Archive for December, 2009

Pam Meister

Our Broken Immigration System – Penalizing Those who Follow the Rules

by Pam Meister

It’s common knowledge that our immigration system is broken. What follows is an example of how broken it is.

A couple of years ago, I wrote about the case of 41-year-old Anatolie Vartosu. Born and raised in Moldova, Vartosu was required to serve for two years in the former Soviet army. He went on to graduate from Romania’s Sport University with a Master in Sport and went on to teach physical education, ballet and track.

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Anatolie Vartosu

A former Olympic marathon qualifier, Vartosu was invited to the US in 2003 to compete in a marathon in Clearwater, Florida and arrived on a six-month tourist visa. Later that same year he ended up in Stamford, Connecticut, where he received immigration sponsorship and a job working for Jack Rabbits Gym in nearby Greenwich. Fellow Romanian immigrant Nicolae Piperea and his business partner, John Schwartz, the owners of Jack Rabbits, were looking to build their gymnastics program to an elite level, making the addition of Vartosu to the staff a natural fit. He received a three-year H1B working visa and his wife, Maria (also from Romania) opened in 2007 what has become a very successful day care program with a business partner.

In March 2006, when he and his employers went to renew his visa, Vartosu was told that he had to wait until October, when he would have to file additional documentation to justify the renewal, which he did. At that point, the 60 days he was told he’d have to wait turned into six months. After placing a call to US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in April 2007, he was instructed to further file the I-29 (an internal status query) and told to wait another 60 days, which turned into yet another filing of the I-29 and a further 60 day wait.

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Jim Hoft

Fistgate X: Kevin Jennings’ Suggested Reading For Kids Included Sick Book That Romanticized Rape of a 13 Year-Old – Media Silent

by Jim Hoft

**FIXED**

(Big Warning on Content)
Yesterday, we reported that Barack Obama’s Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings and his GLSEN organization were promoting a book to children that included a pornographic image of men having sex while boy scouts looked on. The day before that we reported that Kevin Jennings’ organization GLSEN was promoting a children’s book that detailed first-graders having sex.

kevin_jennings-older

As founder and executive director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) Jennings approved of and promoted several filthy sex books for children. Scott Baker from Breitbart-TV.com and Co-Host of ‘The B-Cast‘ submitted a shocking report to Gateway Pundit blog back on December 4, 2009. The report detailed the reading list promoted to 7-12 grade students by Kevin Jennings’ GLSEN organization. This material has not been reported in detail at Big Government website. Remember as you read this that Kevin Jennings is today the nation’s Safe Schools Czar.

Here again is what Scott Baker had to say about this vile material being pushed on children.

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Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX)

Disputed Science Can Lead to Disastrous Decisions in Copenhagen

by Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX)

As President Obama jets off to Denmark for the UN’s climate conference, I hope he will take some time as he flies over the Atlantic Ocean to revisit the science that led him to this trip.

The EPA sure didn’t.

Last week, unelected officials at the EPA abruptly put an end to honest debate by unilaterally declaring carbon dioxide a “harmful substance” and putting themselves in position to begin regulating emissions from every business and farm in America.

Obama and Air Force One

In making this rash decision, they have relied heavily upon findings by climate-change scientists that have been subsequently discredited by the scientists’ own e-mails, which indicate data manipulation and the exile of fellow researchers who didn’t agree with the group’s accepted, foregone conclusions.

As governor of a state that will be unfairly and dramatically impacted by the EPA’s ill-informed decision – one that will cost each Texas family $1,136 annually in higher costs and eliminate as many as 400,000 Texas jobs – this is simply unacceptable.

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Christopher C. Horner

Copenhagen Flash: U.S. Commits Unprecedented Billions, Worse to Follow

by Christopher C. Horner

So Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has just made news by landing in Copenhagen and immediately announcing $100 billion through 2020 in additional new money to developing countries, in the name of “climate change”.

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Climate changes. Always has. Always will. And so long as a country remains poor, its climate and weather will be among the greatest challenges to its people. Just like it was to us until we industrialized and got wealthy. All of the billions in foreign development aid have ostensibly been to help these countries deal with climate change (though it is not due to the weather that they remain poor). We know how wealth transfers to kleptocracies works out. We should expect nothing different here. It’s just waste and an invitation to fraud on a far grander scale.

For perspective, in 2008, total United States Overseas Development Aid was $26 billion. So you see we’re talking about a spectacular increase in foreign development aid in the name of something the case for which is collapsing all around us.

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The New Ledger

Where Does Too Big to Fail Come From?

by The New Ledger

Muscling through a rough cold, Francis shares his thoughts on an interesting piece on the Too Big to Fail concept in the latest issue of National Affairs on today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, a daily podcast from The New Ledger on politics, policy and the marketplace with Francis Cianfrocca, brought to you by BigGovernment.com.

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National Affairs: Too Big Not To Fail

The catastrophe that struck America’s financial system in 2008 was not inevitable. Rather than a failure of markets, it was a failure by government to understand its proper role in markets — and the product of an unwise (and unnecessary) abandonment of a sensible system of rules and boundaries that had served American finance well for six decades.

Beginning in the 1980s, and continuing over the quarter-century that followed, Washington afforded the world of big finance a terrible ­luxury: freedom from the fear of failure. Managers and lenders at financial companies came to understand that the larger and more complex their firms got, the more immunity from market discipline they would enjoy — since they could depend on government guarantees when necessary to protect the broader economy from their mistakes. The government thus countenanced and subsidized an untenable financial system. And it inevitably got more of what it paid for: reckless risk building up to disaster.

The errors laid bare by the financial crisis clearly call for regulatory reform. But in designing that reform, we should avoid the temptation to seek heavy-handed new approaches — and should instead look to the long-term success of the system of rules whose decay brought about the crisis.

Kyle Olson

Health Reform Radicals Are Driving Congressional Democrats Off a Cliff

by Kyle Olson

The socialist wing of the Democratic Party must have thought the brass ring was within its grasp when Barack Obama was elected president, a larger Democratic majority was returned to the House and a filibuster-proof majority was secured in the Senate.

Lemmings p.50

But with the exception of massive new spending, little, if anything, has been delivered to satisfy the liberal base of the party.  Health care reform is a perfect example.  When the political stars began to align, leftists began moving swiftly to enact their agenda.  After all, a government takeover of health care has long been the ultimate goal for the socialist base of the party.

Despite polls that show solid majorities of Americans opposed to ObamaCare, Congressional Democrats trudge ahead.  Common sense would say they should pull the plug, in order to appease voters.

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Jim Hoft

12 National Orgs Co-Sign Letter to Congress; Demand Kevin Jennings Be Fired

by Jim Hoft

Wednesday, 12 conservative organizations sent a letter to the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions demanding that Obama’s Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings be Fired.

** You can contact the committee yourself here.

jennings

This letter was delivered by our sister organization American Principles in Action to the offices of Senators on the Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. This committee has oversight over the Department of Education which employs Kevin Jennings.

Here is the full text of the letter:

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Rep. Tom Price (R-GA)

Let’s Be Frank, Mr. Vice President: The Stimulus Failed

by Rep. Tom Price (R-GA)

Today, the State of Georgia welcomes Vice President Joe Biden for an update on the administration’s so-called stimulus bill. With national unemployment sitting today at 10%, and worse in Georgia, the White House’s credibility on stimulus success is dubious at best. Yet as proper manners would dictate, we owe the Vice President an opportunity to make his case.

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President Obama tapped Mr. Biden to oversee the stimulus program because, as he put it, “nobody messes with Joe.”  While that may be so, as the Vice President has been traveling around the nation touting the various spending priorities of the stimulus bill, their alleged benefits have yet to materialize into jobs.  So if the Vice President is visiting to have us believe expanding broadband is how jobs are created or that we can “weatherize” our way back to prosperity, it may be Joe who is messing with Georgia.

It’s actually quite telling that the Vice President is visiting us to discuss the stimulus package on the same day that President Obama is setting off for Copenhagen to promote a job-killing National Energy Tax as a means to combat global warming. Because what was evident in the stimulus package, and has been reinforced through subsequent actions, is that this administration places a higher premium on its social goals than on putting people back to work.

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Publius

Thursday Open Thread: Reptilicus Edition

by Publius

From the we-can’t-make-this-stuff-up files, we bring you the trailer for Reptilicus, a Danish-American horror movie from 1961. In short, an ancient, nearly invincible, monster is unearthed by oil drillers (!) and goes on a rampage through the streets of Copenhagen (!).  Today, people obsessed about oil-drilling are rampaging through the streets of Copenhagen! So…anytime anyone says global warming or climate change…reply, “reptilicus”…oh, and drink!

Dana Loesch

Scare Tactics: Obama Says USA Will ‘Go Bankrupt’ if Senate Bill Not Passed

by Dana Loesch

You mean if we don’t add a trillion dollars to the deficit then the country will … go … bankrupt?

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Is it Opposite Day?

President Obama told ABC News’ Charles Gibson in an interview that if Congress does not pass health care legislation that will bring down costs, the federal government “will go bankrupt.”

The president laid out a dire scenario of what will happen if his health care reform effort fails.

“If we don’t pass it, here’s the guarantee….your premiums will go up, your employers are going to load up more costs on you,” he said. “Potentially they’re going to drop your coverage, because they just can’t afford an increase of 25 percent, 30 percent in terms of the costs of providing health care to employees each and every year. “

The president said that the costs of Medicare and Medicaid are on an “unsustainable” trajectory and if there is no action taken to bring them down, “the federal government will go bankrupt.”

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Paul A. Rahe

Tiger and Barack

by Paul A. Rahe

Pictures are, they say, worth a thousand words – and sometimes this is really so.

Do you remember the photograph of Bill Clinton on the cover of Cigar Aficionado, brandishing a stogie?  If you do, my bet is that you are laughing now. At the time of the Monica Lewinsky scandal, that photograph got a lot of mileage.

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Well, on the cover of this month’s Golf Digest, there is another photograph well worthy of attention.

In it, thanks to the wonders accomplished by Photoshop, Tiger Woods appears dressed as a caddy, bending over Barack Obama as the latter squats and considers a putt. In the magazine itself, Mr. Woods provides the President with golfing advice.

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Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN)

US Deal In Copenhagen Wrong For Our Country

by Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN)

All across this nation, families and businesses are struggling to make ends meet. Millions of Americans have lost their jobs and many more worry that they will be next. But Americans are meeting these times with courage and by putting first things first, at least everywhere but the White House.

Obama

It is astonishing that in the midst of the worst recession in 26 years, this administration and Democrat leaders continue to advance job-killing proposals like the national energy tax and will carry that message to the global warming convention in Copenhagen.

Rather than making a priority of creating jobs, the president plans to attend negotiations at the United Nation’s convention on climate change in Denmark. This decision is wrong on several levels. The administration’s participation in the Copenhagen negotiations raises a number of concerns that the president should address before catching his flight.

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Christopher C. Horner

ClimateGate Just Got Much, Much Bigger

by Christopher C. Horner

Over at ICECAP.us Meteorologist Joe D’Aleo has posted an item on a “Russian Bombshell” highly relevant to the ClimateGate scandal. The Russian media first posted the story and now some Brits are loving it.

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The long and the short of it is best summarized by the Telegraph’s James Dellingpole: “What the Russians are suggesting here, in other words, is that the entire global temperature record used by the IPCC to inform world government policy is a crock.”

That is, we have yet further evidence that the data is being cooked to make the long-running claim of an increase in global temperatures, and now to diminish the apparent cooling of said temps. As the gang at EU referendum tout, “it is in Soviet Union that the CRU, NOAA, NASA show the greatest warming.”

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Dr. Elaina   George

The Senate Healthcare Bill: Throw It Up On A Wall And See If It Sticks

by Dr. Elaina George

In a recent article published in The Atlantic Jonathan Gruber, an economist from MIT was enthused over the Senate’s healthcare bill because of its kitchen sink approach to the problem of rising healthcare costs. “I can’t think of a thing to try that they didn’t try. They really make the best effort anyone has ever made. Everything is in here….I can’t think of anything I’d do that they are not doing in the bill.” This quote is a distillation of the problem I have with the whole healthcare reform effort. It seems like a case of throw it up on a wall and see if it sticks.

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From the beginning of the debate and the resultant bills in Congress there has been no thought put into the root cause of the high cost of healthcare. As usual the players who were allowed to sit at the table were the ones who had the most to lose if the status quo really changed. Special interest groups (i.e., unions, hospitals corporation, medical insurance industry, pharmaceutical industry, and the AMA) each flooded Washington with money and controlled both the argument, and the perceived solutions for the mess that has become our healthcare system. At no point were physicians on the front line who deliver patient care or patients who are victims of the health insurance maze given a voice in the process let alone a seat at the table.

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The New Ledger

Bernanke’s the Person of the Year, Dean Takes on Health Care, and You Have to Pay Your Mortgage

by The New Ledger

Ben Bernanke is Time’s person of the year, Howard Dean takes up arms against the Senate health care bill, and Megan McArdle says we all have a moral obligation to pay our mortgages, whether it makes financial sense or not. We’ll discuss all that and more on today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, a daily podcast from The New Ledger on politics, policy and the marketplace with Francis Cianfrocca, brought to you by BigGovernment.com.

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Related Links:

Heartland: Dean Opposes Health Care Bill
AmSpec: Dean Wants to Kill Bill
Bloomberg: Bernanke is Time’s Person of the Year
McArdle: New Breed of Deadbeats

Francis adds: I couldn’t agree more with McArdle, because (contrary to popular opinion) I believe deeply in traditional moral norms. But I also believe in pointing out the macro consequences of such behavior.

She’s pointing out macro consequences of a different kind with her story about Memphis. But that just made me think of Argentina and Mexico, the poster children for sovereign moral hazard. These countries (and others) have a history of stiffing global banks every few years. Do they end up like Memphis? Of course not. Bankers always come around offering more later.

The whole country won’t become like Memphis, not with Congress and the Administration pursuing a reflate-even-at-the-cost-of-moral-hazard policy, and with the Fed tacitly supporting that policy. If people who can afford to pay off mortgages on inflated property values continue to do so, then they will have shouldered the collapse of the housing bubble. McArdle implicitly believes this is a good and right outcome. I don’t disagree in the slightest, but it does mean that we’re facing years of economic underperformance.

Jim Hoft

Fistgate IX: Kevin Jennings’ Suggested Reading Included Porn Books for Kids With Images of Men Having Sex While Boy Scouts Watch; Media Silent

by Jim Hoft

(Big Warning On Content)
We all know how the state-run media feels about Barack Obama but still you’d there would be someone in the democrat-media complex who would be outraged over these Fistgate reports on Obama’s Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings.

fistgate

Or, maybe they think that handing out fisting kits (or dental dam kits) and pushing children’s books that show adult men having sex while boy scouts watch to junior high students is acceptable? Maybe that’s just how they roll? It is strange.

Yesterday we reported that Barack Obama’s Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings was promoting a children’s book that detailed first-graders having sex. But, it didn’t stop there. As founder and executive director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) Jennings approved of and promoted several filthy sex books for children. Scott Baker from Breitbart-TV.com and Co-Host of ‘The B-Cast‘ submitted a shocking report to Gateway Pundit blog back on December 4, 2009. The report detailed the reading list promoted to 7-12 grade students by Kevin Jennings’ GLSEN organization. This material has not been reported in detail at Big Government website.

Remember as you read this that Kevin Jennings is today the nation’s Safe Schools Czar.

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Warner Todd Huston

Science, Smoking, Healthcare, All Prove Gov’t Can’t be Trusted

by Warner Todd Huston

Just sit back and let big daddy government show you the way. The Democrat Party is assuring us that they know better because they have science, educated people, doctors and all that “expertise” in their control. Further more they “care” about us all and they want us to know that they’d never do anything to lead us astray.

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If you feel like the con is about to begin, you are right.

Of course, we don’t need mere suspicion to divine that the Democrats are liars. We can look at what government and Democrats have already done in several related areas — science, smoking and healthcare — to prove that this newest attempt to “help” us is based on lies, smoke and mirrors.

Let us begin with science. In two areas we see the failure that Democrats perpetuate even with science as their justification: global warming and healthcare.

We are all by now familiar with the lies that global warming is based upon, as revealed by the scheming to hide failure of the science that went on behind the scenes with the email correspondence of the “scientists” at the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit (CRU). The science went from settled “consensus” to “ClimateGate” in only a matter of weeks. Yet governments all across the globe have based their policies on these lies. Total failure.

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Sergio Gor

Wednesday Funnies: Health Care Edition

by Sergio Gor

Cartoon - Needle in a Haystack (990)

Publius

ACORN, the Working Families Party and Political Corruption: Part 2, Who’s Doing All the Lobbying?

by Publius

[Ed: This excerpt is the second in a series of articles originally reported at City Hall. Go here for Part I in the series. Lead reporter on City Hall investigation was Edward-Isasc Dovere.]

The Working Families Organization, a tax-exempt 501(c)4, was legally created with a certificate of incorporation filed with the New York Department of State on July 12, 2006. Despite the similarities in the names, this paperwork established the Working Families Organization as a legally separate entity.

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That certificate lists four initial directors, starting with now-White House political director Patrick Gaspard, who was then a board member of the Working Families Party. The other three were ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis, Robert Master of the Communications Workers of America and Sam Williams of the United Auto Workers. These three also were and remain the three co-chairs of the Working Families Party.

Kevin Finnegan, who is now the political director for the 1199 Service Employees International Union, but who was then an attorney at Levy Ratner PC, signed the document as the incorporator. Finnegan is also the notary on the official Party rules filed with the Board of Elections and the lawyer who set up Data and Field Services.

The incorporation forms and other documents, like the Organization’s paperwork filed with the IRS, must be made public as a condition of its tax-exempt status. However, the process takes years, meaning that the most recent forms that are completed and available are from 2007.

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Publius

Wednesday Open Thread: Tea Party Edition

by Publius

Today, in 1773, members of the Sons of Liberty boarded British ships in Boston and dumped their cargo of tea into the harbor.

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