South African prosecutors have issued an arrest warrant for Commissioner of Police Jackie Selebi, reports say. Mr Selebi is the current head of the international police body, Interpol.
He has not been arrested, and his spokeswoman said she knew nothing of the warrant. The National Prosecuting Authority has not commented. Opposition parties have highlighted Mr Selebi's reported criminal links and say if reports of the warrant are true, he should be suspended from his post.
Previous press reports have linked Mr Selebi to Glenn Agliotti, who was arrested last year in connection with the murder of leading businessman Brett Kebble.
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Selebi was a representative of the World Federation of Democratic Youth in Budapest, Hungary from 1983 - 1987. Thereafter he was elected Head of the ANC Youth League and member of the National Executive Committee of the ANC in 1987. In 1991 he was responsible for the repatriation of ANC exiles and in 1993 was appointed Head of the Department of Welfare of the ANC. Selebi was elected Honourable Member of Parliament during the 1994 elections. In 1995, Selebi was appointed South Africa's Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Geneva. Switzerland. In 1998 he got a Human Rights Award from the International Service for Human Rights.
In 2007 Selebi was strongly criticised for responding to concern within the country over South Africa's rising crime rate with the comment "What's all the fuss about crime?"
Okay, I get the ANC and UN ambassador bits. But what's the World Federation of Democratic Yoots?
The World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY) is a left-wing youth organization, recognized by the United Nations as an international youth non-governmental organization. WFDY, which describes itself as an "anti-imperialist, left-wing" organisation, was founded in London in 1945.
WFDY was formed as a broad international youth movement, organized in the context of the end of the Second World War. But at the beginning of the Cold War, almost all Western organizations pulled out of WFDY due to its association with Soviet-aligned socialist and Communist parties. It is generally considered to be a successor organisation to the Young Communist International.
I see a Nobel Prize in this man's future. Unless his racketeering buddies arrange for a "accident".
The H5N1 bird flu virus can pass through a pregnant womans placenta to infect the fetus, researchers reported on Thursday.
They also found evidence of what doctors had long suspected that the virus not only affects the lungs, but passes throughout the body into the gastrointestinal tract, the brain, liver and blood cells.
The work helps us to understand H5N1s high fatality rate, as well as serving as model for global collaboration in the field of emerging infectious diseases, said Dr. Ian Lipkin of Columbia University in New York, who directed the study.
Lipkin and a team at Peking University in Beijing studied tissue taken from two people killed by H5N1 in China a 24-year-old pregnant woman and a 35-year-old man.
The study is the first to come out of the Infectious Disease Center at Peking University in Beijing, established after the epidemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome or SARS, a new virus that spread out of China in 2003, killing 800 people and infecting 8,000 before it was stopped.
The center is now looking at victims of H5N1 avian influenza. The virus mostly infects birds, but occasionally infects people and has killed 200 out of 328 infected since 2003. Because experts fear it could cause a pandemic that would kill millions, they are studying it in great detail.
Jiang Gu and colleagues at Peking University looked at tissue samples from throughout the bodies of the victims.
They found genetic material from the virus in the lungs, as expected, but also in the brain, the placenta, the intestines, and in immune system cells in the blood and the liver.
The four-month-old fetus, which died with its mother, was also infected, the researchers reported in the Lancet medical journal.
Their findings support the theory of a cytokine storm the idea that the immune system overreacts to the virus in some cases, and sends out an overwhelming swarm of signaling chemicals that end up killing the patient.
Many people have talked about cytokine storm, Lipkin said in a telephone interview.
Here the lung findings are that the amount of damage appears to be disproportional to the number of cells that were infected. This supports the hypothesis that there might be indirect methods of damage.
They also found evidence the virus had damaged immune cells including macrophages, which they said suggests the virus not only overstimulates parts of the immune system but can also suppress other parts.
Previous studies of H5N1 victims have produced evidence the virus may have evaded their immune systems defenses by suppressing them.
The researchers noted that no one had thought human influenza could cross the placenta and affect unborn babies. But there just isnt that much information, Lipkin said.
Nairobi, 27 September: UN Special Representative for Somalia, Mr. Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, commends the President of France for his announcement before the UN General Assembly to provide naval escorts for ships carrying food and humanitarian assistance off the Horn of Africa from pirate attacks. This important measure will help curb piracy along the coast and facilitate the work of the UN and the Humanitarian agencies in alleviating the suffering of the Somali people...
The UN Special Representative also calls on all the countries with naval assets in the region to join forces with France to help protect the delivery of humanitarian aid. Ould Abdallah added, regular delivery of humanitarian assistance would in addition help stabilize Somalia.
France's U-turn has given me whiplash...
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/28/2007 00:00 ||
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...This is the France that gave us Lafayette. Vive la France!
Mike.
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
09/28/2007 7:52 Comments ||
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For now it is just the government of France, teh French still hate America. Hopefully the doses of poison they get from the French MSM wll gradually be reduced now that Chirak is not at Elysee.
White Zimbabweans found themselves a step closer to losing control of their businesses to black people yesterday as a result of new government legislation. The ruling Zanu-PF party in parliament approved the indigenisation and economic empowerment bill on Wednesday night. The proposed law calls for white owners to hand over 51% of their business interests to black people. Opposition MPs walked out of the sitting, saying the bill was racist and unconstitutional. The legislation has yet to be approved by the senate and signed into law by President Robert Mugabe. After those formalities, legal work could take months.
So a white person born and raised in Zim-bob-we isn't 'indigenious'?
"It's the farms [seizures in 2000] all over again. What next, our homes?" said the white owner of an engineering firm, who did not want to be named. "Keep me out of this or I'll be the first on the list. I'd be out of here if I could." He said he was looking for a black partner for the firm.
On Tuesday Paul Mangwana, the minister in charge of black empowerment, said only white people "disadvantaged by the colonial system" before independence in 1980 were defined as "indigenous" Zimbabweans who would be allowed to keep majority control of businesses. "The bill is not about economics, but politics. It is about the total liberation of Zimbabwe," he told a panel of MPs on Tuesday.
Like the farm takeovers, the bill was to correct colonial-era imbalances, the media quoted Mr Mangwana saying. "If a white person wants to start a business he should partner with indigenous persons. We are not stopping anyone from starting a business," he said. An estimated 30,000 white people still live in the population of 12.5 million, down from about 275,000 at independence.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/28/2007 00:00 ||
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Of course they back the takeover. Its legalized looting for them.
A top Russian investigator was shot dead on Thursday as he walked out of a restaurant in central Moscow in an apparent contract killing, the Kommersant daily reported. Nazim Kaziakhmedov was shot twice in the chest and once in the head by an attacker dressed in black and wearing a baseball cap, Kommersant said on Friday, citing officials. Kaziakhmedov was working on a major fraud case involving investment group Finvest and was a member of the newly-formed investigative committee of the Russian prosecutor's office, Kommersant said.
In the early hours of Wednesday, a member of the Armenian parliament was stabbed and shot by two men in the casino of the swanky Metropol Hotel in the city centre, suffering serious injuries.
Georgian police have arrested an ex-minister for corruption charges after he accused the president of ordering him to kill a businessman. Deputy Prosecutor General Nika Gvaramiya said that Irakli Okruashvili - a former defense minister- had been detained on charges of extortion, money laundering, and abuse of power.
Opposition figures said the real reason behind Okruashvili's arrest were his accusations against the president made in televised remarks late on Tuesday. Okruashvili accused Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili of corruption and discussing the possibility of eliminating a businessman, although he had no evidence to support his accusations.
Leaders of Georgia's fractured opposition called on their supporters to protest in front of the parliament building against what one of them described as "political terror." President Mikhail Saakashvili sacked Okruashvili, a member of his inner circle in 2006 after the minister made hawkish statements. He attacked Russia for propping up the separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and lobbied for tougher action to re-establish Tbilisi's control there.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/28/2007 00:00 ||
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EINNEWS > Georgia is reporting/complaining that there is an unwarranted buildup of [Russ?] troops along its border wid Abkhazia.
A Chinese national and a US citizen have been charged with conspiring to steal sensitive microchip designs capable of use in military technology, justice officials said Wednesday. The US Attorney's office in northern California said Lee Lan and Ge Yuefei had been indicted on multiple charges of conspiracy to commit economic espionage and to steal trade secrets.
Wonder if Mr. Lee gave any money to Dhimmicrats?
Lee, 42, a US citizen, and Ge, 34, a Chinese national, had sought to steal secrets from their employer, NetLogics Microsystems, and from the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation, a statement said. The two men had set up a company for the purpose of developing and marketing products related to the stolen trade secrets, and had attempted to secure funding from the Chinese government, it added.
Lee and Ge have been released on 300,000 dollars bail and must reappear in court on October 29. They face up to 15 years in jail and a 500,000 dollar fine if convicted.
#1
Wonder if Mr. Lee gave any money to Dhimmicrats?
SOP. You have to have your program in place for the contingency the would allow a President Hillary to exchange good Chicom agents for any number of 'human rights' activists sometime in the future.
#2
15 yrs if convicted huh? How about putting their heads on pikes and sending them back to Beijing. However, this looks like a private corporate matter vice one of immediate national intel so I could acquiesce to taking just a hand and a foot.
LONDON - Airbus' notoriously delay-stricken super-jumbo A380 got a new customer for the first time in two years on Thursday, after British Airways snapped up 12 of the planes in a deal worth nearly $4 billion. But the good news will not dispel worries over profitability at the European plane-maker, as well as the ascendancy of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner.
Although British Airways broke with tradition by placing its first ever order for Airbus' A380, it still gave a boost to Boeing by ordering 24 Dreamliners, the mid-sized craft that has so far raked in over 700 orders and is set for a maiden flight before the end of the year.
If the orders get any more lopsided the Airbus will start looking like the Taliban in an ambush.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/28/2007 00:00 ||
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Airbus is in big trouble. They are faced with jacking up prices as the USD falls or heammoraghing money.
#6
I dunno;
Boeing is having trouble getting all the bit / piece parts it needs for the inital low assembly rate ( 7-10/month) with a 700+ backlog, some airlines may get itchy feet if the A350 XWB comes in on time, and if the open secret about Boeing wanting to double 787 production rate is true, this is really going to put a crimp in fastener supplies ( post 9/11, the glut of supply caused many mfg'rs to depart the scene, now they cannot spool up fast enough). i look for some 787 defection, but still waiting to see if the A380 is really going to make it.
The next variant of Agni having a range of 5,000 km will be inducted into the armed forces withing four years, a senior DRDO scientist said today. "The next variant will also be fully indigenous and will be able to strike at over 5000 km range besides carrying heavy payloads ... It would be a multiple warhead missile with a capacity to carry four to 12 warheads," Advanced System Laboratory Director Avinash Chander said here.
He was speaking at a talk on "Technology management for integrated guided missile programme with special reference to Agni intercontinental missile" at the DAV Institute of Engineering and Technology.
He said the system would be meticulously designed so that the missile's direction and target could be changed in air. "We are trying to attain an accuracy level of 100 metres," he said.
The Agni variant will be three-stage solid propulsion with road mobility with composite rocket motors, he said.
Posted by: john frum ||
09/28/2007 05:56 ||
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Good idea but India should be working on a submarine force. Geography gives Pakistan first strike capacity. The stupidest move in the 20th century was the Partition of India. It was certain that all that could be achieved was the creation of 2 mortal enemies.
After cricket, bookmakers have now received bets worth billions of rupees on who will be the next president and what crucial decisions will be taken in the near future, Geo TV reported. Karachi-based bookmakers have declared Musharraf favourite candidate to win the poll. The odds of five to one have been kept on Musharraf, while odds of one to 40 on Amin Fahim and Wajeehuddin Ahmad.
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09/28/2007 00:00 ||
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NPR reported this morning that the Pakistani Supreme Courted voted 6-3 yesterday to allow President General Dr. Musharref to run for a third term as president while remaining in the Army.
Nine people have lost their lives as security forces shot at thousands of anti-government protesters in Burma's main city of Rangoon. Besides the dead, who were eight protesters and a Japanese video journalist, 11 demonstrators and 31 soldiers were wounded on the second day of the crackdown.
The crisis, which entered the 10th day on Thursday, actually began on August 19 with demonstrations over a fuel price hike. The protests are mainly led by Buddhist monks. Security forces have also raided several monasteries, beating monks and arresting more than 100, according to a monk at one monastery.
The protests were the stiffest challenge to the generals in two decades and tens of thousands defied the ruling military crackdown. World leaders have renewed calls for sanctions and more pressure on the military government.
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09/28/2007 00:00 ||
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I know some will dismiss this as just lobbying by big business to bring in cheap labor on visas. But I know a lot of folks who have no direct stake in this issue, but who see recent graduates up close, who are deeply worried as well.
There is nothing automatic about our economic security and dominance. We are running on the skills and training of older workers in many cases - and if we don't get our educational system in order yesterday we will fall behind a lot faster than most Americans realize.
It's a WOT issue too. Anyone who's seen the composition of graduate student bodies in computer science and engineering knows we're in trouble. There's a reason China can boast an ability to attack our cyber infrastructure .....
The topic was education and the talk was not optimistic at the Institute for a Competitive Workforce's Sept. 25 workshop. A part of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, ICW drew several hundred participants to its event, held with the goal of promoting effective and sustainable business and education/work force partnerships.
"Our continued leadership is not inevitable and may not be sustainable," Fred Tipson, Microsoft's senior policy counsel, said in an afternoon panel discussion focused on upgrading the current and future work force's digital literacy and math and science skills. "The question is whether our work force or some other country's will be beneficiaries of new technology."
Tipson referred to America's ability to continue to produce high school and college graduates with the skills needed to be successful in today's technology work force as "dire."
Panel moderator James Whaley, president of the Siemens Foundation, added, "We can no longer assume the talent pipeline will be here."
To read about how some African countries are counting on technological education to help fight poverty, click here.
Judy Moog, national program director of the Verizon Foundation, gave the panel participants little reason to question Tipson or Whaley's statements. According to Moog, 70 percent of the nation's eighth graders are below sufficient levels in reading skills and "might well never catch up."
Moog also pointed out that in terms of "quality" of high school graduates, America has fallen to 19th out of 26 nations surveyed. Moreover, she said, nearly half the U.S. adult populationsome 93 million peoplehave very poor or marginal literacy skills.
"Literacy is the price of admission for competitiveness," she said. "People need to access a torrent of information over a vast array of devices. America isn't succeeding fast enough."
Tipson said Microsoft breaks down the issue into three phases: digital literacy, in which a person learns basic skills, digital fluency, meaning the skills are applied, and digital mastery, in which the first two steps are translated into advanced skills.
"We have a [digital] mastery gap, which is why we keep going outside the country to hire," he said. Microsoft is one of largest users of H-1B visas, a specialized-occupation temporary worker visa.
As for the future, only panelist Robert Leber of Northrop Grumman seemed optimistic, and then only if the business community gets behind efforts to support schools and training programs that emphasize digital literacy, math and science skills.
"The future is not young people, it's keeping the business community involved," Leber said. "Young people need a global view of what's coming, not a xenophobic view about what's happening in other countries."
Moog, too, rooted for business community involvement but characterized the progress made on literacy in the last 10 years as "sad." Whaley said a possible solution was a lifelong "earning account" that would allow to workers to periodically retool their job skills.
Microsoft's Tipson said glumly, "There is a stronger and stronger recognition we are not getting the job done."
#1
That is the problem with hiring from liberal colleges where "diversity training brainwashing" is the requirement for graduation.
We prefer to hire people that have experience and no degree. They are usually highly motivated and learn on their own quickly and adapt to different technologies better than their brainwashed degreed counterparts.
OJT skills are useful for junior roles and for administering or replicating existing technology. They are not adequate for the kinds of technical innovation that drive economic growth however.
I used to hire a lot of programmers and engineers. Now I teach undergraduates.
Employees who lack a solid education in their fields simply could not rise beyond a certain level of contribution. And for innovation, that means a graduate degree from a good program.
#3
And, we have a problem with the core skills of high school grads who aim at other jobs too.
The inability to reason logically, to apply algebra skills to daily problems or to read an article and evaluate the arguments being made -- these are weak in so many of our public school grads from the last decade or so.
#5
OJT skills are useful for junior roles and for administering or replicating existing technology. They are not adequate for the kinds of technical innovation that drive economic growth however.
I will concede that plenty of counter examples exist and that I agree with dramatically improving our educational system and allowing as many technically competent immigrants into the country as possible, but the names of Gates, Wozniak, Jobs, Ellison and Dell demonstrate that a college degree is neither necessary nor sufficient for the kinds of technical innovation that drive economic growth.
#6
The US does offer one critical element that China and many other competitors do not - freedom. Our own youth may drift aimlessly through life, but our freedoms continue to attract the best of most of the rest of the world. Immigrants - legal or illegal - will come to do the jobs Americans won't, or can't. China's economic advancement the past 20 years is not because of successful centralized management but because they allowed the seeds of Hong Kong to spread a little.
#7
Panel moderator James Whaley, president of the Siemens Foundation, added, "We can no longer assume the talent pipeline will be here."
If technology jobs are seen as unstable, if Americans believe those jobs could be off-shored at a moment's notice, then, yes, the pipeline will shut down. No one will be entering it, because the risk is too high.
If their goal really is to maintain American competitiveness, then they'd be looking at alternatives. Look at "in-shoring" -- hiring people in areas of the country that have lower costs of living. The cultural barriers are much, much lower, the time difference is smaller, and you can tout it as helping develop America.
The PR advantages and the lower cost of management will make up the difference in labor costs.
Posted by: Rob Crawford ||
09/28/2007 18:40 Comments ||
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I checked with Mr. Wife, who agrees. He thinks the elites are more highly educated than ever, but too many of the rest are choosing to be less educated than ever, thus making their status permanent. Instead of the old bell curve, a permanent bimodal distribution. And, for instance, the statistic is thrown around that there are now more young black males in prison than there are in college [a more rejectionist, nihilistic choice I cannot imagine}.
The only thing growing as fast as health care cost is university education cost... Between the cost and the difficulty for foreign students to get visas, there are significantly fewer who aspire to come here for an education, then stay, and persuade others to follow. He sees significantly fewer than, say, 20 years ago.
#9
OJT skills are useful for junior roles and for administering or replicating existing technology. They are not adequate for the kinds of technical innovation that drive economic growth however.
I would argue for engineering fields and others of that nature a degree is necessary to quickly learn the basics of physics and the like. However, your analogy of the IT world is flawed. All it takes to learn what is needed not only to replicate and create new and innovative programs, is the ability to learn a language. Our best programmers started this as pre-teens and haven't gone to a lick of school. I'm not saying school isn't necessary and desirable. I am working on my degree with a emphasis in management so I can get higher in the management side. All I'm saying is it isn't fully needed to get good people that can not only administer, but create new products.
Also, that being said, I think our schools are falling behind horribly because of liberal PC bullshit and the basic Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, History, Science and Critical Thinking skills are very much in decline and our whole system needs to be put back into the education business, rather than the indoctrination business.
#10
I suspect we're in violent agreement, Darth. ;-)
No doubt there are good people who can produce new products without grad education. What I had in mind but didn't articulate well is the difference between creating new products based on existing technologies/materials/tools and the kind of innovation that makes NEW technologies etc. Those are the longer-term engines that have given the US a strong economic growth for decades. And those generally -- not always, but in most cases -- do require more advanced education to achieve.
#11
My niece got a BSEE in 1989 & a MSEE in 1994. She is still working in her field. However, nearly all her classmates have left the field, disappointed in the quality of domestic employment opportunities. Pay peanuts, treat them like chimps, don't be surprised if all you get are monkeys.
#12
Problem is H1B gutted the industry. THey used cheap Indian labor to replace US IT workers. THe college kids wised up - they abandonded the field after ssin how IT workers were treated liek crap and thrown away or outsourced.
We have nobody to blame for this except short-sighted peopel running businesses, and the pet congressmen who set the H1B laws to allow indentured servitude which depressed wages (and therefore drove down those willing to settle for those wages for that kind of work).
Cut the H1B, subsidize engineering schools and students, make tech workers easier to get Green Cards provided they want to become citizens, and agree to stay for 7 years at a minimum, and tax the hell out of people who offshore, and that will fix the problem.
can I suggest the $ in the National Endowment for the Arts budget?
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/28/2007 21:16 Comments ||
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NS, of your list none except to some degree Wozniak have innovated technically.
Dell introduced the business model of IBM-compatible computers assembled from low-cost 3rd party manufactured parts. Jobs and Ellison are marketers. Gates bought or copied most of the key technologies that Microsoft has brought to market (although there are a few exceptions).
Woz did show initiative in his early days with the blue boxes for stealing free long distance phone calls (when such calls were expensive) and he did do the basic design on the early Apples. Years later he finished that BSEE degree at Berkely, enrolled under a fake name.
All have taken product to market and created both wealth for themselves and others. But they did so by exploiting research innovations done elsewhere.
We're beginning to run out of that old pool of innovations to exploit. We actually began running out of them a decade ago, but people didn't realize that because so many products came to market in the IT world that there were scads of jobs for e.g. sysadmins.
Until that became such a routine job that it got automated & outsourced.
IBM did and does innovate core technologies. AT&T did in the old Bell Labs - I still cite some of the papers that came out of research there. Rodney Brooks' robotics lab at MIT spun off iRobot and some others that are doing well with defense funding right now.
But we are very close to having exhausted that old supply of research waiting to be exploited by the Dells and Gates of the world. And without a serious cadre of new scientists and engineers we really are in serious danger of falling increasingly behind in global competition. That's not exaggeration, just sober fact.
I'm happy to be in violent agreement if you'll agree that IBM, Bell Labs and Xerox PARC did a lousy job of exploiting their technical innovations to drive economic growth. It takes both. I also agree that it takes continued research to develop new technologies for the dropouts (:-)) to exploit.
I'm just not sure I see a problem continuing to import engineering talent if our native born talent can find more productive opportunities elsewhere.
I agree very much with TW in #8. We need to make the US the most attractive place for the brightest people to migrate. Unlike those who want to keep the furners out, I want to bring the bright ones in and keep the dumb ones out. We should have a concerted effort to raise our national IQ through predatory immigration practices. This not only helps us, it harms our enemies.
#16
Yup - you and I and TW are in violent agreement.
(I would disagree with you on IBM, tho - a lot of their very successful innovations in areas like chip design and manufacturing were leveraged to great advantage within the company).
However - if we do not ALSO attract into our grad programs US citizens whose allegiance is to THIS country, then we will find (as we already have in the case of China) that a dismaying portion of those foreign students may take their grad training home to innovate there instead.
#17
if we do not ALSO attract into our grad programs US citizens whose allegiance is to THIS country, then we will find (as we already have in the case of China) that a dismaying portion of those foreign students may take their grad training home to innovate there instead.
I am very unconcerned about this except in the case of China.
China has an aggressive IP policy to drain our knowledge to their advantage and to coerce their brightest to do it by holding their families hostage. I would be happy to change my mind when shown evidence, but I don't think any country does this with near the success China does. But then I would never have let China into the WTO. But too many Clintonistas and WSJ types were made too rich to stop that train.
#21
Actually I will take it one step further. Should we be lucky enough to ever have a Judgment day I would lobby the deity to place all MBAs in the lower reaches of hell.
#23
Call me an optimist, but I see this in a differing light. I'll agree that we're lacking upcoming students who'll give us these NEW leaps in technology right now. Yet, how many brains does it take to come up with new innovations (usually just one, or a handful, if you look at history). Names like Einstein, Bell, Ford, Ben Franklin, etc. single-handedly caused MOMENTOUS leaps in technology never thought possible before.
And, I've begun to see a backlash to the US Education system in general, and the public schools specifically. All of my friends (married couples) have stay-at-home moms (with 2-3 kids each couple), and often the husband is an engineer. You have the No Child Left Behind Act, which has already caused some VoTech schools here to swell in population. People still show an interest in engineering, just maybe not in the IT world. I've already noticed engineering "characteristics" in my own son, and he's less than 2 years old (loves to take things apart and study them, loves cars/trains/planes/etc.). I will definitely encourage him in this arena, as I know how fundamental engineering is to our society (just ask anyone in New Orleans about drinking water or sewer systems after Katrina). Sure, a lot of the IT world has gone overseas, but is that REALLY where future leaps in technology will occur.
I receive almost daily updates on technological advances by "average Joes" here in the U.S. who are trying to get us off petroleum. They're studying fuel cells, thermal-solar power systems, plug-in electric cars, etc. Sure, these are all in 1 arena, but one I'd think we'd all agree is very important, if only to de-fund the jihadis.
Posted by: BA ||
09/28/2007 23:09 Comments ||
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Just to make clear: those are Mr. Wife's thoughts, not mine. On this subject I'm not qualified to have an opinion. I read the thread back to him just now, though. ;-)
Illegal immigrants living in states and cities that have adopted strict immigration policies are packing up and moving back to their home countries or to neighboring states. The exodus has been fueled by a wave of laws targeting illegal immigrants in Oklahoma, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia and elsewhere. Many were passed after congressional efforts to overhaul the immigration system collapsed in June.
Immigrants say the laws have raised fears of workplace raids and deportation. "People now are really frightened and scared because they don't know what's going to happen," says Juliana Stout, an editor at the newspaper El Nacional de Oklahoma. "They're selling houses. They're leaving the country." In Tulsa, schools have seen a drop in Hispanic enrollment.
Oklahoma state Rep. Randy Terrill, Republican author of his state's law, says the flight proves it is working. Most provisions of an Oklahoma law take effect in November. Among other things, it cuts off benefits such as welfare and college financial aid.
There's no hard demographic data on the trend, partly because it's hard to track people who are in the USA illegally. But school officials, real estate agents and church leaders say the movement is unmistakable.
Illegal immigrants also are leaving Georgia, where a law requires companies on government contracts with at least 500 employees to check new hires against a federal database to make sure they are legally authorized to work.
Real estate agent Guadalupe Sosa in Avondale, Ariz., outside Phoenix, says migration from the state began about three months ago, shortly after Gov. Janet Napolitano, a Democrat, signed a law that will take effect in January. Employers who hire illegal immigrants can lose their business licenses. Of the 10 homes Sosa has on the market, half belong to families that plan to leave because of immigration tensions. "They know they might be losing everything today or tomorrow," she says.
Maria Sanchez, 35, joined the migration with her sister and nephew, who are in the country legally. Sanchez was in the USA illegally, but she has gotten a temporary work permit. The three lived in Aurora, Colo., when Sanchez was fired from her job as district manager of a fast-food chain after she couldn't provide a valid Social Security number.
Colorado has approved several immigration measures. One gives employers 20 days to check and photocopy documents such as driver's licenses and Social Security cards, which new workers present to prove their legal status.
In Hazleton, Pa., families started moving away after the city passed an illegal-immigrant law last summer, says Rudy Espinal, head of the Hazleton Hispanic Business Association. The law would fine landlords who rented to illegal immigrants and suspend the business licenses of companies that hired them. A companion measure would require tenants to register with the city and pay $10 for a rental permit. A federal judge ruled the measures unconstitutional in July, but that hasn't stopped people moving away, he says.
EDINBURG, Texas (AP) House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called a plan to build fencing along parts of the Mexico border a "terrible idea" that overlooks local communities.
Pelosi made the comments during her trip to the Rio Grande Valley for the annual Hispanic Engineering, Science & Technology Week conference at the University of Texas-Pan American.
Excuse me, Madame Speaker. It's time to pander.
Oh. Thanks... "I have been against the fence, I thought it's a bad idea even when it was just a matter of discussion," said Pelosi, D-Calif. "These are communities where you have a border going through them, they are not communities where you have a fence splitting them."
Well, not yet... Last year, President Bush signed the Secure Fence Act requiring the construction of fencing along the 2,000-mile border. The plans call for about 370 miles of fence and 200 miles of vehicle barriers, including concrete barriers, by the end of 2008.
Anybody been keeping track of that? Pelosi also touted legislation known as the DREAM Act that would make it easier for some illegal immigrants to receive higher education benefits. She spoke at a conference that drew more than 5,000 students for activities designed to inspire careers in science and technology. The DREAM Act would eliminate a federal provision that discourages states from providing illegal immigrants with lower in-state tuition rates. It also would allow permanent residency for illegal immigrants who entered the country as children and have been admitted to an institution of higher education."It just isn't fair," Pelosi said. "Those young people who came to America one way or another ... their opportunities are curtailed because of the situation. And it's not only harmful to them it's harmful to the country."
#9
I know it ain't Christian - or even civil - to hate people.
But I sure don't like Nancy Pelosi very much at all.
Posted by: Bobby ||
09/28/2007 16:37 Comments ||
Top||
#10
FREEREPUBLIC/OTHER > TEN REASONS WHY THE US ECONOMY IS NOT IN TROUBLE. Artickle > HOUSING per se comprises only five percent of US total economy. In any case, unlike as during the Cold War, the impetus in the 21st Century is towards MEGALOPOLISes and beyond, i.e. CITIES THE SIZE OF [SMALL?]COUNTRIES. OWG > "THE WORLD" outside of CONUS is now America's SUBURBS. See George Jetson, Lando Kalrissian?, and CORSICANT PLANET-CITY.
#12
There's a move in several places to let non-citizens vote locally and maybe in state races too. Some members of this movement don't give much importance to legal vs. illegal immigrant along the way.
RE: Felon HEADSLAMMERS from Islamic countries and their illegal kissing kousins from down South...
Little Dicky Durbin is about to fuck over every US Citizen AGAIN by giving away "free" education [including 4 free years @ university] to every illegal immigrant here in America or any new one that shows up next year on our soil!
Small point, when Senator A$$ Drip Durbin "gives" away any money or tuition to anyone, its is our Money and Largess that he plays Big Shot with when he Pisses up the Wall!
Oh and BTW, The gall of this son of a Bitch is unlimited...
He stuck his amendment on the DoD appropriations bill for our Troops in Iraq.
wait for it....
He named it, Sen. Durbin's "Dream Act"
*PUKE*!!
Plz God SMITE little dicky durbin with something so HORRIBLE that it will make his fellow travellers quake with fear.
Posted by: Red Dawg ||
09/28/2007 21:42 Comments ||
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#14
But.......but........but......I thought enforcement would never work!
#15
I'm beginning to see this as the "perfect storm" of events. First, the Feds didn't do anything, so the locals/States are taking it upon themselves to do it (here in metro Atlanta, several cities/counties have made it illegal to rent apartments to illegals, have started cracking down on 20 person "single family" homes, etc.). In fact, one County got their police "deputized" by ICE so that they could access ICE's database to see immigration status of those they pulled over for other (mostly driving) violations. This local action, combined with the slump in the housing market (which is where a lot of them work) may be the "perfect storm" we've been waiting on.
I just hope they actually move back home, and don't just call "squatter's rights" to stay here and get gubmint bennies.
Posted by: BA ||
09/28/2007 22:51 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Nairobi, 27 September: UN Special Representative for Somalia, Mr. Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, commends the President of France for his announcement before the UN General Assembly to provide naval escorts for ships carrying food and humanitarian assistance off the Horn of Africa from pirate attacks. This important measure will help curb piracy along the coast and facilitate the work of the UN and the Humanitarian agencies in alleviating the suffering of the Somali people... 
White Zimbabweans found themselves a step closer to losing control of their businesses to black people yesterday as a result of new government legislation. The ruling Zanu-PF party in parliament approved the indigenisation and economic empowerment bill on Wednesday night. The proposed law calls for white owners to hand over 51% of their business interests to black people. Opposition MPs walked out of the sitting, saying the bill was racist and unconstitutional. The legislation has yet to be approved by the senate and signed into law by President Robert Mugabe. After those formalities, legal work could take months.
A Chinese national and a US citizen have been charged with conspiring to steal sensitive microchip designs capable of use in military technology, justice officials said Wednesday. The US Attorney's office in northern California said Lee Lan and Ge Yuefei had been indicted on multiple charges of conspiracy to commit economic espionage and to steal trade secrets.
LONDON - Airbus' notoriously delay-stricken super-jumbo A380 got a new customer for the first time in two years on Thursday, after British Airways snapped up 12 of the planes in a deal worth nearly $4 billion. But the good news will not dispel worries over profitability at the European plane-maker, as well as the ascendancy of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner. 
The next variant of Agni having a range of 5,000 km will be inducted into the armed forces withing four years, a senior DRDO scientist said today. "The next variant will also be fully indigenous and will be able to strike at over 5000 km range besides carrying heavy payloads ... It would be a multiple warhead missile with a capacity to carry four to 12 warheads," Advanced System Laboratory Director Avinash Chander said here.
