The Zimbabwe Dollar Today September 24, 2007
Posted by Webmaster in Zimbabwe's Exchange Rate.comments closed
Today: 30,628.0
Yesterday: 30,660.7
Employer Sanctions Work September 24, 2007
Posted by Webmaster in Education, Immigration.comments closed
PHOENIX - Where did the students disappear to?
Public school officials in several districts in Arizona, California, and Texas – particularly those with a high share of Hispanic students – are seeing a drop in enrollment this school year over last, and many are at a loss to explain it.
The drop is noticeable but not huge – in the range of 1 to 4 percent – and some administrators shrug it off as normal fluctuation or say the missing students, whose families tend to be transient, may yet enroll later in the year. Other analysts posit that the abrupt end to the housing boom has seen construction jobs dry up in these areas and people have simply moved elsewhere for work, kids in tow.
But Miriam, a single mother from Mexico who lives in the Phoenix metro area, offers a different explanation. Five families who lived in the same apartment complex as she does have recently packed up and returned to Mexico, and between them they had 10 children who used to attend a local elementary school, she says. They were “panicked” about a new Arizona law that cracks down on employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants, says Miriam, who would speak only on a first-name basis even though she says she is in the US on a “visitor’s visa.”
Three points:
(1) It’s state, and not Federal action, that has them “panicked.”
(2) If they are “panicked,” it’s not because they fear law enforcement directly targeting them. It is action that targets the employers of illegal aliens. Take the magnet away, and the iron filings won’t come. Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) seems to be the most prominent voice among elected politicians today driving home this point.
(3) Those “five families” in the “same apartment complex” are deporting themselves. Their self-deportation didn’t cost any American government one dime.
FBI: Number of Violent Crimes Up By 2% September 24, 2007
Posted by Webmaster in Minority Crime, Police & Law Enforcement.comments closed
The number of U.S. violent crimes increased in 2006 for the second consecutive year, with more than 17,000 murders nationwide, the FBI said on Monday.
Criminal justice experts have blamed the crime increases on gangs, youth violence, more gun crimes and fewer police on the beat. The experts have been unsure whether the numbers for 2006 represent a temporary upswing or the start of a long-term trend.
It’s circular logic to blame “the crime increases” on “more gun crimes” (i.e. violent crimes with firearms as the weapon). That’s saying that more crime causes more crime.
As far as “fewer police on the beat,” it might be wrong to think of it as fewer cops causing more crime — it might be the other way around: more crime is causing fewer police, or, in other words, crime-ridden cities are ones where seasoned cops are leaving the sinking ships like rats, and the disproportionately young and inexperienced cops they do have will leave once they find greener (and safer) pastures to hire them — we have seen that in New York and St. Louis.
The real answer to the riddle about crime increases is that the proportion of the population that is comprised of young black and Hispanic men is increasing.
“Today’s FBI report shows that violent crime continues to trouble our nation,” added Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the ranking Republican on the House Judiciary Committee.
“Whether it’s the increase in violent street gangs, the scourge of illegal drugs or the dangers our children face online, crime threatens American families today,” he said.
What do the “dangers our children face online” have to do with violent crime?
American Immigration Policy Promotes Diversity, Not Safety September 24, 2007
Posted by Webmaster in Immigration, Racial Dispossession, Terrorism.comments closed
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.
(snip)
The Diversity Visa Program was created by the Immigration Act of 1990 and provides up to 55,000 immigrant visas each year to people from countries with relatively low rates of immigration to the United States. People from 179 countries are eligible to participate this year.
The program has enabled more than half a million immigrants — mainly from Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia — to gain permanent legal status in the United States.
9/11? Who cares? After all, it takes breaking about 3,000 eggs to make the diverse omelet. And look on the bright side: All nineteen of the 9/11 hijackers were men of color.
