From Norm Matloff’s H-1B/L-1/offshoring e-newsletter.

Norm Matloff writes:

The Woodrow Wilson Center held a debate on immigration earlier this summer, the first portion of which you can view here. I recommend it to you.

The participants were Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies, a think tank that favors lower yearly levels of immigration, and Tamar Jacoby, a prominent writer in favor of expanded immigration policies.

Not surprisingly, the debate focused on low-skilled immigrants. I say “not surprisingly,” because the public image of immigrations has in the last few years been moved in that direction, as the result of “image influencing” by those with vested interests in low-skilled immigration, i.e. the employers of low-skilled immigrants and the Latino political activists. As a result, the connotation of the word “immigrant” has incredibly changed from its dictionary definition of “someone who moves to this country” to “a low-skilled person who moves here from Mexico.”

Yet Jacoby did bring up high-skilled immigration, claiming that “Silicon Valley would not exist without immigration.” Her “proof” of that claim consisted of citing the usual statistics on the percentage of foreign-born among engineers and entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley.

(more…)

Steve Sailer pointed out that many of the agents selling subprime mortgages on overpriced houses to the vulnerable immigrant community were Hispanic themselves–see Spanish Language Radio Stations Hit Hard By Drying Up Of Zero Down Mortgages.

Cesar Dias and Jorge Espino used to sell real estate in Stockton, California, the forclosure capital of the nation, now they run a business called Repo Home Tours, which runs bus tours around Stockton, for buyers looking to snap homes up cheap.

And in the Housing Bubble Hall of Shame®, there’s a post about a guy named Chris Nuñez, who would be the poster boy for the “Hispanic Real Estate Agent” Bubble Guy..

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Chris Nunez

Chris Nunez, CPS Real Estate
Chris is a super realtor in Santa Rosa, CA. He is renowned for pushing interest-only loans on people that CANNOT afford them. Once these loans reset, he’s going to have some disappointed customers, such the Carnes family that took out a $700K, interest only loan to purchase a home they “had to have”–household income: $100K. And as he tells his clients, “I eat beans like you in the morning.” Watch the video and enjoy!
Video: Past Due & Pay Day (video at YouTube)
Transcript: Past Due & Pay Day

“I eat beans like you in the morning” is a specific ethnic appeal to Hispanic clients, the kind of thing that HUD targets for consent decrees when it happens in real estate ads. But the “diversity recession” may force him and his cliens to eat beans three times a day.

My favorite part of David Wallechinsky’s quadrennially indispensable The Complete Book of the Olympics are the discontinued sports and events, such as Motor Boating (1908 London games), Tug of War (1900-1920), Croquet (1900 Paris) and Jeu de Paume (or real tennis, which was won in Paris in 1900 by robber barron Jay Gould’s son Jay Jr.).

(more…)

The unmasking of Bruce E. Ivins as a mad scientist who, with a high degree of likelihood, carried out the 2001 anthrax attacks, most likely singlehandedly, has not proven popular. People want to hear that Bush did it, Saddam Hussein did it, the cigarette-smoking man did it, whatever. Personally, I think the idea that a mad scientist at the government’s bioweapons lab did it is pretty interesting, but apparently that’s not good enough. Everybody wants a conspiracy that goes all the way to the Top! (Which Top is a matter of dispute, but that’s not the point; the point is that a mere mad scientist just isn’t good enough.)

One thing to keep in mind is that everybody failed in the case of Ivins. The FBI overlooked him for years; his bosses let him continue to work on deadly toxins despite homicidal ideation about “mixing poisons” to murder some poor soccer-playing girl in 2000; the war-bloggers never gave him a moment’s thought; the Bushitler crowd never did either; the conspiracy theorist hobbyists did a terrible job too.

The guy who did the best job, amateur analyst Edward G. Lake, still didn’t come close to Ivins. In fact, he admitted last week,

“Bruce Ivins is a name I don’t recall ever hearing before (but I’m told his name appears in several articles on this site).”

That’s fascinating, because Lake was generally considered the best informed amateur analyst in the country.

Last week, Lake was highly skeptical that Ivins did it at first, but said after yesterday’s FBI news conference:

“The FBI certainly has a better case against Ivins than I’ve seen against anyone else.”

Here’s Lake’s list of his conclusions from several years ago, with his brand new updatings as of 86/08:

(more…)

Hal Dardick is no rookie in Chicago print journalism circles, which makes even more inexcusable his lopsided coverage of a hearing called by a “visibly moved” Ald. Danny Solis (25th) to address allegations that Chicago cops were (gasp!) violating  city and county sanctuary ordinances by turning illegals over to the feds. ["Hispanics say city traffic violators are being turned over to immigration agents," Chicago Tribune, August 5, 2008]

This hearing, like all such hearings, was held to parade the plight of illegals before a public that must be going through its Kleenex supply faster than politicians spend tax dollars.  To demonstrate the city’s sense of fair play, Solis also invited testimony from six anti-illegal immigration activists.  Four of these individuals, including Rosanna Pulido, who represented “You Don’t Speak for Me,“ spoke on behalf of this nation’s sovereignty and the rule of law. (Pulido also reports that during these proceedings, a Chicago Police district commander testified that the department will be working with the Mexican Consulate to produce a video explaining the “rights” of illegals living in Chicago.  More, hopefully, on this later.)

But don’t look for their comments in Dardick’s (e-mail) story or, for that matter, in the Sun-Times’ piece written by Fran Spielman, that paper’s long-time City Hall reporter, “Alderman: Who is tipping ICE on immigrant motorist arrests?” Chicago Sun-Times, Aug. 6.
Here is how Dardick defends his one-sided coverage of Solis’ boo-hoo dog and pony show:

Given the very short space I had to tell the story, I thought it best to focus on the issue raised by the aldermen and the response of city, county and federal officials. All of that was new information that had never before been written about. The belief by many activists that immigration laws should be enforced was not new and has been written about thousands of times. Unfortunately, we are forced to make those kind of judgments in this business.
And, if you read how the sanctuary-city laws are crafted, at least in Chicago and Cook County, they are worded in such a way as not to be in violation of federal law. I suppose they are walking a fine line and someone could sue them over that.

All that said, I do appreciate your input.

As disappointing as Dardick’s response is, I’ll give him credit for having enough class to respond to my concerns.

Which is more than I can say for Ms. Spielman (e-mail), who has yet to respond to her copy of my e-mail to Dardick.  Perhaps she views me as a washed-up Chicago journalist now sitting on his front porch in rural southwestern Wisconsin, wearing bib overalls, cleaning off the bottoms of his shoes, and wiping Red Man Chewing Tobacco juice from his chin.  That’s OK by me.  I’ll just add her name to my growing list of “reporters” who want the rest of us to believe that they walk on water and answer to no one except their advertisers and, on occasion, the Mexican government and their agents who hold elected office in this country.

Here’s some Census news focusing on the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area presented by the San Jose Mercury News, a major booster of diversity as the highest good in modern secular society. The biggest change is fewer traditional Americans (white people and black people) all the time. The chart showing comparative change over several years doesn’t include African-Americans at all, not even as “other.”

Over the course of this decade, the South Bay had one of the biggest population drops among whites in California, according to census data released today. That trend, combined with a continued surge in Asian population, has given Santa Clara County an uncommon racial mix:

Whites, Asians and Hispanics are more evenly balanced here than anywhere else in America.

In new data being released today, the Census Bureau said there are now 302 counties - nearly one in 10 - that are “majority minority,” where whites are less than half the population.

An analysis of the new federal data by the Mercury News shows that in only 39 of those counties, including Santa Clara, are racial and ethnic groups so closely balanced that no single group makes up 40 percent or more of the total population. Santa Clara was the only U.S. county in 2007 where whites, Asians and Hispanics each made up at least one-quarter of the total population. [...]

A mix like the Bay Area’s is rare. Alameda County could argue that its racial mix is even more balanced than Santa Clara’s, because it has a more significant black population, although Santa Clara has larger Asian and Hispanic populations. San Francisco has the highest percentage of Asians outside of Hawaii, at 33 percent of its population. [...]

“This is a period where California has been a net exporter of college-educated workers to the rest of the country, and a big importer of college-educated workers from the rest of the world,” said Deborah Reed, an economist for the Public Policy Institute of California. “The downturn in the economy probably kick-started the trend in folks leaving.”
[Data shows nearly even racial mix in Silicon Valley, San Jose Mercury News, August 7, 2008]

As required, there are plenty of testimonials to the glories of non-American diversity, with only the odd citizen grouch allowed to observe a growing failure of assimilation.

In Cupertino, where the Cupertino Union School District has gone from about 42 percent Asian to about 70 percent Asian over the past decade, one longtime white resident, who spoke on condition that his name not be used, said he resents seeing so many business signs in languages he can’t read.

That grumpy American should think of all the wonderful ethnic restaurants that have been added to replace a lost sense of community.