Another ad full of lies from the McCain campaign. Haven’t we been lied to enough in the last 8 years? Answer: YES. We don’t need 4 more years of lies.

Throw the flag against: The McCain-Palin campaign.

Call: Illegal shift.

What happened: The campaign Friday launched a 30-second Spanish-language television ad charging that Democrat Barack Obama and his Senate colleagues torpedoed meaningful changes in immigration laws.

“The press reports that their efforts were ‘poison pills’ that made immigration reform fail,” the ad charges. “The result: No guest worker program. No path to citizenship. No secure borders. No reform. Is that being on our side? Obama and his congressional allies ready to block immigration reform, but not ready to lead.”

What that’s wrong: Media accounts cited two votes as effectively killing immigration reform last year - and Obama was on the same side as McCain in both.

On June 7, supporters failed by 15 votes to cut off a filibuster. McCain and Obama voted to limit debate. The Politico headline the next day: “Senate immigration compromise collapses.”

On June 28, another effort to limit debate failed by 14 votes; CNN called it a “crushing defeat.” Obama and McCain again voted to cut off debate, but it was largely Republican senators who led the filibuster.

In its review of the 2007 Congress, Congressional Quarterly cited both votes as crucial to killing the immigration measure.

Penalty: Set the McCain-Palin campaign’s credibility back five yards.

ON THE WEB

To read the CNN account on the June 28 vote:

http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/06/28/immigration.congress/index.html

Source: SanLuisObispo.com

Like we’ll EVER know how many have died. The words Bush and disclose in the same sentence does not compute.

The top U.S. immigration enforcement official told a congressional subcommittee yesterday that the Bush administration will disclose more information about foreigners who die in the sprawling network of federal detention centers around the country.

Julie Myers, assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau, said her agency will report such deaths to a branch of the Justice Department that collects similar information about inmates in state prisons and local jails.

The Justice Department publishes statistics on the fatalities, not the identities of the victims, but Myers said the change represents “more transparency” about detainee deaths. Since last year, congressional Democrats have pleaded with ICE to reveal the names and circumstances of foreigners who have died in U.S. custody.

More at the Washington Post

Rare, probably, because so many of them are returned from Iraq and Afghanistan in boxes.

From WJLA:

In a rare all-military naturalization ceremony, the Pentagon will give 30 service members citizenship of the United States.

The new citizens represent the 17 countries of: Belize, Bolivia, Canada Colombia, Cuba, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guyana, Jamaica, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Panama, Philippines, Peru, and the United Kingdom.

The service members are from the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines, and include members of the National Guard and Reserve.

SLAP!

Judge blocks U.S. illegal worker crackdown

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A U.S. federal court judge on Wednesday blocked a key part of the Bush administration’s stepped-up efforts to crack down on illegal immigrant workers and those who employ them.

Judge Charles Breyer of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California granted a preliminary injunction against a program that would force employers to verify Social Security numbers and fire workers whose numbers did not match official records.

The federal program developed by the Department of Homeland Security is at the heart of a new crackdown on the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants in the country, after Congress failed to pass comprehensive immigration reform.

But the “no-match letter” program was challenged in a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union, the AFL-CIO and other labor groups claiming it was unlawful and hurt all workers, including legal ones affected by errors in the data base.

Leonard Anderson, Reuters

Reuters

By David Morgan
Reuters

…meanwhile, if I take a copy of the Koran on an airplane, I’d find myself in Syria getting hot pokers up the wazoo!

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Nearly 10,000 people from countries designated as sponsors of terrorism have entered the United States under an immigration diversity program with relatively few restrictions, a report released on Friday said.

The report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office said the State Department’s inspector general warned in 2003 that the Diversity Visa Program posed a significant risk to national security and recommended it be closed to people from countries on the U.S. list of state terrorism sponsors.

But four years later, the program remains open to people from those nations and little is known about what becomes of them once they enter the United States, the GAO said.

From 2000 to 2006, the program allowed 3,703 people from Sudan, 3,164 from Iran, 2,763 from Cuba and 162 from Syria to enter the United States and apply for permanent legal resident status, the report said. That totals 9,792 new immigrants.

“We found no documented evidence of … immigrants from state sponsors of terrorism committing any terrorist acts,” said the GAO, a nonpartisan investigative arm of Congress.

“However … the Department of Homeland Security, terrorism experts and federal law enforcement officials familiar with immigration fraud believe that some individuals including terrorists and criminals could use fraudulent means to enter or remain in the United States.”

The report quoted a U.S. security officer in Turkey as saying it would be possible for Iranian intelligence officers to pose as applicants and not be detected if their identities were not already known to U.S. intelligence.

read more HERE

By Gregory Rodriguez
The Christian Science Monitor

Los Angeles - In Kansas, federal officials are investigating an Indian tribe for allegedly selling tribal memberships to illegal immigrants, along with the promise that the documents will protect them from deportation. By their spokesman’s own admission, the Kaweah Indian Nation has sold more than 10,000 memberships for prices starting at $50 and going as high as $1,200.

On one level, its success underscores how desperate many undocumented immigrants are to legitimize their status in the United States. On another, it is a powerful contemporary example of historical fact: Mexicans long have used and manipulated race to improve their social status.

Unlike in the US, where race is understood as purely biological, in Mexico it’s defined by culture and class as much as it is by DNA. An Indian, for example, is not simply someone with Indian blood, but an individual who behaves, dresses, and speaks “like an Indian.” Someone of wholly Indian heritage who speaks Spanish and lives according to Hispanic (as opposed to indigenous) customs would be considered mestizo, or mixed. Not surprisingly, when race is a question of culture, it is a fluid and even changeable category.

This isn’t to say that race has had no social meaning in Mexican history. From the 16th to the 19th centuries, Spain imposed a hierarchical racial order in colonial Mexico, one that favored those with European heritage and lighter skin. Whites, blacks, mestizos, and Indians were assigned different levels of access to property, power, and prestige. But through the years, racial mixing eroded the categories and weakened that social order.

read more HERE

compiled by Jim Swanson

Here’s a list of interesting an important things coming up this next week. To see more about any of the stories below, click on the supplied links. - JS

IMMIGRATION: Cassandra Butts testifies to the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International Law on H.R. 1645, the Security Through Regularized Immigration and a vibrant Economy Act of 2007.

ENERGY: Joseph Romm testifies at the House Science and Technology Subcommittee hearing on “The Benefits and Challenges of Producing Liquid Fuel from Coal: The Role for Federal Research.”

LABOR MARKET: Christian E. Weller analyzes new employment numbers.

CAMPUS PROGRESS: A report on the lack of diversity in college newsrooms and an examination of American use of depleted uranium in Iraq.

Gee, wonder if our current administration and congress has anything to do with this. I’d go, but it’s too damn cold. I’m looking for an island!

It may seem like a quiet country where not much happens besides ice hockey, curling and beer drinking. But our neighbor to the north is proving to be quite the draw for thousands of disgruntled Americans.

The number of U.S. citizens who moved to Canada last year hit a 30-year high, with a 20 percent increase over the previous year and almost double the number who moved in 2000.

In 2006, 10,942 Americans went to Canada, compared with 9,262 in 2005 and 5,828 in 2000, according to a survey by the Association for Canadian Studies.

Of course, those numbers are still outweighed by the number of Canadians going the other way. Yet, that imbalance is shrinking. Last year, 23,913 Canadians moved to the United States, a significant decrease from 29,930 in 2005.

“There has been a definite increase in the past five years — the number hasn’t exceeded 10,000 since 1977,” says Jack Jedwab, the association’s executive director. “During the mid-70s, Canada admitted between 22,000 and 26,000 Americans a year, most of whom were draft dodgers from the Vietnam War.”

More at AOLNews

“Foot in mouth”… it’ll do it every time!

Fred Thompson:
Someone should remind Mr. Thompson that there are plenty of hispanic voters out there. Pissing them off is not a smart thing to do at this time.

Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y.

LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. - Taking a swipe at a potential GOP presidential rival, Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday criticized Fred Thompson for suggesting illegal Cuban immigrants pose a terrorist threat.

“I was appalled when one of the people running for or about to run for the Republican nomination talked about Cuban refugees as potential terrorists,” Clinton told Hispanic elected officials. “Apparently he doesn’t have a lot of experience in Florida or anywhere else, and doesn’t know a lot of Cuban-Americans.”

Thompson, who is polling strongly among GOP primary voters and is expected to join the race soon, made the comment at a campaign stop Wednesday in South Carolina.

The actor and former Tennessee senator was criticizing an immigration bill in the Senate, contending it would make the country more vulnerable to terrorism.

Noting that the United States had apprehended 1,000 people from Cuba in 2005, Thompson said, “I don’t imagine they’re coming here to bring greetings from Castro. We’re living in the era of the suitcase bomb.” Fidel Castro is Cuba’s leader.

Dennis Kucinich:
Mr. Kucinich seems a bit out of touch with mainstream America here. Everybody I know doesn’t want (an official) second language here in America. Making it an educational requirement and forcing it upon our youth removes whatever serious contention Mr. Kucinich had.

Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich, saying he believed all American children should learn to speak Spanish, gave his closing statement in Spanish while apologizing in advance for his accent.

More at Yahoo! News

Can this administration do ANYTHING right? And isn’t Michael Chertoff in charge of this? WHY does this guy still have a job????

By ALICIA A. CALDWELL
Associated Press Writer

COLUMBUS, N.M. (AP) — The 1.5-mile barrier along the U.S.-Mexico border was designed to keep cars from illegally crossing into the United States. There’s just one problem: It was accidentally built on Mexican soil. Now embarrassed border officials say the mistake could cost the federal government more than $3 million to fix.

The barrier was part of more than 15 miles of border fence built in 2000, stretching from the town of Columbus to an onion farm and cattle ranch.

A U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman said the vertical metal tubes were sunk into the ground and filled with cement along what officials firmly believed was the border. But a routine aerial survey in March revealed that the barrier protrudes into Mexico by 1 to 6 feet.

More at the AP

From Reuters:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush suffered a major defeat on his plan to overhaul immigration laws on Thursday when the Senate refused to close debate and advance the legislation.

The bill that would have given a path to U.S. citizenship for millions of illegal immigrants fell 14 votes short of the 60 needed in the 100-member Senate to advance toward a final vote.

Bush has sought an overhaul of U.S. immigration laws for years and this bill may have been his last chance for a significant domestic legislative victory before leaving office when his second term ends in a year and a half.

By James Rowley and Nicholas Johnston
from Bloomberg.com

June 27 (Bloomberg) — The fate of U.S. immigration legislation was cast into doubt when at least six senators who helped revive the proposed overhaul said they either oppose or are leaning against a move to permit a vote on final passage.

The measure is in more jeopardy “than I thought a few hours ago,” said Senator Christopher Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat.

The supporters’ strategy of disposing of amendments that threatened the legislation’s bipartisan support hit a procedural snag late in the day, adding to the uncertainty. The Senate refused to set aside an amendment by Montana Democrats Max Baucus and Jon Tester that would dilute requirements employers verify the identity of new workers.

Under Senate rules, Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, now can’t move to consider other provisions without getting the consent of all 100 senators.

“I think this hurts” the measure, said Texas Republican John Cornyn, an opponent.

Earlier today, Senate sponsors had succeeded in killing a series of proposed changes that would undermine the measure’s support. Nonetheless, senators who voted yesterday to resume consideration of the bill were withdrawing support.

Leaning Against

Republicans Richard Burr of North Carolina and Christopher Bond of Missouri and Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska said they oppose permitting a vote on final passage. Virginia Democrat Jim Webb and Republicans John Ensign of Nevada and Pete Domenici of New Mexico said they were leaning that way.

It takes 60 votes, or three-fifths of the Senate, to shut off debate. Yesterday, the Senate voted 64-35 to permit debate to resume.

Five other senators who voted to resume the debate said they are undecided on the next procedural test. They are Republicans Ted Stevens and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire and Democrats Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico and Mark Pryor of Arkansas.

The legislation would create a path to citizenship for 12 million illegal immigrants, tighten the U.S. border with Mexico and create a guest-worker program to help employers fill low- paying jobs. The Senate had planned to complete action on the bill by the end of the week.

Angry Senators

Sponsors of the bill shut off efforts by critics to offer their own changes, angering some senators.

“We are in trench warfare and it’s going to be rough,” said Pennsylvania Republican Arlen Specter, a chief sponsor of the legislation. “But we are going to see the will of the Senate work one way or another.”

read more at Bloomberg.com

By CHARLES BABINGTON, Associated Press Writer
from Yahoo! News

Well, now! It was OK for you neo-cons when Rush, Hannity and all the others were on YOUR side after your God Almighty Ronald Reagan repealed The “Fairness Doctrine” for radio, wasn’t it? What’s wrong? Did something come back to bite you in the arse? - JS

WASHINGTON - Immigration has supplanted Iraq as the leading issue on television and radio talk shows, complicating the prospects of a Senate bill desperately wanted by President Bush.

Conservative talk radio’s impact on the immigration debate reached new heights last week, with one host effectively writing an amendment for when the Senate returns to the imperiled bill this week.

National talk show hosts have spent months denouncing the bill as providing amnesty for illegal immigrants. Some top Republicans who support the legislation have defied the broadcast pundits. Others GOP lawmakers have tried to placate them, even to the point of accepting their ideas for amendments.

Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., the key conservative negotiator behind the compromise bill, told reporters Friday that California-based radio host Hugh Hewitt “had several ideas” that “we are trying to include” in amendments to be offered in an upcoming series of crucial votes.

Hewitt, a conservative who has criticized many aspects of the bill, had Kyl as a guest on Thursday and asked: “Does the bill provide for any separate treatment of aliens, illegal aliens from countries of special concern?”

Kyl replied: “It’s going to, as a result of your lobbying efforts to me.”

People seeking entry the U.S. from countries that the U.S. has designated as state sponsors of terrorism will get a higher level of scrutiny, Kyl said Friday.

Other Bush allies have tried more confrontational approaches to the talk hosts, sometimes with bruising results.

read more at YAHOO! NEWS

from the Pew Research Center

The public is ambivalent about the immigration bill being debated by the Senate. Most Americans favor one of its key objectives, but the bill itself draws a mostly negative reaction from those who have heard about it. Just a third of those who have heard something about the bill favor it, while 41% are opposed, and a relatively large minority (26%) offers no opinion.

Yet one of the bill’s primary goals - to provide a way for people who are in this country illegally to gain legal citizenship under certain conditions - wins broad and bipartisan support. Overall, 63% of the public - and nearly identical numbers of Republicans, Democrats and independents - favor such an approach if illegal immigrants “pass background checks, pay fines and have jobs.”

The debate over immigration has focused in part on whether the bill currently before Congress amounts to a grant of amnesty for people who are in the U.S. illegally. In general, the public is less supportive of providing “amnesty” for illegal immigrants than it is of providing a way for illegal immigrants to gain citizenship. Even so, a majority of Americans (54%) say they favor amnesty for illegal immigrants already in the country if they pass background checks and meet other conditions.

The way in which the issue is characterized has a significant effect on Republican views. While 62% of Republicans favor “providing a way for illegal immigrants currently in the country to gain legal citizenship,” support declines sharply when the concept of amnesty is raised. However, even when the policy is described as “providing amnesty” for illegal immigrants, about as many Republicans favor (47%) as oppose (48%) the idea.

read more at THE PEW RESEARCH CENTER

This immigration bill doesn’t have a shot in hell of passing……IMO.

By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Republicans and Democrats scrambled Thursday to salvage a fragile compromise that would legalize millions of unlawful immigrants after it suffered setbacks.

The measure, a top priority for President Bush that’s under attack from the right and left, faced a crucial test vote designed to measure senators’ appetite for the “grand bargain” between liberals and conservatives on immigration.

The legislation failed a similar hurdle earlier in the day, and Majority Leader Harry Reid (news, bio, voting record), D-Nev., threatened that if it failed again, “the bill’s over with.”

Republican negotiators were working to break an impasse on a proposal that would let employers continue to handpick the high’skilled workers they want to get green cards, rather than requiring workers to qualify through a new, government-run point system.

That change, sought by Sen. Maria Cantwell (news, bio, voting record), D-Wash., and Sen. John Cornyn (news, bio, voting record), R-Texas, with vigorous backing from the high-tech community, could upset the delicate balance underlying the contentious immigration measure.

The bill would tighten borders, institute a new system to prevent employers from hiring undocumented workers, and give many of the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants a pathway to legal status. Conceived by an improbable coalition, it is exposing deep rifts within both parties and is loathed by most GOP conservatives.

More at Yahoo News