McCAIN'S LONG, LONG, LONG HISTORY OF HISPANDERING FOR THE ILLEGALS' VOTES - Even As AZ Says NO!

Article published May 6, 2008

McCain courts Hispanic voters

May 6, 2008 By Stephen Dinan

Sen. John McCain said yesterday that Republicans have shed support among Hispanic voters because of the party's get-tough approach to illegal immigration, but he predicted that his enforcement-then- legalization approach will rebuild those bridges. Using a Mexican holiday, Cinco de Mayo, as a launching point, Mr. McCain's presidential campaign announced a Spanish-language Web site (www.johnmccain.com/ espanol), and said the senator from Arizona will speak to this year's National Council of La Raza convention in San Diego in July to try to court Hispanic voters. "I believe the majority of the Hispanics share our view that the border must be secured, and the border must be secured first. But they also want us to have an attitude, which I think most Americans do, that these are God's children, and they must be taken care of, and the issue must be addressed in a humane and compassionate fashion," Mr. McCain told reporters at an Arizona news conference yesterday. Hispanic support for President Bush in the 2004 election topped 40 percent by most estimates, but has fallen in the wake of the congressional immigration debate. Now, nearly a year after the Senate rejected the immigration legalization bill supported by Mr. McCain, Mr. Bush and Democratic leaders, the issue is rising again, but a viable solution seems no closer. House Democrats want a compromise that would allow more foreign workers for farms, high-tech firms and seasonal businesses, but the Congressional Hispanic Caucus has said it will oppose such a bill unless it also allows for some form of legal status for current illegal immigrants. Meanwhile, a vocal group of conservative Democrats and Republicans is demanding an enforcement-only approach. Today, the House will hold a hearing on an enforcement bill that would require employers to check a government database known as the E-Verify system before they hire. That bill is sponsored by Rep. Heath Shuler, a North Carolina Democrat who has broken with his party's general stance on immigration, and is backed by House Republicans who are running a petition drive to try to force a floor vote on the measure. Yesterday, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced it was adding new databases to the E-Verify system to reduce false hits for naturalized citizens whose work-authorization records aren't up-to-date. That should cut more than half of false hits, agency officials said. Mr. McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has tried to straddle the line on immigration after his support for legalizing illegal immigrants nearly cost him the nomination. In 2006 and 2007, he was a chief backer, along with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat, of a bill to legalize most illegal immigrants and to dramatically boost immigration. Last year, that bill failed when a majority of senators joined a filibuster to block it. Some opponents said the bill amounted to a lenient "amnesty," while others called it too harsh. Mr. McCain said the bill failed because voters didn't trust the government to handle the security side. Since then, he has said his first priority would be to secure the borders and require border state governors to certify that before turning his attention to a legalization program for the country's illegal immigrants. The Democratic National Committee said he will have to choose between enforcement or legalization. The Democratic presidential candidates, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, have said they would allow for legalization. "It's hard to know what someone's real vision for our country is when they consistently take every side of the issues," said DNC spokesman Luis Miranda. "John McCain cannot have it both ways. He cannot pander to the right wing of his party by promising an enforcement-only approach to immigration while telling Hispanics that he supports comprehensive reform." Immigration advocates said an enforcement-first approach is still too harsh. “LET’S LEGALIZE EVERYBODY!” "Anti-immigrant-light is no more acceptable than anti-immigrant," said Eliseo Medina, international executive vice president of the Service Employees International Union, who added that the proper solution was to offer legal status across the board. "Let's legalize everybody, and then let's figure out what we need to do to ensure we have a legal program going forward." Mr. McCain has acknowledged his close call with voters on this issue in the primaries. Asked whether he feared voter backlash again in the general election, the senator said that's out of his hands. “FUCK THE GRINGOS! I WORK FOR MY CORPORATE MASTERS, THE LA RAZA DONORS THAT MUST HAVE CHEAP LABOR subsidized by the stupid gringos!” "I don't know, but I can't worry about that," he said. ......................................................... WHAT HAPPENS TO A STATE WHEN THE MEXICAN INVADE! SMALL TOWNS, BIG GANGS TAKE OVER CENTRAL VALLEY OF CALIFORNIA Law enforcement officials are trying to crack down on the urban problems that have begun to spread into the Central Valley. By Tim Reiterman Los Angeles Times Staff Writer February 24, 2008 DELANO — Here in the birthplace of Cesar Chavez's nonviolent farm labor movement, a 14-year-old who aspired to become a policeman is cut down by gunfire on his front porch. In the farm town of Merced, billed as the gateway to Yosemite, an armed gang member shoots an officer after a vehicle stop -- the first police slaying in the city's 118-year history. And in Red Bluff, which prides itself on its Victorian homes, rodeos, hunting and fishing, a teenage gangster pumps seven bullets into another high school student outside a party. Along the 450 miles of the Central Valley, an explosion of gang violence in recent years has transformed life on the wide, tree-lined streets of California's agricultural heartland. As jobs and relatively affordable housing in the fast-growing region have attracted families from the Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay areas, law enforcement officials say, some have brought gang ties with them, aggravating the valley's home-grown street crime. "What we are seeing is a migration of gangs from larger cities . . . to more rural areas," said Jerry Hunter, who oversees state Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown's anti-gang units. "The gang activity . . . is a huge crisis for those communities." The spread of gang violence has strained police resources and rendered some playgrounds and streets off limits. Bullets have shattered the peace in parks and strip malls. Some graffiti cleanup crews in Stanislaus County have bulletproof vests or police escorts. Lifeguards in Turlock no longer sport traditional red or blue swimwear -- those gang colors might provoke gunfire. Schools in many places have adopted anti-gang dress codes, and rumors of impending gang attacks sometimes scare students from classes. Fear has silenced witnesses to gang crimes. Up and down the valley, task forces have been formed as evidence mounts that street hoodlums are committing homicides, robberies and car thefts and trafficking in drugs. Some communities have taxed themselves to pay for more police. Local, state and federal sweeps have produced thousands of arrests -- but tens of thousands more gang members remain on the streets, authorities say. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has appointed former Sacramento U.S. Atty. Paul Seave as his anti-gang chief, hoping to improve the effectiveness and collaboration of state agencies that spend hundreds of millions of dollars a year to prevent and combat gang violence. And Brown has declared the gang problem a top priority, likening it to domestic terrorism. His office is providing local agencies with expertise, intelligence and agents for raids. The Central Valley contains eight of the 22 counties that had the most gang-related homicides in 2005 and 2006, Seave said. And annual California Department of Justice figures show that the number of valley gang killings has accelerated, as has the number of law enforcement agencies reporting such crimes. In 1997, 50 gang-related homicides were reported, compared with 80 in 2006, the most recent year for which statistics are available. Gang violence came with startling brutality to the Tehama County town of Red Bluff, at the northern reaches of the Sacramento River. After a 17-year-old Sureño gang member repeatedly shot a 16-year-old Norteño gang member outside a house party, rumors of an attack on a local high school caused many students to stay home. The young gang member was sentenced last year to 25 years to life in prison for the 2006 shooting. "This is a small town, and . . . we're not used to those types of things happening," said Greg Ulloa, the county's juvenile probation chief. "But it is getting worse." The lower end of the valley has long been known as the Mason-Dixon Line of California's major Latino gang rivalry. But now clashes between the Sureños, or southerners, and the Norteños, northerners, have migrated through the state. "In the eastern part of the county, families are moving in from the L.A. basin," said Kern County Sheriff's Sgt. Mike Whiting. The gang members who come with them, he said, "are small fish there, but they can be bigger fish here." The North-South conflicts are particularly pronounced in Delano. It is territory claimed by the Norteños, whose traditional strongholds are farming communities and who have adopted as their insignia a version of the United Farm Workers Union's Aztec Eagle symbol. But the town has Sureños too and is only seven miles from that gang's turf in McFarland. One night last year, 14-year-old Steven Fierro, a freshman at Delano's Cesar Chavez High School, was standing outside his tidy tract home with his older brother and two of his brother's friends when they were strafed by rifle fire from a car. Steven was killed and the others wounded in what police say is an unsolved shooting rooted in the gang rivalry. Steven's mother Isabel keeps a small, candlelight shrine inside her front door to remind her of a son she describes as good-hearted, loving and not a gang member. He wanted to be a policeman, she said, and hoped to buy a bigger house and nice car for his mom, who works in a horticultural facility. She left Steven's room untouched -- with his video games, baseball photos and paintball gun. "Maybe this way I'm thinking he has gone off to school and will be back," she said, weeping. "The same night they killed my son, they killed me also." Police, school officials and community groups say gang violence cannot be curtailed without prevention and intervention. Some towns teach parents to be on alert for signs, such as red or blue clothing, shoes and handkerchiefs, that their children might be drifting toward gangs. Other towns have stepped up recreational activities to keep youngsters busy. Even when law enforcement agencies record successes against a gang, members often move elsewhere, as some may have done after crackdowns on Fresno's Bulldogs gang. It has an estimated 6,000 members. Police in nearby Selma are now seeing Bulldogs, with their dog-paw tattoos, standing on street corners literally barking warnings when squad cars approach. There have been drive-by shootings in midday, and police say one crime witness was wounded by gang members who shot through her front door. The rise of gang violence "has caught us off guard and shocked our community," said Selma Police Chief Tom Whiteside, noting that the town of about 24,000 had five gang homicides in the last three years. "Today, gang crime is probably No. 1 on everyone's radar screen in the valley." Selma voters overwhelmingly approved a half-cent sales tax in November that will allow its police force to nearly double in the next decade. The Bulldogs have adopted the red theme and menacing mascot of Cal State Fresno's athletic teams, sometimes blurring the visual lines between gang members and others. "An Hispanic group occasionally will be in a compromising position at a mini-market or walking down the street . . . because they are wearing . . . Bulldog-related clothing," said Fresno Police Sgt. Bill Grove. "It poses problems for law enforcement as well. . . . We come into contact with known gang members and they claim they are just fans of the teams." University officials say they will not surrender their mascot to gangs. "By changing our name, it would reward them," said Paul Oliaro, vice president for student affairs. A striking case of mistaken identity visited Atwater, 200 miles to the north. A Fresno State student, home for the weekend several years ago, was jogging in her red school T-shirt when someone yelled at her for wearing Norteño colors and fired five shots from a car, narrowly missing her. "Gang members do not heed borders," he said. "Gang members move here but do not cut their ties." ................................................................ The Real Cost Of Immigration Investor’s Business Daily Immigration: As some experts tell Congress to fight a possible recession with more immigrants, a respected economist warns that immigration’s costs are grossly underestimated — because the government won’t study them. Set for release Tuesday is a report published by Social Contract magazine, "The Fiscal Impact of Immigration: An Analysis of the Costs to 15 Federal Departments and Agencies." The 70-page study was conducted by Manhattan Institute adjunct fellow Edwin S. Rubenstein. As senior economist at W.R. Grace & Co. in the 1980s, he directed in-depth studies of government waste for the Grace Commission that sparked much popular outrage against Washington’s spendthrift habits. Rubenstein found that each immigrant costs taxpayers more than $9,000, while every immigrant household of four costs $36,000 in taxes. That’s far more than the $3,408 in 2007 dollars the National Research Council’s 1997 "New Americans" study of federal, state and local government expenditures found immigrants to cost. "The federal government has never produced a comprehensive study of this issue," Rubenstein noted. "Executive agencies are not required to do Fiscal Impact Statements for new immigration policies. Even the immigration reform legislation sent to Congress last year contained not one word on its potential budgetary consequences." So Rubenstein looked across the government at departments and agencies that include Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Education, Energy, Interior, Justice, Labor, HHS, HUD, Transportation, Treasury and the State Department, as well as Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration. His purpose was "to increase awareness — within the government and among citizens — of the myriad ways by which immigration increases the cost of government and how government policies increase immigration." Looking at education alone, Rubenstein found that about "3.8 million public school students — 7.9% of total K to 12 enrollment — are enrolled in classes for English language learners," according to Department of Education statistics. These classes are significantly more expensive than mainstream English classes. Personnel costs include specialized teachers who supplement instruction provided by the mainstream English teacher and professional development to strengthen the skills of teachers working with English language learners. Rand Corp. researchers discovered back in 1981 that added costs for language assistance instruction ranged from $100 to $500 per pupil. Added to that are program administration costs, staff development and functions such as student identification and assessment. Rand found that "the total additional per pupil costs for language assistance instruction was estimated to be in the range of  $460 to $1,600 in 2007 dollars," according to Rubenstein’s extrapolations, making "the total cost of providing English Language Learning instruction to the 3.8 million students enrolled in those programs  about $3.9 billion ($1,030 times 3.8 million)." With more than 140 languages spoken in, for instance, Connecticut’s schools, bilingual education requirements for immigrants are on track to becoming a crippling unfunded mandate imposed on states and school districts. Turning to the Department of Justice, the study found criminal aliens to be "an increasing burden on U.S. prison systems." In 1980, federal and state facilities held fewer than 9,000 criminal aliens, Rubenstein said. But at the end of 2004, about 267,000 noncitizens were incarcerated in U.S. correctional facilities. Of all prisoners in federal prisons, 27% are criminal aliens, he found, with a total cost of $1.5 billion. But that may be low-balling it. "A shortage of available prison capacity has forced federal authorities to release criminal aliens prematurely. Nationally an estimated 80,000 to 100,000 illegal immigrants who have been convicted of serious crimes still walk the streets," he said. On top of that are the private costs criminal aliens impose on their victims. Analyzing the rap sheets of 55,000 incarcerated illegal aliens in 2003, the Government Accountability Office found that the average criminal alien was arrested for 13 prior offenses, 12% of which were cases of murder, robbery, assault and sexually related crimes; only 21% were immigration offenses, the rest being felonies. "The economic burden they impose on victims, including loss of income and property, uncompensated hospital bills, and emotional pain and suffering, has been estimated at $1.6 million per property and assault crime offender," Rubenstein found. Washington has been paralyzed for many years on immigration policies because advocates of restricted immigration are routinely accused of nativism and racism. Rubenstein’s groundbreaking study, of which the facts above offer only a taste, suggests that Washington doesn’t want to take a good look at the issue because the facts will spur the public to demand action to stop the hemorrhage of taxpayer money out-of-control immigration is causing.