LTG: Archive May 2007

LimitsToGrowth Archive

May 2007

RNC fires phone solicitors [5/31/07]
Here's a measure of how unpopular Bush and his wretched amnesty plan are. The Republican base is so angry over the issue that they have stopped donating to the party.

The Republican National Committee, hit by a grass-roots donors' rebellion over President Bush's immigration policy, has fired all 65 of its telephone solicitors, Ralph Z. Hallow will report Friday in The Washington Times.
Faced with an estimated 40 percent fall-off in small-donor contributions and aging phone-bank equipment that the RNC said would cost too much to update, Anne Hathaway, the committee's chief of staff, summoned the solicitations staff last week and told them they were out of work, effective immediately, the fired staffers told The Times. [...]
There has been a sharp decline in contributions from RNC phone solicitations, another fired staffer said, reporting that many former donors flatly refuse to give more money to the national party if Mr. Bush and the Senate Republicans insist on supporting what these angry contributors call "amnesty" for illegal aliens.
"Every donor in 50 states we reached has been angry, especially in the last month and a half, and for 99 percent of them immigration is the No. 1 issue," said the former employee.

Update: Here is a more detailed article.

• • •

Report confirms terror dry run [5/31/07]
In 2004, financial writer Annie Jacobsen reported on a terrifying flight with her husband from Detroit to Los Angeles, in which 13 Syrians behaved as if they were about to blow up the plane. She wrote about the experience on the financial website Women's Wall Street in what turned into a series of columns about the terrorist behavior going on in the skies.
For her responsible reportage about the situation of continuing danger from Muslim terrorists on airplanes, she was slammed by the government as a silly and hysterical woman. However, she received numerous communications from security personnel, flight crews and other passengers who concurred that what she saw was real. Her series of columns grew into a book Terror in the Skies: Why 9/11 Could Happen Again.
Now the Inspector General of the Department of Homeland Security have found that the Syrians were indeed engaged in a terrorist probel.

"Agency management was not only covering up numerous probes and dry-run encounters from Congress and other federal law-enforcement agencies, it was also hiding these incidents from their own flying air marshals," said P. Jeffrey Black, an air marshal stationed in Las Vegas. [...]
"On the flight, 13 Middle Eastern men behaved in a suspicious manner that aroused the attention and concern of the flight attendants, passengers, air marshals and pilots," the report said. The men "walked in the aisle, appearing to count passengers," and "several men spent excessive time in the lavatories."
"One man rushed to the front of the plane appearing to head for the cockpit. At the last moment, he veered into the first-class lavatory, remaining in it for about 20 minutes," according to the report. One man carried a McDonald's bag into the lavatory, and "another man, upon returning from the lavatory, reeked strongly of what smelled like toilet bowl chemicals."
"Some men hand signaled each other. The passenger who entered the lavatory with the McDonald's bag made a thumbs-up signal to another man upon returning from the lavatory. Another man made a slashing motion across his throat, appearing to say 'No.' "

On the subject of how well the government is protecting us, we learned more today about the man with drug-resistant tuberculosis who resisted mild entreaties from public health officials that he not travel by airplane.
Lou Dobbs opened his program with the story, emphasizing the failure of security agencies to corral one easily identifiable person.

See VDARE.com version.

• • •

Labor Divided Over Immigration Plan [5/30/07]
Much current reporting acts as if farm labor icon Cesar Chavez was some sort of early reconquista-type chicano. Nothing could be further from the truth. Cesar understood that he could never organize California agricultural workers while the border was open and thousands of potential scabs were entering every week. So it is unusual for an Associated Press story to be nuanced enough to notice Cesar's pro-border position, however subtle.

In the 1960s, farm labor leader Cesar Chavez rallied fieldhands to speak out against a guest worker program that recruited millions of Mexicans to pick crops at low wages.
Today, farmworker advocates are throwing their weight behind a proposal in the current Senate immigration bill that would bring thousands of laborers to the country's most productive fields but offer them virtually no chance of putting down roots in the U.S.
The United Farm Workers say it is their best shot at improving working conditions in fields nationwide, and especially in California, where 92 percent of workers are foreign-born.

See also Steve Sailer's excellent piece, Cesar Chavez, Minuteman.

• • •

Just 16% Believe Senate Bill Will Reduce Illegal Immigration [5/30/07]
And that's 16 percent of VOTERS, as surveyed by the reputable Rasmussen company.

There's a simple reason the immigration bill being debated by the U.S. Senate is unpopular with voters—the general public doesn't believe it will reduce illegal immigration. And, in the minds of most voters, that¹s what immigration reform is all about.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that just 16% of American voters believe illegal immigration will decline if the Senate bill is passed. Seventy-four percent (74%) disagree. That figure includes 41% who believe the Senate bill will actually lead to an increase in illegal immigration.
If voters had a chance to improve the legislation, 75% would "make changes to increase border security measures and reduce illegal immigration." Just 29% would "make it easier for illegal immigrants to stay in the country and eventually become citizens."

No surprise here. Any honest poll shows that Americans want their borders enforced first and foremost.
Speaking of the reprehensible Senate legislation SB1348, here is John Hawkins' list of 5 Big Problems with the Senate Amnesty Bill

• • •

Immigration Disaster Looming [5/29/07]
The Washington Times is not convinced by pundits who think the Senate immigration bill is too terrible to pass — e.g. George Will who said it was "doomed to fail." Last year's Senate bill was similarly wretched and it passed 62-36.

Judging by what took place in the first hours of the Senate immigration debate last week, critics are deluding themselves if they expect lawmakers to improve the bill when debate resumes after the Memorial Day recess. Most of the organized political pressure on the immigration issue is coming from open-borders advocates intent on enabling more illegals to obtain amnesty and bring their relatives to the United States, and from Washington elites on the left and the right who think anyone who doesn't share their permissive philosophy is backward and xenophobic. Unless the American people rise up en masse and tell their senators in no uncertain terms that they cannot accept amnesty, the Senate bill will easily pass and no one should be surprised if it passes with amendments making it even more harmful to taxpayers and detrimental to hometown safety and homeland security.

FYI, here is a list of all the Senator's phone numbers, from LA radio guys John and Ken. Senate fax numbers are here.

• • •

On Memorial Day, Deepest Gratitude to All Who Have Served in Uniform to Preserve Our Nation

From Veterans for Secure Borders

• • •

Reforms to the work visa program are a small part of the overall debate -- except in Silicon Valley [5/28/07]
This is an amazing article from the San Francisco Chronicle in that it actually admits that American citizens are harmed by an immigration program (H-1b visas) and even goes so far as to name a couple. It is something of a breakthrough for the paper, which loves any and all immigration.

So it appears that at roughly the same time that the economy was trimming tech payrolls by 800,000 positions, the United States invited about 260,000 tech guest-workers to join the labor pool.
That changed the life of Toni Chester, a 44-year-old contract programmer from Phillipsburg, N.J.
"The job market is just not there anymore," said Chester, who nearly lost her home after the dot-com crash.
Chester told Congress in April that she was pushed out of contracts by Indian programmers on H-1B visas who worked for $40,000 rather than the $65,000 she had been earning. "I used to have a really great life," Chester said. "I haven't had health insurance in a year and a half."

Even PBS Newshour ran a segment that included laid-off Americans. But the person used to typify the south Asia H-1b visa holder, Pakistani Umar Mughal, wasn't even a tech wiz: he was working a job in marketing. He didn't sound anxious to leave his temp gig either, remarking, "The other thing is, once I moved, I really like the lifestyle over here."
PBS didn't even notice the anomaly of a tech-visa worker being employed in marketing. Apparently marketing is another job Americans just don't want to do.
Immigration was not originally designed to be a scam by which American workers could be replaced by cheap, exploitable foreigners so that billionaires like Bill Gates could make even more money, but that's certainly the way it has worked out.
At the same time, Gates is planning to invest $1.7 billion in education and research in India while insisting that Congress allow unlimited H-1b workers and complaining that American schools aren't up to snuff. When you are the richest man on earth you can be that arrogant.

• • •

Without foreign workers, U.S. parks struggle [5/27/07]
Yosemite Half Dome You have to read this article closely to realize the tapdance around the truth that is being perpetrated by both the parks department and the LA Times. It's the old "work Americans won't do" song and dance played out in Yosemite, etc. But what young person wouldn't want to spend a summer in paradise, even doing menial work?

At Yosemite, that means wages beginning at the state minimum, which will increase from $7.50 to $8 an hour in January. Health benefits begin after three months, and American and foreign concession workers alike are represented by Service Employees International Union Local 521.
"It does add a nice international flavor to the park," SEIU internal organizer Debra Rockwood said. But the current worker shortage, Rockwood added, shouldn't be blamed on lazy Americans. It's what happens, she said, when "the company doesn't try and look at what it needs to do to employ an American workforce. We have pretty good wages, but they need to treat employees like a valued asset...

Actually, $7.50 an hour is not exactly attractive. Other pertinent details are omitted, such as the cost of meals and housing which are deducted from wages. Also, college students have to leave in August to go back to school, and employers have become spoiled by having adult foreigners with no pressing schedule requirements.
Are job notices posted on college campuses or in outdoors magazines? There is no mention of interest-appropriate hiring attempts. Instead we read of long-suffering employers and their struggles with government failures of visa processing as the cause of their woes.

• • •

Men in their 30s lag behind their fathers in pay [5/27/07]
When Lou Dobbs and others talk about the "War on the Middle Class," this is the sort of trend that is central -- that Americans are working harder but making less. Each generation has been better off than the previous one until now.
Outsourcing plus immigration anarchy has devastated the blue-collar middle class, and white-collar occupations are now affected as well. It certainly doesn't help that college tuition has increased 35 percent in five years.

American men in their 30s today are worse off financially than their fathers' generation, a reversal from just a decade ago, when sons generally were better off than their fathers, a new study finds.
The study, the first in a series on economic mobility undertaken by several prominent think tanks, also says the typical American family's income has lagged far behind productivity growth since 2000, a departure from most of the post-World War II period.
The findings suggest "the up escalator that has historically ensured that each generation would do better than the last may not be working very well," says the study, which was scheduled for release Friday. [...]
Bill Beach of the Heritage Foundation said increased immigration also could have pulled down median wages, as most immigrants at first earn less than native-born workers.

• • •

Echoes of Colombia drug wars in Mexico [5/26/07]
There is no question that Mexico is facing a version of the failed state syndrome in the style of Colombia.

Some analysts see increasing similarities between Mexico and Colombia, which has used the military in its long battle with drug traffickers. Like Calderon, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe has unleashed his country's armed forces against the cartels.
"In some ways, Mexico today looks like Colombia in the late 1980s," said Adam Isacson, a Colombia expert at the Center for International Policy in Washington. Calderon, he said, is "clearly reading from the Uribe playbook."
The Mexican government's open-ended offensive is in response to widespread violence as the Sinaloa and Gulf drug gangs fight over smuggling routes. Last year, drug-related deaths topped 2,000, according to the Mexico City daily, El Universal. The government does not release such statistics, but law enforcement officials say the number is correct.
The high death toll raises the question whether Mexico's drug war is winnable as heavily armed cartels react by attacking high-level officials, soldiers, police and journalists while warring against each other. Even Calderon has received death threats.

Yep, Mexican narco-violence is looking more like Colombia every day.
Drug cartels were allowed to become dangerously entrenched in Mexico during the presidency of Vicente Fox, whose main policy goal was to open the border entirely to the United States. The same border permissiveness that allowed little Juan and Maria to head north for remittance-providing illicit employment also permitted the criminal drug gangs to take over major chunks of territory. Mexico expert Prof. George Grayson said in January "Felipe Calderon is moving in several areas of the country to take back Mexico for the Mexicans."
One symptom of how bad basic law and order has become in Mexico: Mexican paper closes amid threats.
The awful Senate amnesty on steroids will bring this anarchy to the US soon, if signed into law.

• • •

Illegal Immigration's Harmful Effects [5/25/07]
Prof Carol Swain Law Professor Carol Swain, of Vanderbilt University, recently edited the book Debating Immigration and has appeared several times on Lou Dobbs Tonight. In today's Washington Times opinion piece, she excoriates the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) for ignoring the harm that open borders and immigration permissiveness cause to black and low-skilled Americans.

African Americans should expect and demand more from the CBC, because its members have elected to organize as a racial caucus. By doing so, CBC members have placed upon themselves the obligation to represent the interests of the millions of black constituents who have faithfully and repeatedly sent them to Washington.
Instead, CBC members have ignored social-science studies, congressional testimony and census data documenting the harm that high levels of immigration have caused and are continuing to have on low-wage, low-skill workers. Intervention is needed. African Americans and their allies should hold CBC members and other Democrats accountable for failing to represent the interests of their constituents. [...]
We need only focus on unemployment to get an idea of how African Americans and other historically disadvantaged groups are adversely affected by high levels of immigration. Consider that black unemployment rates are usually double the rate of whites and are higher than the rates of Hispanics. For example, in April 2007, the national unemployment rate was 4.5 percent. The black unemployment rate was 8.2 percent, with the rate for black males at 9.7 percent. The rate for Hispanics was 5.4 percent. Moreover, the Bureau of Labor statistics has forecast that in the next seven years the Hispanic labor force will be 6.3 million workers greater than the black workforce. As well, by 2014, the black workforce will lag behind the Hispanics, Asians and white non-Hispanics in labor-force participation.

Furthermore, America has the highest percentage of poverty in the developed world: 12.7 percent. Why should we import additional millions of poor foreigners just so business can have slave-cheap labor?

• • •

Breaching America: War refugees or threats? [5/24/07]
This is the first article of a four-part series "Breaching America" about the ease of entry to the US even for persons from terror-supporting countries. Reporter Todd Bensman follows a presumed Iraqi Christian as he makes his way across the Mexican border and eventually to Detroit, with some bumps along the road admittedly from American police.
Incidentally, there's no doubt that Iraqi Christians have been getting it in the neck from their Muslim neighbors. But the Iraqi featured could have been anyone.

The deals cut at places like Al Nawateer could affect you. Americans from San Antonio to Detroit might find themselves living among immigrants from Islamic countries who have come to America with darker pursuits than escaping war or starting a new life.
U.S.-bound illicit travel from Islamic countries, which started long before 9-11 and includes some reputed terrorists, has gained momentum and worried counterterrorism officials as smugglers exploit 2 million Iraq war refugees. The irony is that the war America started to make itself safer has forced more people regarded as security threats toward its borders.

Hugh Hewitt commented on the Senate amnesty legislation with Bensman's reporting in mind: What Will the Jihadists Do? Apply for Their 601(h) Probationary Status, Of Course. He observes that many of the previously known 59 foreign terrorists (analyzed in a CIS report Immigration and Terrorism) worked hard to regularize their status.

Which is why the draft immigration law's intent to bestow on all illegals in the U.S regardless of country of origin probationary legal status and eventually a Z Visa is simply and obviously insane.

• • •

Comprehensively Bad [5/23/07]
John Fonte, of the Hudson Institute, has a short list of what's wrong with the Senate's abominable legislation, SB 1348. Mr. Fonte has written extensively about immigrant assimilation and testified on May 16 to Congress: "It is Time for Americanization".
Here are a few items from his list:

One-day amnesty: Once the bill is enacted illegal aliens can apply for and receive probationary legal status immediately. Criminal/terrorist background checks are required to be completed by the "end of the next business day." Illegal Monday, legal Tuesday, now that's almost instant amnesty.
Tax amnesty: Unlike last year's Senate amnesty bill, which required the illegal immigrants to pay three of five years back taxes, this year's bill does not require them to pay any back taxes. Senator Kennedy wanted them to pay some taxes, but the White House insisted upon a complete tax amnesty.
Faux enforcement "triggers": The so-called "enforcement" measures do not require that the border be secure. They only require that a few thousand more Border Patrol agents be hired (not deployed); that about half (370 miles) of the already authorized 700 miles of border fence be built; and that a few other bureaucratic inputs are announced. Then DHS will authorize the second phase of the amnesty by awarding the Z visas. Can anyone imagine Michael Chertoff declaring that these phony "triggers" have not been met?
Weak employer verification: This is not the long-promised "tamper proof" identity for employment. No serious fingerprint digital system is required, massive fraud will continue.
No exit system for guest workers: The guest workers are supposed to be "temporary" and required to eventually leave. But there is no way to enforce their leaving because there is still no Entry-Exit system in place.
Trust criminal gang members: As former Ashcroft deputy Kris Kobach notes there are more than 30,000 illegal immigrant gang members "trafficking in drugs, arms, and people." They get a Z (amnesty) Visa if they simply sign a "renunciation of gang affiliation." I guess the Senate-administration "negotiators" trust these M-13 guys.

• • •

Rewarding Illegal Aliens: Senate Bill Undermines The Rule of Law [5/23/07]
There's nothing like a good Top Ten list. Kris Kobach has an enumeration, with the caveat that there are a lot more than just 10 things wrong with this treasonous bill.
Here's numero uno...

A Massive Amnesty: Title VI of the bill grants amnesty to virtually all of the 12 million to 20 million illegal aliens in the country today. This amnesty would dwarf the amnesty that the United States granted—with disastrous consequences—in 1986 to 2.7 million illegal aliens. It is also a larger amnesty than that proposed in last year's ill-fated Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act. Indeed, the Senate's bill imposes no cap on the total number of individuals who could receive Z-visa status.
To initially qualify for a Z visa, an illegal alien need only have a job (or be the parent, spouse, or child of someone with a job) and provide two documents suggesting that he or she was in the country before January 1, 2007, and has remained in the country since then. A bank statement, pay stub, or similarly forgeable record will do. Also acceptable under the legislation is a sworn affidavit from a non-relative (see Section 601(i)(2)).
The price of a Z visa is $3,000 for individuals—only slightly more than the going rate to hire a coyote to smuggle a person across the border. A family of five could purchase visas for the bargain price of $5,000—some $20,000 short of the net cost that household is likely to impose on local, state, and federal government each year, according to Heritage Foundation calculations.
Expect a mass influx unlike anything this country has ever seen once the 12-month period for accepting Z visa applications begins. These provisions are an open invitation for those intent on U.S. residence to sneak in and present two fraudulent pieces of paper indicating that they were here before the beginning of the year.
That is precisely what happened in the 1986 amnesty, during which Immigration and Naturalization Services discovered 398,000 cases of fraud. Expect the number of fraudulent applications to be at least four times larger this time, given the much larger applicant pool.

Elsewhere, a Rasmussun poll finds that only 26 percent of Americans favor the Senate bill's passage.

• • •

Fox News Transcript May 21 [5/22/07]
Here's Robert Rector on Brit Hume's show yesterday.

ROBERT RECTOR, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: I have worked in Washington for 25 years. This is the most expensive bill to the U.S. taxpayer I have ever seen.
GARRETT: Rector says data indicates half of illegal immigrants lack a high-school diploma and are statistically more likely to seek welfare benefits once they receive legal status. Rector says these workers will also consume more in Medicare and Social Security benefits than they will pay in payroll taxes.
RECTOR: The total cost of that to the taxpayers will be about 2.3 trillion dollars, that is trillion with a T. And when you think about this, how could it be otherwise? This is a group that is 50 to 60 percent high school dropouts. They will never pays substantial taxes in the U.S. system.

• • •

Muslim Americans: Middle Class and Mostly Mainstream [5/22/07]
The Pew Center, which produced this poll, has put a positive spin on the results, as indicated by the upbeat title. But numerous findings are quite disturbing indeed and should wake Americans up to the threat brought by unwise immigration, particularly since Muslim immigration is increasing.
Elites love to imagine that America does immigration better than other places and infer therefore that we have nothing to fear from Muslims in our midst. That idea is a dangerous arrogance, which this poll clarifies.
A few points:
• Of Muslims residing in America, 65 percent are foreign born (page 1 of the downloadable PDF report).
• Only 28 percent consider themselves Americans first; 47 percent have their primary identity in being Muslim (pg 31).
• Among those who identify as Muslims first, 13 percent believe suicide bombing is justified to protect Islam from infidels (page 32).
• Also among the Muslim-first set, only 28 percent believe that a "group of Arabs" carried out the 9/11 attacks, while 40 percent did not accept the 9/11 perpetrators were Arabs and 32 percent declined to answer or said they didn't know (pg 32).
• In terms of political philosophy, 70 percent of Muslims residing in America prefer big government, and only 11 percent are or lean Republican (pg 41).
See also the Vdare.com blog version, Muslim Fifth Column Polled.

Additionally:
• Ace of Spades: Media Spins or Ignores Disturbing Finding That Quarter of American Muslim Young Men Support Terrorism
• Washington Times: Young U.S. Muslims back suicide attacks
• JihadWatch — WaPo: "Survey: U.S. Muslims Assimilated, Opposed to Extremism"

• • •

Rewarding Lawbreakers [5/21/07]
Pro-borders attorney Kris Kobach points up probably the worst aspect of the wretched Senate bill, namely the Z-visa, a no-deport card which allows the foreigners to work here indefinitely. That's all the Mexicans care about -- getting citizenship makes no difference to them. They don't come to join the American national community; they come for money, period. Mexican flag on top of reversed american

1) To qualify for the Z-visa amnesty, an illegal alien need only have a job (or be the parent, spouse, or child of someone with a job) and come up with a scrap of paper suggesting he was in the country before Jan. 1 of this year. Any bank statement, pay stub, or similarly forgeable record will do.
Expect a mass influx unlike anything this country has seen before, once the 12-month period for accepting Z visa applications begins. These rules are an open invitation to sneak in and present a fraudulent piece of paper indicating that you were already here.
2) Supporters of the bill call the Z visa "temporary" - neglecting to mention that it can be renewed indefinitely until the visa holder dies. Thus, we have the country's first permanent temporary visa. On top of that, it's a super-visa - allowing the holder to work, attend college or do just about anything else.
Are you a law-abiding alien who's interested in switching to this privileged status? Sorry. Only illegal aliens can qualify.
3) Many criminals and terrorists will find it easy to get a Z visa. The bill allows the government only one day to conduct a so-called "background check" on the applicant. If the (already overstretched) feds can't find anything in that single day, the alien gets a probationary visa that lets him roam at will and seek employment legally.

Meanwhile, France's new leader nixes a mass amnesty: France says no to mass legalisation of undocumented immigrants.

France's minister of immigration and national identity, a new ministry created by President Nicolas Sarkozy, has ruled out legalizing undocumented immigrants en masse. By comparison, Bush the Mexichurian has quietly removed the "pay back taxes" provision of the Senate bill.

• • •

Islamic Community in Minnesota Faces Growing Pains [5/20/07]
PBS Newshour has discoved Minneapolis' taxi jihad, in which Allah-worshipping cab-drivers believe they have the right to refuse service to persons carrying alcohol or blind people with guide dogs, though the latter aspect is not mentioned in the report.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: The news from the airport and Target prompted headlines and often angry words from talk radio hosts and Minneapolis Star Tribune columnist Katherine Kersten.
KATHERINE KERSTEN, Columnist, Star Tribune: I am told this is bogus. It is not an issue. Islam does not prohibit touching pepperoni pizza. What about the next time around, when the Muslim cab drivers or a minority of Muslims in this community say that they won't transport women wearing tank tops, they won't transport unmarried couples?
FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Jason Lewis, who bills himself as "Mr. Right," railed against the immigrants' demands on his radio show.
JASON LEWIS, Radio Talk Show Host: Take this as a sign, folks, of why the current immigration policy of open borders, why the current obsession with diversity training, with multiculturalism is doomed to failure.

• • •

Capitulation, from A------ to Z [5/20/07]
Mark Steyn has a few choice words about the rat traitor Senators who are determined to destroy America.

Are you a fine upstanding member of the Undocumented-American community? That's to say, are you (if you'll forgive the expression) an illegal immigrant?
Great news! Being illegal is now perfectly legal! Just for being one of the circa 12 million people who shouldn't be here, you can now be here indefinitely! If you were living and working in America illegally before Jan. 1, 2007, you're now entitled to one of the new Z-1 "probationary" visas. And your parents and spouses are entitled to one of the new Z-2 visas, and your children to the new Z-3 visas.
Don't worry: It's not an "amnesty." Every politician in America is opposed to amnesty -- if not the concept, then at least the word. That's why the visa starts with the letter that's furthest away from the one "amnesty" begins with. "Z" stands for zellout . . . no, hang on, zurrender or Zapatista, or some other word way up the other end of the alphabet from "amnesty." But the point is, at a stroke there will be no more illegal immigrants. Because being illegal means you're now legal.
Unless, of course, you came to America after Jan. 1, 2007, and thus aren't covered by the zamnesty. But in that case why not apply for the Z-1 anyway? After all, you're here illegally so how would U.S. Immigration know when you arrived? Especially with 12-15-20 million urgent applications tossed in on top of what's already a multi-year backlog. They're not exactly going to be doing a lot of in-depth background checks, especially not for a visa category whose only entry requirement under U.S. law is that you've broken U.S. law when you entered.

• • •

PBS: Interview with Bruce Bawer [5/19/07]
Bill Moyers chats up the author of While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam Is Destroying Europe from Within. Bawer's book is disturbing analysis of how Europeans are deluding themselves via multiculturalism into disregarding the threat of Islamic immigration. It's an interesting interview, because Moyers can't help being stuck on what Robert Spencer calls the fallacy that a "small minority" of Muslim extremists have hijacked the religion:

BILL MOYERS: But I can hear many American Muslims saying "No, no, no. That's not what we're in America-that's not what we're about. He may be talking about a radical core of Islamic extremists. But we're in America because we don't agree with them." [...]
BILL MOYERS: There was a bill in Parliament to protect Muslims and gays from discrimination and it was changed to exclude Gays because of fears that Muslims "might feel offended if they were lumped together with homosexuals." What does that say to you?
BRUCE BAWER: That's very disturbing to me. Ken Livingston, the Mayor of London, used to be a strong advocate for gay rights and he has changed his tune also for the same reasons. He's defended-- the allowing this Muslim leader al-Qaradawi into London. He welcomed him with open arms. He held a public forum with him. He stood at his side. This is a man who has called for executing gay people. This is a man who's defended suicide bombers. It's a signal that a lot of leaders are willing to sell out gay people because they think that will solve a lot of the problems with the Muslim community.

See also my review of While Europe Slept.
In the same show, author John MacArthur was interviewed on the subject of economic globalization and how the power of corporations undermines America's national security.

JOHN R. MACARTHUR:

Senator] Fritz Hollings told me ... not long ago that when he introduced a port security bill after 9/11 -- which would have put a $15 surcharge on every container that comes into an American port to pay for extra security, Wal-Mart and the retail lobby killed it. That's why we don't have a port security system because they don't wanna pay the extra $15 a container.

• • •

Adversaries praise a relentless Kennedy [5/18/07]
Barf alert on this one. The gushing was immense about the treason-loving Democrat Senator from Massachusetts. Disgusting beyond what polite speech can express. These are the people who swore an oath to protect the Constitution and are supposed to represent the interests of the citizens.

But Kennedy, the Senate's consummate dealmaker -- still indefatigable at 75 -- pushed hard at his fellow Democrats, wavering Republican moderates, and even members of the Bush administration, insisting that the deal-makers work all night Wednesday to beat the deadline imposed by the Senate leadership.
Yesterday, the two Cabinet secretaries -- both of whom have been subjects of Kennedy broadsides in the past -- lauded the Democrats' aging lion as the one indispensable player in the negotiating process.
"He's awesome," gushed Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff , as he left a news conference announcing the bipartisan agreement. "I'd say he was one of the critical leaders in putting together this deal."

Below, the joy of treason — From left, Senators Mel Martinez (R-FL), Lindsey O. Graham (R-SC), and Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA) enjoy a yuck, probably about destroying the middle class. Kennedy amnesty crew yuck it up

• • •

Mexicans Fear U.S. Immigration Plan [5/18/07]
You can never surrender enough to suit Mexicans, who think that the United States is their private job farm. The attitude has the convenient blowback that Mexicans accept no responsibility to fix their own wealthy but corrupt country.
Of course Mexicans prefer the family-based system that has imported millions of illiterates to America because it benefits Mexico.

"The United States already has enough people with college degrees. Who is going to cut their tobacco?" asked Bermudez, who has been working intermittently in the U.S. for the past eight years. In Mexico, he makes about $10 a day, while in the U.S. he earns almost that -- $8 -- in an hour.

What a perfect twofer. The Mexican quoted is not only anti-intellectual (displaying his culture's disdain for education), but apparently hopes we all die of lung cancer!

• • •

Diversity Gobbledygook [5/18/07]
Heather MacDonald explores the looking-glass world of campus diversity, its fundamental beliefs (like "you cannot have excellence without diversity") and how the ideology works out in practice.

There may be jobs requiring greater mendacity than a college affirmative action officer - college president comes to mind - but there can't be many. The ideal college affirmative action officer lies about his mission not only without regret but also without awareness, so brainwashed has he become in the foolish ideology of "diversity." The following false propositions form the cornerstone of the college diversity charade:
1. The fact that your college still has not achieved proportional representation of blacks, Hispanics, and women in certain fields, such as the sciences, is because it hasn't put enough effort into finding them. The problem is not that there is an insufficient number of qualified minorities and women to go around. (It is acceptable here to imply that your college may even be discriminating against "diverse" candidates.)

• • •

Senators, White House Reach Agreement on Immigration [5/17/07]
The deal has been done in secret over weeks of negotiation. The Republicans caved to Democrats demands on behalf of LA Raza and other Mexican fifth columnists.

A bipartisan group of Senate lawmakers and the White House struck an immigration reform deal Thursday that would grant legal status to the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants already in the United States and increase border and interior enforcement initiatives.
The plan would establish a temporary worker program for new arrivals to the United States with a separate program for agricultural workers. The bill also would include provisions for new technology to ensure against immigration document fraud.

First of all it's a pipedream that there are only 12 million illegal aliens. Bear-Stearns estmated several years ago that there were 20 million and millions more have entered since then. The number could easily be 25-30 million.
It's a terrible sell-out. All the major mistakes of the 1986 legislation are repeated. There's no tough enforcement, just carrot with a pretense of stick.
As Fjordman noted last year,

In future encyclopedias it will say: USA: "Nation that existed until the 21st century. Had the strongest armed forces in human history. Was conquered and colonized by unarmed Mexicans between 1980 and 2030."

Below, the jolly traitor rats who worked out the "compromise": Sen. Edward Kennedy (seated), and from left, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) and Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA). Kennedy amnesty crew

See the longer VDARE.com version, Traitor Rat Senators Present Amnesty on Steroids.
Also vital to understanding how bad the bill is the "Z visa," explained in GOP Sellout.

These "Z Visa" holders can stay in the "Z" status indefinitely, which means they never have to pursue "a pathway to citizenship." They also would be able to get Social Security numbers and benefit from some welfare programs. Shockingly, there is no cap on the numbers of amnesty recipients in the draft language. The only thing the Z Visa holder can't do is vote — until, that is, a liberal judge declares this limitation unconstitutional or until a liberal president can railroad through a "technical corrections" bill. Every illegal alien will be eligible to receive a Z Visa immediately upon the bill being signed into law. At that point, they are home free, and are protected from deportation.

• • •

Minority population grows to 100 million -- 1 of 3 in U.S. [5/17/07]
The press loves to prattle about increasing "diversity" and "minorities" when what it is really talking about is immigrant population explosion.
Is the proportion of black citizens expanding? Certainly not. They are being nudged out of influence and employment by the hispanic invasion.

The nation's minority population topped 100 million last year, about one-third of the total, and California had roughly 20 million minority residents, more than half of its total, according to new estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau.
Between the rising minority population -- particularly of Latinos of any race -- and the low median age of Latinos, a new kind of generation gap is arising across the country, experts said Wednesday: Most people over 60 are non-Hispanic whites, and most under 40 are not.

• • •

Latino Groups Play Key Role on Hill [5/16/07]
Today's evidence of the perfidy of Democrats is the degree to which the fifth-column Marxicans are piloting the Dems' open-borders agenda.

When Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) declared last week that unnamed "stakeholders" would decide whether Congress overhauls immigration law this year, Latino organizations in Washington understood exactly what he meant.
After laboring in obscurity for decades, groups such as the National Council of La Raza, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and the National Immigration Forum are virtually being granted veto power over perhaps the biggest domestic issue coming before Congress this year. Organizations that represent what is now the nation's largest minority group are beginning to achieve power commensurate with their numbers.
"There's a real sense that the Latino community is key to the solution in this debate, so now they are reaching out to us more than ever," said Eric Gutierrez, lead lobbyist for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, or MALDEF. "Neither party wants to make a misstep politically."
Such groups were practically in the room yesterday, maintaining contact as Democratic and Republican senators tried to hammer out a new immigration bill before a deadline set by Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) for today before he moved it last night to Monday. The contours began to emerge for a bill that would couple a tightening of border controls with a guest-worker program and new avenues for an estimated 12 million undocumented workers to work legally.

"Stakeholders"? What about us American citizens? Aren't we the stakeholders here?

• • •

Toll of drug war rises in Mexico [5/15/07]
It's pretty shocking that a drug cartel would assassinate a major government official in Mexico City in broad daylight. Mexico is getting scarier all the time.

The newly appointed head of a drug intelligence unit in the attorney general's office was shot and killed Monday in a street ambush here that dealt a new blow to President Felipe Calderon's campaign against this nation's drug traffickers.
Officials said several assailants waited for Jose Nemesio Lugo Felix, director of the attorney general's "Information Against Delinquency" unit, trapping his SUV on a narrow street. Such assassinations have become common in many border and port cities of Mexico but are rare in the nation's capital.
Lugo Felix had been appointed in April to head the unit specializing in the analysis of data about the activities of Mexico's drug cartels, officials said. He was shot as he drove his vehicle during rush hour just outside an office of the attorney general in the southern Coyoacan district, a center of the city's arts community.

The murder is part of an escalation of violence as the war between Calderon's government forces against drug cartels intensifies.
More on the same topic in Many Mexicans fear cartels have army outgunned.

cartels here make $10 billion to $30 billion a year selling cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamine to the U.S. market, rivaling Mexico's revenues from oil exports and tourism.

"The reality is that we are scared to go out of houses, scared about what could happen to our children."

• • •

Marxican Insurgency Imagined [5/14/07]
A new novel posits a future hispanic uprising, from a pro-Mexican viewpoint.

Some of the best work to alarm Americans about the slo-mo invasion is done by our enemies, e.g. open-borders squawk box Tamar Jacoby and May Day demonstrations featuring foreign flags.
Today¹s example is the fictional work by Raul Ramos y Sanchos, America Libre, about a near-future time in which Mexican squatters act out in a civil war. You can read the first chapter online, and it is mercifully brief.

• • •

Mass Immigration vs. Black America [5/13/07]
Talmadge Willard Fair is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Urban League of Greater Miami, Inc. On May 9, he testified before the House Subcommittee on Immigration about the effect of immigration on black Americans. It is a brief and powerful statement.

Since 1965, nearly 30 million legal immigrants have come here, plus millions of illegal aliens. The results have been devastating for those Americans -- black or white -- who compete for jobs with this immigrant tide. George Borjas of Harvard has shown that immigration has cut the wages of American men without a high school degree by $1,800 a year. Economists at Northeastern University have found that businesses are substituting immigrants for young American workers, especially for young black men. In fact, scholars estimate that immigration is the reason for one-third of the drop in employment among black men, and even some of the increase in incarceration. [...]
And it's not just a matter of jobs. Whatever your views on government social programs, everyone can agree that resources are not infinite -- there's only so much social spending to go around. And since immigrants have relatively low skills and low incomes, they use a lot of social services and pay little in taxes, cutting into the spending on America's own poor. The Center for Immigration Studies estimates that illegal aliens alone cost federal taxpayers $10 billion more a year in services than they pay in taxes -- that's $10 billion that's not being spent on disadvantaged Americans, not counting the much larger deficits at the state and local level, where most social services are provided.
Likewise with the schools. This is an issue close to my heart, since I co-founded Florida's first charter school and was recently confirmed as chairman of the statewide Board of Education. We must offer the best education possible to all our children, for their own good and for the good of our country. But as budgets have tightened, school enrollment has surged, and all of the growth in the nation's school-age population -- 100 percent -- comes from immigrant families. This surge in enrolment has led to school overcrowding and has diverted resources that would otherwise have been devoted to at-risk students.
Solutions to the challenges facing black Americans have to come from both private efforts and government initiative -- but regardless of the specific approach, flooding the job market and overwhelming the public schools and other government services undermines all our efforts. The interests of black Americans are clear: No amnesty, no guestworkers, enforce the immigration law.

Mr. Fair was recently featured in an ad campaign from the Coalition for the Future American Worker in which he condemned amnesty (aka a "path to citizenship" for illegal aliens) as disastrous for black workers.
Here is a report on Fair's testimony from his hometown paper: Fair's immigration views take battering.

"There's no doubt about it, in Miami, that as the number of legal and illegal immigrants rise, prosperity drops in our community,"

• • •

Severed Head Found Outside Mexican Base [5/12/07]
Mexican drug cartels are stepping up their crime insurgency against the government of Mr. Calderon, who appears to be fighting back against the powerful criminal gangs.

A severed head reportedly accompanied by a note of defiance from organized crime gangs was found outside a military barracks in Veracruz state on Saturday.
The head was found in a box outside the army base in Veracruz city, just hours after the government announced it was sending troops to respond to a shooting attack. The box also held a message saying gangs would continue operating despite the presence of troops, Mexico's Reforma newspaper reported.
The victim's body was found shortly afterward on a street in another neighborhood, wrapped in a sheet.
On Friday, assailants killed four bodyguards assigned to protect the children of a state governor who were vacationing in Veracruz. The killings were latest in a wave of violence across Mexico that has also targeted soldiers and police.
The government began sending additional troops to Veracruz after the slaying of guards protecting the children of Mexico State Gov. Enrique Pena, Interior Secretary Francisco Ramirez said.

Another report: Drug cartels attack Mexican army -- indicates a major escalation and is a sign of either confidence or desperation.

The traffickers' decision to take on a reasonably well-trained and well-equipped army of about 100,000 soldiers shows they are moving from defense to offense now that President Felipe Calderón has put the military at the forefront of the drug war, analysts said.

"I guess we can call it a real war now,"

• • •

Graduate rate is lowest in 10 years [5/12/07]
California schools continue to worsen. And why wouldn't they? The number of non-English-speaking students increases every year. If that isn't bad enough, the atmosphere of entitlement has convinced non-American students that it's UNFAIR to require that they speak English in order to graduate from a California high school! For classic boo hooey, see Exit exam a test of determination: Language barrier adds unfair burden.
Consider that in 2004-05, 25.2 percent of California students were English learners, while an additional 16.8 percent had acquired English skills though it was not their first language.
But the San Francisco Chronicle blames the chimp-simple exit exam. What the test has shown is that many students received social promotion all the way to high school graduation.

California's high school graduation rate dropped to a 10-year low last year as a third of the Class of 2006 left without a diploma, according to state Department of Education numbers posted Friday.
Statewide, the graduation rate was 67 percent of the 423,289 seniors in 2006. That is down from 71 percent in 2005.
That 4 percentage point decline works out to an additional 21,000 students who did not don a cap and gown. [...]
The significant decline came as the state required a test of basic skills, known as the exit exam, for graduation for the first time.
Nonetheless, the decline comes after more than a decade of expensive changes in the classroom -- class-size reduction, higher standards, additional teacher training and more.

That last part is true. The spending per pupil has gone up dramatically to nearly $11,000 annually. California spends a stunning $66.3 billion as of 2007-8 on K-12 education, yet graduation rates are falling. Ever more massive spending won't stop legal and illegal immigration from rapidly transforming this state into the Third World.
It's worth keeping in mind that nationwide, the majority of illegal aliens are Mexicans (57 percent, plus 85 percent of Mexican immigrants here are illegal), who arguably have the worst record of assimilation to American values regarding education of any ethnic group. Samuel Huntington's research has shown that school failure continues for several generations: fewer than 10 percent of fourth generation Mexican-Americans have a post-high-school degree, compared with 45 percent of the population as a whole.
Can you say Mexifornia? (Below is a chart of California K-12 English learners' native languages 2004-5.)

chart of California k-12 English learners' native language

• • •

San Francisco is sued for failing to report noncitizens arrested for drugs [5/11/07]
Sweet that someone is taking on the Smug City for its insistence on having an illegal alien sanctuary policy. (Friend of LTG Carol Joyal is part of a similar lawsuit against San Jose.)

A San Francisco illegal immigration opponent has sued the city's police chief and police commissioners for failing to comply with a state law that requires officers to tell federal authorities about all suspected noncitizens who are arrested on drug charges.
Charles Fonseca, a 70-year-old Portola district resident who came to the United States from Nicaragua at the age of 9 and filed the lawsuit May 4, said he opposes amnesty for illegal immigrants, especially those who break the law after they get here.
"It is absurd that drug addicts don't get deported," Fonseca said. "This country welcomes immigrants. The illegal ones should get in line."

As has been pointed out here numerous times, sanctuary policies kill innocent citizens by allowing illegal alien criminals to run free. A recent example was the teenaged girls killed in the sanctuary city Virginia Beach by an illegal alien with a previous conviction that should have put him in jail at the time of the deaths.

• • •

Contingencies for nuclear terrorist attack [5/11/07]
This is a disturbing bit of news, but not a surprising one. The government has made a deliberate choice, namely that the economic advantages available through open borders are more important than keeping the nation safe. The common-sense recommendations of the 9/11 Commission have never been made into law.
It's not like everything has been done to protect the country, and now the big brains are sorting out what to do if the best-laid plans are unsuccessful: on the contrary, NOTHING has been done to secure the borders since 9/11 and they remain as porous to human trafficking as before. In fact, Washington has been loudly telegraphing the message to the Border Patrol the real enforcement should not occur, or else agents will be prosecuted for doing their jobs, e.g. Agents Ignacio Ramos, Jose Compean and Gilmer Hernandez.
Furthermore, when foreigners smuggled across the border turn up planning terrorism, as in the case of the Fort Dix Six, the MSM sniffs that it's not real al Qaeda ("homegrown"), so no real threat.
Cut to the chase: Washington would rather allow a city to be nuked than secure the border. 24 nuke

As concerns grow that terrorists might attack a major American city with a nuclear bomb, a high-level group of government and military officials has been quietly preparing an emergency survival program that would include the building of bomb shelters, steps to prevent panicked evacuations and the possible suspension of some civil liberties.
Many experts say the likelihood of al Qaeda or some other terrorist group producing a working nuclear weapon with illicitly obtained weapons-grade fuel is not large, but such a strike would be far more lethal, frightening and disruptive than the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Not only could the numbers killed and wounded be far higher, but the explosion could, experts say, ignite widespread fires, shut down most transportation, halt much economic activity and cause a possible disintegration of government order.
The efforts to prepare a detailed blueprint for survival took a step forward last month when senior government and military officials and other experts, organized by a joint Stanford-Harvard program called the Preventive Defense Project, met behind closed doors in Washington for a day-long workshop.

• • •

Londonistan Calling [5/10/07]
Christopher Hitchens recently visited his English birthplace and reported on the dismal scene.

They say that the past is another country, but let me tell you that it's much more unsettling to find that the present has become another country, too. In my lost youth I lived in Finsbury Park, a shabby area of North London, roughly between the old Arsenal football ground and the Seven Sisters Road. It was a working-class neighborhood, with a good number of Irish and Cypriot immigrants. [...]
Returning to the old place after a long absence, I found that it was the scent of Algeria that now predominated along the main thoroughfare of Blackstock Road. This had had a good effect on the quality of the coffee and the spiciness of the grocery stores. But it felt odd, under the gray skies of London, to see women wearing the veil, and even swathed in the chador or the all-enveloping burka. [...]
It's impossible to exaggerate how far and how fast this situation has deteriorated. [...] I find myself haunted by a challenge that was offered on the BBC by a Muslim activist named Anjem Choudary: a man who has praised the 9/11 murders as "magnificent" and proclaimed that "Britain belongs to Allah." When asked if he might prefer to move to a country which practices Shari'a, he replied: "Who says you own Britain anyway?" A question that will have to be answered one way or another.

Incredibly, Hitchens says he is "in favor of multiculturalism", so he apparently hasn't entirely abandoned the foolishness of leftism.

Below: Muslims demonstrate in London against Islam-critical cartoons in February 2006. Muslims at London French Embassy: Behead Those Who Insult Islam
See VDARE.com version: When Immigrants Come to Conquer...

• • •

Transcript Lou Dobbs May 8 [5/9/07]
The arrogant church loonies are on the march for a massive amnesty because they believe they act according to a "higher" law. But even though Los Angeles' pedophile-protecting Cardinal Mahoney is the full-tilt advocate of illegal aliens, apparently the Catholic catechism clearly calls for national sovereignty and the enforcement of immigration laws. Who knew?

CASEY WIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony is an outspoken advocate of amnesty, even marching with illegal aliens and their supporters. [...]
WIAN: But the cardinal's politics have angered some life-long Catholics, including former religion teacher Jerry Mazenko, who has two nuns and two priests in his family. He says Mahoney is ignoring the Catholic catechism, the church's official teachings on matters of faith.
JERRY MAZENKO, LIFELONG CATHOLIC: What the cardinal does not say is that the church actually puts limits on immigration and actually imposes requirements on the immigrants themselves.
WIAN: The catechism approved by the past and present pope states, "Political authorities may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions," and it says, "Immigrants are obliged to respect with gratitude the material and spiritual heritage of the country that receives them, to obey its laws and to assist in carrying civic burdens."

• • •

The Fort Dix Six [5/9/07]
The New Jersey terrorist plot was foiled because of a tip from a sharp-eyed, responsible citizen.

News that a New Jersey store clerk helped the FBI foil a plan to kill soldiers on U.S. soil proves that alert citizens can disrupt a major terror plot -- if they know what to look for.
Luckily the clerk did. One of the terror suspects paid him to burn onto DVD a video of several bearded men shouting "Allahu Akbar!" (Allah is great!) as they fired high-powered weapons at targets in the woods.
The clerk instantly suspected they were Muslims training for jihad, and tipped off the FBI. Agents, in turn, conducted surveillance over the next 16 months on what proved to be a terror cell targeting Fort Dix, the U.S. army base in New Jersey.
The homegrown plot was foiled. But we have to wonder if authorities would have ever uncovered it if not for the clerk's valuable tip.
These would-be terrorists slipped up. Though inspired by al-Qaida, they aren't disciplined foot soldiers. They aren't the sleeper cells lying in wait for a spectacular attack. They're homegrown, living for years in New Jersey's large Muslim community.

IBD's commentary is a good one, but the term "homegrown" is misleading, since all the perps are immigrants. What's meant is no connection to al Qaeda, but a better term would be "self-generated" or "freelance."
Now is a good time to remember that other citizens who spoke up to authorities about a perceived terror threat may be sued by the pro-terror group CAIR (see Anti-CAIR). Not only is the airline being sued for "religious discrimination" in the flying imams case, the John Doe passengers may also face the courtroom.
In addition, it was reported today that there may be a border connection: Brothers Charged in Alleged Fort Dix Terror Plot May Have Been Smuggled Into U.S..

• • •

Little Girls in Headscarves [5/8/07]
Author Mary Grabar, a daughter of Eastern European immigrants who believed in repressing females, notes the invasion of misogynous Muslims into her community. Now a professor, she recalls how she was able to grow up into a free individual because of going to an American school and being exposed to books which respected girls and women.

One afternoon, deep in the poetic reverie the lake and trees and birds inspire, I came across a sight spooky against this natural sunny backdrop: a woman completely swathed in black with only slits for her eyes. The incongruous sight of women, peering out of slits of cloth, in full Islamic regalia, behind the wheels of minivans or paying for goat meat at the Publix is no longer that unusual in my neighborhood, though it still takes me aback. But here on a sunny afternoon, amidst ducks and geese, and gazebos and picnic tables, came this creature who looked like the Ghost of Christmas Past with two small children: the boy around four years old dressed in typical Western clothing of pants and a shirt. The girl, about age seven, wore the traditional headscarf and long dress.

Grabar understands that the burqa and similar garments ("a prison of black cloth") are not about "modesty" as Islam falsely claims, but aim to destroy individuality and inculcate servitude ("But there was the girl, already being trained by the scarf for a reclusive life of subservience").

Below, a scene of diversitude from 2005 on a Glasgow park bench 2005 Glasgow park bench burqa
Meanwhile in Denmark, an immigrant imam opines against women's freedom: "All Women Should Wear A Veil"

not only Muslim women but other women too should wear a veil

See the VDARE.com blog version, Headscarves Are Chains.

• • •

6 'Islamic militants' accused of plotting attack on Fort Dix [5/8/07]
Fox News mentioned that three of the plotters are illegal aliens.

FORT DIX, N.J. - Six men described by federal prosecutors as "Islamic militants" were arrested on charges they plotted to attack the Fort Dix Army base and "kill as many soldiers as possible," authorities said today.
The six were scheduled to appear in U.S. District Court in Camden later today to face charges of conspiracy to kill U.S. servicemen, said Michael Drewniak, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in New Jersey.
Officials said four of the men were born in the former Yugoslavia, one in Jordan and one in Turkey. Five of them lived in Cherry Hill, 10 miles east of Philadelphia and 20 miles southwest of Fort Dix, Drewniak said.

The larger question is why Washington allows any Islamic immigration at all when so many Muslims have sworn to kill all of us -- like the Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council, who recently called for "killing all Jews and Americans.". (See also Top Hamas official: Kill all Americans.)
In addition, see Terrorist plot in Cherry Hill, NJ; illegal aliens among alleged plotters; a John Doe turned them in; press conference at 2:30pm Eastern; Fort Dix has been a refuge for ethnic Albanians; details from the complaint. Nice how these refugees return a kindness!

• • •

DhimmiWatch: Sarkozy opposes polygamy [5/7/07]
Here's an important translation from the JihadWatch folks from the recent events in France. Apparently Mr. Sarkozy does not subscribe to multicultural idiocy.

Question: What do you think of polygamy?
Answer: I respect all cultures throughout the world, but so that it is quite clear: if I am elected President of the Republic, I will not accept women being treated as inferior to men. The French Republic holds these values: respect for women, equality between men and women. Nobody has the right to hold a prisoner, even within his own family. I say it clearly, that polygamy is prohibited in the territory of the French Republic. I will fight against female genital mutilation and those who do not wish to understand that the values of the French Republic include freedom for women, the dignity of women, respect for women -- they do not have any reason to be in France. If our laws are not respected and if one does not wish to understand our values, if one does not wish to learn French, then one does not have any reason to be on French territory.

Heretofore, France has taken a "spineless response to polygamy" so a change in course is most welcome.

• • •

French suburbs threaten riotous dawn for the reign of Sarkozy [5/6/07]
How typical of the French left and their Muslim pals to threaten violence and rioting if the conservative candidate Sarkozy wins.

On Friday morning [socialist candidate Royal] warned that France could slide into violence if Sarkozy, a famously divisive figure, won the election. She said she was "issuing an alert" that his victory could "trigger violence and brutality across the country. His candidacy is dangerous. That is why I am asking voters to think twice".
Sarkozy's increasingly confident team called such attacks "outrageous" but nobody disputed the possibility of a toxic brew of antiSarkozy grievances erupting in violence, particularly in the immigrant suburbs, if his victory is announced tonight.
Arab and African residents of the banlieues, as the suburbs are known, have been in an angry, vengeful mood since Sarkozy described young delinquents as "scum" and "thugs" in 2005.

Talk about intimidation: "Vote for our side or we'll burn the place down!"
Update: Fox News has just called the election as Sarkozy's win, so we will see about the car-b-ques. The riot police are being deployed for possible violence tonight.
Sarkozy won with 53 percent of the vote, with 85 percent voter turnout.
No surprise that the Muslims, er youths are already rioting because the socialist candidate didn't win. Will there be weeks of nightly violence, like in 2005? Time will tell.

• • •

Europe's Champion of Liberty [5/6/07]
Bruce Bawer (author of While Europe Slept) reminds us of the May 6 anniversary of the political assassination of Dutch candidate Pim Fortuyn (shown). Can it have been five years?
Sadly, as Bawer notes, the shock of what the assassination meant has worn off, and the bad habits of appeasement to the slow-motion Muslim invasion via immigration have returned to Dutch life.

Yes, some politicians, notably Parliament member Geert Wilders, are carrying on Fortuyn's battle. But momentum has given way to malaise. Politicians and journalists who once kept mum on Islamization now openly defend it as preferable to culture clash: Amsterdam mayor Job Cohen has called for "accommodation with the Muslims," including toleration "of orthodox Muslims who consciously discriminate against their women."
Only last week, Mr. Wilders was called in by Dutch intelligence and security officials who, he said, "intimidated" him by pressuring him to tone down his rhetoric on Islam. Fortuyn's brief shining moment seems very long ago.
Many political assassinations leave behind haunting questions. How would Reconstruction have gone under Lincoln? Could the Vietnam debacle have been avoided if President Kennedy had lived? Five years after Fortuyn's murder, it can feel as if Volkert van der Graaf robbed Europe not only of a brilliant champion of liberty, but of its one great chance to save itself before it's too late.

See also Dutch Martyrs.

• • •

Their cry: 'The aliens are coming' — As proof, they point to Cinco de Mayo [5/5/07]
New Hampshire Minutemen rally against cinco de mayo Here is the proper patriotic response to Cinco de Mayo (see previous post), as demonstrated by the Minutemen of New Hampshire.

With American flags, pamphlets, a naturalized citizen, a "Don't Tread on Me" poster and a man in a tri-cornered hat, local members of the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps picketed the State House yesterday in hopes of stopping what they've deemed "the Illegal Alien Invasion."
About a dozen people gathered around lunchtime for the rally, which was organized by Exeter resident Ron Oplinus, director of the New Hampshire chapter of the Minutemen. He spent about a month organizing the event in response to Cinco de Mayo, Mexican independence day, and the pro-immigration rallies held throughout the country earlier this week.
"It's a serious problem," he said, squinting beneath the brim of a Minuteman baseball cap. "It's not an easy problem, but we are losing this country. They don't want to become American citizens. They want to reclaim the southern states for Mexico."

Elsewhere, other Americans regard Cinco as an anti-American celebration: Cinco de Mayo celebrations can't mask border tensions

'Go celebrate Cinco de Mayo in Mexico — this is our country.'

That's hate speech? The suggestion that when in America, you should celebrate American holidays and not those of a hostile country?

''I'm saying as an American black man, in this nation when we start putting our ethnicity above our nationalism, we bring in division,"

Marvin Stewart

• • •

President Bush Celebrates Cinco de Mayo, Discusses Immigration [5/4/07]
el presidente Bush cinco de mayo at the white house Here's our Mexichurian president, celebrating Cinco de Mayo a day early.
Does el Presidente Calderon observe any American holidays? Doubtful, to be kind.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you all. Please be seated. Sientese. Bienvenidos. Thank you for coming. Welcome to El Jardin de las Rosas. It's a great place to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. As a matter of fact, I've been looking forward to celebrating this so much that we decided to have our own Cuatro de Mayo. (Laughter.)
Thanks for coming. Welcome. I'm honored to celebrate this important holiday with you all. On Cinco de Mayo, we remember our close friendship with Mexico, and we honor and remember the many contributions Mexican Americans have made to our nation. [...]
As you can see, I'm standing up here with a mariachi band, initially from Monterrey, Mexico -- Los Hermanos Mora Arriaga. Welcome. (Applause.) Brothers and sisters -- I think you told me you had 13 brothers and -- 15 brothers and sisters. (Laughter.) We believe in family values. (Laughter.)

I'm sure traditional environmentalists who have voluntarily limited their family size as a responsibility related to the future liveability of the earth don't find 15 children to be a big yuck.
Furthermore, did these replanted Mexicans support 15 children through their own efforts, or on the US taxpayers dime? Food stamps, cash welfare, housing vouchers etc.?
Oh, and "El Jardin de las Rosas" -- do you think the President means the White House Rose Garden?

• • •

Dishonest Immigration Language Masks the Real Issues [5/4/07]
Georgie Ann Geyer analyzes the curious mind-set of the invaders who think America owes them something.

The revelations come, as so often, with the language used in the rallies across the country, words and phrases such as "anger," "rights," "path to citizenship," "immigration nation" and "legalization for all immigrants." Finally, there is the curious, almost innocent refrain that "We are not illegals."
Anger? These hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens -- not the fashionable "undocumented," but the genuine "illegals" -- were angry because the country they had literally broken into, without showing that respect for the nation that proper documentation entails, dared anyone even to question their right to be here. Yet the only people who really have a right to be here are citizens who have solemnly pledged their troth to America, or visitors with proper visas or other appropriate papers.
Demanding a "path to citizenship" is yet another curious claim. The United States already has a path to citizenship; it is a road that starts with applying legally, waiting your turn, and earning citizenship according to America's needs and decisions, not your own.

• • •

Poll: Americans Still See Controlling the Borders as Top Immigration Concern [5/3/07]
Another poll with no surprises. Americans want immigration to be legal and controlled and they want their borders closed to illegal entrants. Citizens want border anarchy to end and they want legal immigrants to assimilate to American values and the English language. These are reasonable demands, and comprise the history of immigration until the last few decades, when businesses discovered that exploitable illegal alien workers were the next best thing to slaves.

When given a choice, 48% of Americans would opt for a Congressional candidate who "favors building a barrier along the Mexican border and forcing illegal aliens to leave the United States." A Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that just 36% prefer a candidate promising to "expand legal opportunities for foreign workers to find jobs."
Sixty percent (60%) of Americans believe that immigration reform should include laws requiring that all government documents be printed in English. Just 29% disagree.
Republicans favor the candidate focused on controlling the border by a two-to-one margin. Democrats are more evenly divided. Among those not affiliated with either major party (a growing number), 47% prefer the candidate focused on controlling the border while 35% take the opposite view.
The overall results are essentially unchanged from attitudes measured a year ago. They are consistent with the general public view that it doesn't make sense to debate new immigration laws until we can first control our borders and enforce existing laws.
The latest survey also found that most Americans (56%) oppose granting citizenship to the child of an illegal alien born in the United States. Just 35% believe citizenship should be granted.
By a similar margin, 55% to 29%, American adults oppose granting citizenship to parents of children born in the United States.
Last year, the immigration debate caught America's political class completely off guard and most national politicians made an incorrect assessment concerning the nature of the debate. The initial discussions in Washington implied a debate that was either pro-immigration or anti-immigration. Those who favored some form of legalization or earned citizenship were pictured in official Washington as pro-immigrant while those who favored border control ere thought to be anti-immigrant (or perhaps racist). However, Rasmussen Reports data showed an entirely different picture.

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Lou Dobbs Transcript, May 2 [5/3/07]
One segment was a handy enumeration of the advantages illegal aliens get in America. Why would anyone come here through lawful channels?

BILL TUCKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The United States of America offers the best deal in illegal immigration in the world. For those illegal aliens nervous about their illegal presence, there are cities which have declared federal immigration policy null and void. Those sanctuaries include the cities of San Francisco, Oakland, Los Angeles, San Diego, Denver, Chicago, Dallas, Austin, New York, Boston, Cambridge, Virginia Beach.
MARK KRIKORIAN, CENTER FOR IMMIGRATION STUDIES: And if you're arrested, some state and local governments will spend taxpayer money to help you -- give you legal representation.
TUCKER: Illegal aliens in need of a driver's license can go to one of eight states which will give them a license to drive, no questions asked: Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, Michigan, Maryland, New Mexico and Utah. There are even auto insurance companies eager to insure illegal aliens.
That driver's license or the matricula consular's card issued by the government of Mexico to its citizens with no passport or visa, can be used to open a bank account, obtain credit cards, loans, even home mortgages.
DAN STEIN, FEDERATION FOR AMERICAN IMMIGRATION REFORM: It is enormous, tremendous economic benefit to someone to break the law and come here illegally, particularly if they have less education.
TUCKER: Children of illegal aliens receive free tuition in state public schools, as well as free school lunches. In the states of California, Texas, New York, Utah, Illinois, Washington, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Nebraska, illegal aliens can go to college paying the in-state tuition rate, a rate not available to citizens who happen to live outside of those states.
There is medical care, limited to the emergency room, of any hospital who, by law, cannot charge those who cannot pay or have no insurance. The message is inescapable.
GLENN GROTHMAN, WISCONSIN STATE SENATE: When parts of the U.S. government or state governments provide programs for people who are here illegally, it's just like saying, "Please ignore the law, the law doesn't count anyway."
TUCKER: And those are just the privileges. (END VIDEOTAPE)
TUCKER: As for rights, an illegal alien is covered by our Constitution, just like everyone living in America. Which means, Lou, that they enjoy the right to free speech and the right to assemble, as we've seen.

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Diversity Is Strength! It's Also... Familicide [5/2/07]
This is my recent VDARE.com article about immigrants who murder their families, a companion piece to a consideration of immigrants who mass murder. (Hint: important components are the stress of clashing cultures and immigrants who are not educated enough to cope in a technological society.)

For some curious reason, immigrants of all stripes are lauded by America's elite for their exemplary family values. But huddling in high-density hovels should not be mistaken for loving relationships or psychologically healthy lifestyles. There is plenty of dysfunction in those communities of diversitude, from continuing high levels of Hispanic teen and unmarried pregnancy to numerous cases of familial mass murder. Intrafamily killing deserves our attention, because it reveals the underside of immigrant communities in a way that little else can.
When an American mother like Andrea Yates or Susan Smith kills her children, the news coverage is plentiful and angry. But when a dim immigrant mom murders her kids, no one in the media seems to care.

See also a related topic from Britain, Violent Immigrants Fueling Crime.

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Rep Dana Rohrabacher: Immigration Policy [5/2/07]
House member Rohrabacher took the floor last night during Special Orders, and really tore it up with one of the strongest speeches yet heard from a sitting public official on the subject of the treason at the center of immigration anarchy. The California Republican said several times, "Wake up, America. We are losing our country."
You can't say it more clearly than that.

If this President pushes through his so-called comprehensive immigration plan, which will legalize the status of those who have broken our laws and are in this country illegally, America's current 15 to 20 million illegal residents within a decade will mushroom to another 40 to 50 million.
Wake up, America. We are about to lose our country. Wake up, America. The President and Congress are not watching out for you.
The comprehensive immigration legislation that is being bandied around town by this President and by Members of Congress will be a green light to 100 million people throughout the world to do anything they can do to get to our country because we do not have the will to stop them. No matter how impenetrable the defense, no matter how diligent the border patrol, there will be no stopping them. Give them benefits, give them jobs, give them health care, give them every right to the treasures that belong to the citizens and legal immigrants who are in our country and they will come from overseas, and there will be nothing that we can do to stop them because we have given them the greatest incentive to come here, even though they are breaking our laws in doing so.

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'We're proud of our lives' [5/2/07]
The MSM continues to cheerlead for illegal aliens. It's really shameful, not to mention professionally dishonest. Imagine if pedophiles were demonstrating for pedophile rights. But the liberal press thinks it's fine to depress the wages of some black citizens and others on the bottom of the economic ladder for a reason that is hard to comprehend.

"We have done nothing against the law, except that we came without papers," said Celia Martinez, 49, who was among several in the crowd who freely admitted to reporters their illegal status, shouting to be heard over the din. "We're very proud of our lives here."
So after setting the stage for last year's summer of immigration marches, Chicago was again at the center of the national immigration debate.
From the podium, Mayor Richard M. Daley and other elected officials lauded the crowd's tenacity.

What's wrong with these elected officials? Open borders are destroying the country.
Below, some Mexicans in Chicago crucified the Statue of Liberty. Mexicans crucify Statue of Liberty in Chicago

Mexicans crucify Statue of Liberty in Chicago

Below is another photo from Chicago on May Day. Incidentally, America has had a holiday celebrating the working citizen — Labor Day. May Day is a communist holiday. Reversed flags in Chicago May Day march

The photo below of the baby meal-tickets brigade is from the Lost Angeles march. Many who have studied the issue believe that the birthright citizenship bestowed on the children of illegal aliens is a misunderstanding of the 14th Amendment. May Day anchor baby strollers

See also the slideshow of Invaders and their leftist pals acting up in New York City.

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California population nears 38 million, LA tops 4 million [5/2/07]
Are we full yet? Of course California is full several times over, from an environmental sustainability viewpoint.

California's population is closing in on 38 million and its biggest city now has more than 4 million people, but the state's growth rate has slowed since the start of the decade, state officials said Tuesday.
The Department of Finance's demographics unit said California had nearly 37.7 million residents as of on Jan. 1, up by about 470,000 since the start of 2006. One of every eight Americans now lives in the state.
Los Angeles, the nation's second largest city, added more than 37,000 residents in 2006, giving it a population of just more than 4 million. New York City has more than 8 million people, according to the latest U.S. Census Bureau figures.
But California's growth rate has been slowing since the start of the decade, when its population grew by nearly 2 percent. Last year, the state's population grew by almost 1.3 percent, senior demographer Linda Gage said.
She said stable birth and death rates, a slowdown in foreign immigration and a net loss of population to other parts of the country contributed to the drop-off. [...]
Los Angeles County remains the state's largest with 10.3 million people - slightly more than the next four most heavily populated counties combined. They are San Diego and Orange, each with nearly 3.1 million residents, and Riverside and San Bernardino counties, with 2 million each.

Meanwhile, the Sierra snowpack which supplies much of the state's water is far below normal: May snow reading just 29% of normal.

California snow surveyors found nothing to survey Tuesday during their last check of a dwindling Sierra snowpack.

If we don't get above-average rains next winter and even a moderate drought is declared, there will be mandatory water rationing because of California's immigration-fueled overpopulation. Californians will have immigration anarchy to blame for short showers and dead gardens.

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Illegal Immigration Hurts African Americans [5/1/07]
Prof Carol Swain of Vanderbilt University is the editor of a new book, Debating Immigration, which calls African American elected officials to task for fundamentally failing their black and other constituents. Debating Immigration cover

New research by a Vanderbilt professor of law and political science found that illegal immigration is hurting African Americans and the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) is not doing enough about it.
In a new book of essays called Debating Immigration, which Carol Swain edited and contributed to, Swain said that African Americans are losing more jobs to illegal immigrants than other racial or ethic groups, yet low income black workers don't have political input in the debate.
"African Americans have been left devoid of a strong black voice in Congress on a topic that affects them deeply, given their high unemployment rates and historic struggle to get quality housing, health care, education and other goods and services," said Swain.
Swain used a study conducted by the Pew Hispanic Center, which found high unemployment rates among African Americans and Hispanics was partially attributed to the large number of low-skilled immigrants. Swain added that lax or non-existent immigration rules help businesses get away with hiring illegal immigrants instead of legal workers.

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