Saturday, November 21, 2009

ILLEGALS IN DENVER - An American Speaks

That's a very good post.

Problem is, this information has been posted on CL (and elsewhere) for the past 3-4 years.

Apparently the message isn't strong enough. Elected officials continue to support illegal immigration.

And this is where the problem is. Employers knowingly give jobs to illegals. Elected officials create "politically correct" sanctuaries. Welfare, medical, and social services programs are given free of charge to illegals as it's federal law.

So why shouldn't illegals come here and mooch? Did anybody vote "yes" on Initiative 300? Apparently not as only the Hispanics showed up to vote.

As a result, illegals do not need a driver's license or insurance but Colorado citizens must have (and pay for) all motor vehicle documents.

So even the laws are not equally enforced. I've been on this planet a long time. I don't think I've ever seen a situation so screwed up.

Regardless, it starts with putting the right people in public office.

JOBLESS RATE UP IN 29 STATES - GREAT TIME TO CONNIVE ANOTHER AMNESTY SCAM ON THE AMERICAN PEOPLE!

WE KNOW WHO OWNS BARACK OBAMA! THE BANKSTERS HAD HIM BOUGHT BEFORE HE LIED HIS WAY TO THE WHITE HOUSE, AND THEN SURROUNDED HIMSELF WITH BUSH’S ARCHITECTS FOR BANKSTERS’ WELFARE, LIKE TIM GEITHNER.

WE KNOW WHAT HE REALLY THINKS OF THE AMERICA PEOPLE WHEN HE FINALLY GOT HIS ASS TO NEW ORLEANS, AND THEY TOOK OFF FIVE MINUTES LATER!

OBAMA’S PLAN FOR JOBS IS CALLED AMNESTY! THE MORE ILLEGALS, THE MORE WAGES ARE DEPRESSED, AND THEN THE MORE GENEROUS WALL STREETERS WILL BE TO THE CORRUPT LA RAZA DEMS!

November 21, 2009

Jobless Rate Up in 29 States, Hitting Records in 4 of Them

By BLOOMBERG NEWS

California, Delaware, South Carolina and Florida registered record rates of unemployment in October, the Labor Department said Friday.
Joblessness rose in 29 states last month compared with 22 in September, the agency said in a monthly state breakdown. Michigan had the highest jobless rate at 15.1 percent, followed by Nevada at 13 percent and Rhode Island at 12.9 percent.
The unemployment rate fell in 13 states, including Massachusetts, where it declined to 8.9 percent from 9.3 percent; New Hampshire, with a drop to 6.8 percent from 7.2 percent; and West Virginia, which fell to 8.5 percent from 8.9 percent.
The number of states with at least 10 percent unemployment held at 14 last month, the Labor Department’s report showed. In the states reporting record jobless rates, California was at 12.5 percent; South Carolina, 12.1 percent; Florida, 11.2 percent; and Delaware at 8.7 percent. The District of Columbia also set a high with an 11.9 percent rate.
“Virtually every sector aside from the health care sector is losing jobs,” said Sean Snaith, an economist at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, Fla. “Housing has been central to Florida’s economic story throughout the entire cycle. Unfortunately, it has spread well beyond the sectors directly involved in the housing market.”
Payrolls declined last month in 21 states, the report showed. New York showed the biggest drop, with 15,300 jobs lost. Florida had 8,500 job losses, followed by Georgia with 7,500 and Virginia with 7,100.
Over the last year, California showed the biggest loss of jobs, with payrolls falling by 687,700 workers, the report showed.
WSWS.org
US home foreclosures at record high as jobs crisis deepens

By Andre Damon
20 November 2009
The number of home loans in the US that are either in foreclosure or at least one payment past due reached one in seven last month, a record high, according to a survey released Thursday by the Mortgage Bankers Association.
The survey found that nearly 10 percent of mortgage holders were at least one payment behind on their mortgages, while 4.47 percent of were in foreclosure. Both of these are the highest figures on records dating back to 1972. About 7 million households are behind on payments or in foreclosure.
These figures present just one indicator of the worsening conditions facing US workers caught up in the longest economic downturn since the Great Depression. The number of people behind on their mortgage payments has doubled since last year, as has the percentage in foreclosure, according to the survey.
The foreclosures were spread throughout all borrower categories, with high-quality, fixed-rate mortgages showing the fastest growth in delinquencies, not the sub-prime mortgages that initiated the foreclosure crisis.
LPS Applied Analytics, which also recently released a survey of late mortgage payments, found similar figures. The LPS survey found that the number of people three months behind on their payments, but not yet in foreclosure, reached 3.4 percent of US households, up from 1.5 percent 12 months before.
Unemployment is now a primary cause of home foreclosures. MBA chief economist Jay Brinkmann told Reuters: “It is all about unemployment, everything else is secondary. We expect unemployment to keep rising into the first quarter of 2010, which means we will most likely see even higher rates of delinquencies and foreclosures.”
New unemployment claims stayed at 505,000 last week, according to figures released Thursday by the Labor Department. Economists were expecting a decrease in the number of new filings, but this did not materialize. The official US unemployment rate reached 10.2 percent in October, while the “real” unemployment rate, which includes involuntary part-time workers and those who have left the labor market, soared to 17.5 percent.
Home construction starts likewise showed an unexpected slump last month, falling 10.6 percent from September. There were 529,000 new housing construction projects last month, significantly lower than the 600,000 expected by analysts. “As we look out to 2010, we are expecting difficult conditions to continue,” said Richard Dugas, chief executive of Pulte Homes, the largest US homebuilder.
The White House extended its first-time homebuyer tax credit this month to April 2010. Once this measure expires analysts expect a further deterioration in housing prices. Average real estate prices doubled in the first six years of this decade, but have fallen by 30 percent since 2006, with no recovery yet in sight.
The slew of bad data led several economists to revise their estimates for the fourth quarter growth downward. Macroeconomic Advisors, for example, revised its forecast down from 3.2 percent to 3 percent.
Companies continued to announce mass layoffs this week. America Online announced plans on Thursday to cut one third of its 6,900-person workforce ahead of its planned spinoff from Time Warner, Inc. At its height, the company employed 20,000 people. Aetna, the health insurer, announced Wednesday that it plans to lay off 3.5 percent of its 35,000 employees.
Those workers who have not been laid off are facing speedups and higher workloads. A survey of employers released Wednesday showed that half of employees report an increased workload over the previous six months, which contributed to a quarter of employees reporting “low morale.”
While the Confidence Board’s leading indicator, which estimates future economic growth, increased for the seventh month in a row, the rate of its growth slowed significantly in October. The index grew by 0.3 last month, down from 1 percent in September.
As the number of unemployed continues to increase, benefits are becoming harder to come by. A program passed this year that subsidizes healthcare for unemployed people is set to expire December 1st for the first people to take advantage of it. The subsidy, which paid for 65 percent of health-insurance costs for nine months, has not yet been extended. People who lose medical coverage for 63 days or more may not be covered for pre-existing conditions when they reapply for insurance.
Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke highlighted the devastating impact of the crisis in a speech before the National Economic Club Monday, warning of continued loan defaults and high unemployment. Bernanke noted that the number of people working part-time involuntarily has more than doubled since the beginning of the recession, while the average workweek for manufacturing workers has fallen to the lowest level in postwar history.
The Fed chairman noted the impact of the cost-cutting programs being put into effect by US companies, saying that, “together with the reduction in hours worked, slower wage growth has led to stagnation in labor income.” He summed up the conditions facing workers: “The best thing we can say about the labor market right now is that it may be getting worse more slowly.”
High unemployment is in fact a deliberate policy of the Obama administration, which is seeking to drive down the conditions of the working class in order to restore profitability of American companies. Obama has rejected any serious jobs program or further stimulus measures.
Meanwhile, Wall Street profits are likely to set a new record this year, according to a report released Tuesday by New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli. The report noted that Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and a section of JPMorgan Chase are set to make $22.5 billion this year, compared to losses of $40.3 billion last year. There is every likelihood that the year-end bonuses at these banks will be equally unprecedented.

HEALTHCARE FOR MEXICO - One Reason You Can't Afford a Doctor?

IS IT TIME FOR NARCOMEX TO COVER THE COST OF THEIR ILL? THERE ARE MORE BILLIONAIRES IN MEXICO THAN SAUDI ARABIA OR SWITZERLAND!
INCLUDING A MAJOR SHARE OWNER OF THE NEW YORK TIMES, MOUTHPIECE FOR LA RAZA, CARLOS SLIM!

NEW YORK TIMES
American taxpayers and health care consumers have borne the expense.

November 21, 2009
THE BREAKING POINT
Hospital Falters as Refuge for Illegal Immigrants
By KEVIN SACK
ATLANTA — Each had crossed the border years before, smuggled across the desert by a coyote, never imagining the journey would lead to a drab and dusty clinic on the ninth floor of Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta.
Some knew before the crossing that they had diabetes or lupus or high blood pressure, but it was only after they arrived that their kidneys began to fail. To survive, they needed dialysis at a cost of about $50,000 a year, which their sporadic work as housekeepers, painters and laborers could not begin to cover.
And so they turned to Grady, a taxpayer-supported safety-net hospital that would provide dialysis to anyone in need, even illegal immigrants with no insurance or ability to pay. Every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday morning, the 15 or so patients would settle into their recliners, four to a room, and while away the monotonous three-hour treatments by chitchatting in Spanish.
That all changed on Oct. 4, when the strapped public hospital closed its outpatient dialysis clinic, leaving 51 patients — almost all illegal immigrants — in a life-or-death limbo.
For Grady, which has served Atlanta’s poor for 117 years, it was an excruciating choice, a stark reflection of what happens when the country’s inadequate health care system confronts its defective immigration policy.
Like other hospitals, particularly public hospitals, Grady has been left to provide costly treatments to nonpaying illegal residents who most likely could not have obtained such care in their home countries. American taxpayers and health care consumers have borne the expense.
Over time, the mounting losses have compromised Grady’s charitable mission, forcing layoffs, increases in fees and the elimination of services.
“Years and years of providing this free care has led Grady to the breaking point,” said Matt Gove, one of the hospital’s senior vice presidents. “If we don’t make the gut-wrenching decisions now, there won’t be a Grady later. Then, everyone loses.”
But for the dialysis patients, the sudden end to their reassuring routine has prompted a panic.
“We didn’t know what to do,” said Ignacio G. Lopez, 23, who had been sustained by the clinic for more than three years. “We can pass away if we stay like two weeks without dialysis. They were just sending us out to die.”
The chairman of Grady’s recently reconstituted board, A. D. Correll, has said the hospital would not let that happen. “We made a commitment right up front that people are not going to die on the street because of these actions,” said Mr. Correll, a former chairman of the Georgia-Pacific Corporation and a prominent civic leader here.
Soccer and Telenovelas
In fact, the future for many of the patients remains uncertain. Like most of the country’s estimated 11 million illegal immigrants (!!!! ADJUST THESE FIGURES FOR THE REALITY OF 40 MILLION ILLEGALS !!!), they have little access to continuing health care, a reality not addressed by the legislation now under discussion in Washington.
Across the years, the Grady dialysis patients had forged a community, a family, really, of people who share a history and language, as well as a life-threatening condition. As the machines cleansed the toxins from their blood, they would talk about the scarcity of work, the ruthlessness of their disease and their hopes for a transplant. Some would sleep, while others crooned folksongs to drown out the snores.
Any given morning might find Mr. Lopez bickering with Fidelia G. Perez about whether to watch their soap operas, or telenovelas, in English or Spanish. From another chair, Rosa Lira, a frail grandmother, would look up from her prayer book to boast of the previous night’s exploits by Club America, her favorite Mexican soccer team. Rosa Palma de Gamez, from El Salvador, would grin when Ismael Sagrero arrived with his trademark greeting — “Hola-hola!” — which had become his nickname.
Now the patients are trying desperately to figure out their next steps.
With limited exceptions, illegal immigrants are ineligible for public insurance programs like Medicaid and Medicare and often cannot afford private coverage. When major illness strikes, they have few options but to go to emergency rooms, which are required by federal law to treat anyone whose health is deemed in serious jeopardy.
Officials at Grady, which will provide more than $300 million in uncompensated care this year, estimate that as many as a fifth of its uninsured patients are illegal immigrants. Although the numbers are elusive, a national study by the RAND Corporation concluded that illegal immigrants account for about 1.3 percent of public health spending.
The recession has prompted some state and local governments to pare programs that benefit illegal immigrants. And although illegal immigrants may account for about seven million of the country’s 46 million uninsured, the health care bills being negotiated by Congress exclude them from expansions of subsidized public insurance. (The House bill that passed on Nov. 7 would allow illegal immigrants to buy policies at full cost on government-run exchanges, while legislation being considered in the Senate would forbid it.)
THE NANCY PELOSI, BARACK OBAMA ( YOU LIED!) HARRY REID, DIANNE FEINSTEIN, BARBARA BOXER PLAN FOR HEALTHCARE “REFORM” WOULD HAND ILLEGALS FREE MEDIAL – but they get it already at emergency rooms all across the nation.
(The House bill that passed on Nov. 7 would allow illegal immigrants to buy policies at full cost on government-run exchanges, while legislation being considered in the Senate would forbid it.)

Calling it “a horrible situation,” Mr. Correll said that governments at all levels had decided that immigrants were not their problem. “But somehow,” he said, “they’ve become Grady’s problem, which seems totally unfair.”
Some of the Grady dialysis patients have chosen to return to their countries, encouraged by the hospital’s offer of free airfare, cash payments, three months of paid dialysis and assistance in seeking insurance or other long-term remedies. Others are trying their luck in states where Medicaid policies may be less restrictive.
But most remain in Atlanta, taking full advantage of a last-minute offer by the hospital, in response to a lawsuit, to pay for three months of dialysis at commercial clinics. They are hopeful that the reprieve will buy time for the lawsuit to progress or for private dialysis providers to take them as charity cases.
What they fear, however, is that their already fragile lives will soon be reduced to a frenzied search for their next dialysis, most likely in an emergency room after a descent into crisis.
Looking for a Better Life
They need only look to Ms. Perez to see what the future may hold.
After hearing that the clinic would close, Ms. Perez, 32, set out for Alabama on Sept. 6 because cousins told her they might be able to procure dialysis there. Grady was not yet offering its deal for three months of treatment, and instead gave her $1,300, enough to cover dialysis for a week or two.
Ms. Perez said the money was quickly spent on rent, food and transportation. After going without dialysis for 16 days, she walked into an emergency room near Birmingham, which found that the potassium levels in her blood were high enough to require immediate filtration. Eight days later, she did the same at another Birmingham hospital.
“They said this was the first and last time they would help me,” she said. “They told me I didn’t have any right to be there.”
She went back to the first hospital, where she was dialyzed again, and then found a third hospital that was willing to provide three treatments. A doctor there tried to find a private dialysis clinic that would accept her but came up empty, she said.
So she returned to Atlanta on Oct. 11, and underwent one more emergency treatment before agreeing to fly home to Mexico with assistance from Grady and a California company, MexCare, that the hospital has hired to help repatriate interested patients.
Ms. Perez’s parents live in Mexico and can care for her, but in many cases the patients’ families and sources of support are in the United States. Some do not want to uproot their American-born children, or abandon their spouses or jobs. Often they do not trust the quality or availability of dialysis in Latin America.
Like other patients, Adolfo D. Sanchez, 31, said he was astonished to learn when his kidneys failed in 2004 that Grady would provide him ongoing dialysis without charge. A subsistence farmer in Mexico, he said he had paid a coyote $1,500 in 2001 to lead him on an eight-day trek across the Arizona border to Phoenix and then to Atlanta, where his sister had settled.
Three years later, while working in construction, he found he could not keep down the small tacos he ate for lunch. A local clinic referred him to Grady, which diagnosed his kidney failure and placed him on dialysis.
“No place in Mexico would have offered dialysis for free,” he said, sitting in the spare apartment he shares with his girlfriend and their 13-year-old son. “It was better to be here. I am really grateful that this is possible in this country, because if I were in my country I would already have died”
Bertha A. Montelongo, a 59-year-old widow who said she entered the United States illegally in 2005, started having seizures and shortness of breath about a month after arriving in Atlanta.
“I came to look for a better life,” she said, “but then I became sick, and that was it.”
A diabetic, Ms. Montelongo has survived for four years on dialysis, but lost her vision last December. That has made her dependent on her daughter, who baby-sits and sells homemade tamales; her son-in-law, an out-of-work landscaper; and her granddaughters. They live in a rented house in the suburbs where the mantel is lit with votives.
For a blind woman, returning to Mexico, where few family members remain, is not an option, Ms. Montelongo and her family said.
“All the people here on dialysis think the same thing,” said her daughter, Letecia. “They all think that if they go back to Mexico, they will die sooner. In Mexico, it’s different. There, you have to pay.”
Creating a Crisis on Purpose
It has been different for the 25 or so United States citizens who were patients at the dialysis clinic. They were either already on Medicare or about to become eligible, and are thus being readily treated by private dialysis clinics. After a three-month waiting period, the federal insurance program covers anyone with end-stage renal disease, regardless of age, and pays 80 percent of the cost of dialysis.
But illegal immigrants are not eligible for Medicare, and legal immigrants must wait five years to qualify. A few states use emergency Medicaid programs to cover ongoing dialysis for certain illegal immigrants, but Georgia discontinued the practice in 2006.
That sent waves of uninsured dialysis patients from across the region to Grady, which is supported by direct appropriations from Fulton and DeKalb Counties, ostensibly to care for their own residents. The hospital lost $3.5 million on the dialysis clinic last year, said Mr. Gove, the Grady spokesman. Its 88 dialysis patients accounted for a 10th of total losses at a hospital with more than 800,000 patient visits a year, he said.
The board acted, Mr. Correll said, because Grady’s dialysis equipment had become obsolete, requiring heavy investment. It was evident, given that so many patients were undocumented and uninsured, that the losses would never stop.
“It was just financially hopeless,” Mr. Correll said. “For every vacancy that opened up, another nonpaying patient would walk in the door, so it was going to last forever.”
Mr. Correll said the hospital “had to precipitate a crisis” in the hope that other hospitals, dialysis centers and governments might pitch in.
Each of the remaining patients has signed an agreement stipulating that Grady will pay for private dialysis provided by Fresenius Medical Services for no more than three months, Mr. Gove said. The patients agreed to work with the hospital during that period to devise long-range plans for their care, possibly including repatriation.
What Grady has not told the patients is that its contract with Fresenius, which sets a price of $280 per treatment, covers their care for up to one year. Mr. Gove said the contract gave Grady the flexibility to continue paying for patients who fail to make other arrangements by Jan. 3. But he said the hospital’s offer to arrange repatriation would end at that point.
“As patients, they are ultimately responsible for their care,” Mr. Gove said.
The hospital’s agreement with MexCare, obtained through a state open records request, calls for Grady to pay $18,000 for every patient relocated — $6,750 in travel expenses and escort fees, a $750 administrative fee, and payment for 30 dialysis treatments at $350 each.
Two years ago, the Grady board, then dominated by political appointees, undercut its chief executive’s plan to close the dialysis clinic. The new board, now led by business leaders, hopes to save the hospital by convincing corporations and other potential donors that its fiscal discipline is worthy of support.
Mr. Correll said closing the dialysis clinic was “important to the future financial and operational success of Grady, because people have confidence now that the board will make a tough decision if it has to, and do it in the most humane way possible.”
When Mr. Lopez first showed up at Grady in 2006, five years after he had crossed into Arizona at age 15, his disease had turned his skin a pallid gray. The doctors told him he was lucky he had not waited another day.
The charge for the initial hospital stay ran to $40,000; he said his stack of bills now totaled more than $100,000. “I try to pay little by little,” he said, “but I’m never going to finish.”
He said he had never expected such generosity from American health care, calling it “very humane.” After each dialysis treatment at Grady, he said, he would thank the nurses.
“You saved my life,” he would tell them. “One more time, you saved my life.”

HOMELESSNESS - America's Wave of the Future UNDER MEX OCCUPATION

HOMELESS – A PRODUCT OF THE RAPE AND PILLAGE OF BANKSTERS i.e., foreclosures for profits, AND THE MEXICAN OCCUPATION where NO LEGAL NEED APPLY!
Every year 1.5 million poor, illiterate, pregnant, and frequently criminal Mexicans walk over our border. They are directed to the American borders by their own government as the place they need to cut to the front of the line for welfare, American jobs, and the flourishing Mexican gang and drug cartel franchises. They are also invited to hip our borders by the LA RAZA DEMS, such as Nancy Pelosi, who has long illegally hired illegals at her St. Helena, Napa winery, and Dianne Feinstein who has long illegally hired illegals at her S.F. hotel. Both of these lifer-politicians, along with their side-kick Ma’am Boxer, now running for another 6 years of worthless senate seat saving, are LA RAZA ENDORSED and OPEN BORDERS = DEPRESS WAGES = HUGE PROFIT MARGINS.
The city with the largest number of homeless is Los Angeles, under Mexican occupation where 47% of those with a job are illegals, and the MONTHLY welfare paid to ILLEGALS is $50 million!
WSWS.org
New York City homeless population at an all-time high
By Sandy English and Ali Ismail
21 November 2009
According to a report released last month by the New York City advocacy group Coalition for the Homeless, there are currently almost 37,000 people in the city shelter system. This includes approximately 10,000 homeless families with 16,500 children.
The number of homeless housed by the city marks an 11 percent increase over last year and is the highest number of people seeking shelter on record. These figures are all the more significant because they reflect the state of the homeless population before the cold weather has started.
The report notes, “The growing homeless family shelter population has been driven by historically high numbers of newly homeless families entering the municipal shelter system.” In August, over 1,900 families sought shelter in the city’s system. For the last fiscal year (FY), over 120,000 homeless people used the city’s shelters.
The emergence of mass unemployment in the city has been the leading cause of the increase in homelessness. The official figure now stands at 10.3 percent, with a loss of 111,000 jobs since last year. Among Blacks and Hispanics, the figure is over 20 percent. If part-time workers who want full-time jobs and those who have stopped looking for work are counted, the overall unemployment rate rises to 15.8 percent.
Antonietta Bertucci, Director of Part of the Solution (POTS) Justice Center, a nonprofit agency that supplies services to the poor in the Bronx, told the WSWS: “We’ve seen people that would never have imagined they would be seeking our services. One woman who came to us is sleeping her car. She was evicted because she lost her job.”
The city’s capacity to shelter the homeless is being severely strained. Mary Brosnahan, executive director of the Coalition for the Homeless, wrote in the Daily News, “New York City is in the midst of a homeless emergency. … As of Sept. 30, there were only two empty beds left in the entire New York City shelter system for homeless men and only eight empty beds for homeless women—10 available beds in a system of more than 7,000 for homeless single adults.”
The city spent over $856 million providing these services in FY 2009.
On November 7, the Department of Homeless Services announced that it would close the city’s largest drop-in shelter to make way for the construction of a new subway line. The Open Door on 41st St. near the Port Authority Bus Terminal serves meals to homeless men and women. According the Daily News, although the shelter does not have beds, an average of 94 people slept there each night in September.
Robert Hess, the chairman of the Department of Homeless Services, the city will not replace the center, but seek to add beds to churches and synagogues that house the homeless. But Patrick Markee, a policy analyst for the Coalition for the Homeless, told the News: “With all-time record homelessness, this is no time for the Bloomberg administration to close the city’s largest drop-in center for homeless people”.
Bloomberg’s policies, like those of his predecessor, Rudolph Giuliani, are more concerned with hiding the homeless from view than with addressing the needs of people in distress.
One of these schemes involves providing homeless individuals and families with one-way bus or plane tickets to wherever they have contacts that could give them a place to stay. The New York Times reported that at least 550 families have been relocated in this fashion. City Hall would much rather ship families off rather than spend the funds necessary to house them. People have been relocated to many states and to a number of countries around the world.
According to the Times, many of these families are often long-time residents of the city, while others are newcomers. Hector Correa, an immigrant from Puerto Rico, told the Times, “I didn’t expect the city to be the way it is. I was expecting something different, something better.”
Ruby Davis told WCBS TV that she felt the city was trying to give her the boot when she was offered a one-way ticket to North Carolina, where her estranged mother lived. She said, “I didn’t take it because when I was living in North Carolina, I was sleeping on a broken pull-out couch, and I wasn’t getting along with my mom at the time.” Domestic violence and domestic disputes often lead to homelessness—a fact the one-way ticket program obviously does not consider.
Arnold S. Cohen, president of the Partnership for the Homeless, criticized the policy for failing to address the underlying causes of homelessness. He said, “What we’re doing is passing the problem of homelessness to another city. We’re taking people from a shelter bed here to the living room couch of another family. Essentially, this family is still homeless.”
In a grotesque scheme, the city’s Department of Homeless services began charging rent (see “New York City demands rent from the homeless”) to some families living in shelters in May. After a public outcry, the city backed off. Based on WSWS interviews with families seeking shelter from the city, it is clearly difficult for families to obtain services to begin with.
In addition to mass unemployment, the irrationality of the housing market and the very high cost of housing in New York City aggravate homelessness. Millions of working-class and middle-class people sacrifice huge portions of their income to pay rent or mortgages. When someone in a family loses a job or has a medical emergency, it can become impossible to pay rent or make payments on a house.
In New York City, however, blocks of units remain unfinished or unoccupied because big landlords cannot make a profit by completing or renting them. Often wealthy property owners chose to hold back empty apartments from the market, hoping to make a return on them later. Three years ago, the group Picture the Homeless estimated that 24,000 units in Manhattan alone are empty and available.
The New York Times noted recently that, despite city financing for the creation of affordable housing, over 200,000 apartments for lower-income working-class families have been eliminated since 2002. According to data supplied by New York University’s Furman Center, the city now has only 991,591 units that it considers affordable for families that make less than 80 percent of the city’s median income, $37,000 a year. This is a loss of 17 percent since 2002.
Antonietta Bertucci of POTS told the WSWS that over the last year, a number of landlords have taken advantage of a program sponsored by the Department of Homeless Services. The DHS will pay up to $3,000 to rent an apartment as a shelter for the homeless. This has prompted mass evictions from some buildings, especially in the Bronx, because landlords see it as a way to make more money. “They take their tenants to housing court and accuse them of violating their leases,” Bartucci said. “The tenants are obligated to prove that they did not”.
She added, “Everybody is suffering because of the recession, including the landlords. They can’t afford their mortgages and pass the cost on to their tenants. Many apartments are in awful condition. It is quite widespread in the Bronx for tenants not to have hot water”.
The housing crisis in New York City and nationwide is so egregious that the United Nations Human Rights Council recently appointed a special rapporteur on the right to affordable housing in the US. The rapporteur, a professor of city planning from the University of São Paulo in Brazil named Raquel Rolnik, was denied entry into the US by the Bush administration. Admitted to the US after the election of Barack Obama, she found that little had changed in US government attitudes to the homeless: “One of the first meetings I had at the State Department, they clearly told me: here, adequate housing is not a human right.”
*
Atlanta homeless shelters strain under economic crisis
By Naomi Spencer
23 October 2009
As the economic crisis deepens, Atlanta, Georgia, emergency providers are straining to accommodate more than 7,000 homeless people, including many newly homeless families.
Along with rising unemployment and a growing number of home foreclosures across the US, the homeless population is swelling far beyond the capacity of emergency facilities. Urban centers have felt the impact most sharply, with service organizations facing budget cuts at the same time that thousands are thrust into poverty and foreclosure.
According to an October 12 report in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Atlanta’s Salvation Army cannot open a nearly completed homeless shelter for families because of a lack of funds. Similarly, the city’s Midtown Assistance Center, an agency providing emergency financial assistance, announced in August that it had spent twice its monthly $24,000 budget on aid in the month of July. The agency assists employed workers and those in job training who do not receive public assistance.
Another area service provider, MUST Ministries, reported that it aided 29,000 people last year, and requests for assistance are up 25 percent this year. Annette Lee, MUST Ministries’ resource development coordinator, commented to the Journal-Constitution of September 29: “It’s no longer just hourly wage workers. These are professionals—from bankers to people with masters and PhD’s…. We are seeing more and more people who are above the poverty line.”
Metro Atlanta has lost nearly 143,000 payroll jobs in the past year, according to the most recent Labor Department figures, and well over a quarter million workers are unemployed in the city. Foreclosure filings have surged, with more than 97,000 foreclosure notices served in the metro area so far this year, up from the already high 79,400 in 2008.
According to Census Bureau data released in September, nearly 26,000 metro Atlanta families fell below the poverty line in 2008—before the sharp economic decline of 2009—representing an increase of 19 percent over 2007.
The Metro Atlanta Task Force for the Homeless, a large walk-in shelter downtown, is now serving more than 700 people each night and anticipating far higher numbers as the weather turns colder. The Task Force is often the only emergency shelter open to men, after other city shelters fill with families.
According to employees, the shelter has come under attack from a local business group, Central Atlanta Progress (CAP), which wants the agency closed. The Task Force filed a lawsuit in July against CAP and members of city government on charges of harassment and interference. According to the lawsuit, the city refused to issue certifications to the Task Force that would have allowed the group to obtain government funds, despite the agency’s compliance with city requirements.
The shelter has also had its water shut off by the city twice in the past year without explanation. CAP officials have publicly expressed the opinion that the shelter breeds crime and encourages laziness among the homeless population. In September, the city petitioned to have the Task Force’s lawsuit dismissed. That petition was denied by Fulton County Superior Court.
According to Anita Beaty, director of the Task Force, more than three-quarters of the people who sleep at the shelter earn a living during the day, but not enough to afford rent in the city.
“Atlanta has been trying to hide poverty so they attack us for keeping poverty out front,” shelter employee Troy Harris told the Journal-Constitution. “If the city was doing what it says it is doing in placing people in housing, we wouldn’t have 700 people a night in here. We are the visible truth of Atlanta.”
Atlanta’s political establishment has taken several measures over the past decade to push out the poorest layers of the population and gentrify the downtown area. In the mid-1990s, in preparation for hosting the Olympics, the city initiated a systematic destruction of public housing.
The first city to open public housing units to the poor in the 1930s, Atlanta now bears the distinction of being the first city to have all of them closed down. In the past 15 years, the city has torn down some 15,000 units in 32 housing projects. According to a 2007 study by the Georgia Institute of Technology, as the number of units was halved and replaced by mixed-income communities, only one third of displaced residents were able to resettle.
As part of the same broad strategy of gentrification, beginning in 2003 Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin issued a series of orders banning such acts as donating food to the homeless on downtown streets, soliciting donations and sleeping in public areas. Atlanta police, posing as tourists, have staged a series of undercover street sweeps, arresting dozens of homeless people for asking for money.
The policies in Atlanta are not unique. Virtually all major cities in the US have put in place measures to criminalize homelessness and push shelters, clinics and other services outside of the downtown areas. As the economic crisis deepens, those pushed out of their jobs and homes will come under increasing attack, as the ruling establishment seeks to obscure the social realities.
In July, the National Coalition for the Homeless issued a report on this trend throughout the country. A survey of 235 cities found that one-third have ordinances in place banning “camping” in public areas, and 30 percent banned “sitting/lying” in public areas. Nearly half of all cities surveyed had bans on “loitering” and begging.

OBAMA'S THREAT TO AMERICAN PEOPLE and SHERIFF JOE

WE ALL KNOW THAT AFTER OBAMA FINALLY FINISHES SELLING US OUT TO HIS BANKSTER PAYMASTERS, HE’S OFF TO HAND 40 MILLION ILLEGALS ( HE CALLS MY “SPECIAL VOTERS”) AMNESTY.

THE BORDER (OURS) TO BORDER MEXICAN CRIME WAVE – WHO CARES? NOT OBAMA OR HIS LA RAZA MINISTER JANET NAPOLITANO OF “HOMELAND SECURITY = PATHWAY TO CITIZENSHIP”

THE STAGGERING COST OF THE EVERY EXPANDING MEXICAN WELFARE SYSTEM? HEY, IT’S THE STUPID GRINGOS THAT PAY FOR THAT, NOT WALL STREETERS. HE PUNKED US ONCE, BUT WITH BANKSTERS’ MONEY, AND THE ILLEGALS’ ILLEGAL VOTES, HE CAN GET THE WHITE HOUSE AGAIN!

EVERY DAY 12 AMERICANS ARE MURDERED BY MEXICANS.

NO WONDER OBAMA MOVED TO NEUTRALIZE SHERIFF JOE!

SHERIFF JOE HAS MORE BALLS THAN THE ENTIRE CORRUPT LA RAZA BENDING – BANKSTERS BOUGHT OBAMA ADMINISTRATION!!!


Sheriff Joe and the Chinese Illegals
by Roger Hedgecock (more by this author)
Posted 10/09/2009 ET

Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Arizona, is a tough, no nonsense Old West lawman. For that, Obama and Congress want to shut Sheriff Joe down.

Sheriff Joe's "offense"? His deputies arrest illegal immigrant law breakers because the illegals have become a local law enforcement nightmare. Over 33% of the inmates in the Maricopa County jail are illegal. More than 53% of violent crimes committed in Maricopa County are committed by illegals.

Maricopa's biggest city, Phoenix, bears the sad title of "Kidnapping Capitol of the U.S." In fact, Phoenix is second only to Mexico City in kidnappings in the Western hemisphere. Almost all of these kidnappings are drug related and perpetrated by Mexican drug gangs.

The liberal Mayor of Phoenix blames Sheriff Joe for cracking down on the illegals. He's complained to the Justice Department and now Congressional Liberals are howling for Sheriff Joe's hide, accusing him of "discrimination" and of being a "racist". Hearings have been held; heads will roll; law enforcement is the problem, not the illegals.

Now Sheriff Joe is really in trouble. To get why, you need to know the back story.

Time was, the border with Mexico was peaceful and pretty simple to understand.

In the 1950's, American farmers needed seasonal workers; Mexicans needed money. The legal way to accomplish the obvious was called the “Bracero” program--temporary legal status for seasonal workers.

Then in the 1960's came unions, specifically Cesar Chavez and the United Farmworkers Union.

Things got complicated. Seasonal workers resisted unionization, so the union went after the bracero program and got it repealed. Now all the seasonal workers were "illegal aliens" and Chavez went after them, urging the U.S. government to protect the border and thereby protect the jobs of legal farmworkers.

But both political parties benefited from the "illegal" status of these workers. Corporate donors to Republicans benefited from cheaper labor which held down the pay for a lot of legal workers as well. Democrats salivated at the prospect of millions of new immigrants whose votes could be bought with welfare programs and, for example, turn red state California both Dodger blue and Democrat blue.

So the bi-partisan bargain was struck. The border stayed open to illegals; employers got cheaper labor; and the Democrats got new voters.

If public outrage got too bad, as it did in 1986, Congress would vote an amnesty to make the illegals legal.

Then things got out of hand. 2.5 million illegals in 1986 became 12-20 million in 2007. The National Council of La Raza, M.E.C.H.A., and other radical, leftist groups preaching a "Reconquista" of the American Southwest became the face and voice of the illegals. Many Immigrants no longer assimilated as Americans first. Multiculturalism ruled the public schools. Activists demanded education in their own language.

Gangs based on immigrant communities grew bolder and prisons became filled with the "Mexican Mafia" and "MS-13". The blight spread from the Southwest to every corner of America. Americans were scared and angry and got even more so when their objections were called "racist".

Recently, Sheriff Joe showed how open the Border is by blowing the whistle on the arrest of four Chinese nationals (with Cuban currency in their pockets) caught trying to sneak across the Border.

Quietly, the Tucson Sector Border Patrol admitted that 261 Chinese (who paid smugglers up to $70,000 each) have been apprehended just this year trying to illegally cross the border. How many Chinese illegals avoided detection ? They will not guess.

Now the Department of Homeland Security is after Sheriff Joe. He's touched the "third rail" of Border Politics--the OTM. The "Other Than Mexicans" Border Patrol Category that describes hundreds of illegals nabbed at the Border from countries like Syria, Venezuela, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and dozens of other nations. And now the Chinese.

With President Obama denying the Dalai Lama an audience to placate the Chinese before his meeting with Chinese President Hu, Sheriff Joe's whistle blowing just threw a political hand grenade into Obama's Beta-male M.O.

So, the campaign against Sheriff Joe has heated up. DHS wants Sheriff Joe to agree to stop arresting illegals just because they're illegal. If he doesn't agree, DHS has publicly threatened to cut off 237 (g) funding to his Department.

This funding is used by 62 local law enforcement agencies to train officers to identify and apprehend illegals. Over a third of all the apprehensions of illegals by all 62 departments were done by Sheriff Joe's deputies. That, apparently, is what the DHS wants to stop.

Yesterday, they did it. Sheriff Arpaio was stripped of his 237 (g) funding. He says it won’t slow him down, and that he’ll continue to enforce local, state and federal law.

Sheriff Joe is a national treasure. His fight is our fight.

And just where do Chinese illegals get $70,000 they pay the smugglers to break into our country?

*
Lou Dobbs Tonight
Monday, February 11, 2008
In California, League of United Latin American Citizens has adopted a resolution to declare "California Del Norte" a sanctuary zone for immigrants. The declaration urges the Mexican government to invoke its rights under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo "to seek third nation neutral arbitration of disputes concerning immigration laws and their enforcement." We’ll have the story.
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UNEMPLOYMENT IS NOT HIGH ENOUGH!
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FORECLOSURES ARE NOT HIGH ENOUGH!
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MEXICAN DRUG CARTEL SALES ARE NOT HIGH ENOUGH!
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MEXICAN GANGS NOT MURDERING ENOUGH!
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NUMBER OF ANCHOR BABIES NOT HIGH ENOUGH!
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COSTS OF MEXICAN PRISONERS NOT HIGH ENOUGH!
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COST OF WELFARE FOR ILLEGALS NOT HIGH ENOUGH!
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AND THE ASSAULT TO OUR CULTURE BY ILLEGAL MEXICANS – NOT HIGH ENOUGH! Heard English this week?

*
Obama soft on illegals enforcement

Arrests of illegal immigrant workers have dropped precipitously under President Obama, according to figures released Wednesday. Criminal arrests, administrative arrests, indictments and convictions of illegal immigrants at work sites all fell by more than 50 percent from fiscal 2008 to fiscal 2009.

The figures show that Mr. Obama has made good on his pledge to shift enforcement away from going after illegal immigrant workers themselves - but at the expense of Americans' jobs, said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, the Republican who compiled the numbers from the Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE). Mr. Smith, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee, said a period of economic turmoil is the wrong time to be cutting enforcement and letting illegal immigrants take jobs that Americans otherwise would hold.

JUDICIAL WATCH.org - MEXICO EXPANDS THEIR WELFARE SYSTEM IN OUR BORDERS - Who Pays?

Mexico Promotes Free U.S. Healthcare For Illegal Immigrants
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Time to wake up people! With unemployment at 12% and the state going broke, our tax dollars are going to pay for healthcare for hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens. To the tune of over a billion dollars a year!


Read on:

Mexico's government operates programs in about a dozen American cities that refers its nationals--living in the U.S. illegally--to publicly funded health centers where they can get free medical care without being turned over to immigration authorities.

The program is called Ventanillas de Salud (Health Windows) in Spanish and its mission is to help illegal immigrants find U.S. hospitals, clinics and other government programs where they can get free services without being deported for violating federal immigration laws.

Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, San Diego and Indiana are among the cities where Mexican consulates operate the health referral system which annually costs U.S. taxpayers billions of dollars. In Los Angeles County alone, illegal immigrants cost taxpayers nearly $440 million in health services annually and a whopping $1.1 billion statewide.

The Mexican consul in Los Angeles proudly announced that nearly 300,000 Mexicans in the area have benefited from his government's health referral program, which he says actually saves the county money by encouraging immigrants to seek preventive care rather than waiting for more expensive emergency treatment.

The Southern California operation promises to assess "consulate clients" for eligibility to government-funded health insurance and other primary care services and offers free legal assistance to those who are denied coverage. Its goal is to improve access to health services for immigrants of Mexican origin by formalizing a health education, medical home referral and insurance enrollment program.

In Chicago, the Mexican consul's Spanish-language web site heavily promotes the Illinois Department of Health's low-cost prescription medicine program for illegal aliens and various free medical services throughout the state. It encourages all Mexicans in the area to pursue the valuable U.S. government-financed services for their entire family.

The Indiana-based program boasts that it serves thousands of "Mexican nationals" living in that state as well as Ohio, Kentucky and southern Illinois. Mexican officials claim that its highly successful pro-health program sends out a clear message to other Mexican consulates throughout the country and the world.

Although these programs facilitate people to remain in the country illegally, Mexico is working hard to expand them to all 47 U.S. consulates to better serve its nationals. In the meantime, U.S. taxpayers will keep picking up the exorbitant tab of medically treating the millions who live in the country illegally.

www.judicialwatchwatch.org

MEXICO'S LARGEST EXPORT: Their Poor - THROUGH THE EYES OF AN AMERICAN

MEXICOS LARGEST EXPORT (#1)

yes the poor.

Felix Calderon..the US educated President of mexico said it himself in a speech to his people. He encouraged the people of Mexico to flee north for better opportunities....and most disturbingly....he encouraged the poor, the disenfranchised, the illiterate uneducated and desperate dregs of "his" society.

California does not get the college grads, the proffessors, the doctors, the scientists, the engineers from Mexico.

on the contrary. We get the NON assimilating dregs. Those so far behind the 8-ball in Mexican society that a large percentage of illegal immigrants coming into the US and setting up Camp here....can't even read or write in their Native Language.

When you wonder what it takes to dismantle the achievements of an advanced modern and successful society and at one time the 7th largest economy in the entire world.... POVERTY.

That's all it takes.
Our nation, our politicians....looking the other way as they utlilize a few "immigrant workers" here and there.

Well word gets around quick in 3rd world nations. And when California and the USA for that matter was determined to be an "easy mark" for the poor of Central America and Mexico....

Guess what happened.

That's right. Our fucking door was busted down.

Now there are so many encroaching latino poor in this state that vast stretches of gang ridden tagged up and now filthy Los Angeles look like Mexico City or worse, Tijuana.

If you picked up old High School year books from the 50's and 60's and looked at the picture of the proud successful American communities that were vibrant and thriving...... and then looked at what those communities are today......
If you cared about California, or Los Angeles.
You would fucking cry.


POVERTY BREEDS AND DESTROYS.


That is what Mexcio EXPORTS in the most suffocating number fathomable to mankind.

It's poor.



If you're wealthy here in California....you simply look the other way...their slave labor after all helped put you there.....if you are middle class?

You`ve been fucked!

STOCKTON under OCCUPATION - The MEXICAN CRIME WAVE is EVERYWHERE

AN AMERICAN SPEAKS:



Recession= Less Mexicans

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Date: 2009-11-15, 8:57AM PST

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Due to the Recession, many illegal mexicans, are out of a job. Less Mexicans have entered the United States illegally this past year than years past, according to the US CENSUS BUREAU. Less mexicans have sent money back to mexico this past year than previous years according to Western Union. (whether they are mexicans or others are not determined)

Illegal mexicans who are out of a job cannot claim unemployment benefits, again, pushing them to starvation or back to Mexico. Many are committing more crimes as you can see from the SPD. Police Log. 90% or higher are names of Mexicans, illegal or not.

The Most wanted fugitives in Stockton are ALL MEXICANS!

Most decrepit and run down parts of the city are all mexican filled areas.

What does this say? They come in flocks, they ruin whatever area they settle, they breed like rabbits. You could classify them as a virus. Multiplying in hordes, and wreaking havoc everywhere they go.

Thank God for this recession because it has rid a lot of parts of the city of mexicans. I know for a fact in my ares Crime has been down, i have not seen any vandalism, trash, or hordes of mexicans sitting on their front steps. Spanish music coming out of cars has been down or non existent. Lawn mowers and weed whackers are now safely off the street. The neighborhood is now CLEAN, SAFE, THANK YOU RECESSION!!!

WHY IDIOTS ONLY WANT ILLEGALS HERE - An American Speaks

OBAMA'S LA RAZA MINISTER FOR "HOMELAND SECURITY = PATHWAY TO CITIZENSHIP" WORKS HARD BUYING OBAMA'S NEXT ROUND OF VOTERS; THE MEXICAN OCCUPIERS!


Why idiots only want illegals here (Texas)

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Date: 2009-11-17, 5:01AM PST


Reply to: pers-6vzhj-1469690401@craigslist.org [Errors when replying to ads?]

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More than 22,000 illegal immigrants with criminal charges or convictions have been arrested in Texas through a 1-year-old program that links FBI and federal immigration databases, Homeland Security officials said Thursday.

About 12 percent of them, or 2,700 people, were charged or convicted of what authorities call "level one" crimes such as murder, rape, kidnapping or narcotics violations with a sentence of more than one year.

The real question is of the 22,000 they arrested how many more did they miss, and how long does it take the illegal to sneak back across the border once deported?

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION and the FEDERAL BUDGET - Then Why Is AMNESTY on the Table?

Illegal Immigration and the Federal Budget

Executive Summary


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This study is one of the first to estimate the total impact of illegal immigration on the federal budget. Most previous studies have focused on the state and local level and have examined only costs or tax payments, but not both. Based on Census Bureau data, this study finds that, when all taxes paid (direct and indirect) and all costs are considered, illegal households created a net fiscal deficit at the federal level of more than $10 billion in 2002. We also estimate that, if there was an amnesty for illegal aliens, the net fiscal deficit would grow to nearly $29 billion.

Among the findings:

Households headed by illegal aliens imposed more than $26.3 billion in costs on the federal government in 2002 and paid only $16 billion in taxes, creating a net fiscal deficit of almost $10.4 billion, or $2,700 per illegal household.


Among the largest costs are Medicaid ($2.5 billion); treatment for the uninsured ($2.2 billion); food assistance programs such as food stamps, WIC, and free school lunches ($1.9 billion); the federal prison and court systems ($1.6 billion); and federal aid to schools ($1.4 billion).


With nearly two-thirds of illegal aliens lacking a high school degree, the primary reason they create a fiscal deficit is their low education levels and resulting low incomes and tax payments, not their legal status or heavy use of most social services.


On average, the costs that illegal households impose on federal coffers are less than half that of other households, but their tax payments are only one-fourth that of other households.


Many of the costs associated with illegals are due to their American-born children, who are awarded U.S. citizenship at birth. Thus, greater efforts at barring illegals from federal programs will not reduce costs because their citizen children can continue to access them.


If illegal aliens were given amnesty and began to pay taxes and use services like households headed by legal immigrants with the same education levels, the estimated annual net fiscal deficit would increase from $2,700 per household to nearly $7,700, for a total net cost of $29 billion.


Costs increase dramatically because unskilled immigrants with legal status -- what most illegal aliens would become -- can access government programs, but still tend to make very modest tax payments.


Although legalization would increase average tax payments by 77 percent, average costs would rise by 118 percent.


The fact that legal immigrants with few years of schooling are a large fiscal drain does not mean that legal immigrants overall are a net drain -- many legal immigrants are highly skilled.


The vast majority of illegals hold jobs. Thus the fiscal deficit they create for the federal government is not the result of an unwillingness to work.


The results of this study are consistent with a 1997 study by the National Research Council, which also found that immigrants' education level is a key determinant

An AMERICAN Speaks ILLEGALS & JOBS - or, NO LEGAL NEED APPLY?

Illegals & Jobs

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Date: 2009-11-21, 5:17AM PST

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Tens of millions illegals are wreaking havoc in this country just by being here. And, yes, they are taking jobs.

My teenage daughter wanted a low-paying job last summer and she couldn't find one. But everywhere you go there are Mex's working the counters.

And don't forget the anchors. These kids are getting a free ride through 12th grade. When they graduate they DO compete and sometimes take jobs American kids would normally have. At an average of 4 anchor kids (low end) per illegal family the number of anchors is mind boggling -- and growing.

You seem to be myopic. It's the long-term ramifications that will destroy this country.

If you think illegals are in the fields doing nothing but picking fruit then your blind.

I can't wait for the next amnesty scheduled for 2010. Then it hits the fan.