We don't care

Houston Chronicle:

More than 4.2 million Iraqis have been displaced since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. But just 1,608 have been admitted to America in the government's fiscal year ending in September. Among other things, Department of Homeland Security officials are required to personally interview applicants.

The real debate about immigration

Michael Kinsley, in Time:

What you are supposed to say about immigration--what most of the presidential candidates say, what the radio talk jocks say--is that you are not against immigration. Not at all. You salute the hard work and noble aspirations of those who are lining up at American consulates around the world. But that is legal immigration. What you oppose is illegal immigration.

This formula is not very helpful. We all oppose breaking the law, or we ought to. Saying that you oppose illegal immigration is like saying you oppose illegal drug use or illegal speeding. Of course you do, or should. The question is whether you think the law draws the line in the right place. Should using marijuana be illegal? Should the speed limit be raised--or lowered? The fact that you believe in obeying the law reveals nothing about what you think the law ought to be, or why.

Another question: Why are you so upset about this particular form of lawbreaking? After all, there are lots of laws, not all of them enforced with vigor. The suspicion naturally arises that the illegality is not what bothers you. What bothers you is the immigration. There is an easy way to test this. Reducing illegal immigration is hard, but increasing legal immigration would be easy. If your view is that legal immigration is good and illegal immigration is bad, how about increasing legal immigration? How about doubling it? Any takers? So in the end, this is not really a debate about illegal immigration. This is a debate about immigration.

One way to bolster military enlistments

Spiegel Online:

Since Sept. 11, 2001, the United States has granted US citizenship to 32,500 foreign soldiers. In July 2002, US President George W. Bush issued an executive order to expand existing legislation to offer a fast track to citizenship to foreigners who agree to fight for the US Armed Forces. About 8,000 non-Americans have joined the US military every year since then.

The foreigners already represent 5 percent of all recruits. They even make up the majority of soldiers from some New York and Los Angeles neighborhoods. Four years and 3,800 US deaths after the beginning of the Iraq campaign, fewer and fewer American citizens are willing to fight in a war opposed by a majority of the US population. But despite the Iraq war's lack of popularity, US generals are demanding 180,000 new recruits a year.

The Pentagon already spends $3.2 billion a year on recruitment, even sending its recruiters to high schools to persuade 17-year-olds still a year away from graduation to enlist.

No one wants to fight Bush's war, so people desperate to become Americans are bribed to do so. If they survive.

Trent Lott: Illegal aliens are like goats

Biloxi Sun-Herald:

Sen. Minority Whip Trent Lott, R-Miss., was talking to reporters Wednesday about the immigration bill, when he said, "If the answer is 'build a fence' I've got two goats on my place in Mississippi. There ain't no fence big enough, high enough, strong enough, that you can keep those goats in that fence."

"Now people are at least as smart as goats," Lott continued. "Maybe not as agile. Build a fence. We should have a virtual fence. Now one of the ways I keep those goats in the fence is I electrified them. Once they got popped a couple of times they quit trying to jump it."

"I'm not proposing an electrified goat fence," Lott added quickly, "I'm just trying, there's an analogy there."

I'm sure we could all come up with some good analogies for Lott.

More Evidence Gonzales Is A Criminal

The Washington Post has conducted an extensive analysis of Bush Administration immigration judge appointees, and concludes that the Administration has politicized these judicial selections, despite laws specifically forbidding such a practice. In the wake of the U.S. Attorneys scandal, which inspired the investigation, this blatantly illegal behavior should come as no surprise; but it is yet another example of the Administration's monomaniacal obsession with politicizing absolutely every aspect of government, to the detriment of the government's ability to function.

As the Post explains:

The Bush administration increasingly emphasized partisan political ties over expertise in recent years in selecting the judges who decide the fate of hundreds of thousands of immigrants, despite laws that preclude such considerations, according to an analysis by The Washington Post.

At least one-third of the immigration judges appointed by the Justice Department since 2004 have had Republican connections or have been administration insiders, and half lacked experience in immigration law, Justice Department, immigration court and other records show.

Two newly appointed immigration judges were failed candidates for the U.S. Tax Court nominated by President Bush; one fudged his taxes and the other was deemed unqualified to be a tax judge by the nation's largest association of lawyers. Both were Republican loyalists.

Also appointed were a Republican election law specialist from New Jersey, a former treasurer of the Republican Party in Louisiana, a White House staffer, and an anti-pornography advocate. None had any apparent qualification to be involved in immigration issues; and one El Paso appointee was later ruled to lack even the minimum qualification.

According to sworn testimony before Congressional investigators, the Department of Justice abandoned the traditional civil service process for selecting judges in 2004. Our friends Kyle Sampson and Monica Goodling reportedly explained that they thought the practice was legal, but DOJ spokesman Dean Boyd says it was not. These appointments are made by the Attorney General, and this politicization took place under both Attorneys General John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzales.

According to news reports, the no-confidence resolution against Gonzales will be voted on today. Given this latest report, it's time for Congress to realize that no-confidence just doesn't cut it. The man breaks laws. He is a criminal. He is the nation's chief law enforcement officer. It's time to get serious about dealing with him.

Nobody's Mayor

The American Prospect's Michael Tomasky eviscerates Rudy Giuliani:

Gun control? Welcoming immigrants? A woman's right to choose? Never mind his past positions. The only -ism that Rudy Giuliani believes in is sadism.

Go read.