June 2008
Feds probe S.F.'s migrant-offender shield
[6/30/08]
Shielded by S.F., illegal immigrant juvenile dealers escape
Below: San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom and Chief of Police Heather Fong.
To top it off, the man who has done such a swell job of running San Francisco wants to do the same thing to the state: San Francisco's Mayor Gavin Newsom launches exploratory bid for governor.
• • •
Food safety inspectors struggle with swelling volume of imports
[6/30/08]
• • •
Joe Horn cleared by grand jury in Pasadena shootings
[6/30/08]
• • •
The American Dream: Dr. Quinones Incredible Story
[6/30/08]
• • •
After Words: Andrew McCarthy author of "Willful Blindness"
[6/30/08]
• • •
Candidates court Hispanic voters
[6/30/08]
• • •
Schwarzenegger now supports on McCain, environment
[6/29/08]
• • •
Dan Walters: Immigration, population and politics
[6/29/08]
It's too bad Monty Python never wrote an economist song similar to the one composed about the philosophers...
Only the Money Song comes close:
• • •
Suspect in triple killing ordered held without bail
[6/29/08]
There are other disturbing aspects to this crime. For one, Danielle Bologna, the widow and mother of the murder victims, pleaded with the San Francisco District Attorney to pursue a death penalty, because Kamala Harris clearly stated before she was elected that she didn't believe in capital punishment. A couple years ago she didn't ask for a death sentence in a cop killing case, so it's unlikely she will budge on this.
Below is a local news report. Included is Supervisor Geraldo Sandoval saying, "The gang problem right now in San Francisco in the Mission, in the outer Mission, is really out of control, they are shooting each other, they are armed to the teeth, they are ready at a split moment to start firing." Also, Gavin Newsom is shown blaming the NRA for the Bologna triple murder.
• • •
Minuteman Takes Down Goon
[6/28/08]
In other Minuteman news: OCEANSIDE: Judge orders Minutemen's Adopt-A-Highway permit reinstated.
• • •
Korean-Americans still getting settled
[6/27/08]
• • •
Surgeon Suspended For Removing Wrong Lung
[6/26/08]
• • •
Justices Rule for Individual Gun Rights [6/25/08]
• • •
The Fall of France and the Multicultural World War
[6/25/08]
• • •
Utah Rep. Cannon ousted in Republican primary
[6/25/08]
• • •
The Great Wall of America
[6/24/08]
• • •
More Grief for McCain on Secret Meeting with Hispanics
[6/24/08]
• • •
The New Pariahs?
[6/23/08]
This recent Times opinion piece criticizes Europe because of a few bleats for cultural survival.
Update: See Bruce Bawer's take on this article, The Times It Ain't A-Changin'." He is the author of the book, While Europe Slept.
• • •
An immigration end run around the next president
[6/23/08]
• • •
Oaxacan townspeople have high lead levels
[6/23/08]
• • •
'Model minority myth' can hinder Asian-American students [6/22/08]
• • •
Why driver in fatal crash was unlicensed
[6/22/08]
• • •
Fuel costs sending immigrants back to Mexico
[6/21/08]
• • •
Latinos Hard-Hit by Mortgage Crisis
[6/20/08]
• • •
American Girls
[6/20/08]
• • •
English language legislation gathers steam across the USA
[6/19/08]
Below, Philadelphia restaurant owner Joey Vento got in trouble with the Raza types for politely requesting that people order their cheese steaks in English.
• • •
ACLU seeks to clear 2 charities in Holy Land case
[6/19/08]
• • •
Mexico Revises Its Justice System
[6/18/08]
• • •
What led Turlock man to fatally beat toddler son?
[6/18/08]
• • •
Human cost of unlicensed drivers
[6/17/08]
• • •
Washington-area police report wave of burglaries, cite illegal immigrants
[6/17/08]
• • •
The Bubble: How homeowners, speculators and Wall Street dealmakers rode a wave of easy money with crippling consequences.
[6/16/08]
• • •
Asian restaurants often run afoul of Sacramento County health inspectors [6/16/08]
• • •
China Heeds U.S. Economist's Food Warnings [6/15/08]
• • •
Salvadorans send record remittances [6/15/08]
• • •
Jobs for teens hard to find [6/15/08]
• • •
Burmese refugees fill meatpacking jobs [6/15/08]
• • •
Immigration failure falls hard on suburban D.C. [6/14/08]
• • •
Driver may face federal charges [6/14/08]
• • •
3 in Ohio guilty of plot against US troops in Iraq [6/13/08]
• • •
Muslims 'planned creation of Islamic state in Scotland' [6/13/08]
• • •
Hispanics suffer highest pedestrian death rate [6/13/08]
• • •
"New poll: Both Obama and McCain are very unpopular in Mexico -- and Bush is off the charts" [6/12/08]
• • •
Rough Events at Mexican Rodeos in U.S. Criticized [6/12/08]
Jose Duran is building a "state-of-the-art lienzo" (Mexican rodeo ring) with his family in Patterson, California: "What we hope is this place will be a place where we'll teach our new generation our culture. This is my son Gabriel and Amelio, and hopefully they'll take this thing over and learn what it means and help me make this work. When they dress with a charro suit, with a charro outfit, they can feel that their body is being covered by the Mexican flag."
• • •
ACLU unveils big expansion plans for US heartland [6/11/08]
• • •
How HUD Mortgage Policy Fed The Crisis: Subprime Loans Labeled 'Affordable' [6/11/08]
• • •
House gives Merida Initiative the green light [6/10/08]
• • •
Chinese woman admits conspiring to smuggle sensors [6/10/08]
• • •
Uber-sanctuary city San Francisco continues to outdo itself. The latest misadventure in using taxpayer funds to improve the lives of illegal alien criminals by providing them with free flights home to Honduras that are not deportations. The kind-hearted San Francisco authorities want the drug-dealing kiddies to be able to return.
San Francisco police doubt that many of the young Hondurans they arrest on drug charges are even juveniles.
Here's an update from late today:
Police can report suspected adult illegal immigrants to federal authorities if they commit a crime, said Capt. Tim Hettrich, until recently the head of the narcotics unit.
So immigrant drug dealers "pass themselves off as juveniles, with a three-day growth of beard and everything else. It's frustrating," he said.
"Some of them have been arrested four or five times," Hettrich said. "That is one of the big problems with being a city of sanctuary."
He scoffed at San Francisco's strategy of returning the offenders to their home country. "They probably get the round trip and the next day, they will be right back here," Hettrich said.
Honestly, how much worse can it get than the city shielding crack dealers!?
An effort by San Francisco to shield eight young Honduran crack dealers from federal immigration officials backfired when the youths escaped from Southern California group homes within days of their arrival, officials said Monday.
This comes out just a few days after the shocking triple murder of a father and two sons by a MS-13 illegal alien gang-banger.
The walkaways are the latest in a string of embarrassments for city officials who are protecting illegal-alien drug dealers from federal authorities and possible deportation because of San Francisco's 1989 declaration that the city is a sanctuary for undocumented immigrants.
Until recently, San Francisco flew juvenile illegal immigrants convicted of drug crimes to their home countries rather than cooperate with the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, a practice that drew national attention when The Chronicle reported it Sunday.
When federal law enforcement authorities demanded that San Francisco halt the flights and began a criminal investigation, the city decided to house some of the dealers in long-term youth rehabilitation centers. Some of those centers are run by a not-for-profit outfit called Silverlake Youth Services in mountain towns southeast of San Bernardino.
Eight Honduran juveniles who had been convicted of dealing drugs in San Francisco were sent within the past few weeks to the company's group homes, where one month's placement costs $7,000 per youth - an expense borne by San Francisco taxpayers.
In addition, San Francisco has had to return several million dollars in federal grants in the Southwest Border Prosecution Initiative.
SAN FRANCISCO -- San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who built a national reputation pushing cutting-edge -- and controversial -- policies on same-sex marriage, healthcare and other issues, today launched an exploratory bid for governor.
Another growing problem with globalization is unsafe food. Foreign imports are not inspected to any meaningful degree and they are not designated as foreign in the supermarket, so we shoppers are at the mercy of unregulated business in Mexico and beyond.
LAREDO – Day after day, Mexican trucks line up as far as the eye can see for entry to the U.S. at the World Trade Bridge, carrying everything from raw tomatoes, broccoli and fresh basil to frozen seafood. They also bring in salmonella, listeria, restricted pesticides and other food poisons.
Customs and Border Protection officers take less than a minute per truck to determine which products enter the U.S. and find their way into grocery stores and restaurants across North Texas.
Most trucks are waved through. The avalanche of imported goods – especially food from Mexico – is too much for the limited number of inspectors at the nation's 300 ports of entry to effectively screen, critics say. And the sheer volume makes it impossible for them to carry out their mission: protecting the U.S. food supply and American consumers.
Joe Horn was the Texas guy who shot a couple of illegal aliens as they left his neighbor's house after robbing it. It's good to hear Texas gun rights are alive and well.
A Harris County grand jury decided today that Joe Horn should not be charged with a crime for shooting two suspected burglars he confronted outside his neighbor's home in Pasadena last fall. [...]
Another report noted the two illegal aliens were unemployed -- did the journalist mean to suggest that jobless illegals were inclined to commit crimes to make money they weren't earning? If so, it may constitute a trend; see In DC, Last Week’s Hard-Working Day Laborer Is Today’s Burglar.
Aside from the shooting itself, the national debate revolved around the fact that Ortiz and Torres were illegal immigrants from Colombia. Torres had been sent to prison for dealing cocaine and was deported in 1999.
I wrote about this doctor in May: Brilliant Neurosurgeon Discovered in Tomato Fields!. Dr. Quinones was an illegal alien who managed to work the system to become a surgeon.
Now he is a major character in a network reality tv series Hopkins; you can watch the opening episode start by following him around the hospital making his rounds and discussing his lawbreaking background ad nauseum; e.g. "The media portrays Mexican Americans in many cases as not being hard workers and if I don't make an effort to change that, who will?"
The film clip here has Dr. Q driving by a group of day laborers and remarking, "Just down the street is a group of people doing what I was doing just about 20 years ago," with heart-tuggy music playing in the background. The not-so-subliminal message is America shouldn't close its borders because we might miss out on some Einstein. (The brilliant physicist came legally, in fact.)
"By the time I was 19, I decided I wanted to go to the U.S. and explore," Quiñones-Hinojosa said. "I was tired of the political oppression and the bifurcation of classes, the oppression of the poor that happens in my country."
To media elites, it's okay for foreigners to break a pile of immigration laws as long as there is a warm and wonderful story at the end, suitable for network programming.
Desperate for money, and with his sights set on a brighter future, he scaled a barbed border fence across from Calexico, Calif.
"It was a pretty scary experience," Quiñones-Hinojosa remembered. "It was filled with a real adrenaline rush excitement, but also fear, and, you know, fear gives you extra strength and courage. I got caught and sent back, but I did it again the same night."
After watching this interview on C-SPAN yesterday, I will definitely get this book and read it closely. Andrew McCarthy prosecuted the blind sheik Abdel Rahman for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and putting the case together was a crash course for McCarthy to learn about the deeply violent nature of Islam. He admitted to being very naive about Islam in the beginning, but that changed with contact.
Andrew McCarthy, the lead prosecutor against Sheik Omar Abdel Rahmen and the other men responsible for the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 recounts the case in "Willful Blindness: A Memoir of the Jihad." Mr. McCarthy presents his thoughts on the trial and the current state of the war on terror. Andrew McCarthy discusses his book with Hugh Hewitt, host of the nationally syndicated radio program, The Hugh Hewitt Show and executive editor of Townhall.com.
You can watch the interview online by opening the link above and clicking the WATCH button. Or, you can download the audio as a podcast from Hugh Hewitt's radio archives on June 24: in mp3, Part 1 and Part 2. Highly recommended.
How truly remarkable that Sen McCain called comprehensive immigration "reform" (political speak for amnesty) his "top priority" in today's political climate.
Think about it. Think about the severe economic crises facing the United States today. The Dow lost 500 points last week. The Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University has stated that the country is facing its worst housing crisis in 50 years. The national unemployment rate is 5.5 percent, while California has a seasonally adjusted rate of 6.8 percent and Michigan is suffering the worst with 8.5 percent. The price of gasoline just hit a record high (with oil at $143/barrel);
seven in 10 Americans say the skyrocketing cost of gas has caused them "financial hardship." America has no plan to deal with declining availability of oil, despite the oil shocks of the early 1970s that were a clear warning that we needed new, preferably sustainable energy sources.
But for Sen. John McCain, his Top Priority is rewarding tens of millions of lawbreaking illegal aliens with amnesty. It takes your breath away.
WASHINGTON -- With an estimated 9.2 million Hispanic voters poised to play a critical role in November, John McCain and Barack Obama each pledged Saturday to make immigration overhaul a priority as they courted influential Hispanic leaders whose votes could be pivotal in key swing states like Florida.
McCain, the senator from border state Arizona who disappointed some Hispanic leaders by appearing to temper his support for comprehensive immigration changes during the Republican primaries, told the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials that fixing U.S. immigration policy would be a priority -- even as he acknowledged it's not popular with some members of his own party.
"It'll be my top priority yesterday, today and tomorrow," McCain said.
It's interesting to learn the things powerful people say to each other when the microphones are turned off. Here's a piece about the California governor and a little item about changing the Constitution comes out like it's no big deal...
Schwarzenegger said Tim Russert, the recently deceased host of "Meet the Press" whom Shriver had called her best friend, told him if he ever chose to run for president he would help. "When I ran for governor, he called me and said, 'If you make that, if you win, then I will take care of the rest,'" Schwarzenegger recalled. "I said what are you talking about? And he said, 'I will get you to run for president. I will make sure that we change the Constitution.' It never happened. But anyway, I miss him very much."
Meet the Press honcho Tim Russert thought that he was powerful enough to engineer a change in the United States Constitution in order to advantage a pal. Arnold Schwarzenegger was born in Austria and is therefore not eligible to become President.
When you are a Washington player, like Russert was, issues like American foundational law are just bumps along the road to be flattened by the mighty power of the MSM. It's an example of the everyday, accepted arrogance of the press.
The Sacramento columnist does an update on the population growth aspect of California's race off a cliff...
It's a simple demographic fact that as California's population grows by a half-million or more people each year, virtually all of that growth stems from immigration, legal and illegal. Were it not for immigration and babies born to immigrant mothers, California's births and deaths would be in balance and the state would have zero population growth.
Unfortunately Walters goes on to spew the Ponzi-esque idea that we need increasing population in order to do the jobs and pay for Social Security. It's sad to see a smart guy like Walters spout thoughtless Washington boilerplate.
It's also obvious that population growth, whatever its source, creates the demand for more housing, more water, more schools, more highways – more of everything – and that filling that demand puts pressure on the environment.
Environmental groups such as the Sierra Club have attempted to ignore this cause-and-effect relationship for political reasons, i.e., they depend on liberal politicians to advance their agenda, and tolerance of immigration, even illegal immigration, is a tenet of modern liberalism. The Sierra Club, et al., especially don't want to alienate Latino politicians and organizations, or the expanding ranks of Latino voters.
With the very large baby boom retiring out of the labor force, shortages of trained workers are already looming in California. Who would be there to do the work, pay the taxes and provide the services that a rapidly aging population would demand? Low-growth countries such as Japan are already feeling that pinch.
He should understand that the country needs fundamental changes in policy because we cannot continue to base our economy on population growth, in particular the importation of poorly educated foreigners. Americans will need to work longer before retirement because the average lifespan is increasing. We will need far more automation, from robots to Roombas and crop-pickers.
For several days after this terrible multiple murder in San Francisco, the low-life attorney of the Salvadoran illegal alien gang-banger Edwin Ramos lied that his client was a legal immigrant. The truth is out now, however.
Police say Ramos is a member of the Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, gang.
The details of the triple killing are strikingly evil. The precipitating traffic incident was nothing that would cause most Americans to bat an eyelash, but the MS-13 creature went ballistic and shot a father and two sons (Alleged killer of S.F. father and 2 sons ordered held without bail
):
Immigration authorities say they believe Ramos is in the country illegally and could try to deport him once the case is resolved.
Edwin Ramos, 21, of El Sobrante is charged with three counts of murder and other crimes in the slayings Sunday in San Francisco of Tony Bologna, 48, and sons Michael, 20, and Matthew, 16.
Anthony Bologna, left, and his two sons, Michael, 20, and Matthew, 16, were shot and killed on Sunday, June 22, 2008, in San Francisco, Calif.
He appeared shackled at the waist in a jail jumpsuit, a large tattoo of the Salvadoran national crest visible on the back of his closely shaved head. Ramos is a native of El Salvador. [...]
The killings happened when Tony Bologna blocked a car making a left turn in the Excelsior district Sunday afternoon while he was driving home from a family picnic. The killer opened fire after Bologna backed up to let the other car past, authorities say.
Worse, the SFPD had Edwin Ramos in custody earlier this year and let him go. That's how justice works in sanctuary cities -- foreign gang-bangers get cut loose and innocent citizens get murdered.
Apparently a chubby Mexican was more sensitive about his waistline than his immigration status. One anti-borders individual became irate and bit a Minutemman when the former's weight was impugned at a rally of several dozen citizen patriots in Westminster, California. Fortunately there were police nearby to arrest the violent man. Link above has numerous photos of the event.
OC Vaughn organized a day laborer site rally - Home Depot Westminster, CA - 40 ralliers were assembled at 7:30 am 6/28/08 At approximately 8:30am a male Hispanic, driving, stopped his truck and yelled at assembled ralliers.
He asked "You Minutemen?" No one answered at first, then Kingfish stepped forward and stated "I AM." "You are sick!" The man yelled. "And you, are a little overweight" Kingfish replied.
The man became enraged quickly exited the truck ran around and ran at Kingfish cocking his arm back to punch him. As he did so, Kingfish blocked the punch with his left hand, and punched the goon with his right. He then knocked the goon to the ground in two moves and restrained him until the police arrived. In the struggle, the goon bit Kingfish on the thumb.
A federal judge on Friday ordered the state Transportation Department to let a controversial group of anti-illegal immigration activists pick up litter near a Border Patrol checkpoint.
In a 34-page order, Judge William Q. Hayes granted the San Diego Minutemen's request for a preliminary injunction that gives Caltrans 30 days to reinstate the group's Adopt-A-Highway permit for a 2-mile stretch of Interstate 5 near San Clemente.
The state also must restore the courtesy sign bearing the Minutemen's name, the judge ruled.
Koreans are one of those immigrant groups that are supposed to be among the most successful. When you look more closely, however, the picture is not so rosy.
In the region for more than 40 years, Koreans "are still in the settlement stage," Song said. "People think it's time to figure out how we can be more actively engaged in this society."
Doing that remains a challenge, given some obstacles presented in the survey.
Although nearly 70 percent of all Koreans are college graduates, nearly half of workers surveyed confessed that they are more comfortable communicating in Korean than in English. About a third of the employers interviewed said they rely more on Korean.
Nearly half of the workers surveyed had no health insurance and roughly 75 percent didn't know federal minimum wage laws require they earn at least $5.85 per hour.
Medical malpractice is always disturbing, but when the actions are as egregious as in this case, the punishment of a mere fine and two-year suspension are appalling. Is the minimal response because the perp is a foreigner?
Not only did Indian physician Santusht Perera remove the patient's healthy lung, he lied about it and covered up his deadly malpractice.
Santusht Perera’s physician’s license was suspended after he removed of portions of the wrong lung during surgery and allegedly attempted to conceal the error.
That description leaves out details about the lengths to which Santusht Perera went to protect himself and misinform his patient. See New Jersey Moves to Strip License of Surgeon Who Removed Wrong Lung, Corporate Crime Reporter, June 8, 2005:
Perera was issued a two-year suspension on June 5 from the State Board of Medical Examiners. The Board’s appellate court upheld the suspension in Perera’s appeal case with a final decision on June 12.
After the surgery, Perera told the patient, Richard Flagg, the right lung tissue, which was wrongfully removed, contained a life-threatening tumor even though he knew it did not.
He altered his records to show he intended to operate on the right lung even though he was actually supposed to remove the tumor in the left lung.
"I was pretty groggy when I woke up," Flagg told Corporate Crime Reporter in an extensive interview in March 2003. "It was the next day when most of the morphine wore off, that I felt a big bulk on my right side. And it hurt. The doctor came in that day, and I asked him – why did you operate on my right lung? And he said – while you were asleep, we did an x-ray and we found a much larger, a much more dangerous, tumor in your right lung, as well as severe hemorrhaging. By doing this operation, I probably saved your life, he said."
A total lie. A doctor interviewed earlier today on Fox News said removing the good lung condemned Richard Flagg to death because the tumor on the infected lung was so extensive.
In addition, Indians continue to be obsessed by their expat countrymen, and this story was no exception. MSNBC has a special NRI edition -- NRI being "Non-Resident Indians." The Times of India keeps an Indians Abroad page -- such is the fascination Indians have for themselves. They expect NRIs to refrain from assimilation and bring honor to Mother India by snaring first-world accomplishment with lots of effusive press coverage.
In addition, immigrant MDs are another bad public policy area, where foreign medical students and residents get advantages that citizens do not; see Immigrant Doctors Aren’t Necessary Either.
Good news on the Second Amendment front -- sort of. The idea that Americans have the right to armed self-defense has been upheld, but only by a vote of 5-4. Here is the text of the decision (in PDF).
Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for the majority in the landmark 5-to-4 decision, said the Constitution does not allow “the absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home.” In so declaring, the majority found that a gun-control law in the nation’s capital went too far by making it nearly impossible to own a handgun.
It's too bad Charlton Heston didn't live to see this day.
Fjordman is one of the few critics of Islam who consistently emphasizes the central part that immigration has played, in particular that Europe's pending suicide stems from welcoming millions from a foreign, hostile culture. Many other pundits and bloggers (e.g. Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs) tapdance around that pertinent fact because the "I" word is too controversial for them.
Fjordman is also imaginative enough to consider the dangerous future that unwise immigration is creating, and how the clash of civilizations might play out, since liberal immigration has permitted historic enemies to live among us. Did the architects of this policy believe a few choruses of kumbaya would end deep-seated tribal hatreds? That once Muslims got a taste of western values (such as they are in Europe these days), they would forget unpleasant ideas of jihad and have another capucino? It hasn't worked out that way, to say the least.
If Muslim immigration continues, the impending fall of France could mark the starting point of the Balkanization of much of Europe, perhaps later even North America. I fear this is a world war. Maybe future historians will dub it the Multicultural World War. Just as WW1 was caused by Imperialism, WW2 by Fascism and the Cold War by Communism, this one will be caused by Multiculturalism. The term “the Multicultural World War” has been coined by Fjordman. I find this to be more accurate than “The Islamic World War” because what will cause this world war is Western cultural weakness, through Multiculturalism and Muslim immigration, rather than Islamic strength. As poster DP111 says, this world war may very well be in the form of a global civil war, where you get a succession of civil wars instead of countries invading other countries. Multiculturalism and uncontrolled mass-immigration destroy the internal cohesion of the decadent West, which will slowly fall apart as it has lost the will to defend itself and the belief in its own culture. The wars in the Balkans in the 1990s will in hindsight be seen as a prelude to the Multicultural World War. Rather than a Westernization of the Balkans, we get a Balkanization of the West.
Excellent news -- we are doing the Happy Dance here! Open borders creep Chris Cannon has been defeated in a primary election. Previous attempts by challengers Matt Throckmorton in 2004 and John Jacob in 2006 attacking his immigration record failed, so this victory is particularly sweet. In addition, the deciding issue was clearly immigration because Cannon was conservative on other issues, and this win will likely be noticed by pundits looking for indicators of which way the political winds are blowing.
U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon, one of the nation's most conservative congressmen, lost his bid for a seventh term Tuesday in a Republican primary that focused on whether he was conservative enough for Utah's 3rd District.
Cannon was particularly two-faced about the immigration issue, as even the LA Times pointed out in 2006 (From Welcome to Wary in Utah):
Cannon was defeated by first-time candidate Jason Chaffetz, a former Brigham Young University football player who served as chief of staff for popular Republican Gov. Jon Huntsman.
The lobbying group American Conservative Union said Cannon was nearly perfect on its issues in 2007, scoring 96 percent. But Chaffetz repeatedly pounded the incumbent, especially on immigration, and pledged to be even more conservative. [...]
In the congressional race, Chaffetz, 41, claimed Cannon was soft on immigration, saying his votes amounted to offering amnesty to people in the country illegally.
In 2003, Cannon sponsored a bill that would have allowed states to charge in-state tuition for children of illegal immigrants.
Rather than deporting all illegal immigrants, Cannon has called for a guest-worker program that doesn't punish businesses and allows immigrants to travel freely across the border.
Chaffetz said he wants the U.S. to deport all illegal immigrants and stop granting automatic citizenship to children born here if their parents aren't legal residents.
Four years ago, U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon told the audience at a Mexican-American Legal Defense and Educational Fund dinner: "We love immigrants in Utah. We don’t make distinctions between legal and illegal."
What a lying scum. Hopefully a lot more incumbents like him will get the boot this year.
Two weeks ago, the Utah Republican sent a video to party activists saying that he was tough on illegal immigration and that the nation had to secure its borders.
Time magazine paid a visit to the border to check the progress of the interminable border fence project. As we approach the seven-year mark of 9/11, our southern border remains largely open. DHS aims to have 650 miles completed by the end of the year, but that's only about one-third of the Mexican border.
If we didn't have to worry about terrorists as well as job thieves, workplace policing would suffice, but we don't so we need comprehensive enforcement.
Critics complain that the fence is funneling migrants into a life-threatening desert, and they may be right, because while the area is difficult to reach from the north, on the Mexican side, Highway 2 parallels the border within sight of the U.S. It's tempting to catch a ride out here and start walking. Indeed, so many people have died or approached death in the Sonoran Desert that the CBP has installed radio beacons with flashing lights on them for walkers in distress to summon help. A more primitive sos is also common: a creosote bush set on fire at night.
Below: A few strands of barb wire is supposed to keep out 100 million Mexicans, according to el Presidente Bush.
Still, a case could be made that Yuma Sector's fence is part of an overall strategy that is actually reducing the number of unprepared humans wandering in the Sonoran Desert. As agent Ben Vik explained, by eliminating banzai runs in Yuma and reducing vehicle traffic in the desert, the fence has cut illegal crossings to a level at which the judicial system in western Arizona can actually handle the number of illegal immigrants apprehended by border agents. Instead of loading people onto buses and sending them back to Mexico--after which many immediately try crossing again--authorities are taking them to court. "Two weeks in jail with no income is a real deterrent," said Vik. This combination of forces--the fence, plus more agents, plus the desert, plus a real penalty--has allowed Yuma Sector to cut traffic 80%, the CBP estimates.
Good for Tom Tancredo to take McCain to task for his pandering to La Raza.
Tancredo asks if promises made by McCain earlier in the presidential campaign to hold off on giving longtime illegal immigrants a "pathway to citizenship" until after the borders were secured were any more than lip service, and wonders whether the presumptive Republican nominee's candidacy is a Trojan horse for amnesty.
"Senator, given your past sponsorship of amnesty legislation, such statements raise troubling questions. Are you planning to break a promise you made in February to postpone all other immigration reform legislation until we have first secured our borders?" writes Tancredo, who goes on to ask McCain to use an upcoming speech to the pro-pathway to citizenship National Council of La Raza in San Diego to embrace a "security first" immigration approach.
"I challenge you to deliver a message to that assembly which does not pander to their amnesty agenda. You should speak to the La Raza convention and to all Hispanic audiences about America's need for secure borders as a priority above all other immigration reforms," Tancredo said.
McCain was a vocal proponent of the failed Senate attempt to pass comprehensive immigration reform when Republicans controlled the body in 2006. He was a less visible proponent in 2007, when Democrats were in charge, though he voted again for a bipartisan, comprehensive approach to immigration in both years.
Is there another institution more Energizer Bunny-like in its slavish adoration of multiculturalism than the New York Times? Put away those ideas of national identity, the Times preaches: patriotism is redneck stuff and inappropriate for the new improved global economy.
The photo below (complete with a pink balloon and cutesy kiddies!) is an example of the paper's continuing propaganda that open-borders diversity is the best thing going: the only thing missing is a an adorable puppy! Oh wait, Muslims hate dogs because Sons of Allah believe they are "unclean." Never mind.
No country is wholly free of anti-immigrant prejudice, whether it is the United States, where illegal immigration was a hot-button issue in the Republican primaries, or post-apartheid South Africa, where economic migrants were recently burned to death. But in many Western European countries today, something new and insidious seems to be happening. The familiar old arguments against immigrants — that they are criminals, that their culture makes them a bad fit, that they take jobs from natives — are mutating into an anti-Islamic bias that is becoming institutionalized in the continent’s otherwise ordinary politics.
The opinion writer omits inconvenient details of how Muslim immigrants are busy blowing Europe up and working to force women to live under Islamic oppression in the West, including a "Muslim Rape Wave."
Examples abound. The Swiss People’s Party sponsors ads in which three white sheep push one black sheep off the Swiss flag — and wins 29 percent of the vote. In Belgium, the Vlaams Belang deploys a clever variation, publicly praising Jews and seeking their support against Muslims, whom it tellingly describes as “the main enemy of the moment.” Meanwhile, the Dutch politician Geert Wilders calls Islam “the ideology of a retarded culture.”
For a disturbing example of the latter, see Brussels: Less and less women on the street.
It's good to hear that plans are being made to deal with the next President, who will seek an amnesty that will include at least 10 million, perhaps double or trible that number. Both candidates are hopeless globalists who talk up strengthening American borders and national security but have no intention of doing the job.
NumbersUSA concentrates on elections but soon will expand its work to legislation, [NumbersUSA Executive Director Roy] Beck said. For now, the group tracks the immigration positions of every candidate in every race and assigns them a grade that is distributed monthly to the organization's 640,000 members. Beck boasted that NumbersUSA had an average of 1,300 members per congressional district. But he added: "We need more participation on the ground."
To that end, Beck is looking for fundraisers and local leaders in preparation for November's congressional races. He argued that a Democratic Congress "doesn't necessarily mean bad things for us."
Some freshman Democrats who won seats from Republicans are tough on illegal immigration because "they need a way to show people that they're different from the party leadership," he said.
Beck once saw the same split among Republicans. Though the Bush administration and much of the party leadership backed changes that would legalize illegal immigrants, other Republicans shifted to a stricter stance.
"We've spent the last seven years separating the Republican back bench from the party leadership with tremendous success," said Beck, who said his sights are now on the Democrats. "We'll continue to push that line hard."
This item is a particularly egregious example of the San Francisco Chronicle emphasing upbeat aspects of diversity while leaving out important facts entirely.
The topic is lead poisoning among Oaxacan immigrants in California who are eating snacks sent from home, like fried grasshoppers and pumpkin seeds. At no point does the story mention the symptoms of even low levels of lead in the blood. The emphasis is how much the immigrants love culturally connecting food items.
A far more informative Chronicle report in 2006 noted, "Just 10 micrograms of lead per deciliter of blood can permanently lower a child's IQ by four to five points." Today's article states that some Oaxacan immigrant children have lead levels "reaching 20 micrograms per deciliter."
Since half of Hispanic children don't graduate from high school, you might think cultural proclivities that decrease intelligence would be taken seriously as a public health concern. But no, not at the Chron.
In an open-air market in this rural town, indigenous Zapotec women scoop fried, rust-colored grasshoppers and pumpkin seeds from large baskets into plastic bags. Customers, from elderly men to school children, pluck down a few pesos to munch on Oaxaca state's most popular snacks.
Scenes like these make Oaxaca immigrants to the United States - many of whom live in the Bay Area - homesick. And one of the best ways to assuage their nostalgia: lovingly prepared care packages sent by relatives filled with homemade goodies.
"It's comfort food," said Teresa Mendez, a 54-year-old market cook who regularly sends local treats to her grandchildren in Northern California. "Food keeps us connected." [...]
Aragon says respected community leaders must step forward to issue warnings on radio stations in Zimatlan and Seaside.
Back at the Zimatlan market, Maria Luisa Quevedo has sold glazed pots near the market for generations.
"We've cooked this way for years, and we're all fine," said Quevedo. She then pointed to her 92-year-old grandmother, who stirred a large glazed pot of beans. "Look at her. She's fine."
Add to the list of ways that immigrants suffer is the idea that Asians are top quality when it comes to scholarly success. While UC Berkeley is up to its eyeballs in Chinese, Hmong and others are not so swift with book learning. So the less gifted feel unduly pressured.
And naturally, college social engineers are wringing their hands because they haven't yet achieved perfect skin-tone diversity in their campus petrie dishes.
The generalizations place unnecessary academic pressures on Asian students and can prevent universities from reaching out to subgroups of Cambodian, Laotian and Hmong high schoolers, who have dramatically lower college enrollment rates, according to the report. [...]
Oops, apparently culture matters quite a bit in educational achievement.
The new report says there is a broad range of educational and income ranges among the two-dozen Asian-American ethnic groups reported by the U.S. Census Bureau.
About 44 percent of Asian Americans - excluding Pacific Islanders - have earned a bachelor's degree, which compares with the national average of 24 percent. But just 7.5 percent of Hmong immigrants, 9.2 percent of Cambodians and 7.7 percent of Laotians had earned a bachelor's degree in 2000, according to the national figures.
Even so, perfect diverse wonderfulness is prevented by the presence of all those annoying white people, at least according to a local Asian student:
"We want to make Hmong students feel more welcomed,” [senior psychology major Victoria] Vue said. “CU-Boulder tries really hard to be more diverse, but it is a Caucasian hole. I feel like a lot of students get intimidated by that.”
"Caucasian hole"? If someone called UC Berkeley a "Chinese hole" they would be smacked around as a racist, but insulting white Americans brings no disapproval.
Another child has been killed by an illegal alien. Sixth-grade student Breanna Slaughter-Eck was run down and killed in San Jose as she rode her bike home from school on June 12.
Not only was the driver of a Ford Bronco that fatally struck a 12-year-old girl unlicensed, but San Jose police say she is also an illegal immigrant, renewing the debate over whether undocumented people should be allowed to apply for driver's licenses.
Naturally rathole one-bill Gil Cedillo is on the case, misrepresenting drivers' licenses for illegal aliens as the solution to tragedies like this.
The revelation that Adriana Fierro De Marin, 31, is in the country illegally struck yet another chord with the family of Breanna Slaughter-Eck, still reeling from the loss of the Hoover Middle School sixth-grader.
"I'm worried that she just might flee now and walk away from all this," said Joe Castro, the man who raised Breanna for the last four years. For her part, Breanna's mother simply wants justice.
Breanna was biking home from Hoover on June 12, her last day of school, when a Ford Bronco making a left turn slammed into her. The crash is still under investigation and no charges have been filed.
"We have, every day, 2 1/2 million people ..taking the roads who, if given the opportunity, would apply for driver's licenses," said Cedillo, whose latest proposal passed the Senate and is back before the Assembly this summer. "We're endangering the lives of pedestrians and motorists in California every single day."
That's right, dismantle America's system of laws in order to suit foreign criminals! It's typical thinking from one of Mexifornia's hispanic leaders. Handing out state Identification to anyone who wants it is a welcome mat for terrorists and criminals alike.
There are so many reasons for aliens to leave -- the occasional but well publicized workplace crackdown, the crash in house building following the subprime debacle -- now it's gasoline prices. Buh-bye foreigners! Happy trails!
But high gas prices are forcing contractors and day laborers to change how they do business, which is causing a ripple effect in other areas.
Speaking of unwelcoming America, see Why Former Mexican Migrants Are Staying Home. The CSM reports that Mexicans who have done jail time for illegal entry are motivated not to return -- imagine that!
Construction projects and landscaping jobs are being delayed because contractors can’t afford to pick up workers. And workers faced with additional costs for gasoline or the purchase of a car are giving up on day-labor jobs and going back to their home countries.
"Your car is your job; nothing is more true these days," said Warren Harris, human services coordinator for the center, which assists between 60 and 70 day laborers a day.
EL GUSANO, MEXICO - Jose Balderama spent half a decade in the United States working roofing jobs in Texas. The money he sent home each month went to his wife and four children - a source of income the family expected to count on for many years to come.
But after serving six months at the Eden Detention Center in Texas for getting caught without the proper paperwork, he says he is never going back. "This was six months, next time it could be six years," he says on a recent day in this tiny town tucked in the foothills of the Sierra de Guanajuato mountains.
Here's a text and sound report from National Public Radio about the subprime fallout. Apparently increased crime is one of the various unfortunate symptoms when immigrants experience hard times: for another example, see In DC, Last Week’s Hard-Working Day Laborer Is Today’s Burglar.
All Things Considered, June 20, 2008 - The wave of foreclosures spreading around the country is hitting Latino communities especially hard.
Many Hispanic homeowners could only qualify for subprime loans, and those mortgages were marketed to them aggressively.
Now as the forelcosures mount, some neighborhoods are deteriorating.
Crime is up, businesses are struggling and the construction jobs that were so plentiful are vanishing.
This piece is a flawed feature story about the two Texas high school girls, Amina and Sarah Said, who were murdered by their Egyptian father for disobeying his demands that they live as oppressed Islamic women in America. (See Honor Killing in Texas.)
The girls' mother was a 15-year-old high school dropout working as a cashier when she met Yaser Said in 1987. The Egyptian immigrant needed an America wife quick because his visa was about to end. She was warned by relatives not to marry a man from such an alien culture, but she didn't listen and as a result, the family got the whole nine yards of Islam.
From the time they were little, Yaser told his daughters they were to have no American boyfriends, ever. Yaser and Islam kept strict watch over the girls to ensure they didn't disobey the command.
This article is disappointingly flawed because it attempts to cling to political correctness by rounding off the edges of murderous cultural rage against two girls, saying about the honor killing charge, "The truth is more complex."
Yaser had big plans for both girls. Everything would begin in May, when Amina received her high school diploma. She would get engaged to a man he had chosen for her in Egypt, his birthplace. From the groom, Amina would receive a sizable mahr, the traditional dowry. Yaser had scrimped for years to provide his own contribution to the marriage: a small vacation "chalet" on the seaside in the Sinai.
When Amina, who dreamed of becoming a doctor, asked her father when she would go to college, Yaser had a simple answer: when—if—your husband allows. The same was expected for Sarah.
But how "complexity" can absolve this terrible crime is not explained.
I have mixed feelings about stories like this: while defense of English should get much more energy than it does, according to the state Constitution, "English as the Official Language of California." (See Article 3, Section 6.)
And it hasn't done Californians much good to have English as our official language. We still have expensive multilingual ballots up the kazoo, Press One for English and "bilingual" (Spanish) capability being required for the lowest sorts of jobs.
English as an official language has gained momentum as proponents keep going to the ballot box with measures that discourage bilingual ballots, notices and documents.
How is it "hostile" to require that immigrants learn this nation's language in return for all the benefits they receive from living here? A 2005 poll found that 79 percent of Americans believe immigrants should know English before allowed to become citizens -- a requirement that is officially in place now, but is rarely followed.
Thirty states now have laws specifying that official government communications be in English, says U.S. English, a group that promotes the laws. This year such bills are under consideration in 19 legislatures.
"It's multiplying tremendously," says Mauro Mujica, a Chilean immigrant and chairman and CEO of U.S. English. "We've made huge progress."
Critics do not see progress. Some say the increase in the measures nationwide sends a hostile message to newcomers.
Furthermore, the people who say official English is hostile are the ones insisting we Americans learn Spanish.
How evil is the ACLU? Very evil. Defending America's head-choppy enemies is job #1. The ACLU no longer makes much of a pretense about the free speech stuff: now it is full speed ahead for the borderless socialist paradise.
In today's episode, the commie lawyers are defending the well known terrorist-support organization, the Holy Land Foundation.
The American Civil Liberties Union filed a motion in federal court Wednesday seeking to clear two groups named as unindicted co-conspirators in a terrorism-financing case.
Last year's Holy Land terrorism-financing trial ended in a mistrial.
The Islamic Society of North America and the North American Islamic Trust were among about 250 Muslim individuals and groups named by the government in its case against the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development.
The case against five former Holy Land officials accused of helping finance Hamas, which the U.S. government designated as a terrorist group, ended in a mistrial last year. Another trial is set for September.
A person could almost get to like Calderon for his efforts at reforming Moochico
if he weren't such a total pest about immigration and destroying America.
President Felipe Calderón on Tuesday signed legislation designed to fundamentally change Mexico's much-criticized justice system by allowing U.S.-style oral trials and establishing a presumption of innocence for criminal defendants.
The sweeping measures also require local and state police departments to "purify" their ranks of corrupt officers, and they grant those agencies power to investigate organized crime, an authority that had previously been the exclusive domain of federal authorities. Calderón has said the changes are crucial to his battle against the drug cartels blamed for thousands of deaths each year.
"What is at stake is not the liberty, security or integrity of the government, but above all the security and integrity of the governed," Calderón said in a ceremony at the presidential palace, Los Pinos, in Mexico City.
On local news in northern California, the case of a man beating a child to death on a country road has gotten a lot of coverage. He was shot and killed by police when he refused to stop thrashing the little boy.
No mention of immigration status, of course.
Sergio Casian Aguiar, who worked at a supermarket in Turlock, was fatally shot by police Saturday night after he refused to stop attacking his 2-year-old son, according to the Stanislaus County Sheriff's Department.
An earlier report: Killer dad said he had to 'get the demons' out.
Aguiar's wife, Frances Liliana Casian, a kindergarten teacher, told detectives that she didn't know why Aguiar would brutally beat their child and said he didn't have any mental illness that she knew about, according to sheriff's spokesman, Royjindar Singh. Casian and Aguiar had been separated. [...]
Aguiar had immigrated from Mexico, and family members will be traveling from abroad to make funeral arrangements and meet with Stanislaus County investigators, Singh said.
A 27-year-old grocery store worker who police say punched and kicked his 2-year-old son to death on a country road calmly told motorists who stopped at the scene that he had to "get the demons" out of the boy, two witnesses said Monday.
Was the killer a superstitious peasant from the Mexican boonies? Sounds like it.
It's rare to see an article like this, because it actually mentions the victims (like 21-year-old Steven Rand Rouvet) of unlicensed drivers, who are often drunk-driving illegal aliens.
COLUMBIA—Recent accidents, some involving illegal immigrants, have captured the attention of the community and have lawmakers talking about what to do about unlicensed drivers.
One of the crime victims remembered was Joyce Dargan, killed near her home.
From 2001 to 2005, 807 fatal accidents in South Carolina are believed to have involved unlicensed drivers, according to AAA Carolinas. It's unclear how many of those accidents were caused by illegal immigrants.
Regardless of the reasons they don't have licenses, unlicensed drivers are among the greatest safety threats on the highways, said Carol Gifford, public relations manager for AAA Carolinas, which released the "Unlicensed to Kill" study in March. [...]
Earlier this month, Smokey Bones bartender Steven Rand Rouvet, 21, was killed in an early-morning hit-and-run crash near North Charleston. Four days later, Highway Patrol troopers charged Jesus Magana, an illegal immigrant with no driver's license, with leaving the scene of an accident involving a death.
Myrtle Beach, Oct. 13, 2005:
I included her in a poster I created a couple years ago, partially because I thought it was outrageous that border anarchy has made going the the mailbox a dangerous activity in America.
Joyce Dargan, 57, was hit and killed when she walked to her mailbox in Restaurant Row, The Myrtle Beach Sun News reported. Authorities said two teen boys were racing their cars when one swerved off the road and struck Dargan. The boys, 14 and 15 at the time, were sentenced to up to six years in juvenile prison. Both were illegal immigrants who later could be deported. The boy whose car struck Dargan had been stopped for traffic violations twice in the six weeks before her death.
This story should be a warning about permitting too many immigrants, particularly illegal ones. When the economy goes into the tank, crime increases.
But hey, they're only doing it to feed their families, so it's okay!
A wave of burglaries is spreading across the Washington area, and police say illegal immigrants, hit by police crackdowns and the drop in new construction, are likely playing a key role.
I spoke with a former prosecuter last week who is not involved with this issue, and he said in his experience in North Carolina, once the psychological line of commiting a crime had been crossed, more wrongdoing followed. In for a dime, in for a dollar.
“The immigrant community is at a tipping point,” said Montgomery County police community liaison Officer Luis Hurtado. “The poor economy is pushing more immigrants to turn to crime.”
In the first five months of this year, burglaries climbed 10 to 20 percent in many jurisdictions.
The District of Columbia had the greatest increase, jumping 20 percent from 1,370 in the first five months of 2007 to 1,638 for the same period this year.
Montgomery County police said they’ve averaged 288 burglaries a month for the first five months of this year, up 23 per month, or nearly 10 percent, from last year. [...]
Crime experts have mixed opinions on the role illegal immigrants play when it comes to breaking the law. Criminologists either believe illegals are more prone to criminal behavior because they’ve already broken one law upon entering the country, or they will more likely keep their hands clean, fearing deportation.
See the vDARE.com version In DC, Last Week’s Hard-Working Day Laborer Is Today’s Burglar.
The Washington Post is in the middle of a three-day series about the history of the subprime loan scam. Surprisingly, the writers mention the immigrant component.
The black-tie party at Washington's swank Mayflower Hotel seemed a fitting celebration of the biggest American housing boom since the 1950s: filet mignon and lobster, a champagne room and hundreds of mortgage brokers, real estate agents and their customers gyrating to a Latin band.
On that winter night in 2005, the company hosting the gala honored itself with an ice sculpture of its logo. Pinnacle Financial had grown from a single office to a national behemoth generating $6.5 billion in mortgages that year. The $100,000-plus party celebrated the booming division that made loans largely to Hispanic immigrants with little savings. The company even booked rooms for those who imbibed too much. [...]
Seen in the best possible light, the housing bubble that began inflating in the mid-1990s was "a great national experiment," as one prominent economist put it -- a way to harness the inventiveness of the capitalist system to give low-income families, minorities and immigrants a chance to own their homes. But it also is a classic story of boom, excess and bust, of homeowners, speculators and Wall Street dealmakers happy to ride the wave of easy money even though many knew a crash was inevitable.
Of course, considering this massive rip-off "in the best possible light" would be highly naive.
Those of us following the immigration issue have been warning for years that banks couldn't get any more stupid than giving home loans to illegal foreigners. See Joe Guzzardi's 2005 article Mortgages For Illegal Aliens: Are Banks The Treason Industry? and Tom Allen's 2004 piece, The Mortgage Monsters Meet The Immigration Invasion for important background.
Even the MSM noted the trend toward mortgages being given to illegals. The San Francisco Chronicle wrote in 2005 Selling illegal immigrants the American dream.
Marisol and Ramiro got their mortgage through the Citibank/ACORN Housing program, which offers interest rates a full percentage point below the published rate and $3,000 toward closing costs or down payment. In addition, their Realtor, Rebecca Gallardo-Serrano of Protelo Group Realty in San Jose, gave them a rebate of $2,500 to help pay their closing costs. At less than $260,000, their small condo was the lowest-cost listing in Santa Clara County.
How two Mexicans who haven't graduated from high school with a kid to raise can be expected to afford the payments on a quarter-million-dollar condo was not explained. The mostly cheerful diversity-speak didn't specifiy the monthly loan payments either.
Another California mortgage case was examined in the Chronicle (4/13/07) by a real estate writer who helpfully included pertinent financial data: Minorities are the emerging face of the subprime crisis. Two couples with six children between them wanted a house in Watsonville and figured they could pay a total of $3000/month from their agricultural jobs. They were guided into buying a house they could never afford.
But the couple says they were assured them it was possible. "The monthly payment was supposed to be $4,800, but then after we bought it, it went up to $5,378," says Rosa, speaking of their zero-down mortgage with a one-month "teaser rate." "Our agent told us that once we refinanced, we could get the payments down to $3,000 or less." For a number of months Avila, who arranged for the loan with New Century Mortgage, paid the difference between what the buyers had said they could afford -- $3,000 -- and the actual loan payment. According to the buyers, this arrangement was supposed to carry them over until the group refinanced. [...]
How indeed?
How did a strawberry picker earning $15,000 a year qualify for a loan of $720,000? The answer, say the experts, lies in a lending industry that got too innovative for its own good.
A different view comes from North Carolina: Illegal immigrants are good risks, lenders find -- an assertion I find hard to believe. The only way that it could be true is that immigrants are happy to invite lots of rent-paying family members to share the digs.
When Miguel left Mexico for the Carolinas, he planned on staying for a year.
Oh, the Hispanic National Mortgage Association -- that's a credible source! Interestingly, when you look at the group's news page, you see an NPR report from 2007 listed, Illegal Immigrants Good Mortgage Risk. This "news" from Carolina may just be recycled statistics that were questionable when first served up last year.
That was five years ago. Now, he has a wife, a 1-year-old son and a mortgage that he got in February without a Social Security number.
"It wasn't difficult at all," Miguel says.
Though illegal immigrants can't get a driver's license in North Carolina anymore, they can still be approved for a home loan.
With an individual taxpayer identification number (ITIN), good credit and proof of tax filing, those who aren't legal permanent residents can qualify for a fixed-rate "ITIN mortgage." [...]
Banks aren't required to keep track of how many ITIN home loans they give, so it's difficult to find accurate data on them.
But according to estimates from the Hispanic National Mortgage Association and local lenders, less than 1 percent of ITIN loans have gone into foreclosure. That compares with 1.2 percent for prime mortgages and nearly 11 percent for subprime mortgages given to borrowers with poor credit history, according to the latest available data from the Mortgage Bankers Association.
And how depressing that ITIN mortgages are still being issued. It's one of the many magnets that keeps them coming.
The only kind of diversity that enjoys widespread support among Americans is that of food. Who doesn't enjoy the occasional dim sum or pad thai?
But when in Sacramento, I think I'll stick to meatloaf.
With a new Asian restaurant opening in Sacramento County every two weeks, health inspectors face a growing challenge because Asian eateries are most prone to health violations.
Like upscale French restaurants dinged for making hollandaise with uncooked eggs, some of the local Asian restaurants' issues stem from cultural food practices. In Chinese restaurants, for instance, roast duck meat may hang from a hook to dry for more than four hours, creating a tasty entree that inspectors consider a virtual petri dish for bacteria.
But most of the inspectors' unsavory findings are more basic: unwashed hands, vermin and food cooked or stored at the wrong temperature.
Forty-four of the 50 Sacramento restaurants castigated most often since 2003 for major violations -- the infractions that pose an immediate health threat -- serve Asian food, according to a Bee analysis of county inspection data newly posted at www.sacbee.com/databases.
Nearly half of the 400 or so restaurants temporarily closed down for safety problems during those years also served Asian food, though fewer than one in six local restaurants is Asian.
This NPR discussion with Lester Brown about China's increasing demand for food notes the water dimension. My transcript of part of the audio report:
One thing there's not much debate about is why China's grain stocks are hitting new lows. Its glaciers, rivers and underground water tables are drying up. Farmland is being paved over to make new cities and factories, and on the demand side, Chinese are eating more meat which requires grain for animal feed.
See Lester Brown's recent article, Falling Water Tables, Falling Harvests
China's leaders are vigilant about the food supply situation because they know it has servious political implications. Brown agrees: "The stresses associated with emerging food shortages could lead to more and more failing states."
Scores of countries are overpumping aquifers as they struggle to satisfy their growing water needs. The drilling of millions of irrigation wells has pushed water withdrawals beyond recharge rates, in effect leading to groundwater mining. The failure of governments to limit pumping to the sustainable yield of aquifers means that water tables are now falling in countries that contain more than half the world’s people, including the big three grain producers—China, India, and the United States.
Most of the world’s aquifers are replenishable, so that when they are depleted, the maximum rate of pumping will be automatically reduced to the rate of recharge. Fossil aquifers, however, are not replenishable. For these—including the vast U.S. Ogallala aquifer, the deep aquifer under the North China Plain, or the Saudi aquifer, for example—depletion brings pumping to an end. Farmers who lose their irrigation water have the option of returning to lower-yield dryland farming if rainfall permits. But in more arid regions, such as in the southwestern United States or the Middle East, the loss of irrigation water means the end of agriculture.
The cash faucet from legal immigrants and illegal aliens continues to flow at record rates south, even thought there has been a hiccup in the dollars going to Mexico.
El Salvador says Salvadorans working abroad sent home a record amount of money in remittances in the first five months of the year.
The country's central bank says remittances were up by almost 6 percent in the January-May period, as compared to the same period of 2007.
The banks said in a report Friday that remittances totaled $1.6 billion, the highest amount on record, compared to about $1.51 billion
in 2007.
Remittances have been falling in Mexico, declining 2.4 percent through April.
One possible difference is the temporary protected status some Salvadorans have in the United States.
About 10 percent of the 2.5 million Salvadorans living in the U.S. were given the protected status after their country suffered a series of
earthquakes.
One of the forgotten groups of people harmed by open borders are teenagers trying to work to earn college tuition or simply because their families are poor. Many part-time or summer jobs that once were dependable opportunities for youngsters to learn the ropes of the working world are now taken by immigrants, legal and illegal.
Just 35% of 16- to 19-year-olds in the United States had a job last year, the lowest teen employment rate since World War II, according to the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston. In a sputtering economy, employers -- if they're not downsizing -- can bypass teens for more qualified adult applicants, said Andrew Sum, director of the center.
In the ABC News report exerpted below, economist Andrew Sum stated, "Teenagers are working 11 to 12 percentage points less than they weree seven years ago. If the same thing happened to U.S. adults, we would have called it a great depression." Only one-third of 16-to-19-year-olds will find work this summer, the lowest rate since WWII. The clip also shows white and black kids alike struggling to find work, although the ghetto youngsters seem particularly discouraged: only 15 percent of inner-city teens looking for a job will find one.
"You're not going to bring in interns when you're laying off their parents," he said.
The competition for jobs comes not only from adult workers who have lost jobs, but also from those 55 to 70 who are punching checkout registers and bagging groceries to supplement their retirement. And in some states, immigrant workers also are filling jobs traditionally held by teens.
As I noted in Legal Somalians ("Refugees") Replace Illegal Mexicans At Swift Plant, employers have recently turned to refugees to fill meatpacking jobs. In Greeley, Colorado, Somalis are the new cheap workers; in Cactus, Texas, Burmese have become the exploitable labor of choice.
CACTUS, Texas -- Foreign-born workers have been the mainstay at a meatpacking plant in this small Panhandle town for decades.
Incidentally, meatpacking was still a well-paid union job in many states in the 1970s:
When the plant opened in 1974, Vietnamese and Laotians filled many of the jobs. Then came workers from Mexico and Guatemala, many of them in the U.S. illegally.
Most left or were arrested after a 2006 immigration raid that took nearly 300 workers from the Swift & Co. plant.
Now a new group of foreign-born workers are employed at the plant, where starting pay begins at $12 an hour.
Since January about 450 Burmese refugees have arrived from places like Houston, Florida, New York and Indianapolis, lured by lower living costs, safe neighborhoods and jobs. More are on the way.
During the 1960s and 1970s, meatpacking wages were relatively higher than at manufacturing plants, running about 14 percent to 18 percent above manufacturing wages at that time, Mintert said. By 2002, meatpacking wages were running 25 percent below manufacturing wages.
Here's a confirmation of that part of labor history from fast-food expert Eric Schlosser: The Chain Never Stops (Mother Jones, July/August 2001).
Accompanying the wage drop was the decline of unions in the plants. In the late 1970s, about 45 percent of the meatpacking industry was unionized. By the late 1980s, that had dropped to 21 percent as more immigrants took jobs in the industry, [agriculture economist James] Mintert said.
(Immigration raids could affect wages, meat prices, MN Public Radio, December 15, 2006)
Thirty years ago, meatpacking was one of the highest-paid industrial jobs in the United States, with one of the lowest turnover rates. In the decades that followed the 1906 publication of The Jungle, labor unions had slowly gained power in the industry, winning their members good benefits, decent working conditions, and a voice in the workplace. Meatpacking jobs were dangerous and unpleasant, but provided enough income for a solid, middle-class life. There were sometimes waiting lists for these jobs. And then, starting in the early 1960s, a company called Iowa Beef Packers (IBP) began to revolutionize the industry, opening plants in rural areas far from union strongholds, recruiting immigrant workers from Mexico, introducing a new division of labor that eliminated the need for skilled butchers, and ruthlessly battling unions. By the late 1970s, meatpacking companies that wanted to compete with IBP had to adopt its business methods—or go out of business. Wages in the meatpacking industry soon fell by as much as 50 percent. Today meatpacking is one of the nation's lowest-paid industrial jobs, with one of the highest turnover rates. The typical plant now hires an entirely new workforce every year or so. There are no waiting lists at these slaughterhouses today. Staff shortages have become an industrywide problem, making the work even more dangerous.
There's nothing like college "journalism" to show the sort of liberal bias syphoned into young minds paying for the privilege. This item is from Northwestern University's media program.
In this article, immigration enforcement is treated largely as a terrible thing, a crackdown on "minorities." One mother who employed an illegal alien nanny says in a video clip, "I hate being affiliated with Prince William County."
Yolanda Lemus, a U.S. citizen originally from El Salvador who volunteers with the advocacy group Mexicans without Borders, said just from driving around she and her boyfriend have noticed the dramatic change in the atmosphere.
Apparently Americans in their own country count as non-people to newbies who want ever more of their tribe. But the good news sneaks in inadvertently, that a little enforcement goes a long way...
“We don’t see the Spanish, the Latinos, the way we used to, everywhere, every time, anymore. Going to the malls, going to the parks. It’s like, ‘Where’s everybody at?’” she said.
While there are no definitive studies to answer that question, most observers believe that many immigrants of Hispanic origin got scared, packed and left.
The whiney tone is standard issue PC BS. But the growth statistics are truly jawdrop, and explain the citizen uprising.
It wasn’t that the police stopped that many people. Since March, 265 were questioned about their status and 138 of them were arrested, according to county data. Sixty-six were released without charges and 59 were cited for minor offenses. Two were found to be legal residents.
Rather, the fear alone of either deportation among illegals or of harassment among illegals, seems to have done the job.
Prince William County experienced explosive economic and population growth for the better part of this decade, attracting thousands of construction workers and day laborers to help expand the community. The county had the fourth largest Hispanic growth rate in the country from 2000 to 2006 and grew by almost 150 percent, according the U.S. Census Bureau.
And of course the foreign freeloaders will continue to come until we tell them to scram.
The phenomena turned Hispanics into the major ethnic group in the county. The Hispanic population grew by 183 percent from 1990 to 2000 and by 2007 was roughly 19 percent of the county population. The white population grew by 7.7 percent.
Overcrowding was an unavoidable consequence of the exponential growth the county experienced. The county welcomed more than 75,000 new residents since 2000. And in the span of fifty years, the population increased seven-fold, from 50,000 to more than 380,000. The demographic stress started to push resources and services and local politicians to the brink.
Mackenzie Maddox was another child killed by an illegal alien, specifically Mexican Jose A. Rodriguez.
In this instance, the authorities had previously behaved correctly by deporting him months ago. But the perp returned, presumably because of the allure of big piles of American dollars. Rodriguez reportedly wasn't drunk when he plowed into the mother and child in an intersection, but he was driving without a license.
The 29-year-old Kenosha man charged in the West Allis crash that killed a 6-year-old girl Monday could face federal charges for re-entering the country illegally after being deported to Mexico in February, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement office said Wednesday.
Gail Montenegro, spokeswoman for ICE’s Chicago region, said her agency expects to file federal re-entry charges against Jose A. Rodriguez, accused of striking Mackenzie J. Maddox and her 25-year-old mother, Andrea F. Maddox, both of West Allis as they crossed the street.
Andrea Maddox remains in satisfactory condition at Froedtert Hospital.
Rodriguez was charged Wednesday in Milwaukee County Circuit Court with driving with a revoked license, causing death, a misdemeanor punishable by a fine and up to nine months in jail. According to the complaint, he was driving a red dump truck north on S. 84th St. and crossed W. Cleveland Ave. under a green light when he struck the two pedestrians.
Rodriguez, who waited for police at the scene, is being detained on an immigration hold at the Milwaukee County Jail. He faces from two to 20 years in prison if convicted, depending on the types of criminal offenses for which he was deported, Montenegro said.
More than 100 friends and family of Mackenzie and her mother held a candlelight vigil Wednesday night near the scene of the collision.
“I’m having a real hard time getting up in the morning and not seeing her there,” said Mackenzie’s grandmother, Christine Maddox. “Mackenzie was a very caring girl, very, very helpful for a 6-year-old. You would think she was 12, as much as she was able to help people.”
According to police, Rodriguez has several traffic-related convictions, including one for driving while intoxicated. He was first identified by ICE while serving 30 days in the Kenosha County Jail on that charge, under the agency’s Criminal Alien Program that identifies individuals who are in the country illegally and serving time in jails and prisons, Montenegro said.
The program identified 164,000 criminals last year, up from 64,000 the previous year.
You have to keep a constant lookout for domestic terrorist news in America because nobody in the MSM is interested in covering it nationally. There are local reports, but that's it. When you add them together, however, the picture is not reassuring that Muslim immigrants come here with friendly intentions. A 2007 Pew Poll of Muslims residing in America showed a jihad-friendly group that is willing to admit its beliefs. For example, 26 percent of young Muslims believe suicide attacks against non-Muslim civilian targets is acceptable.
Here's a report from today:
CLEVELAND (AP) — Three Ohio men were convicted Friday of plotting to recruit and train terrorists to kill American soldiers in Iraq, a case put together with help from a former soldier who posed as a radical bent on violence.
Another case was partially concluded in a plea deal today: Former USF student admits to supporting terrorists. In the photo, Mohamed is seated.
Mohammad Amawi, 28, Marwan El-Hindi, 45, and Wassim Mazloum, 27, face maximum sentences of life in prison. Prosecutors said the men were learning to shoot guns and make explosives while raising money to fund their plans to wage a holy war against U.S. troops.
The federal jury in Toledo returned its verdict after three days of deliberations. U.S. District Judge James G. Carr did not set a sentencing date, said acting U.S. attorney Bill Edwards.
"Today's verdicts should send a strong message to individuals who would use this country as a platform to plot attacks against U.S. military personnel in Iraq and elsewhere," said Patrick Rowan, acting assistant attorney general for national security, in a written statement. "This case also underscores the need for continued vigilance in identifying and dismantling extremist plots that develop in America's heartland."
Tampa, Florida -- Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif Mohamed entered a plea agreement Friday.
At the time of the arrest, one misleading story was that the "kids" had "fireworks" in the trunk.
The press also printed various protestations from the parents that their upstanding son could never be a terrorist. For example, Father: USF student no terrorist.
In the court document, he admits to providing material to support terrorists. He also acknowledges that a YouTube video he produced was to be used in "preparation for or in carrying out the killing of employees of the United States," including uniformed personnel.
Mohamed and Youssef Megahed were arrested August 4, 2007, in Goose Creek, South Carolina after a traffic stop. Authorities recovered a number of items from the car which constituted explosive materials.
Megahed remains in custody.
Mohamed faces a maximum sentence of 15 years imprisonment, a $250,000 fine and a term of supervised release.
"It's killing me," Samir Megahed said Saturday of the charges against his son. "We have no charge like this in my family for 400 years. It's killing all my family in Egypt."
But today, when Mohamed admitted his guilt, the press is not as interested.
What is it about Muslims and their Sharia fixation? If poor oppressed Sons of Allah want to live the full-tilt Islo-lifestyle, then why not head off for Sudan or the tribal regions of Pakistan? In addition, there are dozens of majority Muslim countries for those who want to commune with the ummah.
Really, there is no shortage of places for them to live where Islamic cultural practices are the norm.
Of course their purpose is to infiltrate and undermine the west because they believe we are too weak to defend ourselves and our culture.
Two Muslims supporters of "violent jihad" discussed setting up a secret Islamic state in a remote part of Scotland, a court heard today.
This case is another argument to 1) end Muslim immigration for the duration of their war against western civilization and 2) continue prohibitions against guns being sold to non-citizens in the USA.
Away from the prying eyes of the authorities, it would provide a safe haven for those who felt "oppressed", jurors were told.
It would also be run according to Sharia law and eventually be used as a base to "discreetly train" for attacks against non-believers.
The only drawback Aabid Khan allegedly identified was the availability of weapons. [...]
The barrister claimed he then added: "In the UK you can isolate with a group discreetly and train, but better in the US as they have weapons there. Over here weapons is problem."
Is this a culture clash issue? Are Mexicans fresh from the pueblo unable to cope with hi-tech items like vari-colored traffic lights and sidewalks? Apparently so, according to hispanic experts.
Hispanic pedestrians are run down by cars in greater numbers than members of any other ethnic group, according to new data that is prompting the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments to press municipal transportation departments to address the problem.
(Why do I imagine that if a friend of law and borders made this point, hispanics would be squawking about racism?)
A resolution, scheduled for a vote Wednesday, calls for a public education campaign "with increased targeting of high-risk populations."
In Northern Virginia, Hispanics stand an eight in 100,000 chance of getting struck by a car or truck, compared with three per 100,000 for Caucasians, two per 100,000 for Asian Americans and six per 100,000 for the black community, according to a recent report from COG, a regional planning agency.
Maryland and the District report similar accident rates by ethnic group. [...]
"Some immigrants are not used to using crosswalks," Mr. Quiroz said. "The shortest distance between two points is a straight line."
Incidentally, as a daily pedestrian myself, I agree that neighborhoods with no sidewalks are unacceptable. So I support pedestrian-friendly planning; every street should have a safe place for people to walk. But turning America into a zone designed for Mexican sensibility is not okay.
One of the more twisted arguments about about how American should adjust for hispanics was posted in the New California Media in 2002: No Slowing in Pedestrian Accidents Among Latinos.
Latino Urban Forum Chairman James Rojas explains the spike in incidents among Latinos is more of a cultural practice. “Basically Latinos use streets like plazas. They work there, they play there and they grow up there. The streets (in L.A.) are not designed that way," said Rojas, who conducted his Master's Thesis at MIT on Latinos and public space using L.A. as a case study.
See? Everything has to be rearranged to suit the needs of foreigners who are not interested in assimilating to American pedestrian customs, even for their own safety.
“There is no such thing as jaywalkers in Mexico,” said Vicente Negrete, a machinist and recently naturalized citizen, originally from Tijuana, while waiting for the bus on Arizona Ave. and Whittier Blvd. Negrete says that newly arrived Mexicans accustomed to dodging cars in Mexico are aware of the laws protecting pedestrians in the U.S. and believe that drivers routinely watch for them, creating a false sense of security. "They (drivers) won't stop for you in Mexico, but here Mexicans think they (drivers) are more careful. They think if they get hit here, they could sue whoever hit them," said Negrete.
Deputy Gabriel Rendon of the Traffic Division at the East L.A. Sheriff Station says density is a clear factor. He says a common accident in dense Cudahy is on driveways of crowded apartment complexes where children use driveways as playgrounds. “It’s an unfortunate thing but I have to put most of the fault on the pedestrian,” said Rendon.
Rojas disagrees. "We can't blame ourselves and say we are dumb, we can't cross the street right," said Rojas. Rojas supports street planning reform to accommodate Latinos. "You have to change with the times. It's something where Latinos have to get together and determine what we want," said Rojas. He recommends that speed limits in dense areas be reduced and designate them as pedestrian areas.
When you read more deeply into the article about the new Pew Global Attitudes Poll, you might feel that Mexicans are a hateful bunch of ingrates. The US House of Representatives just voted to send a billion dollars to help them with their internal violence problems -- a total waste of money. Yet Marxicans continue to bite the hand that stupidly feeds them.
Bear in mind that a 2006 Zogby poll found 73 percent of Mexicans regard Americans as racist and only 16 percent think we are honest and law-abiding: Our Friendly Neighbors Spill the Frijoles.
The current numbers are more of the same hateful crap. Some neighbor. Building the south Texas version of the Great Wall of China on the Rio Grande is what should be done.
Overall, Mexican opinions of the U.S. are mixed. Forty-seven percent of Mexicans have a favorable impression of our country. A slightly smaller number, 44 percent, view the American people favorably.
This poll is from the Pew Global Attitudes Project. You can download the whole thing in PDF here. One interesting fact is the 68 percent of Mexicans are dissatisfied with the way things are going in their country, versus 30 who think it's okay.
Only 17 percent of Mexicans think the U.S. influences their country in a positive way. One in five Mexicans think the U.S. influences their economy for the better. About half of Mexicans think of the U.S. as a partner; 31 percent consider America an enemy.
Also timely is Americans' view toward foreigners buying domestic companies: 67 percent Bad, versus 25 percent Good.
I wrote in VDARE.com about Mexico's culturally accepted animal cruelty in 2004 -- They Kill Horses, Don't They? (Mexicans, That Is.) -- so it's nice to see the New York Times get around to the topic, albeit in a watered-down fashion. The current focus in on Mexican rodeos, charreada in Spanish.
But now the charreada, which is strictly amateur, is facing its biggest challenge. After criticism from animal rights and anti-rodeo activists, eight states over the last decade have cracked down on several events, most notably horse tripping, a centuries-old tradition that involves roping and snaring the front legs of a running mare and that can cause serious injury. As a result, no charros in the federation practice horse tripping.
If Mexicans residing in the United States knew anything about American culture, they would understand that we strongly disapprove of animal cruelty, period. But to many Mexicans, expressing even the sicko parts of their culture is paramount.
In a law that takes effect next month, Nebraska is also banning steer tailing, in which a charro grabs a steer’s tail, wraps it beneath his stirrup and flips the animal to the ground. The legislation grew out of abuses uncovered by the Omaha Humane Society at an unsanctioned arena, in which some horses had rope burns and torn tendons and were severely emaciated.
For those who spend their weekends on the dusty rails, these new laws seem to be singling out their culture unfairly. They argue that other sports involving potential injury to animals, like dressage, polo and thoroughbred racing, continue relatively uninterrupted, despite the recent high-profile deaths of the thoroughbreds Eight Belles and Barbaro.
“I sometimes feel like we’re the witches in Massachusetts,” said Mr. Franco, whose federation sets the rules and regulations for the charreadas.
One thing I've noticed in New York Times stories which include diversity is that the good stuff is often tucked away in the multimedia section. This story is no exception: the audio slideshow reveals more of the cruelty and desire to implant Mexican culture in America than is shown in the text. Marcos Franco, a booster and participant of charreada, noted, "When we were really in our heydays out there, they felt that they were in Mexico, even though they were in the States. They used to call it the reconcito Mexicano, the little corner of Mexico... That's what's beautiful about this country."
Regarding horse tripping (shown below) which has long been opposed by Americans as tremendously cruel, Franco insisted that if the horse is roped by only the front two feet, no injury occurs. Ri-i-i-ight. But even he admitted there are unsanctioned charreada events that offend him: "They have these free-for-alls that, my god, I am 100% against. Because of their misconduct, we pay the price."
So the next time you see a Mexican dressed in traditional charro regalia, you'll know what it means!
If there is a more evil institution in America than the ACLU, I don't know what it might be. The "American Civil Liberties Union" portrays itself as defending free speech, but mostly what it does is defend terrorists from justice and work for open borders. The far-left group hinders common-sense law enforcement and supports people like the jihadis jailed at Gitmo. The ACLU protects the national pedophile organization NAMBLA (whose stated interest it is to molest children, a crime).
NEW YORK (AP) — The American Civil Liberties Union announced by far the largest fundraising campaign in its 88-year history Monday, eying a dramatic expansion of its work on social justice issues in relatively conservative states such as Texas and Florida.
Just how rotten is the ACLU? As usual, the IBD pulls no punches. ACLU: Cops = Terrorists.
The campaign's goal is $335 million, with $258 million already raised through behind-the-scenes solicitations over the past year, ACLU executive director Anthony Romero said.
Major donors include billionaire financier George Soros, who gave $12 million through his Open Society Institute.
"The purpose is to build a civil liberties infrastructure in the middle of the country — where battleground states are often under-resourced and our efforts are most needed," Romero said.
He cited issues such as immigrants' rights, gay rights, police brutality and opposition to the death penalty as causes that would be pursued vigorously as the ACLU expanded in heartland states. At present, the ACLU's biggest offices are in the Northeast, the Pacific states and Illinois; targets for expansion include Michigan, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico and Tennessee, with even the smallest ACLU affiliates in line to get extra funding to hire new attorneys and launch new advocacy programs.
Immigration has long been an issue used by the ACLU to keep the police from doing their job. When President Reagan during his first year in office proposed penalizing employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants, the ACLU called it "an invitation to conduct dragnet searches of places frequented by foreigners or those who look foreign."
Today, the ACLU's Lin says that when local police duly follow the precepts of federal law by acting as immigration agents — even though they're trained and supervised by the immigration division of the Department of Homeland Security — it is "not the appropriate constitutional use of state and local power."
If local policy can't help fight illegal immigration, it's a lost cause. But perhaps that's what the ACLU wants.
More social engineering from hell, er, Washington, designed to increase the number of minorities -- including illegal aliens -- to achieve home ownership. The lack of regulation ended up harming diverse people the most, not to mention Americans as a whole.
In 2004, as regulators warned that subprime lenders were saddling borrowers with mortgages they could not afford, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development helped fuel more of that risky lending.
Eager to put more low-income and minority families into their own homes, the agency required that two government-chartered mortgage finance firms purchase far more "affordable" loans made to these borrowers. HUD stuck with an outdated policy that allowed Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae to count billions of dollars they invested in subprime loans as a public good that would foster affordable housing.
Housing experts and some congressional leaders now view those decisions as mistakes that contributed to an escalation of subprime lending that is roiling the U.S. economy.
The agency neglected to examine whether borrowers could make the payments on the loans that Freddie and Fannie classified as affordable. From 2004 to 2006, the two purchased $434 billion in securities backed by subprime loans, creating a market for more such lending. Subprime loans are targeted toward borrowers with poor credit, and they generally carry higher interest rates than conventional loans.
Today, 3 million to 4 million families are expected to lose their homes to foreclosure because they cannot afford their high-interest subprime loans. Lower-income and minority home buyers -- those who were supposed to benefit from HUD's actions -- are falling into default at a rate at least three times that of other borrowers.
How regrettable that the Chair of the House Immigration Caucus, Brian Bilbray, voted for this giveaway to corrupt Mexico. Calderon must be having a big laugh that he can still beg for money from Washington and get over a billion dollars in American taxpayer funds. Uncle Sucka is alive and well -- unfortunately for us citizens.
House lawmakers voted 311-106 on Tuesday to authorize the Merida Initiative, a $1.6 billion plan to help fight drug cartels in Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean.
More details from CQ Foreign Drug-Trafficking Bill Passes in House:
“Either we can go after these cartels in Ensenada, or we can fight them in Escondido,” said Rep. Brian Bilbray (R-Carlsbad), who voted for the plan. “I’d prefer that we move now and take care of this problem south of the border. The drug wars in Mexico and in other regions have grown horrendously violent, and their destructive ways must be quashed.”
Bilbray was one of several U.S. lawmakers who went to Monterrey, Mexico, over the weekend to discuss the initiative with Mexican officials. Mexico has objected to human rights conditions that Congress attached to the aid. The State Department has identified Mexico as a major supplier of marijuana and methamphetamine to the U.S. Escalating violence between rival Mexican drug cartels has fueled increasing violence along the U.S.-Mexico border.
The House on Wednesday passed a three-year, $1.6 billion plan to fight drug trafficking from Mexico and Central America.
The point I have made several times is that Mexico is quite wealthy and has plenty of money to pay for its own internal policing. (See A "Marshall Plan For Mexico"—Sending Welfare To A Crack House.)
The funding would be used to train and equip security forces, strengthen the rule of law and judicial systems, and boost a U.S. program to prevent guns from traveling illegally into Mexico.
The bill, which passed 311-106, largely reflects a plan developed by President Bush and Mexican President Felipe Calderón known as the Merida Initiative, for the Mexican city where the leaders unveiled it in 2007.
The bill would authorize $595 million for fiscal 2008, $645 million for fiscal 2009 and $350 million for fiscal 2010.
The Senate supplemental would provide $450 million for fiscal 2008; the House version would include $461.5 million. The administration had requested $550 million.
Below, Rep. Ted Poe explains the difficulties of border county sheriffs, and how tax funds would be better spent by equipping them, not Mexicans (June 5, 2008).
Rack up another Chinese spy here to do the business of the glorious People's Republic.
SAN DIEGO (AP) - A Chinese citizen has pleaded guilty in San Diego to trying to smuggle military-grade sensors to her homeland.
Qing Li pleaded guilty Monday in federal court to conspiring to harm the U.S.
Prosecutors say she approached a company in Orange County in 2007 about buying accelerometers. The devices can measure the power of missile systems but are illegal to export without State Department approval.
Li told undercover investigators she was buying the devices on behalf of a scientific agency in China.
She was living in Connecticut and was arrested in October at Kennedy Airport in New York.
She faces five years in prison when she is sentenced in September. Her attorney did not return a message left by The Associated Press.
