24Ahead

In Rich Benjamin's universe, Obama hasn't played the race card against his critics ("Whitopia")

2009-11-08T15:39:12-06:00

Rich Benjamin of the Demos think tank is the author of a book called "Searching for Whitopia: An Improbable Journey to the Heart of White America" and he offers "The Marshmallow Center of American Politics in the 21st Century" (hnn.us/articles/118555.html). Discussing what's wrong with the rest of it is left as an exercise; I'll just concentrate on this hilariously wrong bit:

President Obama refuses to attribute any racial bias to his virulent immigration- and heathcare-reform critics. Meanwhile, GOP Chair Michael Steele scolds the President for "playing the race card."

Obama has himself played the race card several times; see for instance this and this. Even worse, virtually every Obama surrogate before the election and many since has played the race card. There are too many examples to list but try this, this, and this.
And, Obama has specifically played that card when discussing immigration; for one example see this. He even went as far as implying that Rush Limbaugh and Lou Dobbs incited hate crimes. Apparently in Benjamin's universe none of that happened, or something.

Why didn't Steve Landsburg approve my comment? It's a mystery.

2009-11-07T15:41:51-06:00

Steven Landsburg (armchair *at* troi.cc.rochester.edu) is apparently an "economist" who writes the Everyday Economics column for Slate magazine. My June 2007 discussion of a column he wrote about immigration is at the last link, and when I was recently informed by Glenn Reynolds that Stephen Landsberg had started his own blog I left the following welcome message on his site at thebigquestions.com/2009/10/15/up-and-running:

Maybe Landsburg could address the big question of him being a complete idiot:
http://24ahead.com/blog/archives/006765.html

The comment was put into moderation and based on my logs I know he visited that link, but oddly enough he didn't approve it. Perhaps it was just a bit too antagonistic and I should have snuck it in in order to help his readers see how he can't figure things out. Feel free to see if you can get something past his filter.

Carly Fiorina supports massive skilled immigration ("There is no job that is America’s God-given right anymore")

2009-11-06T15:12:00-06:00

Former Hewlett Packard CEO Carly Fiorina recently announced her candidacy as a Republican for senator from California; she's trying to unseat Barbara Boxer. While the latter is a highly worthy goal, she appears to be a globalist, profits-at-any-cost supporter of massive immigration at least of the skilled variety. Her position on low-skilled immigration isn't known, but generally speaking people who hold her positions are open to compromises with the Democrats, where they trade increases in H1B caps and the like in exchange for giving the Democrats a legalization program. They're willing to give the Democrats even more power in exchange for short-term profits, and that's not exactly a wise move.
Here are some strong warning signs about her candidacy:

Paul Krugman promotes a WPA; why not simply enforce our immigration laws?

2009-11-06T12:13:04-06:00

Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman of the New York Times offers "Why not a WPA?" (link) in which he promotes - while maintaining plausible-to-his-followers deniability - the creation of something like FDR's Works Progress Administration:

You can make a pretty good case that just employing a lot of people directly would be a lot more cost-effective... So why aren’t we doing this? Politics, of course: government is the problem, not the solution, even when it is, you know, the solution, and cheaper than running things through the private sector... Still, it might be worth discussing whether we shouldn’t try to include an, um, public option in stimulus, too.

I left the following comment that's in moderation; if it's approved I'll update this post:

Wouldn't simply ramping up immigration enforcement be even better? If there's some reason why that wouldn't work to reduce unemployment in the U.S. hopefully Krugman will spell it out for us.

That would also be a good question to ask him at one of his public appearances; the resulting spinning and deflection should be at the least entertaining.
UPDATE: Somewhat surprisingly they did approve the comment.

IPC: 1986 amnesty was good (just not great) for those amnestied

2009-11-05T23:10:59-06:00

The Immigration Policy Center has released a report called "Economic Progress via Legalization: Lessons from the Last Legalization Program" [1] which points out that the 1986 amnesty helped those amnestied improve their situations. However, there's little in their report that's remarkable and they don't take into account the balance between the benefits and costs of the amnesty; everything's always great when it comes to amnesty. On the one hand, those amnestied may have led to increased economic activity and that might have helped others. On the other hand, the cost to those others of competition for their jobs led to reduced wages. And, of course, all the other costs; see below.
Theirs is yet another in the long line of bogus economic studies designed to encourage comprehensive immigration reform. They don't take into account what would have happened if those amnestied had instead been encouraged to return home: the Mexican government and far-left racial power groups would have less power inside the U.S. than they do now, we'd have less illegal immigration (it's increased in part due to the network effect; Mexicans arriving here illegally know they have a support structure in place), and our own low-wage workers' wages would be higher. In fact, they as much as acknowledge the last (note that their report concentrates on what they call "IRCA immigrants", which they define as "Mexican immigrants of different age groups who came to the United States during the 1975 - 1981 period"):

But the fact remains that the data indicate that the IRCA population improved its status both as a group and compared to natives.

Good for them, not so good for the rest of us; we know which side the IPC is on.
The most "dramatic" change they offer is: "By 2006, only half as many IRCA immigrants were below the poverty line as in 1990." Meanwhile: "Use of public assistance among IRCA immigrants remained largely unchanged overall" We're also informed that the "home ownership rates [of IRCA immigrants] improved tremendously". Perhaps considering the mortgage meltdown the IPC should have kept that to themselves. In fact, little in the report presents amnesties as that beneficial to the U.S., and there are all those costs the IPC will never mention. If you want to throw the IPC for a loop, ask them to do similar reports on those from other countries, or ask them to give a full accounting of all the costs and benefits of amnesty.

68% oppose sanctuary cities, only 13% support; 49% think their funds should be cut

2009-11-05T23:10:23-06:00

From a Rasmussen immigration poll from last month (link):

68% of U.S. voters oppose the creation of sanctuary cities. Only 13% favor the creation of cities that give safe haven to illegal immigrants. Nineteen percent (19%) are not sure.
Forty-nine percent (49%) say federal and state government funds should be cut off to cities that provide sanctuary to illegal immigrants. Thirty-three percent (33%) disagree and oppose any funding cutoff. Eighteen percent (18%) aren’t sure.
Fifty percent (50%) of voters say sanctuary policies that protect illegal immigrants lead to an increase in crime. Just 20% do not believe this to be true, while 30% are undecided.

Dan Lipinski challenger has divided loyalties, was official with Mexican political party (Jorge Mujica, Illinois)

2009-11-05T15:31:55-06:00

On Monday, Jorge Mujica of Illinois filed as a Democrat to challenge Rep. Dan Lipinski, also a Democrat. Mujica helped organize some of the illegal immigration marches in Chicago, he claims to be a dual citizen, he's a member of an advisory council to the Mexican government, and he is or was an official with the Mexican political party PRD. In other words, he clearly has divided loyalties, if he has any loyalty to the U.S. at all. Illinois seems to be even ahead of California in that regards; current Illinois state senator Martin Sandoval also serves on the same advisory council.
There's a Spanish-language article here where he refers to "mi doble nacionalidad" and says that Lipinski might try to sue to block his candidacy over that issue. He also mentions that a few others like him are or were considering running for various offices. See also this and this. Our past coverage of Mujica is here.
While Mujica probably doesn't stand much of a chance, the case of him and Sandoval shows yet another cost of massive immigration: it gives power inside the U.S. to foreign governments through those who represent those countries' agendas. And, that's a cost that those who promote massive/illegal immigration never want to acknowledge; don't let them get away with it by pointing out that cost in response to their promotion of massive/illegal immigration.

How to make Michelle Bachmann's plan to block Obamacare work

2009-11-05T14:43:16-06:00

Earlier today, Rep. Michelle Bachmann and a group of hundreds or thousands from the tea parties and related groups "stormed" Capitol Hill in an attempt to block Obama healthcare. That follows a conference call yesterday (link). If they had listened to me, they would have already blocked the plan or at least have eliminated any possible debate over the immigration-related provisions.
Since February 2007 I've been promoting the question authority plan, and in this case I wanted people to go to townhalls and ask tough questions on video about the immigration-related issues of Obamacare. That post is from August 14, 2009 post, right in the middle of townhall season. If any of the tea partiers had asked one of those questions or had otherwise tried to follow my plan, they could have had a major impact on the debate. Instead, all they did - encouraged by their corrupt and/or incompetent leaders - was go to meetings and act like baboons. They ranted, they raved, they threw tantrums like little kids, and at the end of the day they had little impact. And, they're still doing it, thinking that waving loopy signs is a replacement for intellectual debate.
Bachmann appears to be catching on about how to do things, albeit too late. On the conference call she told her followers:

"Don’t bring your pitchforks... bring your video cameras.... I think that will absolutely scare these members of Congress so much that Pelosi will not get the votes and it will kill the bill. I think it could be dead for 10 years. Why won’t we? Why won't we go for broke?"

She appears to at least be grasping at an idea close to mine. The difference however is that I want people to form local groups and assign themselves roles. Some people are better at thinking up questions than others, some are better at publicity than others, some are better at asking questions, and so on. Simply telling people to go videotape, say, Barney Frank isn't going to be that effective because he's a skilled politician who can easily respond to those who aren't also skilled at what they do.
To have an impact, the partiers and others would have to first sit down and think this through; obviously that's difficult for them but they need to do it. Then, with their emotions in check and with their goal in mind, they can follow the plan at the link above and try and have an impact.

Roundup of legal and illegal immigrant coverage by Obamacare

2009-11-04T12:45:56-06:00

Julia Preston of the New York Times has a roundup of the current state of Obamacare as it relates to coverage of legal immigrants and illegal aliens here. While near the beginning she does try to pretend that the Democrats wants to prevent illegal aliens from receiving benefits, she also includes quotes from those working to stiffen the identification requirements and correctly pointing out what the Democrats are trying to do. Per her, the battle now is over whether legal immigrants will be covered immediately or whether they'll have a waiting period. She also includes this:

"You can either keep those immigrants healthy now, or exclude them and wait until they get really sick, then pay for it down the line," said Prof. Steven P. Wallace, associate director of the U.C.L.A. research center. "If you don’t pay now, you’re going to pay for them later."

That's a false choice: legal immigrants are supposed to have sponsors who'll ensure that they don't become public charges.

Doug Hoffman's immigration position, Part 2

2009-11-02T21:57:07-06:00

On October 21, Glenn Beck interviewed Doug Hoffman on his radio show, and the transcript and audio are here, relevant portion excerpted at [1]. I previously discussed Hoffman's immigration position based on the three sentences he has on his site (questions for him are here); my review wasn't positive. While there's a slight glimmer of hope in what he said on Beck's show in regards to amnesty, the rest reveals him to be a bit worse than what I assumed based on the three-sentence blurb.
1. Based on the fact that he seems a bit malleable in the interview, he doesn't appear to be an ideologue on this issue or have been completely paid off; it might be possible to improve his position, if not for the fact that most of his ardent supporters either support massive immigration or concentrate on less important topics and thus won't ask him about this issue in an attempt to make him stronger; their mental and emotional issues also play into that (see tea parties).
2. As discussed before, he's very business-friendly, openly supporting mass immigration by skilled workers and - as previously discussed - probably supporting a guest workers scheme for low-wage workers.
3. He sounds a bit like George W Bush with his "willing workers" shtick with this: "I do believe, again, in giving better easier regulations and red tape to make workers that want to come into this country, giving them green cards easier so that we know they're in here legally and we know that they go out". The fact that he doesn't appear to be clear on what a green card is isn't that big of a deal; the big deal is that he appears to be supporting guest workers just as Bush did.
4. He was asked where he stood on amnesty and, as with all other politicians he said he was against it. Then, while they brought up the topic of comprehensive immigration reform and Hoffman appeared to come out against it and in favor of attrition. However, he just seemed to assent to Beck's prompting and didn't explicitly say he was for that. Unless he actually says it explicitly, it doesn't count (he's a politician after all).
5. Hoffman is, however, quite gung-ho on skilled immigration at least of the temporary kind ("we need to make it easy for skilled professionals and doctors and scientists and engineers that can come in here and help us out and then go home after they've done the job, we need to make it easier for them to come in.") He doesn't mention it by name, but that means something like the H1B program.
Partial transcript follows:

Ask Doug Hoffman these immigration questions

2009-10-31T17:57:01-05:00

Dede Scozzafava has withdrawn from the NY-23 race in upstate New York, leaving conservative and tea parties favorite Doug Hoffman squaring off against Democrat Bill Owens; the odds are speculated about here. As it turns out, the supposed insurgent conservative candidate appears to be weak on immigration matters (see also this update based on his comments about this issue), meaning that if he wins he might support guest workers and perhaps even an amnesty; both of those would lead to additional spending, higher taxes for his supporters, and reduced long-term political power for his supporters. Pointing that out to as many people as possible in as public a way as possible would have an impact on the election, and the best way to do that is to go to his public appearances and ask him the questions below on video. That video can then be uploaded to Youtube and similar sites where his supporters can see it; see the question authority summary for an action plan.
For Owens supporters, getting a video like that would reduce Hoffman's position with his base. For Hoffman supporters, getting a video like that might encourage him to drop his apparent Bush/RINO-like position on this issue.
A few questions follow, and see the immigration questions for Republicans for more:

Hundreds of thousands more foreign citizens got work permits than any stimulus jobs "created or saved"

2009-10-30T15:32:07-05:00

The Obama administration claims (link) that the stimulus plan "saved or created" about 650,000 jobs. Meanwhile, since the plan was enacted, 1,125,000 foreign workers have gotten work permits to work in the U.S. (whether green cards or temporary). That's almost a half a million difference, and not on the American side of the ledger.
The calculations are here:

*Each month, the feds give out about 160,000 first-time permanent and temporary work permits to working-age foreign citizens.
* The 160,000 working-age foreign citizens are divided almost equally into those getting permanent work permits through green cards and those getting temporary work permits each month.
* Of the immigrants aged 18-65 who get permanent work permits each month, about 35,000 of them were already working in the U.S. on previous temporary work permits.
* Thus, the NET figure is 160,000 minus 35,000 equals about 125,000 foreign citizens who are getting a work permit for the first time each month.

This would be a great thing to ask politicians about. In fact, it would be a great topic to ask anyone who discusses these issues from any side, whether pundits or bloggers.

Meg Whitman spouts amnesty talking points (California governor candidate)

2009-10-29T16:12:36-05:00

Former eBay CEO Meg Whitman is apparently like a talking doll you might find on that site, except in this case she says pro-business, pro-massive/illegal immigration talking points. Speaking at the border (link):

[She said] it is “simply not practical” to deport the estimated 12.5 million illegal immigrants living and working in the United States. (note: see deportations false choice)
The candidate, 53, said the solution is to find a mechanism that allows them to live here legally. "Can we get a fair program where people stand at the back of the line (note: see immigration line), they pay a fine, they do some things that would ultimately allow a path to legalization?" she asked. (note: see comprehensive immigration reform for some of the many downsides)
Whitman also urged tougher measures against those who hire undocumented workers, and said that as governor "I would be an advocate . . . for the people of California to make sure we really do secure this border." (note: see secure the border)
...[in the past she's] said that had she lived in California in 1994, she would have voted against Proposition 187... Yesterday, Whitman reiterated her opposition to "sanctuary cities"...

Judge David Carter makes false assumption, rules against Orly Taitz ("Birther" suit)

2009-10-29T13:31:03-05:00

Yet another Orly Taitz "Birther" lawsuit has failed; Dave Weigel crows about it here. Leaving aside all the many other factors of this story, judge David Carter of the Central District of California in his ruling (link) made a false assumption that shows either bias or inability to understand the fine points of this issue. He says (bolding added):

More specifically, Plaintiffs allege that the President has not shown that he is a "natural born citizen" of the United States and assert that he should have to establish his citizenship by "clear-and-convincing evidence". Plaintiffs argue that despite the fact that President Obama has produced a birth certificate from the state of Hawaii, there is evidence to show that the President was actually born in Kenya, thus making him ineligible to be President.

In fact, Obama hasn't "produced" anything beyond putting a picture of an alleged Certification of Live Birth on his web site. Further, it's not a "birth certificate", it's a "COLB". Ask yourself: would the judge give you the same leeway? If you were appearing before him and had to provide a document, would he accept a picture on a website in lieu of the actual document? Wouldn't he require the document to be authenticated by the issuing agency? Not only has Obama just shown a picture instead of the apparent underlying document, but Hawaii has not authenticated that picture. The judge is giving Obama a great deal of the benefit of the doubt, calling into question his integrity or his ability to understand that sometimes an alleged picture of an object and the object itself are different.
UPDATE: Despite what you might read in the comments, Hawaii has not authenticated the picture on Obama's site; there's a link right in the post above. They have not "authenticated his birth certificate" either. The most they've done is issue this statement. Note that she doesn't say anything about the picture on Obama's site.
Also, Obama never showed the supposed physical certification to Politifact, and there are several problems with the FactCheck posting on this, including the fact that they were lying to people for about eight months. See the main page at Obama citizenship, and see this page from over a year ago for more issues with the Fact Check posting.
Ask yourself: if this issue is as cut-and-dried as Obama cultists would have you believe, why do those Obama cultists - whether sockpuppets or MSM reporters - have to keep lying about the basic facts of this matter?

Shot fired at Lou Dobbs' house; what you can do about it

2009-10-29T11:34:11-05:00

On his Monday radio show, Lou Dobbs announced that a few weeks ago someone shot at his house while his wife was just 15 feet away. And, that followed a series of threatening phone calls; the state police are currently investigating. Audio of his broadcast is attached, and a partial transcript (via this) is at [1]. It goes without saying that if something like this had happened to a "liberal" broadcaster it would be a front-page story on the New York Times for the next month. However, at post time, this Fox News story about the incident is the most major source to cover this.
First, there's certainly the possibility that the shot had nothing to do with either the calls or with Dobbs' broadcasts. If it did, hopefully it's just one deranged person and not something more sinister. Assuming that it is related to his broadcasts, is it invalid to blame Dobbs-bashers like Geraldo Rivera, Rick Sanchez, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and all the rest? Not entirely. It would be scurrilous to directly blame Rivera, but it isn't invalid to point out that he and others have repeatedly vilified Dobbs and have helped create a toxic environment. And, it would be difficult to believe that someone who's familiar with Dobbs wouldn't also be familiar with his opponents.
Whatever the outcome of the case, it's vitally important for others to help Dobbs out in effective ways. The great majority of his backers aren't willing to do that. For instance, the FreeRepublic thread on this has over 2400 views (link) but when it comes time to actually doing something the vast majority of those folks have something else to do. If you'd like to actually do something, help discredit Dobbs' opponents. You can find a list of just some of them at the first link in this post. When they publish something online about Dobbs, leave a comment pointing out how they're lying, misleading, smearing, or enabling illegal activity. The same goes for those reporters who retail the thoughts of the SPLC or the Anti Defamation League. When a reporter posts something in which they try to re-sell the SPLC's line without any sort of skepticism, point out in comments how that reporter is misleading their readers. If you have a website, write posts similar to those at the first link in this post; try to arrange it so those searching for the name of a reporter in a search engine will be able to find why that reporter isn't credible. You can also help out by linking to the pages at the first link in this post. Those are all seemingly very simple steps, but few people are willing to actually do any work.
[1] From his 10/26 radio broadcast:

"But I want to tell you, when you talk about what they've done - they've created an atmosphere and they've been unrelenting in their propaganda... Three weeks ago this morning, a shot was fired at my house where I live. My wife was standing out and that followed weeks and weeks of threatening phone calls... And, as I told the state patrol, and by the way, the New Jersey State Patrol is absolutely terrific - they responded instantly. But this shot was fired with my wife not, I don't know, 15 feet away and we had threatening phone calls that I decided not to report because I get threatening phone calls... I now - it's become a way of life - the anger, the hate, the vitriol, but it's taken a different tone where they've threatened my wife. They've now fired a shot at my house while my wife was standing next to the car. It's become something else... But we've got to start being honest... Instead, the national liberal media has chosen sides and they've decided that they're going to focus on the liberal view, which is that they will embrace illegal immigration - no matter who is harmed, no matter how many laws are broken or how few consequences there are for breaking those laws."

UPDATE: Both the New York Post (link) and the Huffington Post (link) are trying to throw cold water on this story. The first says: police believe the shots were just from hunters... Sgt. Stephen Jones said, "At this time of year, hunter complaints go up." The second says that Jones chuckled out loud after he heard about Dobbs' account of the gunfire incident. Jones commented that he "wouldn't classify it [the gunfire incident] as very unusual." He also confirmed that there are hunters in the area, and stated that, "at this time of year hunter [shooting] complaints go up."... [another spokesman] explained that the bullet had hit the house in vicinity of the attic; it "hit the vinyl siding and fell to the ground" without penetrating the vinyl, he said. There are certainly a lot of possibilities here: Dobbs could be over-reacting, the cops could be playing a game in order to make the suspect complacent, the cops could be conflicted in some way, and so on. If the bullet didn't penetrate the siding, that would seem to indicate it had been fired from a distance, yet a hunter's bullet would probably be lower to the ground. Maybe Lou Dobbs should move to another state.
UPDATE 2: The CNN report presents the NJ police as more professional (link), with Jones saying among other things that "We want to take any incident like this seriously." It also says: Jones couldn't give his opinion on what kind of shooting this might be, and he said the incident is being investigated "further past a stray hunter's bullet" because of Dobbs' "public persona." Police have conducted interviews and patrolled the area, Jones said. And, per this, Dobbs lives on a 300-acre farm and A search of the area around Dobbs’ home did not uncover any hunters or recreational gun enthusiasts, [Jones] said.
11/02/09 UPDATE: Janet Murguia of the National Council of La Raza has released a passive-aggressive statement that smears Dobbs (nclr.org/content/news/detail/60357):

"Our thoughts are with Lou and his family... Our community knows all too well the impact that extreme rhetoric and a hostile climate can have on an issue like this. Every year since the immigration debate started, hate crimes against Latinos have increased, as has the number of hate groups targeting Latinos... While it is unclear who or what was behind this particular incident, we know that violence has no place in this debate... We have appealed to the networks repeatedly over the past three years to tone down the demonization of immigrants that is purveyed nightly over the nation’s cable network news and talk radio. We will continue our work to ensure that cooler heads on all sides of this debate prevail."