I was in Washington DC from October 3-6 to attend several days of intense immigration and overpopulation seminars. I attended the FAIR Board of Advisors Conference, Social Contract’s Writer’s Workshop, and almost two days of public forums sponsored by the Population Institute.

Speakers included some of the world’s foremost experts on immigration and population stabilization. Some of my favorite speeches were made by Congressman Brian Bilbray, Kris Kobach, Sheriff Chuck Jenkins, Otis Graham, Don Barnett, Peter Brimelow, Diana Hull, Ann Corcoran, Father Patrick Bascio, Paul Nachman, Bob Howard, Brenda Walker, Howard Wooldridge, Terry Anderson, William Catton, Richard Heinberg, and William Ryerson. There were many other good speakers whose names I don’t recall.

One of the most enjoyable things I did was to attend Terry Anderson’s radio show, which was broadcast live from the FAIR office at midnight on Sunday evening in Washington DC. The office was kind of spooky because we were the only ones there at that late hour of the weekend. Also there for the show were Brenda Walker, Paul Nachman, and D.A. King. Terry’s special guest for the show just happened to be D.A King.

DA and TA together on one show was like roids on radio. They really got into it and were entertaining as well as informational. Terry announced all of our names about 15 minutes into the show.

You can listen to the October 4 show by going directly to the mp3 or get to it by finding the past show archives at the Terry Anderson home page:

If you get a warning in your browser when you click the Terry Anderson links ignore it because it’s a false cyber attack that is meant to hurt TA’s web traffic. His webmaster is working on the problem but meanwhile, depending on your browser, there should be a way to ignore the warning.

Photo courtesy of Brenda Walker

Last week I sent out a newsletter warning that a deal is being worked out on Capitol Hill to pass a large H-1B increase. Since then, things have been silent in the media but that doesn’t change the fact that there is still a substantial effort to pass through an increase. Unfortunately there is only circumstantial evidence that a deal is being negotiated but I thought I would share with you what I know so far.

Bill Gates is going back to Washington DC next week to lobby for an increase. If there wasn’t a deal before, there will be when Gates throws his money around. His timing can’t be coincidence–right after the big primary and just about when Congress critters go groveling for campaign money for the next election.

I have communicated with Roy Beck at NumbersUSA and he assured me that the threat of an H-1B increase is very, very real.

• Compete America sent a letter to Congress urging them to “consider a package of urgent reforms”. Compete America is leaving it to the public to guess what’s in the care package but one thing for sure is that it will have a demand for an increase in the H-1B cap.
• On February 29, U.S. Representative Joe Baca (D-CA) sent legislation to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute. Like Compete America, he said he isn’t going to allow us to see what’s proposed but he gave a few cutesy riddles like for instance: “It will involve visas, but it won’t be a path towards amnesty, it will not be amnesty.” Baca had a rather exclusive attitude about sharing the documents — he said if you aren’t in the Hispanic Caucus you can’t see them!
• Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) and other House Democratic leaders want to poison the enforcement only SAVE ACT by attaching an amnesty amendment to it. There are other things besides amnesty but she won’t say what. Do you see a pattern of secrecy developing here?
• There will soon be a mad scramble to secure H-1B visas. They will run out of visas very quickly, and employers are screaming bloody murder about it. They want more visas and they are letting that be known very forcefully.

See stories here:From industry group Compete America - The Alliance for a Competitive Workforce

Letter To Congress

In summary, we are very concerned about the potential for Congress to consider an enforcement-only immigration bill and instead urge the House to consider a package of urgent reforms that will help the U.S. remain the world leader in innovation and serve our economic, national security and other core national interests. Sincerely,
Robert Hoffman
Co-Chair, Compete America
[More]

New Immigration Reform Proposal Being Prepared

Would make illegal immigrants legal residents, supporters say it is ‘not amnesty’

By Jim Forsyth Friday, February 29, 2008

The Congressional Hispanic Caucus says it is prepared to introduce a new immigration reform bill later this year which will confront Congress with the tricky issue of legal residency for 12 million undocumented workers in the middle of an election season, 1200 WOAI news reports.

U.S. Representative Joe Baca (D-California), the First Vice President of the CHC, revealed the measure today as he attended a meeting of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute in San Antonio.

‘We will be coming out specifically with the legislature later on,” Baca said. “It will not be comprehensive in nature, but it would include the 12 t0 14 million people who are here in the United States, it will address those individuals working in agriculture, and it will address the DREAM Act,” Baca said.[More]

Pro-illegal immigration Dems undermining SAVE Act, says bill sponsor Jim Brown

OneNewsNow - 2/29/2008 9:00:00 AM

House Democratic leaders are working to derail a bipartisan bill that would beef up border security, crack down on illegal aliens and employers who hire them, and reject amnesty.

Representatives Brian Bilbray (R-California) and Heath Shuler (D-North Carolina) are seeking an up-or-down vote on their bipartisan Secure America through Verification and Enforcement (SAVE) Act, which has 47 Democrat and 89 Republican co-sponsors. They need the need the signatures of 218 House members on a discharge petition for the vote to occur. The Washington Times reports that Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) and other House Democratic leaders want to poison the bill by attaching an amnesty amendment to it.

Bilbray points out the amendment proposed by Representative Joe Baca (D-California) would give illegal aliens a visa for five years so that during that time period Congress could work on passing legislation that would grant citizenship, voting rights, and welfare benefits to the illegal alien population.

“We’re talking about 20 million people who’ve broken the law being rewarded for their illegal activity,” he says, “but more importantly, Washington officially announcing to the world that we will reward those who come to our country illegally.”[More]

How evil is Washington?

Evil enough to destroy the border fence in the dark of night right before Christmas, when people are busy shopping and not watching Congress carefully. Legislators know full welll that Americans want their border enforced, as required by the Constitution (Article 4, Section 4).

According to Rep Brian Bilbray (interviewed on the John and Ken radio show on Tuesday 12/18), the omnibus spending bill is even worse than how it’s been described in many reports.

It’s bad enough that the legislation reduces the fence from a substantial double structure with a road in the middle to an easily scalable single wall. But in addition, the Congressional leadership cut out the provision that required federal contractors to use the e-verify system to make sure workers were legal; Congress doesn’t even want to prevent hiring illegals with federal funds. (Listen here to what Rep Bilbray has to say.)

And the malevolence doesn’t stop there. Any fencing is now discretionary and subject to the desires of local Indian tribes, community groups and property owners. Since when did imaginary property rights trump the ability of the government to enforce the nation’s borders and sovereignty?

On Wednesday, John and Ken featured an “absolutely infuriated” Rep Ed Royce, who said, “The fence is not going to be built.” He was further incensed that at the same time as the fence was gutted, Bush still plans to send Mexico a $1.4 billion aid package to help Mexico’s police against drug cartels.

“The American public should be infuriated about this,” he said. “We had one thing that we knew worked well because we had listened to the Border Patrol down there… Instead we’re going to spend $1.4 billion in taxpayer assistance, giving that money and technology across the border and I can tell how this will work. I was down there on the border, on the fence when we saw [Mexican] customs agents on the other side … helping the cartels tunnel underneath the US border.”

For $1.2 billion we could have built the border fence and kept many of the drug smugglers out of this country altogether. But no, not with a Mexiphilic Congress as well as a Mexichurian President.

Royce continued, “And this isn’t all of it. It provides $10 million to pay lawyers to defend illegal immigrants that are in this country.”

Our tax dollars at work!

(There’s more — listen to the whole interview here from the John and Ken podcast page.)

No doubt el Presidente Calderon is happy with his big Christmas present from Washington. The American people, however, will not be pleased when they find out how thoroughly we have been shafted by our elected representatives, as US sovereignty is dismantled by those who swore to protect and defend it.

I have looked at the electoral politics of immigration for some time now. There is ambiguous evidence that opposing Amnesty is winning proposition for Republicans (at least in recent years). However, the reverse is decisive. Supporting Amnesty is a strong losing proposition for Republicans. It also appears that opposing Amnesty/supporting immigration control is a winning stand for Democrats.

In the 2006 elections, Republicans with F grades on immigration suffered far more severe losses (25% were defeated) than those with A grades (10% were defeated). Only 6.7% of the Immigration Reform Caucus was defeated. Notably, Lincoln Chafee was crushed even though he was liberal on everything including Amnesty. Dewine in Ohio suffered a similar fate for similar reasons.

Several immigration reformers including John Hostettler, Randy Graf, and J.D. Hayworth, were defeated. However, their Democratic opponents at least claimed to be tougher on immigration than they were (we will see). Indeed, many successful Democrats ran far to the right of their Republican opponents on immigration.

Two of the defeated Republicans (Graf, Hayworth) were in Arizona. Arizona had four immigration related initiatives on the ballot in 2006. All passed by huge margins. Clearly, immigration control was / is a very popular theme in Arizona . See here [PDF] and here for Democratic Underground discussion.

There overall model appears to be, that opposing Amnesty and supporting immigration enforcement is a big plus for Democrats. This position attracts blue collar workers, Republicans concerned about immigration, law and order types, etc. It probably alienates some ethnic activists. However, they aren’t going to vote Republican anyway (Rove needs to consider rehab).

Conversely, supporting Amnesty/Open Borders is a strong loser for Republicans. Of course, Open Borders appeals to ethnic activists and corporate types. However, they are tied to the Democratic and Republican parties and won’t switch over this issue. Conversely, Republican support for Open Borders is a strong “go to H….” message for blue collar workers, independents, middle-class voters concerned about schools, congestion, community values, etc.

This has been born out recently, by the dramatic falls in the popularity of McCain (falling from 59% to 48% approval), Bush (15% approval on immigration), and Mel Martinez (falling from 48% to 37% approval) as the Amnesty debate has proceeded. This is one issue that really “splits the blanket” for Republican voters.

As stated above, there are only limited recent examples of Republicans winning on an immigration control platform. Bilbray in California is a good example. Why? Of course, the Republican Party (starting with Bush) has sent a dubious message on the topic and Democrats have been able to easily outflank Republicans.

Back in 1994, this clearly wasn’t the case. Pete Wilson scored a stunning come from (way) behind victory by attacking Open Borders. A key point is that immigration control was a “public” issue back then in California. It may be a “public” issue nationally now.

When people talk about the benefit of illegals to the economy, they’re talking about the benefit to employers like the Western Growers Association, or an immigration enthusiast named Helen Krieble, who owns a horse farm, and doesn’t want to pay American wages to her stableboys. But Americans who aren’t employers of cheap labor are worse off.

One group that’ s worse off is taxpayers. We’ve been saying this for years,(see, for example - How Much Is That Strawberry In The Window?, by Linda Thom) and now the Heritage Foundation is agreeing with us.

Low-skilled aliens exact a burden

By S.A. Miller
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
April 5, 2007

Immigration reforms that increase the number of low-skilled workers entering the United States threaten to impose a high cost on taxpayers, says a study being released today.
The Heritage Foundation report calculates that for every $1 unskilled workers pay in taxes they receive about $3 in government benefits, including Medicaid, food stamps, public housing and other welfare programs.

It should serve as a warning to President Bush and lawmakers proposing to give illegal aliens a so-called path to citizenship or what critics call amnesty, said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, which handles immigration bills.

You can (a) read the whole thing, including quotes from Brian Bilbray, and (b) check out the underlying study, which is neither named nor linked to in the Washington Times story.

The Fiscal Cost of Low-Skill Households to the U.S. Taxpayer April 4, 2007 by Robert E. Rector, Christine Kim and Shanea Watkins, Ph.D. Special Report #12

I have no idea why journalists do that–write a carefully reported story about a study, call two US Congressmen for quotes, and then not mention the name of the study, but you’ll never see that on VDARE.com.

Powerline has nominations for Worst Newspaper In America, and you can vote. The New York Times is not on the list–it’s the defending champion.The winner is goes up against the New York Times in the finals.

Here are a couple of examples of immigration related bias, one from the Palm Beach Post, a multimedia presentation called “Train Jumping: A Desperate Journey“[Will play sound, if you click on it.] that suggests that either they don’t know Sonia Nazario did exactly the same thing a while back, or they do know, and are copying her in hopes of getting a Pulitzer, like she did.

The other is from the San Francisco Chronicle, which covered Brian Bilbray’s victory by saying thing like “”Disapproval of Bush helps Dems” “ and “”Disapproval of Bush helps Dems” “ then sliding in at the end with “Still, GOP wins.” If you had just been scanning the headlines, you wouldn’t have known that Bilbray won.

But really, no newspapers are good on immigration, either they don’t know, or they don’t want to know. Here at VDARE.com we continue, as we have for seven years now, fighting both misinformation in the MainStream Media, and we’re having a fundraising drive as we do from time to time. Imagine a world in which your only sources of information were your local paper, and the New York Times and give generously.

This (not true, satirical) story was one of the top stories on Google News’s immigration results the other day:

Bush Proposes Making Illegal Immigrants ‘Guest Voters’
Would Be One-Day Citizens on November 7
Thursday, October 26, 2006, The Borowitz Report .com

In his boldest stroke to date to break the logjam over illegal immigration, President George W. Bush today proposed a “guest voter” program for illegal immigrants that would make them eligible to vote in the midterm elections on November 7.

Speaking at a press conference at the White House this morning, Mr. Bush said that his “guest voter” proposal would allow illegal immigrants to attain full citizenship status for one day only.

“Illegal immigrants are important to this country, because they do many of the things that other Americans are unwilling to do,” the president said. “Like voting.”

According to the president’s plan, undocumented immigrants would be bused to special “naturalization/voting booths” on November 7 where they could become citizens for the day simply by pulling a lever.

“Then, when their work is done, we’ll make sure they’re back on the other side of the border by November 8,” Mr. Bush said. “Everyone wins.”

But Mr. Bush’s guest voter program received mix reviews from congressional Democrats, many of whom believe that glitches in the so-called naturalization/voting booths could lead to invalid election results.

In particular, critics have complained that in an early prototype of the booth, the translation of the phrase “I want to be a U.S. citizen” appeared as “Vote for all Republican candidates with this lever.”

.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, one the main problems House Republicans have with Bush’s legalization proposals is that citizenship is forever, and they don’t think Hispanics will be pulling the Republican lever. When you consider that Robert Dornan and Brian Bilbray were both defeated by illegal Hispanic votes, you can imagine how Republican Congressman feel about the sudden appearance of new bloc of Democratic citizens in their districts.

America: taking it to the limit?, published 8/6/06 in the San Diego Union Tribune, details environmental organizations’ refusal to grapple with their elephant in the living room, namely the US population explosion caused almost entirely by immigration. Now, as the nation approaches 300 million, the enviro-elites’ denial is becoming hard to ignore.

The environmental establishment has mostly abandoned talking about the nation’s growing populace, particularly as it relates to immigration. The topic is dogged by internal squabbles, divisive politics and a desire to avoid ethnic discrimination.

One result is that ecological factors are rarely mentioned in the current effort to establish a new immigration policy. The debate mostly centers on economics and national security.

“People have been avoiding it like the plague,” said U.S. Rep. Brian Bilbray, R-Carlsbad, a hawk on illegal-immigration issues.

“[Environmentalists]will sidestep major challenges to what their stated goal is because it may end up stepping on political friends’ toes,” he said. “They have credibility problems when they are willing to look the other way.” [...]

“Some people … want the Sierra Club to have a position that is more U.S.-centric,” said Stephen Mills, the club’s international program director in Washington, D.C. “We feel that the entire planet is worth protecting, not the U.S. over anywhere else.”

How many average Sierra Club members would continue to send their annual dues if they knew the management didn’t believe the American environment was worth saving? And despite the obvious global interconnectedness of natural systems, we citizens have far more to say about what is done in our own country than across the planet.

The Sierra Club in particular is corrupt to the core, having accepted a “donation” of $100 million on the condition that immoderate immigration not be mentioned as detrimental to environmental preservation.

The article included a preview of a report to be published in September, with some disturbing news about America’s environmental health.

About 40 percent of the nation’s rivers and 46 percent of its lakes are too polluted for fishing and swimming. Wetlands, the biological filters for water pollution, are shrinking by 100,000 acres a year, mainly because of development.

Roughly 6,700 species in the country are at risk of extinction, most often because of habitat loss.

Half of the continental United States no longer supports native vegetation, largely because people have altered the terrain significantly.

See the theme running through? Too many people crowding up the place, paving over every living thing in sight. And Bush’s Washington is planning on importing at least 100 million more in the next 20 to 35 years.

But don’t expect the compromised faux-greens to criticize American overpopulation — as long as it’s “diverse.”

Almost two years ago to the day, VDARE.COM predicted that Utah’s 3rd Congressional District Republican incumbent Chris Cannon’s primary victory over under-funded and little known challenger Matt Throckmorton was a “costly victory.”

That in 2004 Cannon, a four-term veteran, was forced into a primary run-off spoke volumes about his dwindling popularity.

The main reason that Cannon was unpopular then and is unpopular now even in his heavily Republican district is his advocacy, reiterated multiple times, of unlimited illegal immigration.

Based on Cannon’s record, VDARE.COM proclaimed that he would remain “a tempting target” in all his future elections.

And we were right.

Now Cannon is again fighting for his life in yet another primary. His opponent this time is John Jacob. And once more immigration plays the central role in Cannon’s campaign.

Jacob, a local businessman, is taking it to Cannon on the incumbent’s dismal immigration record.

Cannon supports amnesty. And he is using all the familiar tricks to paint Jacob as an extremist on immigration, saying in a recent debate:

“That disagreement is whether the Republican Party is going to be some kind of new xenophobic, anti-foreigner party or whether we’re going be the party of a country that we’re thrilled has grown.”

Cannon versus Jacobs has drawn national attention because of the dueling House-Senate approaches to immigration reform. If Cannon loses, it will be because of his long-standing open-borders commitment.

Coupled with Republican Brian Bilbray’s special election in California’s 50th District, propelled by his anti-illegal immigration stance, a Cannon defeat would spell more bad news for those who support S. 2611, the Bush/McCain/Kennedy/Specter Amnesty-Guest Worker Immigration Acceleration proposal pushed by the White House.

President Bush and First Lady Laura Bush, leaving no stone unturned, have recorded messages played throughout the Third District encouraging Republicans to get out to vote for Cannon.

On the other hand,the Team America Political Action Committee, endorsing Jacob, has spent $50,000 in radio ads that say:

“A vote for John Jacob is a vote for cleaning up the immigration mess Chris Cannon helped make.”

The race may go down to the wire. Two separate Utah polls show Cannon ahead but in one, Jacobs is within striking distance.

Whatever the outcome, here is what we need to focus on: an incumbent, Cannon, because of his immigration advocacy was forced for the second straight election into a primary run-off.

Cannon has been forced to dip significantly into his own funds to defend his outrageous statements and behavior on illegal immigration.

Like others of his ilk, Cannon is on the defensive. Whether he wins or loses, every other U.S. Congressional candidate–Republican and Democrat alike–knows what got Cannon into so much trouble.

And since they will all remember in November, we can expect to make gains in our fight for sane immigration policies.

The MSM appears (wisely, given its pro-Kennedy-Bush Amnesty/Immigration Acceleration Bill preferences) to have averted its eyes from the spectacle of GOP Chairman’s sycophantic bootlicking at the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) conference in Dallas.

RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman Addresses NALEO Annual Conference –GOP.com June 22 2006.

Maybe it is just a spasm of good taste. Mehlman, fresh from claiming credit for Rep. Bilbray’s 50th District anti Immigration Bill victory, is clearly cravenly unscrupulous, even by Washington standards.

But more likely it is because any normal Republican reading it will be outraged to the point of departing the Party. Mehlman displays nothing but hostility and disdain for the interests and preferences of the historic core constituency of the GOP

And as Republican Party Chairman …I want to make it very clear to my Republican friends, both here in Texas and across the nation – that… a Republican Party that does not reach out to Hispanics does not deserve to win. (VDARE.com emphasis).

One might argue (fallaciously) that the GOP cannot win without courting the Hispanic vote, but why doesn’t it deserve to win, if it can? What does Ken Mehlman dislike about the American Government being elected by the historic American nation?

More Mehlman:

I am proud that this is the most diverse administration in history…since I became chairman of this party, I have made it my highest priority to reach out, to say to those who might never have really looked at the Republican Party…

Political appointments are obviously a zero sum game: more Hispanics means fewer whites. If reaching out to non Republicans is the highest priority, that means Republicans are to be relatively neglected.

Even an elementary concern like learning English is considered only as a convenience to the immigrants, not as a moral obligation of an aspiring new citizen. The whole approach is that of a salesman for a new cheap subdivision, rather than that of a leader of one of the nation’s major political groupings.

Apparently in Mehlman’s mind, the old America deserves obliteration because it was sinful:

In an opinion survey in May 1938, fully 68 percent of the public opposed letting refugees from Germany and Austria enter the United States…. In 1905, Republican Senator Henry Cabot Lodge called for “more restrictive legislation” partially because of “the effect upon the quality of our citizenship caused by the rapid introduction of this vast and practically unrestricted immigration.”
Ladies and gentleman, that was wrong then … and it is wrong now.

[So much for his pretence of favoring immigration controls.] Why is being concerned about the survival of your heritage so wrong? Mehlman’s prejudices probably have more to do with his policies than any concern for the GOP

So where does the overwhelming majority white and Christian-stock GOP (and American) community fit into this plan? As a correspondent remarked of Southerners at the time of the Trent Lott lynching, their job appears to be to vote and shut up. Or as Sam Francis put it: Bushman to Christians: Drop Dead (After Voting Of Course)!

When Southern whites figured out the Democratic Party had betrayed them, they decisively left it. The same thing could happen to the Repubicans, right across the country.