stillmore, Georgia)" that I barely need to add anything more: almost everything said about that slab of pro-illegal immigration propaganda applies to the current slab.

There are a few minor differences. For instance, we learn that the Crider plant "does everything from poultry processing to packing M&Ms for the military to grilling the ribs for restaurant franchises, employees say". Bear in mind that apparently hundreds of workers at that plant were illegal aliens, i.e., citizens of other countries. (See, for instance, "Poisoning the MREs Americans won't poison").

Note that both the previous AP story as well as the Los Angeles Times story discussed in "Molly Hennessy-Fiske/LAT promotes corruption in Arkansas; Huckabee" have featured locals who speak favorably of the illegal aliens and express the wish that ICE had just let the massive corruption continue. The current article is no different:

...raids and crackdowns have uncorked a phenomenon for those left behind: a sense of moral confusion about mass roundups and midnight raids.

Thankfully, the AP, the Los Angeles Times, and the CSM are here to offer us moral guidance. And, although no other information is provided, we're informed that:

But some, including the Southern Poverty Law Center, have voiced concerns about the searches.

And, as with the AP article, the news that the illegal aliens had lowered local wages and taken jobs from legal workers is hidden at the end of the piece:

Now the plant is paying a dollar more an hour than before the raid, to draw new workers from neighboring counties. "With the illegals gone, Americans have a chance to make more money," says Mr. Byrd.

Posted to Immigration at 10:32 AM | Comments (0)

Tim Gaynor/Reuters, "experts", say fence is "impractical"

Tim Gaynor of Reuters offers "Experts see U.S. border fence plan as impractical". Three such "experts" are quoted, only two of them being named.

The first is "veteran agent Lee Morgan". First, let's take a look at what he told Tamar Jacoby in early 2005:

[BP Agent Lee Morgan] criticizes the apprehensions as a waste of time and resources. "They're just poor people trying to feed their families," he shrugs... "What if the bastards come across here in Arizona and I don't catch them because I'm so busy chasing a busboy or a gardener that I don't have time to do my job--my real job--catching terrorists?..."

Bush has said something similar, as have David Brooks, John Fund, and the WSJ editorialists. Who started the whole "busboys vs. terrorists" line it is not known.

Back to the current article, let's look at his complaint about the fence:

"You can't build a wall across the mountains of southern Arizona, as much of the terrain is inaccessible even on foot," veteran agent Lee Morgan told Reuters as he stood near the proposed route of the fence, east of the town of Douglas.

Well, pretty obviously to just about everyone else, if there are cliffs there that require 5.14 climbs, then you don't need to build a fence there. Duh.

Another agent has a better complaint:

Another former U.S. Customs special agent, who declined to be named, said the fencing would also struggle to bridge hundreds of creek beds spanning the Arizona-Sonora border, which are prone to flash floods from May through October.

That's definitely a real concern; what plans there are - if any - to avoid that issue isn't known.

Then, we get the thoughts of Doris Meissner, "senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington":

"It may work to curtail crossings in the immediate area it has been built, but it won't stop illegal immigration,"

I don't think anyone's ever said that the fence would stop illegal immigration. I also don't think any, say, prospective police chief has ever said he'd stop crime in his city.

"Experience has shown that traffic will shift to other parts of the border" where there is less vigilance, added Meissner, a former commissioner at the now defunct U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service.

Fences can be built there then. And, the presence of fences in some areas will also lead prospective crossers to the correct assumption that the easy routes have been sealed off and it's even more dangerous than ever to try to cross. If that point were driven home in Mexico, it would help reduce illegal immigration even without the whole border being fenced. Of course, that would assume that Mexico won't simply encourage their citizens to cross in the unfenced areas.

"The draw for illegal immigrants is the availability of employment in the United States, and that is not being addressed by this fence," she said.

So, we can expect her to get solidly behind efforts to fine employers, right?

Posted to Immigration at 05:28 AM | Comments (2)

October 02, 2006

"North American Union threat gets attention of congressmen"

From this:

Rep. Virgil Goode Jr., R-Va., has introduced a resolution – H.R. 487 – designed to express "the sense of Congress that the United States should not engage in the construction of a North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) Superhighway System or enter into a North American Union (NAU) with Mexico and Canada."

"Now that Congress is preparing to take up the issues of the North American Union and NAFTA superhighways, we are moving out of the realm where critics can attempt to disparage the discussion as 'Internet conspiracy theory,'" explained Jerome Corsi, author and WND columnist who has written extensively on the Security and Prosperity Partnership – the semisecret plan many suspect is behind the efforts to create a European Union-style North American confederation and link Mexico and Canada with more transcontinental highways and rail lines. "This bill represents a good first step."

The three co-sponsors are Tom Tancredo (R-CO), Ron Paul (R-TX), and Walter Jones (R-NC).

Posted to NAU at 04:01 PM | Comments (2)

Union Pacific acquiring land for railway from Mexican "superport"

From this:

...The [Yuma] Sun previously reported that Union Pacific officials are researching Yuma as a route to ship cargo from 130 miles south of Tijuana into the United States. Landowners throughout Yuma told The Sun that they had been approached by Union Pacific officials about property acquisition.

Chris Peterson, the Union Pacific director of government affairs, previously stated in articles that the company had conducted preliminary studies, but the "project remains very uncertain."

Local farmer Bruce Easterday has no illusions about trying to fight the railroad if it should pursue eminent domain to acquire his property.

...Easterday said he was approached by a Union Pacific representative about selling an option to purchase 200 acres he owns at County 13th Street and Avenue 3E for the potential rail line that would come up from Mexico, likely from a new superport planned for Punta Colonet.

Posted to NAU at 01:57 PM | Comments (1)

My writing faced the SAT challenge (and lost)

In some sort of massive linkbaiting scheme, "scienceblogs.com" asked bloggers to enter SAT essays similar to those now written by college students. They were then graded by a team of "experts". My entry (which you're encouraged to vote on) has won especial reknown. The average score was around 3, with some as high as 6. Mine got a 1:

blogger SAT essay challenge

Of course, I don't know whether it received that low score because of the fact that it's a satire and they didn't get it, or because they did get it and, being satire "experts" as well, they didn't appreciate its sheer brilliance:

I completely disagree. He who dies with the most toys wins, as the license plate frames say on all those toy haulers that I see. Never let it be forgotten that Booker T. Washington lived in a different time and a different place. I'm not entirely sure of when or where that was, but I am also equally sure that it was not now and here.

With all due respect to Mr. Washington, he could not invision the microwave oven or plasma televisions or power boats or any of our other modern accoutrements.

Furthermore, I find this question and the desired response extremely negative and quite possibly this is an attempt by the people behind the SAT to accustom their young charges to failure. What are we doing, raising a country of people accustomed to failure, and prepared to consider it commendable not to succeed?

Why is the SAT trying to prepare students to fail? Should they not encourage them to succeed, and make them painfully aware of all penalties for failure? This essay should instead offer intense opprobrium to all those who think failure is an option. We must go for the gusto, and we must encourage the same in the youth.

Posted to WackyHumor at 11:05 AM | Comments (2)

Mexico consul general in Oregon profiled

Janie Har of the Oregonian offers "Mexican consul walks a fine line" about Mexico's consul general for Oregon, Fernando Sanchez Ugarte. Despite having five screens (!) to work with, there is very little of interest to those who've, for instance, watched how the government of Mexico has been able to obtain political power inside the U.S. by sending us people and by their resulting aggressive actions to make sure those people have everything they need to keep sending their money home.

The only slight nod to our reality is this:

About a year ago, critics began protesting the weekend sessions that Sanchez's office hosted around the state for Mexican nationals. The consulate offered information on worker safety and Oregon driver's licenses. It issued "matricula consular" identification cards, which opponents say are used by illegals to get state services... Under pressure, Gov. Ted Kulongoski pulled state agencies from participating at the weekend events. Ever diplomatic, Sanchez shrugged off the move, saying it was Kulongoski's call.

We do, however, receive the urgently important news that:

He is dressed in his usual suit and tie, his brown hair tinged with silver. He wears a pair of stylish gray Gucci eyeglasses, selected by his wife. She's dressed casually in slacks and a white knit shirt, black earrings dangling against her blond hair.

Despite that, on the GushOMeter this only gets a "6", and we suggest that Janie Har and the Oregonian try harder next time. (For reference purposes, OCRegister columnist Yvette Cabrera gushing over (her) Mexican consul scores an "8" on the GushOMeter, although some judges on the panel wanted to give it a "9").

I take pity on those who think the Oregonian is a news source and not just a propaganda vehicle.

Posted to Immigration_consul at 10:30 AM | Comments (0)

Tamar Jacoby shows possible fence folly

One of the major problems with the recent border fence bill is that supporters of "comprehensive" reform will hide behind the fence in order to push through their "reform". They'll say something like, "now that you've got your fence, give us our amnesty".

Or, for instance, they'll say something like, "Real immigration reform will vault over border fence". Oddly enough, that also just happens to be the title of Tamar Jacoby's latest screed:

...No wonder many people concluded that the immigration hard-liners in the House, where the fence bill originated, had won the debate.

But they're wrong. For most members of Congress, this was little more than an election-year charade. The truth is, one mug-for-the-camera vote will not reverse the progress made in the past two years toward comprehensive immigration reform, which is still the only way to solve the problem.

By now, the two competing visions are clear to everyone: simply cracking down harder with fencing and other measures, or combining more effective enforcement with more realistic laws - laws that recognize our labor needs, current and future, and offer some long-term path to legal citizenship for the illegal immigrants already here.

Lopsided fence votes in the House and Senate belie growing support for that broader vision. It's not just that the President and many senators support balanced reform. Poll after poll shows that between two-thirds and three-quarters of the public believes that the best answer combines tougher enforcement with earned citizenship for the illegal immigrants already here. The 20% to 25% who feel differently have an outsized influence in this midterm election year. But even if that tail can wag the dog for now, it can't prevent the majority from expressing its will eventually...

Does she actually believe that those biased polls reflect what the American public wants, or is she just trying to make everyone else believe it?

It would be easy to put what she says in the same camp as those who tried to fabricate a backlash over the failure to pass "reform" (includes a Jacoby quote), but as another quote from her at that link says, "There are some very powerful players who still want ['comprehensive' 'reform'] to happen."

Posted to Immigration at 03:13 AM | Comments (1)

October 01, 2006

"Citizen" Saul Arellano, Luis Gutierrez to address Bush?

Far-left illegal immigration supporters frequently demonize president Bush apparently without being able to get it through their heads that he's on their side; whether there'd be a border at all if he could get away with it is not known.

While he's supported illegal immigration in the past, and while Karl Rove spoke to the far-left illegal immigration supporters at the NCLR, they haven't been completely explicit about it.

So, would they go as far as meeting with Saul Arellano, the seven-year-old son of Elvira Arellano, the "activist" who's holed up in Slim Coleman's storefront church in Chicago? How else to interpret the final paragraph of the article "Immigrant rights group calls for boycott":

Saul will be accompanied by several immigration activists as well as by Congressman Luis Guitterez [sic] to Washington DC. The group plans to address the president on Tuesday.

Would Bush go as far as meeting with anti-American U.S. Representative Luis Gutierrez and Citizen Saul? Stay tuned.

UPDATE: From this:

A spokeswoman for Arellano said Saul left on a flight for Washington on Monday with Emma Lozano, head of the Chicago immigration-rights group Centro Sin Fronteras... Saul hoped to deliver a letter the White House on Tuesday asking President Bush to intervene in his mother's case.

And, if he fails, perhaps he could get his own space at Cindy Sheehan's 4-acre plot in Crawford. That will show not just solidarity with the cause, but it will make the media's job so much easier.

Posted to Immigration at 10:45 PM | Comments (2)

UK: Hardline Muslim teacher now national school inspector

From this:

A hardline Muslim teacher who caused a furore by denouncing pupils for celebrating Christmas [at Washwood Heath Secondary School in Birmingham] has been made a Government schools inspector.

Israr Khan's Ofsted appointment was described by a former colleague as 'absolutely astonishing'...

...It has been claimed that Washwood Heath school was then a 'hotbed of Islamic fundamentalism'. Rashid Rauf - the airline terror bomb suspect whose extradition is currently being sought from Pakistan - was a pupil there at that time...

Posted to MultiCultiCult at 03:40 PM | Comments (3)

David Streitfeld/Los Angeles Times promotes illegal immigration

David Streitfeld of the Los Angeles Times' business section offers a five-screener called "Illegal -- but Essential". It informs us that illegal labor is a "pillar of California's economic strength" and takes other steps to promote illegal immigration. While it does contain two anecdotes about workers who've been affected, and a mention of George Borjas' studies, they're overshadowed by the general feeling of sleaziness. Similar articles could have been written about the benefits of crooked cops or about how drugrunners buying speedboats props up the economy.

And, needless to say, nowhere in the article is there even the slightest allusion to such corruption and its effect on our political system.

Hundreds of thousands of immigrants have repeatedly demonstrated this year for legal recognition, sparking a backlash from many native-born Americans. Congress has been stalemated between legalization advocates and those pushing punitive measures.

Those "immigrants" were either illegal aliens or their supporters, and not all the marchers were immigrants but may have been the citizen relatives or friends of illegal aliens. (A small number were no doubt otherwise unaffected useful idiots). And, certainly not all those who were opposed to the marchers are the "native-born", but no doubt included large numbers who went through the legal process to become (real) immigrants. And, is a subtle message being sent that "Americans" include both the "native-born" and what he refers to as "immigrants"?

Then, he misrepresents the Independent Institute's Open Letter on Immigration. Contrary to what he implies, that childlike screed doesn't mention illegal immigration; it only refers to the general term without drawing any sort of distinction:

The 500 economists concede that a "small percentage" of native-born Americans may be hurt by competition from illegal immigrants who are willing to work cheaply. But any harm, they say, is outweighed by the benefits to the overall economy.

Then:

"The only people to benefit from the deportation of millions of low-skill workers would be other low-skill workers, who would get an immediate increase in pay rates," said Timothy Kane, an economist with the conservative Heritage Foundation. "However, they would also be the first to lose their jobs during a recession — which would be inevitable if the economy were shocked in this fashion."

Then:

UC Berkeley economist David Card has challenged those findings, saying cities such as Los Angeles are absorbing large numbers of laborers without wages being affected... The plentiful supply of workers, Card speculates, has led companies to keep people at jobs that might otherwise have been automated.

In other words, having access to endless cheap labor has reduced innovation.

And, we get the thoughts of "urban affairs expert and Economic Roundtable President Daniel Flaming":

"When manufacturing collapsed, there was no effort to salvage the infrastructure for other purposes... The formal economy here has been stagnant since the beginning of the 1990s. The only growth has been in under-the-table employment, predominantly fueled by desperate workers and in particular undocumented workers... [Without immigrants, Flaming said, Los Angeles would be smaller and weaker and poorer — Detroit or Pittsburgh or Cleveland with better weather.] We should be thankful to immigrants... Without them, things would be much worse."

Then, just so the reader can be absolutely assured where the LAT stands, it ends on a PIIPPish note.

This article is symptomatic of the "Fahrenheit 451"-ish trend of journalism. Newspapers that used to "follow the money" now try to cover up the trail. I don't expect any MSM source to ever "follow the money" in the case of illegal immigration and find out exactly who's profiting from massive illegal activity and what steps they take - perhaps by encouraging a certain type of immigration coverage - to promote their goals.

Posted to Immigration at 01:01 PM | Comments (2)