Saturday, November 14, 2015

Mexico and the Mexican Fascist Party of LA RAZA (U.S. TAX SUPPORTED) Endorse Sen. Marco Rubio as America's Successor to La Raza Supremacist Barack Obama - Will Rubio implement the Obama IMPERIAL AMNESTY? He's already promised it!

The immigration system Marco Rubio wanted



Saturday | November 14, 2015


The immigration system Marco Rubio wanted

 
The 2013 Gang of Eight comprehensive immigration reform bill is the signature achievement of Marco Rubio's four years and ten months in the U.S. Senate. Yet in the first four Republican presidential debates, in which Rubio has played an increasingly prominent role, he has not been asked even once about the specifics of the legislation.
Despite that omission, it seems likely that if Rubio continues to rise in the GOP race, someone, somewhere will pay attention to his most important accomplishment. The 1,197-page Gang of Eight bill is so far-reaching, and at the same time so detailed, that it provides a sharp picture of where Rubio would like to take the U.S. immigration system. Rubio has renounced parts of his own work, but it's not clear which parts, and it's not clear if he has renounced them for good or only until he determines they are more politically practicable.
Related Story: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/article/2575923
So until Rubio faces the inevitable questioning about his work, here are some features of the Gang of Eight legislation that might attract discussion as the Republican race goes forward.

1.) More immigration
 
 Comprehensive immigration reform means more immigrants coming to the United States, and with the Gang of Eight Rubio would have dramatically increased that number. "The legislation would loosen or eliminate annual limits on various categories of permanent and temporary immigration," the Congressional Budget Office wrote in its 2013 assessment of the legislation. "If [the bill] was enacted, CBO estimates, the U.S. population would be larger by about 10 million people in 2023 and by about 16 million people in 2033 than projected under current law."
Those numbers are wildly out of touch with the wishes of Republican voters — and of all voters, for that matter. Recently Pew Research asked Americans whether immigration should be "kept at its present level, increased or decreased." Among Republicans, just 7 percent supported increasing the level of immigration, which is at the heart of the Gang of Eight. Among independents, 17 percent supported increased immigration, along with 20 percent of Democrats. So while huge majorities do not support increasing immigration, the gap is particularly large among Republicans, whose presidential nomination Rubio is seeking.

2.) Immediate legalization of illegal immigrants

A fundamental and, as it turned out, fatal flaw of the Gang of Eight was apparent the first day Rubio and his fellow lawmakers announced the reform project, on Jan. 28, 2013. "On day one of our bill, the people without status who are not criminals or security risks will be able to live and work here legally," Rubio's co-author, Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer, said in a press conference with Rubio and the rest of the Gang.

Conservatives — the ones who remembered the debacle of the 1986 immigration deal, in which legalization of illegal immigrants came first but promised border security measures never happened — were stunned. They demanded that new border security and interior enforcement measures be in place and running before legalization.


oughout the months of writing and promoting the Gang of Eight bill, Rubio reassured skeptics the legislation would be very tough on illegal immigrants who are criminals. They wouldn't be allowed to stay. "They will have to come forward and pass a rigorous background check," Rubio said in April 2013. "If they're criminals, they won't qualify."

When the bill's language was made public, Rubio's promises didn't seem so tough. The legislation forbade the legalization of immigrants who had been convicted of a felony or of three or more misdemeanors. But there were some big exceptions.
First, if breaking the immigration laws was an "essential element" of any criminal conviction, it wouldn't count.
Second, the bill said the three misdemeanors that could disqualify an immigrant would count as three misdemeanors only "if the alien was convicted on different dates for each of the three offenses."
That meant that in the case of a person accused of multiple misdemeanors, and convicted of them during a single court session — a fairly common occurrence — the multiple convictions would count as just one conviction for the purposes of the Gang of Eight bill. Given that in some U.S. jurisdictions, some cases of vehicular manslaughter, drunk driving, domestic violence, sex offenses and theft are all categorized as misdemeanors, an illegal immigrant could be convicted of multiple serious crimes and still stay in the country.

Finally, Rubio gave the Secretary of Homeland Security broad authority to issue waivers to criminal immigrants. "The secretary may waive [the misdemeanor and other requirements] on behalf of an alien for humanitarian purposes, to ensure family unity, or if such a waiver is otherwise in the public interest," the bill said. That could mean almost anything

4.) An unclear enforcement guarantee
During the selling of the Gang of Eight, Rubio pushed back against skeptics who suggested the executive branch — whether the Obama administration or any other administration — would actually enact tough border security. Rubio's trump card was the bill's provision for something called the Southern Border Security Commission. Made up of border state governors plus representatives appointed by the president, the House and the Senate, the commission, according to Rubio, would take charge of border security if an administration failed to do so.
Rubio promised conservatives that the commission would have actual authority to enact security. The bill "requires if the Department of Homeland Security does not achieve 100 percent operational awareness and 90 percent apprehensions on the border, they lose control of the issue, to a commission, not a Washington commission, to a local commission, made up of the governors of the four border states ... where they will then finish the job of securing the border, including the fencing plan," Rubio told radio host Mark Levin in April 2013. Rubio told many other people the same thing.
It wasn't true. When the bill came out, it said the commission's "primary responsibility ... shall be making recommendations" to the president and Congress on "policies to achieve and maintain the border security goal." The bill said the commission would have six months to write a report with security recommendations; after giving its advice, it would be disbanded within 30 days.
The commission was, in other words, just another Washington commission. It had no actual power to do anything, regardless of what Rubio said.


5.) An imbalanced work force
Almost all immigration reformers, Rubio included, argue that the current American immigration system allows in too many unskilled immigrants and too few skilled ones. Rubio used that argument for the Gang of Eight. "I'm a big believer in family-based immigration," he told The Wall Street Journal in January 2013. "But I don't think that in the 21st century we can continue to have an immigration system where only 6.5 percent of people who come here, come here based on labor and skill. We have to move toward merit and skill-based immigration."
When the Gang of Eight bill was released, it became clear that Rubio and the Gang, while increasing high-skilled immigration into the United States, increased low-skilled immigration even more.
"[The bill] would allow significantly more workers with low skills and with high skills to enter the United States — through, for example, new programs for temporary workers and an increase in the number of workers eligible for H-1B visas," the CBO noted. "Taking into account all of those flows of new immigrants, CBO and [the Joint Committee on Taxation] expect that a greater number of immigrants with lower skills than with higher skills would be added to the workforce."


6.) The legalization trigger loophole
Many conservatives worried that the legalization for illegal immigrants, once offered, would inevitably become permanent. Rubio sought to reassure them by explaining that the Gang bill would require a "trigger," by which registered provisional immigrants could attain permanent status only after a long set of border security measures were put into place.


The actual bill, however, directed the secretary of Homeland Security to start the permanent legalization process even if the conditions had not been me. The Gang bill specified that permanent legalization would begin 10 years after passage of the legislation, whether or not the border provisions were in place. Even if the delay was the result of lawsuits tying up progress on border security, the bill said permanent legalization would go forward.


7.) Government micromanagement and special favors
The Gang of Eight bill included page after page of new laws governing the agricultural sector of the economy. After months of delicate negotiations between labor and business, Rubio and his colleagues decided to dictate wages, to the penny, for millions of agricultural workers. The bill specified a number of categories — agricultural products graders and sorters; animal breeders; farmworkers and crop, nursery and greenhouse laborers; agricultural equipment operators, etc.
For each, it laid out specific pay rates for 2014, 2015, 2016 and beyond. For example, farmworkers would be paid $9.17 an hour in 2014, $9.40 an hour in 201, and $9.64 an hour in 2016. Agricultural equipment operators would be paid $11.30 an hour in 2014, $11.58 an hour in 2015 and $11.87 an hour in 2016. And so on. Rubio and the Gang then set out a detailed formula for determining wages in the years after 2016.
As for special favors, Rubio and the Gang gave a number of breaks to specific business areas — tourism, cruise ship operators, meat packing plants and more. Perhaps the most famous is what might be called the Snowboard Exception. The original version of Rubio's bill extended the time limit for visas for "a ski instructor seeking to enter the United States temporarily to perform instructing services."
Not long after the bill was released, an amended version appeared, changing the language to "a ski instructor, who has been certified as a level I, II or III ski and snowboard instructor by the Professional Ski Instructors of America or the American Association of Snowboard Instructors ... seeking to enter the United States temporarily to perform instructing services." The snowboard instructors, ignored in the original bill, got their break in the final version.


8.) Fast tracks on the road to citizenship
During the selling of the Gang of Eight, Rubio repeatedly emphasized that newly-legalized illegal immigrants would have to go through years of procedures — maintaining a clean record, learning English, etc. — and still have to wait 10 years before even having a chance to apply for permanent legal residents, and only then if the border has been certified secure. Citizenship might lie many years beyond.
As it turned out, Rubio's bill contained some much quicker ways for illegal immigrants to gain permanent legal status. A provision in the Gang of Eight allowed immigrants with even a limited connection to the agricultural economy to gain legal status in half the time Rubio said. This is from a piece I wrote in April 2013:

The Gang of Eight bill creates something called a blue card, which would be granted to illegal immigrant farm workers who come forward and pass the various background checks the bill requires for all illegal immigrants. Instead of the 10-year wait Rubio described in media appearances, blue card holders could receive permanent legal status in just five years.

How does an illegal immigrant qualify for a blue card? If, after passing the background checks, he can prove that he has worked in agriculture for at least 575 hours — about 72 eight-hour days — sometime in the two years ending Dec. 31, 2012, he can be granted a blue card. His spouse and children can be granted blue cards, too — it can all be done with one application ...

[After five years], the legislation requires the Secretary of Homeland Security to change the blue card holder's status to that of permanent resident if the immigrant has worked in agriculture at least 150 days in each of three of those five years since the bill became law. A work day is defined as 5.75 hours.

Also, the immigrant can qualify for permanent residence with less than three years, of 150 work days each, if he can show that he was disabled, ill or had to deal with the "special needs of a child" during that time period. He can also shorten the requirement if "severe weather conditions" prevented him for working for a long period of time, or if he was fired from his agricultural job — provided it was not for just cause — and then couldn't find work.
So for many illegal immigrants, there was no 10-year wait. And Rubio and the Gang granted similar fast-track five-year status to so-called Dreamers who came to the U.S. before age 16 — and also to their spouses and children.



9.) An all-powerful Secretary of Homeland Security
For all its specificity, the Gang of Eight bill granted enormous discretionary powers to the secretary of Homeland Security; it would not be much of an exaggeration to say that for many of the seemingly hard-and-fast requirements in the bill there is a provision giving the secretary the authority to grant a waiver.
One way to see that is to search the bill's text for the phrase "the secretary may," which generally means the secretary has been given the authority to ignore or waive some requirement in the bill. The misdemeanor waiver earlier in this article is just one example. Waiving the blue card requirements is another.
There are more. For example, the secretary can re-admit to the United States an illegal immigrant who has been deported if the secretary determines it is in the "public interest." And in some cases, Rubio and the Gang gave "sole and unreviewable discretion" to the secretary to decide when an illegal immigrant may stay in the country legally.

THE TAX FREE MEXICAN UNDERGROUND ECONOMY IN LA RAZA-OCCUPIED LOS ANGELES IS ESTIMATED TO BE MORE THAN $2 BILLION DOLLARS PER YEAR! THIS SAME COUNTY HANDS MEXICO'S ANCHOR BABY BREEDERS MORE THAN A BILLION IN WELFARE!

10.) A disappearing back taxes requirement

During the sales period for the Gang of Eight, Rubio said many times that the bill would require immigrants to pay back taxes. "They would have to ... pay back taxes," Rubio told The Wall Street Journal in that January 2013 interview. But when the bill was released, the requirement wasn't much of a requirement. The legislation did not require illegal immigrants to pay back taxes in order to be given registered provisional immigrant status.
It did say that when, after five or 10 years, that immigrant applied for permanent legal status, he or she would have to have "satisfied any applicable federal tax liability," which the Gang defined as "all federal income taxes assessed." That meant the immigrant had to pay any existing IRS liability — except that as illegal immigrants, many had never filed paperwork with the IRS to pay taxes in the first place and thus had no existing liability in IRS files. No matter what Rubio said, the bill did not require all illegal immigrants to pay back taxes.
The Gang of Eight bill passed the Senate on June 27, 2013. The vote was 68-32; the winning total was reached by unanimous support of the Senate's 54 Democrats, plus 13 of Rubio's fellow Republicans, and of course Rubio himself. After the vote, Rubio turned on his own handiwork, with a spokesman saying he opposed passage in the House. The bill was stopped when Speaker John Boehner rejected efforts to bring it up for a vote and House Republicans declined to pass their own version of comprehensive immigration reform.
This year, Rubio refused to answer the question of whether he would sign the Gang of Eight bill if he were president. Future immigration reform, Rubio now argues, must be done piecemeal, with legalization measures coming after the implementation of security. But the Gang of Eight was a big bill. For many Republicans, and indeed for many in the public at large, its problems went far beyond sequencing. If Rubio continues to play a leading role in the Republican presidential race, those problems will receive renewed attention.

Republican presidential candidate Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla. during a campaign event at Saint Anselm College in Manchester, N.H., Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2015.
Charles Krupa

Cruz Fought Amnesty, Rubio Fought Conservatives

By: Daniel Horowitz | November 13th, 2015
    • i remember the spring of 2013 like it was yesterday.  It was one of the busiest times of my career.  Republicans were working overtime to codify Obama’s open borders agenda into law, and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) was the ring leader of the effort.  The voice of the people was not being heard and we were subjected to fallacious talking points on a daily basis. 
Instead of working with conservatives, Rubio and his office coordinated attacks on conservatives together with liberals.
Along with several other conservative writers, I wrote dozens of articles exposing the details and the broader implications of the 1,000-page piece of bilge that is known as the “Gang of 8” bill.  Instead of working with conservatives, Rubio and his office coordinated attacks on conservatives together with liberals.  Even after all of his promises were exposed as pure fabrications, he still went on to star in ads for Mark Zuckerberg touting his bill as something it was not. 
Now Rubio wants our votes and suddenly he is on our side. 

In order to convince voters that he has walked the Road to Damascus on the road to winning Des Moines, his campaign is promulgating the following narrative: Rubio learned his lesson from the Gang of 8 and now shares the same views on immigration as Ted Cruz, so nothing to see here – let’s move on.
There is a lot to like about Marco Rubio.  But as it relates to the all-important compound issue of immigration, one would have to erase all of history to suggest he is on the same playing field as Ted Cruz.  When it mattered, Cruz wasn’t just a vote for sovereignty and security, he was a voice for it.  Rubio wasn’t just a vote for Obama’s prize agenda, he was a voice for it.               
For those of us who fought with everything we had to defeat the Gang of 8 despite Rubio’s best effort to score the ultimate game-winning touchdown for Obama, we can’t just let this go.  The only similarity Rubio and Cruz share as it relates to immigration is the same similarity that a firefighter and an arsonist share with regards to fire – they were both there at the scene of the crime.  The one was a perpetrator of the problem; the other was part of the solution.


Rubio Negated His Own Talking Points at the Time



As highlighted in his Conservative Review profile, Rubio was promoting his bill as ‘enforcement first’ even as he was voting down amendments to make the bill do just that.  It’s not just that Rubio changed his position to “enforcement first,” it’s that he touted that Gang of 8 bill for months as doing just thatHe opposed the following amendments:
  •  A provision to ensure that the border is secured before any amnesty is granted. (Senate.gov)
  •  A provision requiring completion of the reinforced double-layered border fencing. He was one of only five Republicans to do so. (Senate.gov)
  •  A provision requiring that a visa tracking system be implemented before any amnesty is granted. (Senate.gov)
  •  A provision that would require congressional votes affirming the border has been secured before the granting of temporary legal status. (Senate.gov)
As noted in our guide to political conversions, a legitimate recent convert to a cause is usually the most zealous in championing the issue unprompted by political pressure.  When Cruz was fighting Obama’s executive amnesty, the border surge, sanctuary cities, the release of criminal aliens, the Islamic refugee scheme, and homegrown terror threats via immigration – using all his platforms on committee, floor speeches, and in the media – where was Rubio?  Until Breitbart called him out for not supporting a single enforcement effort, Rubio never even signed onto the effort against sanctuary cities. 
Moreover, even long after the Gang of 8, Rubio continued to promote his amnesty agenda and gave tail winds to Obama instead of actually fighting him on his executive amnesty.  While Cruz was fighting DACA, Rubio was saying he’d keep it and the only problem he had with it is that it wasn’t permanent amnesty.  He seemed to be bothered more by Obama poisoning the well against his legislative amnesty effort than actually stopping Obama’s broader open borders agenda.
Every candidate engages in conversions while running for office to a certain extent.  Even Cruz has changed his tune on H1B visas.  But Cruz has a lot more credibility on the overall immigration issue because “enforcement first” has been more than a campaign talking point to serve as window dressing for amnesty; it has embodied his tenure in the Senate. 
Ask yourself this question: do you believe in your heart of hearts that Rubio will fight for conservatives on sovereignty and borders the minute he wins the primary and commences his general election messaging? 

 
- See more at: https://www.conservativereview.com/commentary/2015/11/cruz-fought-amnesty-rubio-fought-conservatives?utm_source=E-mail+Updates&utm_campaign=e9ef12a58c-Immigration_Opinions_11_13_1511_13_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_7dc4c5d977-e9ef12a58c-45100901#top

Turning Cruz’s Firefighting Into Arson


Rubio is now suggesting that Cruz also supported amnesty because at the time of the Gang of 8 debate, Cruz introduced an amendment stripping the provision providing a path to citizenship from the bill.  Rubio’s camp disingenuously submits that this act means Cruz implicitly supported legalization so long as no citizenship is involved.
Perhaps Rubio is unfamiliar with an amendment strategy when fighting legislation because he has been in very few firefights for the cause of conservatism since his election to the Senate.  One way of embarrassing and exposing proponents of a bad bill is by introducing amendments to tweak the bill with changes its proponents are hard-pressed to oppose.  This doesn’t mean the senator would otherwise support the legislation if it contained those changes, it’s merely a strategy to derail the bill altogether.
It’s for this reason that Rubio, during one of the few battles he actively fought, introduced an amendment to the Corker-Cardin bill forcing Iran to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.  It’s not that he otherwise would have been fine with the Iran deal or the Corker-Cardin process.  This was merely a way to expose the other side for their extreme position. 
This is what Cruz was doing when he introduced amendments to pause any amnesty until the enforcement was implemented or to take away the pathway to citizenship or his amendment to expand legal immigration.  He wanted to show that the entire Gang effort had nothing to do with being compassionate, pro-immigrant, or enforcement oriented – as proponents of the bill, including Rubio, so ardently asserted – rather this was a scheme to create new Democrat voters and disenfranchise the citizenry. Indeed, Senator Sessions, who clearly opposes legalization, supported Cruz’s amendment, while Rubio’s fellow Gang members on committee opposed it.
Hence, in the irony of all ironies, Rubio is using the hard work of Cruz in defeating his bill to suggest that they really share the same view!
Rubio was promoting his bill as ‘enforcement first’ even as he was voting down amendments to make the bill do just that.


Rubio Negated His Own Talking Points at the Time



As highlighted in his Conservative Review profile, Rubio was promoting his bill as ‘enforcement first’ even as he was voting down amendments to make the bill do just that.  It’s not just that Rubio changed his position to “enforcement first,” it’s that he touted that Gang of 8 bill for months as doing just thatHe opposed the following amendments:
  •  A provision to ensure that the border is secured before any amnesty is granted. (Senate.gov)
  •  A provision requiring completion of the reinforced double-layered border fencing. He was one of only five Republicans to do so. (Senate.gov)
  •  A provision requiring that a visa tracking system be implemented before any amnesty is granted. (Senate.gov)
  •  A provision that would require congressional votes affirming the border has been secured before the granting of temporary legal status. (Senate.gov)
As noted in our guide to political conversions, a legitimate recent convert to a cause is usually the most zealous in championing the issue unprompted by political pressure.  When Cruz was fighting Obama’s executive amnesty, the border surge, sanctuary cities, the release of criminal aliens, the Islamic refugee scheme, and homegrown terror threats via immigration – using all his platforms on committee, floor speeches, and in the media – where was Rubio?  Until Breitbart called him out for not supporting a single enforcement effort, Rubio never even signed onto the effort against sanctuary cities. 
Moreover, even long after the Gang of 8, Rubio continued to promote his amnesty agenda and gave tail winds to Obama instead of actually fighting him on his executive amnesty.  While Cruz was fighting DACA, Rubio was saying he’d keep it and the only problem he had with it is that it wasn’t permanent amnesty.  He seemed to be bothered more by Obama poisoning the well against his legislative amnesty effort than actually stopping Obama’s broader open borders agenda.
Every candidate engages in conversions while running for office to a certain extent.  Even Cruz has changed his tune on H1B visas.  But Cruz has a lot more credibility on the overall immigration issue because “enforcement first” has been more than a campaign talking point to serve as window dressing for amnesty; it has embodied his tenure in the Senate. 
Ask yourself this question: do you believe in your heart of hearts that Rubio will fight for conservatives on sovereignty and borders the minute he wins the primary and commences his general election messaging? 

 
- See more at: https://www.conservativereview.com/commentary/2015/11/cruz-fought-amnesty-rubio-fought-conservatives?utm_source=E-mail+Updates&utm_campaign=e9ef12a58c-Immigration_Opinions_11_13_1511_13_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_7dc4c5d977-e9ef12a58c-45100901#top

Guarding Right Flank, Cruz Unveils Immigration Plan
Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio
Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio
 
 
Further aligning himself with the most restrictive voices in his party — and guarding his right flank amid new questions about how tough he is on the issue — U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, on Friday released his plan to end illegal immigration and temporarily halt some legal immigration.
Speaking in Florida, the GOP presidential hopeful presented the plan in populist terms, lamenting how American workers are "left behind" as people flood the country unlawfully and snatch up menial jobs, driving down wages. Cruz also continued to distance himself from his past support for dramatically upping legal immigration — support that has been magnified by an increasingly contentious feud with presidential foe Marco Rubio.

Cruz's plan includes many proposals he has previously voiced, including finishing a border wall only minimally started under President Obama, tripling the number of U.S. Border Patrol agents and putting an end to so-called "sanctuary cities," or jurisdictions that do not comply with federal immigration law. The plan's most notable parts, however, deal with curbing legal immigration, a relatively new addition to his approach. 

If elected president, Cruz is promising to suspend for 180 days the H-1B visa program, which allows legal immigration for highly skilled foreign workers. With the program on hold, he says, a Cruz administration would investigate allegations of abuse that recently led him to abandon his 2013 support for increasing the number of visas fivefold. Cruz's previous position has become fodder for some GOP rivals and conservative radio hosts skeptical of Cruz's hardline immigration credentials.
More generally, Cruz wants to hold off on any increase in legal immigration "so long as American unemployment remains unacceptably high." In his remarks, he emphasized his support for legal immigration, but said it "needs to be structured so that it serves America's needs, so that it benefits our nation rather than undermining our nation."

The plan brings Cruz's immigration views closer in line with those of Republican frontrunner Donald Trump, who also wants to put new restrictions on legal immigration. Cruz has already backed Trump's call to end birthright citizenship, or the right to citizenship for any person born in the United States regardless of the immigration status of his or her parents.

Rolling out the plan at an Orlando church, Cruz took some fresh shots at his Republican rivals, many of whom he said "composed an epic poem in support of amnesty" at the most recent Republican debate. On Friday, he blasted them for dodging the question of whether they would repeal Obama's executive actions on immigration, which he has promised to do if elected.

"There’s some Republican candidates for president that don’t want to answer that question," Cruz said. "Sometimes they answer them one way on English stations and another way on Spanish stations."
 
While the event was rife with implications for Cruz's feud with Rubio, the Florida senator's name did not come up. However, Cruz left little doubt whom he was referring when he recalled how the Gang of Eight bill — a failed congressional attempt at immigration reform — was pushed by Democratic senators and "maybe a Republican or two."
 
Cruz was not as coy after his speech, telling reporters that in the Gang of Eight debate "Marco chose to stand with [New York Democratic U.S. Sen.] Chuck Schumer and to lead the fight tooth and nail for a massive amnesty plan." 
 
The simmering rivalry between Cruz and Rubio boiled over Thursday, with the candidates and their campaigns openly sparring over immigration views. As Cruz sharpened his criticism of Rubio as soft on immigration, Rubio countered that the two actually had much in common on the issue. 
 
At the center of the scrap is Rubio's membership in the Gang of Eight group of lawmakers who set out to reform the immigration system in 2013. Among the amendments Cruz proposed was one that would have stripped the legislation of a pathway to citizenship for people in the country illegally, but kept in place a pathway to legal status. Rubio's campaign sees Cruz's amendment as a tacit endorsement of a pathway to legal status; Cruz's team suggests that is not necessarily so, arguing that the amendment was part of a broader strategy to kill the bill. 
 
In an interview Friday morning, Cruz said he "laughed out loud" when he heard Rubio say their immigrations views are similar. 
 
"That’s like Obama saying my position is the same as his on Obamacare," Cruz told conservative radio host Mike Gallagher. "That’s like the Ayatollah Khomeini saying my position is the same as his on the Iranian nuclear deal. It is laughingly, blazingly, on-its-face false."
 
Speaking with reporters Friday morning in Florida, Rubio repeated his assertion that there is little daylight between himself and Cruz on immigration, saying he was "puzzled and quite frankly surprised by Ted's attacks, since Ted's position on immigration is not much different than mine." 
"He is a supporter of legalizing people that are in this country illegally," Rubio said. "If he's changed that position, then he certainly has a right to change his position on that issue, but he should be clear about that."


Lawless: The Obama Adminstration’s Uprecedented Assault on the Constitution and the Rule of Law

12:00-1:00 p.m., Tuesday, November 17, 2015

 The Heritage Foundation, Lehrman Auditorium


 214 Massachusetts Ave NE
Washington DC 20002-4999


http://www.heritage.org/events/2015/11/lawless

Overview: In Lawless, George Mason University law professor David E. Bernstein offers a scholarly and unsettling account of how the Obama Administration has undermined the Constitution and the rule of law. He documents how the President has presided over one constitutional debacle after another – from Obamacare to unauthorized wars in the Middle East to attempts to strip property owners, college students, religious groups, and conservative political activists of their rights, and more.

Respect for the Constitution’s separation of powers has been violated time and again. Whether in amending Obamacare on the fly or signing a memorandum legalizing millions of illegal immigrants, the current Administration ignores not only Congress, but also the Constitution’s critical checks and balances.

In Lawless, Professor Bernstein shows how the Constitution as well as the President’s own stated principles have been betrayed. In doing so, serious and potentially permanent damage has been done to our constitutional system and repairs must be addressed by the next President of the United States.


Obama to Wannabe Illegals: Do as I Say, Not as I Do
By Mark Krikorian

 CIS Blog, October 30, 2015

http://cis.org/krikorian/obama-wannabe-illegals-do-i-say-not-i-do

In response the surge of Central Americans sneaking into Texas in the summer of 2014, the Obama administration launched an ad campaign in the sending countries earlier this year to stem the flow. The radio and TV spots assert that "there are no permits for the people trying to cross the border without papers" and promise "the immediate deportation of those trying to cross the border without documents."

None of it is true. There are permits for illegal-alien minors and families. Formally known as Notices to Appear but known colloquially in Spanish as permisos, they require the aliens to present themselves to immigration authorities by a certain date, until which they have temporary legal status. That gives them time enough to travel to join their relatives and disappear into the existing illegal population. And disappear they do, since, despite the tough promises, virtually none of them are deported, immediately or otherwise.

So it should come as no surprise to read today's AP report, which begins this way:




Once again, President Obama is looking to defy Congress in implementing its immigration reform proposals. This time, his administration is looking to also defy a federal court to achieve it. A judge sitting on the 5th Circuit in Texas issued an...



NO PRESIDENT HAS HAD MORE CONTEMPT FOR LEGALS, OUR LAWS AND BORDERS THAN MEXICO'S LA RAZA SUPREMACIST, BARACK OBAMA!

NOT ONLY DOES OBAMA FUND THE MEX FASCIST MOVEMENT OF LA RAZA "The Race"
BUT IT OPERATES OUT OF THE AMERICAN WHITE HOUSE UNDER LA RAZA V.P. CECILIA MUNOZ!


Obama set to defy federal court on amnesty

By Rick Moran


Once again, President Obama is looking to defy Congress in implementing its immigration reform proposals.
This time, his administration is looking to also defy a federal court to achieve it.
 
A judge sitting on the 5th Circuit in Texas issued an injunction last June against the administration's regulatory plans to legalize millions of aliens in the U.S. illegally.  The injunction was upheld by a federal appeals court in Louisiana, and the president's plan is now stalled while the administration works through the federal court system.
Except now there are plans afoot to change the regulations pertaining to green cards that would accomplish almost everything the president can't get from Congress or the courts.  A leaked memo from DHS outlines four plans the administration is considering.
Ian Smith of the Immigration Reform Law Institute:
The internal memo reveals four options of varying expansiveness, with option 1 providing EADs to “all individuals living in the United States”, including illegal aliens, visa-overstayers, and H-1B guest-workers, while option 4 provides EADsonly to those on certain unexpired non-immigrant visas. Giving EADs to any of the covered individuals, however, is in direct violation of Congress’s Immigration & Nationality Act and works to dramatically subvert our carefully wrought visa system. 
As mentioned, the first plan the memo discusses basically entails giving EADs to anyone physically present in the country who until now has been prohibited from getting one. A major positive to this option, the memo reads, is that it would “address the needs of some of the intended deferred action population.” Although DHS doesn’t say it expressly, included here would be those 4.3 million people covered by the president’s DAPA and Expanded DACA programs whose benefits were supposed to have been halted in the Hanen decision. On top of working around the Hanen injunction, this DHS plan would also dole out unrestricted EADs to those on temporary non-immigrant visas, such as H-1B-holders (their work authorizations being tied to their employers) and another 5 to 6 million illegal aliens thus far not covered by any of the President’s deferred action amnesty programs. By claiming absolute authority to grant work authorization to any alien, regardless of status, DHS is in effect claiming it can unilaterally de-couple the 1986 IRCA work authorization statutes from the main body of U.S. visa law. While DHS must still observe the statutory requirements for issuing visas, the emerging doctrine concedes, the administration now claims unprecedented discretionary power to permit anyone inside our borders to work. 
Get a load of what the DHS bureaucrats think about illegals working in the U.S.:
The anonymous DHS policymakers state that a positive for this option is that it “could cover a greater number of individuals.” In a strikingly conclusory bit of bureaucratese, they state that because illegal aliens working in the country “have already had the US labor market tested” it has been “demonstrat[ed] that their future employment won’t adversely affect US workers.” The labor market, in other words, has already been stress-tested through decades of foreign-labor dumping and the American working-class, which disproportionately includes minorities, working mothers, the elderly, and students, is doing just fine. Apparently, the fact that 66 million Americans and legal aliens are currently unemployed or out of the job-market was not a discussion point at the DHS “Retreat.” 
Smith concludes: "Bottom line: The memo foreshadows more tactical offensives in a giant administrative amnesty for all 12 million illegal aliens who’ve broken our immigration laws (and many other laws) that will emerge before the next inaugural in January 2016."
I'm not sure that judge in Texas will let the administration get away with this.  When the government began handing out green cards anyway in defiance of the injunction, the judge, Andrew Hanen, threatened to arrest the lot of them for contempt.  He forced the government to recall the green cards immediately.  There will be no circumventing the law in his court.
But the plans may be untouchable because they don't directly stem from the series of executive orders currently being adjudicated.  Of course, any plan to blanket the country in work permits for illegals will be challenged in court.  But eventually, the administration may find a friendly judge who gives it the go-ahead.
Once again, President Obama is looking to defy Congress in implementing its immigration reform proposals.
This time, his administration is looking to also defy a federal court to achieve it.
A judge sitting on the 5th Circuit in Texas issued an injunction last June against the administration's regulatory plans to legalize millions of aliens in the U.S. illegally.  The injunction was upheld by a federal appeals court in Louisiana, and the president's plan is now stalled while the administration works through the federal court system.
Except now there are plans afoot to change the regulations pertaining to green cards that would accomplish almost everything the president can't get from Congress or the courts.  A leaked memo from DHS outlines four plans the administration is considering.
Ian Smith of the Immigration Reform Law Institute:
The internal memo reveals four options of varying expansiveness, with option 1 providing EADs to “all individuals living in the United States”, including illegal aliens, visa-overstayers, and H-1B guest-workers, while option 4 provides EADsonly to those on certain unexpired non-immigrant visas. Giving EADs to any of the covered individuals, however, is in direct violation of Congress’s Immigration & Nationality Act and works to dramatically subvert our carefully wrought visa system. 
As mentioned, the first plan the memo discusses basically entails giving EADs to anyone physically present in the country who until now has been prohibited from getting one. A major positive to this option, the memo reads, is that it would “address the needs of some of the intended deferred action population.” Although DHS doesn’t say it expressly, included here would be those 4.3 million people covered by the president’s DAPA and Expanded DACA programs whose benefits were supposed to have been halted in the Hanen decision. On top of working around the Hanen injunction, this DHS plan would also dole out unrestricted EADs to those on temporary non-immigrant visas, such as H-1B-holders (their work authorizations being tied to their employers) and another 5 to 6 million illegal aliens thus far not covered by any of the President’s deferred action amnesty programs. By claiming absolute authority to grant work authorization to any alien, regardless of status, DHS is in effect claiming it can unilaterally de-couple the 1986 IRCA work authorization statutes from the main body of U.S. visa law. While DHS must still observe the statutory requirements for issuing visas, the emerging doctrine concedes, the administration now claims unprecedented discretionary power to permit anyone inside our borders to work. 
Get a load of what the DHS bureaucrats think about illegals working in the U.S.:
The anonymous DHS policymakers state that a positive for this option is that it “could cover a greater number of individuals.” In a strikingly conclusory bit of bureaucratese, they state that because illegal aliens working in the country “have already had the US labor market tested” it has been “demonstrat[ed] that their future employment won’t adversely affect US workers.” The labor market, in other words, has already been stress-tested through decades of foreign-labor dumping and the American working-class, which disproportionately includes minorities, working mothers, the elderly, and students, is doing just fine. Apparently, the fact that 66 million Americans and legal aliens are currently unemployed or out of the job-market was not a discussion point at the DHS “Retreat.” 
Smith concludes: "Bottom line: The memo foreshadows more tactical offensives in a giant administrative amnesty for all 12 million illegal aliens who’ve broken our immigration laws (and many other laws) that will emerge before the next inaugural in January 2016."
I'm not sure that judge in Texas will let the administration get away with this.  When the government began handing out green cards anyway in defiance of the injunction, the judge, Andrew Hanen, threatened to arrest the lot of them for contempt.  He forced the government to recall the green cards immediately.  There will be no circumventing the law in his court.
But the plans may be untouchable because they don't directly stem from the series of executive orders currently being adjudicated.  Of course, any plan to blanket the country in work permits for illegals will be challenged in court.  But eventually, the administration may find a friendly judge who gives it the go-ahead.


Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/11/obama_set_to_defy_federal_court_on_amnesty.html#ixzz3qSG6XCr3
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Obama’s Secret Destruction of Our Immigration System

 By Arnold Ahlert

 Canada Free Press, November 4, 2015

A newly-leaked memo from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) reveals the Obama administration is seeking to sidestep a federal court injunction that suspended portions of the president’s amnesty-based initiatives known as Deferred Action for Parents of Americans (DAPA) and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). In short, Obama is determined to impose his transformational agenda on the nation by any means necessary.

According to the Hill, the document outlining the administration’s attempt to thumb its nose at the rule of law was prepared at a DHS “Regulations Retreat” last June, four months after a preliminary injunction was initially imposed by Texas Judge Andrew Hanen and subsequently left in place by a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. The Fifth Circuit’s final ruling on that injunction, either confirming or reversing it, is expected to occur in a matter of days.Apparently the Obama administration couldn’t care less.
. . .
http://canadafreepress.com/article/76535

TO KEEP WAGES DEPRESSED AND BUILD THEIR LA RAZA "The Race" MEXICAN ILLEGAL PARTY BASE, THE DEMOCRAT PARTY HAS RUTHLESSLY ASSAULTED THE AMERICAN WORKER, OUR LAWS ON HIRING ILLEGALS AND OUR BORDERS TO KEEP WAGES DEPRESSED.



"The U.S. now ranks at, or near, the top of developed countries for income inequality. Job creation has lagged far behind population growth. Automation has erased some jobs, but corrupt, inept government leadership is responsible for the deplorable job- deficit-low wage situation." 

"The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs."



Income inequality has risen during the last several decades to heights last seen in the 1920s. Most of the income growth has gone to a small fraction of the population, the ultra-rich elites, while real wages for the bottom 90 percent ...

The Causes of Income Inequality

 
Income inequality has risen during the last several decades to heights last seen in the 1920s. Most of the income growth has gone to a small fraction of the population, the ultra-rich elites, while real wages for the bottom 90 percent has been stagnant since the 1980s. The U.S. now ranks at, or near, the top of developed countries for income inequality. Job creation has lagged far behind population growth. Automation has erased some jobs, but corrupt, inept government leadership is responsible for the deplorable job- deficit-low wage situation.    

Trade agreements are one cause of job and wage reduction. Over the last twenty years, we’ve amassed $10 trillion in trade deficits and exported 12 million manufacturing jobs, forcing workers to move into lower-wage service jobs. Government brags about the free trade agreements, CAFTA, NAFTA, KORUS, and TPP. But the “free” applies only to the foreign trading partners, which manipulate their currencies, pay sweatshop workers low wages, manufacture under environmentally-toxic conditions, and restrict U.S. imports. We hand over our technology, good-paying jobs, product labeling, and safety guarantees -- all to enrich multinational corporations and foreign industry. Industrial research and development have been decimated as companies move overseas or outsource jobs, leaving the nation a future of little technological innovation. The U.S. is left with hollowed-out industries and service jobs. 
 
The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs. A well-known example is that of Disney IT workers who were forced to train their cheaper immigrant replacements. It is no coincidence that the rise in immigration has occurred simultaneously with the rise of the welfare state. People unemployed, or in low-wage and part-time jobs, rely on government subsidies. The result is larger national debt, more corporate wealth, and declining wages.

ObamaCare influences, and will influence to greater degrees, the lowering of incomes for Americans as healthcare costs rise. Higher premiums and deductions for health insurance are being shifted to employees, reducing benefits and wages. Medical care costs already have risen much faster than wages, leaving many struggling to pay for necessities. Ever-higher deductions mean that people can’t afford to use the insurance they are forced to buy because they can’t even pay the deductions.        

Another contributor to job deficiency and wage stagnation is the increased regulation and taxation of small businesses instituted by Obama’s executive orders, EPA overreach, and ObamaCare. Small businesses traditionally have created two-thirds of new jobs annually. The bright spot in the economy, small businesses have created 78.7 percent of new jobs since the recession. Today, faced with these government anti-business policies, small businesses are closing their doors at a faster rate than new businesses are opening. The small businesses that remain open often don’t expand because of Obamacare and government regulations.

Income inequality is greatly impacted by the Federal Reserve’s policies of money-printing and zero interest rates, which have led to the funding of the financial and corporate markets while ignoring the needs of smaller businesses. The money supply and cheap lending has gone to the government, large corporations, and Wall Street, leaving the rest of the economy to sputter along with little capital and fewer jobs. The Fed’s policies of crony capitalism favor big business and big banks over that of smaller entities and are responsible for the increasing number of big business deals such as Walgreen's purchase of Rite Aid.


DEATH OF THE AMERICAN MIDDLE-CLASS

This government-driven, crony-capitalist economy defined by job scarcity and wage stagnation is the reason college graduates are burdened by $1.3 trillion debt, living with parents, can’t afford to marry or buy homes, and working as waitresses and bartenders. Job scarcity and low wages are the reasons we’re becoming a nation of renters rather than homeowners. They are the reasons that 51 percent of workers earn less than $30,000 a year. They are the reasons for the demise of the middle class and the burgeoning welfare rolls, the modern-day equivalent of slavery.    

Income inequality and its devastating consequences are seldom mentioned on the nightly news. The media and bogus government statistics paint rosy pictures about economic recovery, and government masks the bad economy with welfare so that we don’t see Great Depression bread lines. But the only recovery has been in the Federal Reserve’s inflated stock market, not in the main street economy, where 94 million working-age adults are unemployed and 47 million are on some welfare program. The “Made in America” displays weekly touted by ABC news are the few exceptions, rather than the rule, in an American economy of boarded-up stores and factories.    
The political implications of income inequality are most evident in the increasing rise and entrenchment of career politicians, supported by big donor funding and media favoritism. The integrity of the electoral process is endangered as election propaganda, funded by big money and hyped by corporate media bias, become more prominent in spreading lies, distortions, and innuendos to the voting public. Unrestricted campaign funding has given the moneyed elites first access to elected officials. At the same time, private-sector unions, small businesses, and citizens find their influence dwindling or irrelevant. This crony capitalism, resembling dictatorships and communist oligarchies, seriously threatens our democracy because money, power, and media control are consolidated in the hands of a few at the top. Voter apathy prevails, as voters feel increasingly powerless to change the course of events. 

The United States, a once great economic powerhouse and the largest creditor nation, has become the largest debtor nation, and is fast becoming a banana republic. Past and present elected authorities and public officials have stripped bare our industries, put the nation under a mountain of debt, and turned the U.S. into a welfare depository. Government leaders have intentionally failed to protect our borders, jobs, and freedoms. These public “servants” and the wealthy elites have garnered riches for themselves, and purposely impoverished citizens and future generations. The greatest threats to our economy and national security are not foreign countries or terrorists; they are the enemies inside, corrupt government leaders and the money masters they serve. 
 
Income inequality has risen during the last several decades to heights last seen in the 1920s. Most of the income growth has gone to a small fraction of the population, the ultra-rich elites, while real wages for the bottom 90 percent has been stagnant since the 1980s. The U.S. now ranks at, or near, the top of developed countries for income inequality. Job creation has lagged far behind population growth. Automation has erased some jobs, but corrupt, inept government leadership is responsible for the deplorable job- deficit-low wage situation.    

Trade agreements are one cause of job and wage reduction. Over the last twenty years, we’ve amassed $10 trillion in trade deficits and exported 12 million manufacturing jobs, forcing workers to move into lower-wage service jobs. Government brags about the free trade agreements, CAFTA, NAFTA, KORUS, and TPP. But the “free” applies only to the foreign trading partners, which manipulate their currencies, pay sweatshop workers low wages, manufacture under environmentally-toxic conditions, and restrict U.S. imports. We hand over our technology, good-paying jobs, product labeling, and safety guarantees -- all to enrich multinational corporations and foreign industry. Industrial research and development have been decimated as companies move overseas or outsource jobs, leaving the nation a future of little technological innovation. The U.S. is left with hollowed-out industries and service jobs. 
The federal government encourages the massive illegal and legal immigration that plays a huge role in job scarcity and income suppression for American workers. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, a viable economy cannot exist with open borders and unrestricted immigration. An oversupply of workers willing to work for less pay, the outsourcing of jobs, and visa-immigrant hiring allow companies to replace American workers with immigrants for reduced labor and benefit costs. A well-known example is that of Disney IT workers who were forced to train their cheaper immigrant replacements. It is no coincidence that the rise in immigration has occurred simultaneously with the rise of the welfare state. People unemployed, or in low-wage and part-time jobs, rely on government subsidies. The result is larger national debt, more corporate wealth, and declining wages.

ObamaCare influences, and will influence to greater degrees, the lowering of incomes for Americans as healthcare costs rise. Higher premiums and deductions for health insurance are being shifted to employees, reducing benefits and wages. Medical care costs already have risen much faster than wages, leaving many struggling to pay for necessities. Ever-higher deductions mean that people can’t afford to use the insurance they are forced to buy because they can’t even pay the deductions.        

Another contributor to job deficiency and wage stagnation is the increased regulation and taxation of small businesses instituted by Obama’s executive orders, EPA overreach, and ObamaCare. Small businesses traditionally have created two-thirds of new jobs annually. The bright spot in the economy, small businesses have created 78.7 percent of new jobs since the recession. Today, faced with these government anti-business policies, small businesses are closing their doors at a faster rate than new businesses are opening. The small businesses that remain open often don’t expand because of Obamacare and government regulations.

Income inequality is greatly impacted by the Federal Reserve’s policies of money-printing and zero interest rates, which have led to the funding of the financial and corporate markets while ignoring the needs of smaller businesses. The money supply and cheap lending has gone to the government, large corporations, and Wall Street, leaving the rest of the economy to sputter along with little capital and fewer jobs. The Fed’s policies of crony capitalism favor big business and big banks over that of smaller entities and are responsible for the increasing number of big business deals such as Walgreen's purchase of Rite Aid.

This government-driven, crony-capitalist economy defined by job scarcity and wage stagnation is the reason college graduates are burdened by $1.3 trillion debt, living with parents, can’t afford to marry or buy homes, and working as waitresses and bartenders. Job scarcity and low wages are the reasons we’re becoming a nation of renters rather than homeowners. They are the reasons that 51 percent of workers earn less than $30,000 a year. They are the reasons for the demise of the middle class and the burgeoning welfare rolls, the modern-day equivalent of slavery.    

Income inequality and its devastating consequences are seldom mentioned on the nightly news. The media and bogus government statistics paint rosy pictures about economic recovery, and government masks the bad economy with welfare so that we don’t see Great Depression bread lines. But the only recovery has been in the Federal Reserve’s inflated stock market, not in the main street economy, where 94 million working-age adults are unemployed and 47 million are on some welfare program. The “Made in America” displays weekly touted by ABC news are the few exceptions, rather than the rule, in an American economy of boarded-up stores and factories.    
The political implications of income inequality are most evident in the increasing rise and entrenchment of career politicians, supported by big donor funding and media favoritism. The integrity of the electoral process is endangered as election propaganda, funded by big money and hyped by corporate media bias, become more prominent in spreading lies, distortions, and innuendos to the voting public. Unrestricted campaign funding has given the moneyed elites first access to elected officials. At the same time, private-sector unions, small businesses, and citizens find their influence dwindling or irrelevant. This crony capitalism, resembling dictatorships and communist oligarchies, seriously threatens our democracy because money, power, and media control are consolidated in the hands of a few at the top. Voter apathy prevails, as voters feel increasingly powerless to change the course of events. 

The United States, a once great economic powerhouse and the largest creditor nation, has become the largest debtor nation, and is fast becoming a banana republic. Past and present elected authorities and public officials have stripped bare our industries, put the nation under a mountain of debt, and turned the U.S. into a welfare depository. Government leaders have intentionally failed to protect our borders, jobs, and freedoms. These public “servants” and the wealthy elites have garnered riches for themselves, and purposely impoverished citizens and future generations. The greatest threats to our economy and national security are not foreign countries or terrorists; they are the enemies inside, corrupt government leaders and the money masters they serve. 


Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/11/the_causes_of_income_inequality.html#ixzz3qSBDYQVs
Follow us: @AmericanThinker on Twitter | AmericanThinker on Facebook



Obamacare open enrollment: A widening health care disaster for workers

Obamacare open enrollment: A widening health care disaster for workers

3 November 2015
“All of Obama’s policies have been geared toward increasing social inequality. … The claim that the health care overhaul is an oasis of progress in this desert of social reaction is simply a lie”— World Socialist Web Site, March 22, 2010


Open enrollment for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) began November 1 for plans taking effect January 1. The coming year will be the third in which the ACA, signed into law by President Obama in March 2010, will be operational. The World Socialist Web Site’s assessment five years ago that the “reform” commonly known as Obamacare would usher in a frontal assault on the health care available to working people is being richly confirmed.
The ACA has nothing in common with universal health care. That was merely the slogan initially advanced to disguise a corporate-designed scheme to dramatically shift health care costs onto the working class.
The central component of the scheme, the “individual mandate,” requires that individuals and families without health insurance through their employer or a government program such as Medicare or Medicaid obtain insurance or pay a tax penalty. Low-income people can qualify for modest tax subsidies to go toward premiums.
The uninsured are required to purchase coverage from private, for-profit insurance companies on the health care “exchanges” set up under the law. This vastly increases the market for private insurance firms without placing any real restraints on the prices they charge—a formula for windfall profits.
By the government’s own forecast, enrollees will face a 7.5 percent average premium rate increase in 2016. Other sources project rate hikes in excess of 20 percent. A recent study showed that many insurers are requesting double-digit rate increases next year and state insurance commissions are approving them.
A frenzy of mergers in the health care industry will fuel further premium increases. In the space of a few weeks in July, Aetna Inc. and Humana Inc. merged in a $37 billion deal, and Anthem Inc. agreed to acquire Cigna Corp. for $54 billion. As a result, the five largest health insurers in the US were consolidated into three.
Drug makers Allergan and Pfizer are in the advanced stages of talks to merge and form the world’s largest pharmaceutical company, valued at $330 billion. The price of top brand name prescription drugs are already surging, having increased by 12.9 percent in 2013, the last year for which data is available.
Last week the giant drug store chain Walgreens announced a deal to take over one of its main competitors, Rite Aid, creating a mega-chain to compete with CVS for total domination of the market.
Premiums and drug costs are only one aspect of the burden to be borne by those purchasing coverage under the ACA. The average deductible for the lowest tier “bronze” plans on the exchanges was $5,200 in 2015, and the prevalence of such “high-deductible” plans is sure to expand in 2016. This means that aside from mandated “essential services,” such as certain forms of wellness care and screenings, no medical care is covered until the entire deductible is paid out of pocket. Co-payments for doctor visits and other services are also required.
Research published in the current issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association looked at 135 health plans in 34 state marketplaces available during last year’s open enrollment period. The study found that as of April 2015, 18 plans in nine states lacked in-network specialists for at least one specialty. These included obstetricians/gynecologists, dermatologists, cardiologists, psychiatrists, oncologists, neurologists, endocrinologists, rheumatologists and pulmonologists.
What all of this means is that a substantial portion of the 12 million people who have purchased coverage on the health care exchanges will be forced to self-ration medical care due to economic necessity. Workers and their children will forego doctor visits, prescriptions for life-saving medicines will go unfilled, needless suffering and deaths will occur.
This appalling state of affairs is not an unfortunate byproduct of the ACA. By design from its inception, the legislation has been crafted to cut costs for the government and corporations and boost the profits of the health insurers, pharmaceutical corporations and health care chains.
According to the big business parties and their corporate sponsors, Americans are living too long and health care costs are sucking up too much of the national wealth. There is a calculated drive to lower life expectancy for working people.
That is why the introduction of Obamacare has been accompanied by a concerted drive to restrict access to basic medical tests—that is, to ration health care for workers. In recent months, official bodies have called for reducing or delaying mammograms, pap smears, prostate tests and other standard screening procedures.
One indication of the catastrophic implications of the assault on health care is a recent study showing that since 1998, the death rate for middle-income white Americans age 45-54 has risen sharply, resulting in half a million deaths, comparable to the 650,000 Americans who have lost their lives from AIDS since 1981. Researchers point to suicides and substance abuse, driven by increasing financial stress, as the main contributing factors. The ACA will only increase the number of such tragedies.
The implications of Obamacare go far beyond those buying insurance on the ACA exchanges and extend to all segments of health care. The legislation is serving as a model for the assault on employer-sponsored health care coverage as well as the bedrock government-run programs Social Security and Medicare.
Today, approximately half of all Americans receive their health care coverage through their employers. Employer-paid health benefits was an important social gain wrested from the corporations by the struggles of workers in the aftermath of World War II and has been central in raising the living standards of working class families.
But the workings of Obamacare aim to destroy these gains. As Ezekiel Emanuel, a close ally of Obama and key architect of the ACA, predicted in 2009: “By 2025, few private-sector employers will still be providing health insurance.” These plans will give way to vouchers handed out to employees to purchase coverage on insurance exchanges, either those set up under the ACA or others.
In the current contract struggle of US autoworkers, the drive by the auto companies and their union partners to dismantle the “cradle-to-grave” medical coverage won by autoworkers and retirees is in line with the Obama administration’s policy of shifting health care costs to workers.
The recent budget deal between Obama and congressional Republicans rolls back a significant provision in the ACA, the requirement that businesses with more than 200 workers automatically enroll their employees for health insurance. And while employers are basically absolved of responsibility for providing insurance, fines for individuals for not obtaining insurance will rise substantially in 2016—to $695, or 2.5 percent of income, whichever is higher.
Paul Ryan, the newly elected speaker of the House of Representatives, has advocated transforming Medicare into a voucher program and partially privatizing Social Security. That he is now presented as a “moderate” unifying force by the ruling elite and the media is an indication of how far to the right the political establishment in America has veered. The foundations are already being laid for the dismantling of Medicare and Social Security.
As the real content of Obamacare becomes clear to millions of workers and middle class people, who suddenly discover that they cannot get access to drugs or doctors and standard medical procedures are no longer covered by their insurance plans, there will be an explosive growth of social opposition.
The third year of the Affordable Care Act is the occasion to call the reactionary legislation by its rightful name: a health care counterrevolution. The only rational and progressive solution to the health care crisis in America is to replace the privately owned and controlled system with socialized medicine, in which the health care industry is nationalized, restructured, and placed under the democratic control of a workers government. This will make possible the provision of quality health care for all as a basic social right.
Kate Randall

"Amazon became a byword this year for savage treatment of 

employees. Bezos joins several others in the top 15 notorious 

for low-wage exploitation, including four heirs to the Wal-

Mart retail empire, James, Alice, Christy and Samuel Robson 

Walton, and Phil Knight, chairman of Nike Inc., whose $24.4 

billion fortune is extracted from his international network of 

sports apparel-producing sweatshops."


OBAMA-CLINTONomics is a simple device - Serve the super rich and pass the cost of their looting and Wall Street crimes on to the backs of the last of the American middle-class!


"Of course, the wealth of the financial elite cannot come from nowhere. Ultimately, the continual infusion of asset bubbles is the form taken by a massive transfer of wealth, from the working class to the banks, investors and super-rich. The corollary to rise of the stock market is the endless demands, all over the world, for austerity, cuts in wages, attacks on health care and pensions."


“As a result, the share of wealth held by the richest 0.1 percent of the population grew from 17 percent in 2007 to 22 percent in 2012, while the wealth of the 400 richest families in the US has doubled since 2008.”

OBAMA-CLINTONomics and the final death of the American middle-class

"Obama expanded the Wall Street bailout, handing trillions of dollars to the criminals who wrecked the economy. He then utilized the financial meltdown to restructure the auto industry on the basis of brutal pay cuts, setting a precedent for the transformation of the US into a low-wage economy."

"In the midst of the deepest slump since the Great Depression, the administration starved state and city governments of resources, leading to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of education and public-sector jobs and the gutting of workers’ pensions. Obama’s Affordable Care Act set in motion the dismantling of employer-paid health insurance and massive cuts in the Medicare insurance system for the elderly."

Wealth of America’s super-rich grows to $2.34 trillion

By Nick Barrickman 
3 October 2015
The wealth of the 400 richest Americans 
continues to soar, according to the results of 
the new Forbes 400 list, published annually 
by the business magazine of the same name. 
At $2.34 trillion, the total net worth for the multi-billionaires on the list set new records, displacing last year’s all-time high of $2.29 trillion.

 
OBAMA-CLINTONomics: MELTDOWN!

Did their crony banksters ultimately destroy the global economy?





Richest one percent controls 

nearly half of global wealth

 

In 2009, the total net worth of the Forbes 400 was $1.27 trillion. Today, nearly six years into the so-called economic “recovery” fostered by the Obama administration, the wealthiest Americans have nearly doubled their hoard. The total wealth of the richest 400 Americans managed to reach new heights even while financial markets have been roiled by tumultuous swings.

The Forbes report notes that in 2015, “It was 
harder than ever to join the 400. The price of 
entry this year was $1.7 billion, the highest

it’s been in the 33 years that Forbes has

racked American wealth.” Forbes makes note

that the wealth threshold was so high this year that 145 billionaires failed to make the list.
While a majority of billionaires have prospered, their wealth underwritten by the massive government bailouts of financial institutions and near-zero interest rates from the Federal Reserve, a significant fraction of the wealthy elite have lost ground in the turbulent stock markets of recent months.
The ratio of winners and losers among the billionaires was ten to one last year, but this year was much closer to 50-50. Forbes noted that the top three position-holders on the list, Microsoft’s Bill Gates, Berkshire Hathaway’s Warren Buffett and Oracle’s Larry Ellison, each saw a drop in their total net worth of at least 5 percent in the last year. This did nothing to threaten the position of Gates, number one at $76 billion, or Buffett, number two at $62 billion, but Ellison’s third-place position, with $47.5 billion, left him “only” $500 million ahead of the fourth-place multi-billionaire, Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com.
The majority of those on the Forbes list were associated with some form of financial speculation, or with computer software and the Internet. According to the industry breakdown supplied by Forbes, its 400 include 126 engaged in investment, real estate and finance, 81 from computer technology and media, 36 from food and beverage, 32 from retail and fashion (including five members of the Walton family, owners of Wal-Mart), 31 from oil & gas, 20 from health care, 19 from miscellaneous services (including six members of the Pritzker family, owners of Hyatt Hotels), and 19 from sports and gaming.
This left only 35 listed as making their fortunes in manufacturing, automotive, construction, and logistics. The largest manufacturing fortune is the $7.4 billion of Harold Kohler, whose company makes toilets and other plumbing fixtures. Perhaps that is symbolic, given the state of manufacturing in the United States, once the world leader in industry, but no longer.
The growth of financial parasitism has underwritten the wealth of many on the Forbes 400. In 1982, the first Forbes 400 list saw figures directly involved in finance making up only 4.4 percent of the total wealth on the list. As of today, this group now makes up more than 21 percent of billionaires on the list.
Former Microsoft chairman Bill Gates, who has held the number one spot on the Forbes 400 for 22 years, has less than 13 percent of his fortune in stock in the company he founded. According toForbes, the majority of Gates’ wealth is bound up in Cascade, the software mogul’s investment firm, which specializes in “investing in stocks, bonds, private equity and real estate.”
Besides the well-known super-rich of Silicon Valley like Google’s Larry Page and Sergey Brin (with $33.3 billion and $32.6 billion, respectively) and Mark Zuckerberg, founder of the social media web site Facebook, the seventh wealthiest man in America with $40.3 billion in total assets, there are numerous other newly minted Internet billionaires, including the owners and co-owners of Uber, Airbnb, WhatsApp, LinkedIn, Twitter, SnapChat, GoPro and GoDaddy.com.
Jeffrey Bezos, owner of the online retailer Amazon, saw the largest gain in wealth for the year, making $16 billion in 2015, placing his total net worth at $47 billion and catapulting him to fourth place. Nearly half of Bezos’ gains came within a single day last July, when his company announced gains in the second quarter, leading to a speculative frenzy which bid up stock values for Amazon by over 18 percent.
Amazon became a byword this year for savage treatment of 

employees. Bezos joins several others in the top 15 notorious 

for low-wage exploitation, including four heirs to the Wal-

Mart retail empire, James, Alice, Christy and Samuel Robson

Walton, and Phil Knight, chairman of Nike Inc., whose $24.4 

billion fortune is extracted from his international network of 

sports apparel-producing sweatshops.
While safeguarding the ill-gotten wealth of the Forbes billionaires remains an ironclad principle of both the Republican and Democratic parties, working people throughout the US continue to suffer the brunt of attacks on their living standards. A US Census report released earlier this month shows that 14.8 percent of the US population lives in poverty; a figure that is unchanged from a year earlier. The Census findings show that 6.6 percent of the population lives in “deep poverty,” or less than half of the already unrealistically low official poverty line in the US.



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