Archive for December 2006

There’s a popular game in America that goes, I’ll cut your wages, but you don’t cut mine. And the outsourcing of your factory job to China is a good thing, because it makes my paycheck go further at Wal-Mart. We hear this theme a lot in the debate over illegal immigration.

Consider the recent raids on Swift meat-processing plants. Federal agents arrested 1,187 illegal immigrants at facilities in six states. Mere hours later, economists warned that depriving the industry of illegal labor could raise hamburger prices.

Illegal immigration is usually presented as a win-win situation: Undocumented foreigners earn far more than they could back home. Consumers get a bargain.

Nowhere to be seen are America’s working poor who get stomped on 13 different ways. They have to compete with illegal immigrants for jobs and housing. Low-skilled natives and legal immigrants also end up subsidizing the undocumented because they tend to live in the same communities, which must provide hospitals, police, schools and garbage pickup.

Who doesn’t suffer from illegal immigration? For starters, the people who write about it. I speak of the journalism profession, which has the habit of covering the issue by anecdotes. Reporters thrive on sympathetic stories about illegal immigrants who work hard and go to church.

But, were a busload of illegals from Australia to turn up at their newspaper and offer reportage at 10 percent below the going rate, the writers would call the authorities so fast that your head would spin. And the publisher’s argument that thanks to the cheap Australians, he’s able to trim a few cents off the newsstand price would make no impression.

As it turns out, the meat-processing companies that employ so many illegal immigrants have been enjoying a nearly 50-percent discount on what was the going rate. In 1980, the average meat-processing job paid $19 an hour. The companies then moved their plants to rural areas, far from the Midwest cities and their unions. The industry’s wages now average about $9 an hour.

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Readers of the AIM Report are accustomed to learning of huge distortions or omissions by the media. This time, the under-reported story deals with the possible end of America, as we know it.

Major players are secretive and are trying to keep the media out of the loop. But that does not let the mainstream media off the hook. There is enough stonewalling, secrecy and there are plenty of telltale signs, so that any assignment editor whose curiosity is not aroused is probably in the wrong business.

But in terms of the national media, only Lou Dobbs of CNN has blown the whistle on a scheme whereby a North American “Security and Prosperity Partnership,” being implemented by the Department of Commerce, could pave the way for a transnational entity called the North American Union.

The implications of this scheme are staggering. Some experts say that up to a million people in Texas stand to lose their homes and 584,000 acres of rich farm and ranchland are to be destroyed, all for a privately funded highway. Of course, this is not the first time property-owners did battle with highway builders. That in itself is getting lots of media attention, but almost entirely in the regional/local media. At first glance, one might say this is a local story, so why should it go national?

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The neo-conservative dream faded in 2006.

Iraq was meant to be the showcase for a New American Century

The ambitions proclaimed when the neo-cons’ mission statement “The Project for the New American Century” was declared in 1997 have turned into disappointment and recriminations as the crisis in Iraq has grown.

“The Project for the New American Century” has been reduced to a voice-mail box and a ghostly website. A single employee has been left to wrap things up.

The idea of the “Project” was to project American power and influence around the world.

The 1997 statement (written during the administration of President Bill Clinton) said:

“We seem to have forgotten the essential elements of the Reagan Administration’s success: a military that is strong and ready to meet both present and future challenges; a foreign policy that boldly and purposefully promotes American principles abroad; and national leadership that accepts the United States’ global responsibilities.”

Among the signatories were many of the senior officials who would later determine policy under President George W Bush - Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Elliot Abrams and Lewis Libby - as well as thinkers including Francis Fukuyama, Norman Podheretz and Frank Gaffney.

The neo-conservatives were called that because they sought to re-establish what they felt were true conservative values in the Republican Party and the United States.

They wanted to stop what they felt were the isolationist tendencies that had developed under President Clinton, and even under the pragmatic President George Bush senior.

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The neo-conservative dream faded in 2006.

Iraq was meant to be the showcase for a New American Century

The ambitions proclaimed when the neo-cons’ mission statement “The Project for the New American Century” was declared in 1997 have turned into disappointment and recriminations as the crisis in Iraq has grown.

“The Project for the New American Century” has been reduced to a voice-mail box and a ghostly website. A single employee has been left to wrap things up.

The idea of the “Project” was to project American power and influence around the world.

The 1997 statement (written during the administration of President Bill Clinton) said:

“We seem to have forgotten the essential elements of the Reagan Administration’s success: a military that is strong and ready to meet both present and future challenges; a foreign policy that boldly and purposefully promotes American principles abroad; and national leadership that accepts the United States’ global responsibilities.”

Among the signatories were many of the senior officials who would later determine policy under President George W Bush - Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Elliot Abrams and Lewis Libby - as well as thinkers including Francis Fukuyama, Norman Podheretz and Frank Gaffney.

The neo-conservatives were called that because they sought to re-establish what they felt were true conservative values in the Republican Party and the United States.

They wanted to stop what they felt were the isolationist tendencies that had developed under President Clinton, and even under the pragmatic President George Bush senior.

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A new Center for Responsible Lending (CRL) study reveals that 2.2 million American households are likely to lose their homes and as much as $164 billion due to foreclosures in the subprime mortgage market.

The CRL study is the first comprehensive, nationwide review of millions of subprime mortgages originated from 1998 through the third quarter of 2006.

CRL’s research suggests that risky lending practices have triggered the worst foreclosure crisis in the modern mortgage market, projecting that one out of five (19.4%) subprime loans issued during 2005-2006 will fail.

“In the subprime sector, the most vulnerable borrowers are sold the most dangerous loans,” said Mike Calhoun, CRL president. “At $164 billion, the losses from foreclosures could pay for the college educations of four million kids. For families who lose their houses because their loans fail, savings and economic security will be way out of reach.”

The report discusses a number of factors that drive subprime foreclosures — in the majority of cases, borrowers receive high-risk loan features, packed into an adjustable rate mortgage with a low start rate, that is approved without considering whether the homeowner can afford to pay the loan after the rate rises.

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The argument over immigration controls deepened last night after a gang of teenage robbers who were in the country illegally was convicted of killing a woman as she held a six-month-old baby at a christening party.

The killers: Diamond Babamuboni, Timy Babamuboni and Jude Odigie

It was the second time this week that immigrants who had been allowed to remain in Britain despite committing a string of offences were found guilty of a brutal killing.

On Tuesday, a court heard how two Somali men involved in the shooting of Pc Sharon Beshenivksy had been spared deportation because their homeland was judged too dangerous for them.

At the Old Bailey yesterday, Diamond Babamuboni, 17, his brother Timy, 15, and Jude Odigie, 16, all from Nigeria, were convicted of the manslaughter of Zainab Kalokoh, 31, a married mother of two children from war-ravaged Sierra Leone.

A fourth, who cannot be named, was found guilty of her murder at the party in Peckam, south London, in August last year. The Babamuboni brothers — whose mother had been refused leave to remain in the country — were in Britain illegally. Odigie had also been told he could not stay.

Yet despite this, they carried on a life of crime with apparent impunity other than occasional court appearances. They were meant to attend courses run by local youth offender teams but shunned any interventions.

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DES MOINES, IA - Raids at meatpacking plants in six states last week started with an investigation in early March that uncovered a potential of 4,300 illegal workers, only a fraction of which have been caught, U.S. Attorney Matthew Whitaker said Wednesday.

Whitaker, the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Iowa, said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents began scrutinizing employment documents at the Swift & Co. meatpacking plants in Iowa, Colorado, Nebraska, Texas, Utah and Minnesota.

On Tuesday, Whitaker announced some of the firsts arrests resulting from the raids. He said 23 people taken into custody during a raid at a Swift plant in Marshalltown have been charged with identity theft and immigration violations. In addition, seven other previous Swift workers taken into custody earlier in December have been charged.

Whitaker said 89 people had been taken into custody during the Marshalltown raid.

The number of people in Iowa now charged in violations is a small slice of about 1,300 people who were detained in six states during the raids last week. The nationwide figure is far smaller than the number of people targeted by federal agents, though, Whitaker said.

Among the 14,000 Swift employees at those plants, Whitaker said, agents had identified 4,300 people with questionable documentation.

Nationwide, about 199 people have been charged and are held in jails. The rest face a lengthy administrative procedure that could lead to deportation.

Whitaker said he initiated the six-state raid after the March document study uncovered 664 potential illegal aliens working at the Swift plant in Marshalltown.

“When that was brought to my attention by ICE, I determined that something had to be done,” he said. “It started off a series of events that included a national organization of five other judicial districts, which ultimately set up the enforcement actions that happened last Tuesday.”

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Virgil Goode sparks a nationwide controversy with a letter sent to a hundred of his constituents.

It said in part, “If American citizens don’t wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran.” The letter went on to say, “I fear that in the next century we will have many more Muslims in the United States if we do not adopt the strict immigration policies that I believe are necessary to preserve the values and beliefs traditional to the United States of America.”

His e-mail was in response to Representative-Elect Keith Ellison’s decision to take the oath of office using a Koran instead of the Bible. Ellison, who is from Minnesota was born and raised in America and converted to Islam. Goode’s office received dozens of complaints about Ellison’s decision to use the Koran.

Goode’s letter has some Muslim groups asking for Goode to apologize, but those calls aren’t coming from around here.

In Rocky Mount, Goode’s hometown, there are streets and buildings named for his father, Virgil Goode, Sr. In this part of the Commonwealth, you aren’t likely to hear any criticism of the congressman.

“The people of Franklin County love Virgil,” said Sue Wallis of Boones Mill.

At Hazel’s Beauty Salon, they cut Goode some slack.

“I think Virgil would not do anything that he did not think was right for his people,” said Hazel Jones, the owner of the shop. “I think he’s trying to protect his people.”

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Inside the walls of Brookland-Cayce High School, you expect students to be treated equally. But a viewer tip led News19 online where a teacher’s comments left us asking questions.

“These sorts of things are going to upset people, but the truth can be very upsetting,” said Brookland-Cayce High School teacher Winston McCuen.

That truth, at least according to McCuen, is that black people are inferior to whites.

“Intellectually, yes they are,” said McCuen. “This has been confirmed over and over, and this is a generalization. Again, there are some blacks who are more intelligent than individual whites. But as a rule, that is true. I-Q tests prove it over, and over and over.”

News19’s J.R. Berry asked McCuen, “Do you think slavery in America was a good thing? “Yes,” said McCuen. “In America there was a rational assessment saying listen, if we give these people freedom right as they are and you have to go back to see how they were, you can’t assume they were like us.

J.R. asked, “How were they?” “They were coming out of the jungles,” said McCuen. “They had been enslaving each other for centuries in Africa, and in terms of being used to rule of law, they knew none of that.”

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DALLAS - Former employees are suing Swift & Co. for $23 million, alleging the meatpacking company conspired to keep wages down by hiring illegal immigrants.

The 18 former employees are U.S. citizens and legal residents who worked at a plant in Cactus, north of Amarillo, one of six facilities raided an a multistate federal sweep that led to the arrests of nearly 1,300 employees and temporarily halted Swift’s operations.

“These plaintiffs are … victims in a longstanding scheme by Swift to depress and artificially lower the wages of its workers by knowingly hiring illegal workers,” said their attorney, Angel Reyes. “By lessening its labor costs and increasing its profits, Swift has severely damaged the potential earnings and livelihood of these hardworking men and women.”

A spokesman for Greeley, Colo.-based Swift didn’t immediately return calls Monday, but President and CEO Sam Rovit has said the company has never knowingly hired illegal workers and does not condone the practice.

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