-As we predicted, the Senate passed the Gang of Eight amnesty yesterday, setting the stage for the final battle in the House of Representatives, which is ostensibly controlled by Republicans. You can view the roll call vote, which will serve as a handy reminder of which cringing Republicans need to be removed from office the next time they come up for reelection.

-The Senate debate over disassembling our republic was a thoroughly unedifying spectacle, from the senescent tirades of the Republican Party’s chief open borders pom pom twirler to the irrefragable idiocy that we’ve come to expect from his mini-me, Lindsey Graham. The only consolation is that some of us will be able to elect a new Senate before Congress elects a new people.

-You would think the threat of a bitterly fought, expensive primary-endorsed by no less than a former GOP Vice-presidential nominee-would cause skittish representatives to think twice before enacting a politically and economically ruinous amnesty. The promise by Rep. Steve King to depose Speaker Boehner if he moves forward on S.744-a move supported by powerful members of the House Republican caucus-seems to have instilled a measure of fear into La Raza enthusiast Luis Gutierrez’s BFF.

-Then again, the Republican leadership has never been known for its sagacity or political intuition. A fact demonstrated by comments made by RNC Chairman Reince Priebus after Senate passage of the Gang of Eight monstrosity. The elites have an entirely different conception of the public interest than that of most Americans, who tend to prioritize things like job security, safety, and upward mobility over the concerns of large corporate donors such as Big Agra and Silicon Valley lobbyists pleading for the importation of more high tech serfs.

-I tend to agree with Mark Levin, who believes that if amnesty is stopped in this session of Congress it will be in spite of John Boehner, not because of him. This man wants amnesty to be the law of the land, and the only thing preventing his wish from being fulfilled is the unified opposition of conservative Republican voters. The leadership of the Republican Party in the House needs to be reminded that they do not work for either Nancy Pelosi or Barack Obama, but for their constituents, i.e. patriotic  citizens who believe in American sovereignty and real border security. Even if the demise of the GOP as a national political entity is meaningless to them, these people should be reminded that they are placing their own political careers in jeopardy.

-With the abdication of leadership and abandonment of principle by so many Republicans, it’s reassuring to find a small glimmer of light in the struggle over amnesty in one of the least likely places. I refer to a fantastic piece published by The New Republic written by self-described liberal, opposing immigration reform. Much like Ted Rall, T.A. Frank sees the peril in naturalizing millions of workers-in addition to the hundreds of thousands who will imported over the same period-that will compete-at a decided advantage thanks to Obamacare regulations-with unemployed Americans who are already on the bottom rung of the economic ladder. The plight of American workers is something that the left cared about a scant two decades ago, but I suppose times have changed.

-We end today’s Rattle on a slightly humorous note. It appears that the Obama administration is not pleased with the way Hong Kong immigration officials  handled the departure of former NSA contractor turned leaker Edward Snowden, whose whereabouts have yet to be ascertained with any degree of certainty. Although this subject raises themes of constitutionality, privacy, foreign policy and other issues of grave import, what tickles the funny bone is the White House’s reaction to Mr. Snowden’s tour of the Eastern Hemisphere. In particular, the comments of White House Press Secretary Jay Carney:

The White House, which is typically much more restrained in its public remarks about the PRC, expressed a similar sentiment.

“We are just not buying that this was a technical decision by a Hong Kong immigration official,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said to reporters at a daily news briefing on June 24. “This was a deliberate choice by the government to release a fugitive despite a valid arrest warrant, and that decision unquestionably has a negative impact on the U.S.-China relationship.”

I completely agree, Mr. Carney. The notion that career bureaucrats would be responsible for momentous decisions that could have potentially grave consequences for national security is simply preposterous! I have no idea why someone would even consider deceiving the public with such an implausible scenario. People get the daftest notions sometimes.

Video of Frank Gaffney’s speech can be found on Urban Infidel.

One of the unofficial mottos of the United States, this phrase-which is minted on this country’s coins and emblazoned upon our paper bills-embodies the common heritage of the American nation, which was created from the union of thirteen distinct, unique former British colonies. Over the course of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it came to symbolize the melting pot forged from a collection of people who came to the United States from various European nations in order to reconstitute their lives.

It is a concept that, like many of its inhabitants, has become alien to contemporary America. We now live in a country comprised from a polyglot agglomeration of foreign tribes, individuals and extended families, many of whom would be unable to assimilate to American culture even if a coherent one still existed and they were encouraged to do so, both dubious propositions.

One of the most persistent questions raised by the September 11th attacks, and recurring periodically since, e.g. during the debate over the construction of Park 51, the debacle that the trial of Ft. Hood jihadist Nidal Malik Hasan has occasioned, and other terrorist attacks conceived by native or naturalized American citizens, has  revolved around whether Islam as it’s practiced today can be reconciled with traditional American values embodied in documents like the United States Constitution.

This question is what brought Frank Gaffney, the founder and president of the Center for Security Policy, to the Women’s National Republican Club last week, where he addressed the “civilizational jihad” he asserts Islamists are waging against the United States, as well as the West more broadly conceived. While the sight of Mr. Gaffney delivering a policy address is far from unusual, the fact that the event was hosted by Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies reflects a growing recognition among some conservatives-albeit, not all-that our nation’s immigration policy has a deep and profound influence upon national security and foreign policy concerns.

While some believe that the growing diminution of the traditional demographic profile of America will lead to a more pacific, non-interventionist foreign policy-analogizing it to the anti-war sentiment which prevailed in this country before its entry into World War I-it can be argued that the government’s embrace of heretofore foreign ethnic and religious groups will foster an even more aggressive, and in many ways detrimental, foreign policy, which might well endanger American diplomats, servicemen and civilians in the future-as it has in the recent past. What’s more, the union of multinational jihadist platforms with digital technology has given an entire generation of Arab, Asian and African Muslim young men who are essentially unmoored-having been transplanted to a foreign land at a young age-a distinct cultural and political identity; one which involves the replacement of Western norms and mores with a muscular, revanchist interpretation of Islam. The fact that the dominant legal, cultural, and political class have spent the past five decades attempting to minimize or nullify these very same values speeds their mission.

A perfect illustration of this dilemma was discussed by Frank Gaffney in relation to the Somali community within Minnesota, which now numbers in the tens of thousands. Resettled in previously homogeneous, tranquil parts of the United States at the urging of a United Nations bureaucracy and with the assistance of the U.S. State Department, these refugees have children who are now returning to the homeland of their parents and enlisting in battle against the Transitional Federal Government which our government helped to establish and killing African Union peacekeepers whose mission it ostensibly supports. Beyond the validity of their refugee claims-many of which are wholly fraudulent-there is the inescapable conclusion one must draw that the wealth confiscated from American citizens in the form of taxes-and lavished upon social welfare programs necessitated by the Somalis inability to support themselves or their families legally-is being used in some small measure to defray the cost of living of those who intend on blowing other people up.

In addition to the expense-born in our pocketbooks and  in the gradual erosion of American community-of this experiment, there is the the genuine threat posed by a large segment of migrants who dislike this country both because of specific foreign policy decisions and concrete Koranic injunctions. It beggars belief that the federal government would seek to import scores of foreigners from third world nations whose populations harbor significant hostility towards America while at the same time another branch of the state engages in nation-building experiments and military operations in those very same lands. The fact that this process is facilitated by the United Nations, a world body whose values are diametrically opposed to those cherished by most Americans, strains credulity.

One of the points emphasized throughout Gaffney’s lecture was the global, multidimensional nature of the jihadist threat. He focused extensively on the case of a particular individual who was detained while he and his hijab-clad wife filmed the support structure of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, an incident which would ultimately lead to one of the most critical pieces of evidence introduced during the trial of the Holy Land Foundation, at the time the largest Islamic charity in the United States. The HLF was eventually revealed to be not only a financial conduit for Hamas but also part of a network of institutions within the United States which were created under the auspices of the Muslim Brotherhood in order to achieve their ideological goals on American soil.

Although it might seem absurd to believe that bedrock American institutions can be undermined by a small coterie of Islamic ideologues, you have to consider the havoc the institutional left has already inflicted upon our society. An Iraqi refugee-with prior criminal offenses-has been charged with maliciously damaging federal property for attempting to destroy a Social Security Administration office with an improvised explosive device! The systematic execution of over a dozen soldiers by Nidal Malik Hasan is deemed a case of  ‘workplace violence’ by our federal government. A premeditated jihadist assault on LAX’s El Al terminal is not even considered a hate crime, and the head of the Justice Department cannot even utter the name of the religion whose doctrines inspired the man who attempted to obliterate Times Square with an explosive device which dwarfed that used in the Oklahoma City bombing.

In this context, it’s not difficult to see how a machiavellian political apparatchik with an outsized influence over the conservative movement, or an influential Democratic congressmen popular among both leftists and militant Muslims, or a presidential advisor with dubious ties to apologists for the Muslim Brotherhood can do permanent harm, especially when constitutional rights like freedom of speech are being used as bargaining chips in relations with the Muslim world.

The fact that a would-be facilitator of regicide and terrorist financier was able to enter the good graces of a sitting president and establish a program for Muslim chaplains, which still exists, because of the oleaginous influence of someone who purports to represent American Muslims illustrates the toxic combination of  identity politics and K street lobbying. And while some maintain that establishing a pro-Arab/Muslim political infrastructure in this country is necessary to balance the existing pro-Israel bias among American lawmakers, it’s hard to imagine Israelis-regardless of the wisdom of their specific policy views-enacting violent revenge upon Americans for their government’s policy regarding the West Bank or votes on the UN Security Council.

Glenn Greenwald raises the question of whether Nidal Malik was engaged in an act of terrorism, since-from his perspective, at least-he was fighting those who had enlisted in an army which had attacked his coreligionists in the nation of Yemen. But a more pertinent question is why someone who places allegiance to a foreign religion or a terrorist group in the Persian Gulf above his oath to the U.S. Army, or even his  obligation not to slaughter unarmed Americans, is in the United States to begin with. Why must the cult of diversity take precedence over the lives of ordinary American citizens?

And the answer is not comforting. It’s because our immigration policy is not designed with the interests of Americans in mind. Our laws are built to satisfy the demand of  colleges and universities that need the tuition paid by tens of thousands of Saudi students. Of private and public institutions that demand the addition of Muslim chaplains, regardless of ideology. Of parasitical federal contractors which make a killing by resettling scores of refugees who are a drain on state coffers in towns and cities throughout the country.

The customary response from advocates of changing the cultural landscape of America is that we need to do these things in order to change the hearts and minds of those living in the Islamic world. We need to project an image of openness in order to change the negative image of the United States overseas. The problem is that it has not worked, and in all likelihood, will never work. Globalization, insofar as it facilitates the exchange of goods and services according to the law of supply and demand, is a good thing. However, importing the maladies, cultural neuroses and obscurantist religious dogmas of foreign cultures for the sake of appeasing the gods of diversity and multiculturalism, even as we engage in questionable foreign interventions urged on by figures whose interests are inimical to those of the United States, is madness.

The rotten fruit of the Arab Spring, like that from the most recent war in Iraq, is being brought to our shores, so this is as good a time as any to begin having a conversation about what we want our country’s future to look like. Like Frank Gaffney, I believe it’s time to discontinue the diversity lottery, stop issuing visas to imams for whom there is no demand, and begin to look out for the interests of Americans, first and foremost.

To live in New York is to be surrounded by people suffering from various pathologies, many of whom you encounter on a daily basis if-like most of us-you use public transportation. Living here also means being surrounded by Marxists of varying hues, including Maoists, Trotskyites, and-as the photograph above illustrates, supporters of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Most of the time, international supporters of the only communist hereditary dictatorship fly under the radar. Outside of the faltering consortium of ethnic Koreans living in Japan-whose own stability has been imperiled for obvious reasons-there are not many people willing to support a regime which has killed enough of its subjects to rank comfortably between Pol Pot and Mengistu Haile Mariam in the annals of historical, third world despotism.

The event which occasioned these paeans to The Great Leader was the opening night of Red Dawn, a 1984 action-adventure thriller involving a Soviet invasion of the mainland United States that-much to the chagrin of the director of the original film-is being remade into a would-be blockbuster where the main antagonists are North Korean shock troops. Being a state-barely-where an economy  doesn’t exist and ICBMs are too poorly designed to reach the shores of the United States appears to have its advantages, at least from the perspective of a Hollywood film producer.

However, those going out of their way to avoid controversy usually have it thrust upon them, whether it be in the form of racially insensitive tweets, or a counter-protest staged by a bedraggled band of true believers led by an SDS spokesman who resembles a more unkempt version of Eric Stoltz, ca. The Butterfly Effect.

You thought SDS had disappeared with the departure of the last Americans from the U.S. embassy in Saigon, South Vietnam? Alas, it’s still extant, as is the Workers World, which peddles old ideas from the new left slightly repackaged-emphasis on slightly-for the Internet Age. The bilingual edition of the latter no doubt aimed to appeal to emigres from that vast swathe of Latin America which is infatuated with socialism, notwithstanding its rather obvious shortcomings.

Whether the proclivity of newcomers to favor government management of the economy will translate into increased support for The Great, Dear, Omniscient Leader is a matter for future generations to decide, but the spirited crowd of approximately half a dozen devoted communists seemed to be solidly in the corner of Kim Jong-Un and opposed to the shameless political dwarfs behind the cinematic reincarnation of this motion picture.

One of the scheduled speakers was the man wearing the jaunty keffiyeh seen above, who hails from the workers’ paradise that is post-Batista Cuba. Apparently, Raul Castro’s tropical paradise is, like the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, another victim of malicious, patently false Western propaganda. You might be asking yourself why, if that’s the case, he is in New York City right now instead of Havana. Oh, you vile, imperialist cur.

There was also an unofficial spokesperson from Occupy Wall Street whose purpose I wasn’t able to readily discern, although perhaps it was intended to add ballast to a movement that has seen better days. Most recently, when the Soviet Union existed as more than a whimsical advertising campaign from Hershey’s.

In fact, one of the points emphasized by our Alexi Lalas look-alike was that North Korea had a thriving economy during the untainted, benevolent reign of the Soviet Empire. Aside from the fact that this is wholly inaccurate, this assertion is 100 percent true. Still, you wonder why a regime that prides itself on its rigid autarky would rely upon its two largest neighbors in order to survive.

One of my hopes for the anti-Red Dawn/pro-deranged, overtly racist, vaguely Confucian Communist junta demonstration was that its small number of participants would be dwarfed by a slightly larger group of trolls, a la Communists for Kerry or Bureaucrash during its heyday.

Alas, no such hilarity ensued. I did get the chance to capture an amusing confrontation between comrade Maupin and a friend of mine who was also there to record this historic event. I don’t recall what was said verbatim, but I’m sure it involved a denunciation of capitalist lickspittles and/or running dogs of imperialism. For those of you who are interested in watching this tete-a-tete for yourselves, you can view it in its entirety on Youtube, which I’m certain would have been created by North Korean engineers if their nation hadn’t been bombarded by Western disinformation campaigns.

Sarcasm aside, one of the most disturbing aspects of this rally was a brief speech delivered by an envoy from the America-Democratic Republic of Korea Friendship Committee, who parroted the same lies you find published regularly by North Korea’s official news service.

Like the useful idiots who traveled back from Moscow with nothing but praise for Joseph Stalin-even as he was in the process of liquidating class enemies within the Soviet state-this loathsome creature returned from Pyongyang in order to stand upon a soapbox-quite literally-and laud the achievements of  a state which is synonymous with indifference to human life and the ruthless suppression of anyone who dares to exercise his natural rights.

It’s sickening to think that such a creature walks among us, but like ignorance, disease, and hatred, he is a pestilence which has yet to be eradicated in a world where knowledge is at the fingertips of most of humanity. A sad yet ineluctable truth that we’ll have confront as plunge ahead into an era just as turbulent as the one which occasioned a cinematic classic of the Cold War.

Update: Breitbart coverage here.  Also, a write-up from North Korea News. Watch Adrian Hong’s speech Escape from North Korea. A much longer speech by a survivor of a North Korean concentration camp can be viewed here. Hat Tip: Todd Seavey.

One of the chief distinctions between the anti-Israel rally and the slightly smaller, yet equally exuberant, pro-Israel counter-demonstration held in Times Square this weekend was the sentiments expressed by the participants. While the former vocalized their antipathy towards Israel and the United States and demanded ordinary Israelis be punished-through measures such as the BDS movement-and spent most of their time anathematizing Jews in the most historically inaccurate way possible, the latter concentrated mostly upon messages of solidarity with Israel.

There were, of course, expressions of hostility towards the jihadists who have instigated the current wave of bloodshed, and who continued to barrage terrified Israeli civilians with Iranian-designed missiles even as this was being written.

However, I saw no generalized contempt for the Palestinian people, or even the bellicose Islamist leaders of neighboring countries who exhorted those currently entrusted with power in the Gaza Strip to stand their ground.

The overwhelming sentiment was one of resilience, not hatred, and was expressed through chants like “Am Yisrael Chai,” the people of Israel live, and the singing of the Hatikvah, the national anthem of Israel.

As well as an attempt to convey, in concrete terms, the intensity of the terror ordinary civilians, especially those living in southern Israel, experience on a daily basis.

And to connect the coercive violence aimed at Israel to the jihadist attacks carried out against similar Western nations throughout the globe.

Specifically, the United States, which has endured jihadist attacks for the past several decades, including lethal assaults initiated by the men currently in charge of the Palestinian Authority and the Gaza Strip.

Needless to say, there are legitimate critiques to be made of the methods Israel employed in responding to the rocket war waged by Hamas, as well as unaffiliated jihadist and Palestinian gangs. If nothing else, the fact that Hamas has been able to enchance its growing diplomatic standing in the Middle East-while preserving its vast, Iranian-supplied weapons arsenal-and was able to deter Israel from a ground invasion bodes ill for the security of Israeli citizens, to say nothing of those Palestinians who will be the unfortunate human shields in future military engagements.

Whether or not the result of this conflict constitutes a victory for Hamas, it is clear to all but the most deluded observers that it is a defeat for the adversaries of Hamas. Rather than Thing, a.k.a. Ben Grimm, Israel reacted to this assault in the dithering, indecisive manner of Shakespeare’s tragic hero, Hamlet. And as we all know, this strategy, if it can be called that, only leads to more bloodshed in the future.

Perhaps most disconcertingly, the inhumanity and barbarity of Islamic law was papered over by the persistently hostile mass media which reported on the Gaza conflict.

As these images from the public execution and dismemberment of suspected “collaborators,” which has drawn remarkably little attention from the fifth estate-with some notable exceptions-demonstrate.

Unfortunately, I don’t think the collective expression of support for Israel we’ve witnessed in New York City, whether from ordinary citizens or self-interested pols, is going to have much of an impact on public discourse. The sad truth is that the dominant media narrative, i.e. Palestinians as perpetual victim and Israel as eternal aggressor, is going to remain in place for the foreseeable future, and not even the most well crafted, factually accurate  publicity campaign is going to alter the status quo.

In fact, it could be argued that the appeal of the formulaic, anti-Israel meta narrative will only grow as those sympathetic to the Islamist cause gain an even surer foothold in the corporate world, within Congress and among influential media organs. The only way to counter this cresting tide is, to paraphrase the great Franz Kafka, take an axe to the frozen sea inside of us. Or in this case, the ice inside of those who willfully ignore the truth before them.

The truth, like life, is not pretty, but it must be told. Israel, like most of the West,  faces an existential struggle. Its preservation does not hinge upon a slick media relations campaign, or a superficially persuasive viral video, but upon disabusing spectators of the fallacies that underlie much of received wisdom about this conflict. And the only way to accomplish that goal is by telling the truth about jihadist dogma and how it informs the actions of  organizations like Hamas.

As we’ve discussed in previous posts, the main draw for LibertyFest was not personalities. Although Ron Paul, ironically, has become an icon for many in the libertarian movement within the United States, that movement is a cult of ideas more than anything. In fact, one of the recurring themes throughout the day was the repeated emphasis upon how this was a leaderless movement. In a speech that was one part performance art, one part Jonathan Edwards spiritual jeremiad, and wholly Kokesh, Adam Kokesh, of  Adam vs. The Man, inveighed against the mentality which insists that there is a single person, or even a group of people, who are fit to “lead” other individuals.

Although made in typically histrionic fashion, his point about the logical inconsistency of fighting against the state by relinquishing your identity-or letting it be subsumed by someone else running for office under the liberty banner-resonated with the audience. Contra Dan Halloran, he declared that the Ron Paul campaign was the “compromise” made by sincere anarcho-capitalists. The fact that an elected official, however heterodox, is able to inspire people who believe voting to be an act of aggression is testament to the soundness of his ideas, almost all of which revolve around the simple principle of self-ownership.

This concept is never so explicit as during an encounter with an agent of the Transportation Security Administration, an horrific experience with which anyone who travels by air is intimately familiar. That’s why I was pleased to run into James Baab, of We Won’t Fly, while milling about the Libertyfest grounds. The campaign to eradicate an agency that is detested by large segments of the public, and whose abuses-unlike other government bodies-are in full view of the citizenry, has been led by individuals, not politicians, nor even political activists. To the contrary, the political heat generated by the TSA’s outrages-however evanescent-has been a direct result of individual travelers exposing the obscenely subservient nature of our relationship to the state which this arm of the government crystallizes for airline travelers every single day.

This sort of citizen-driven opposition is just one avenue libertarians can take when contemplating how best to disseminate their message to a broader swath of the American public, because you don’t have to be an agorist  or minarchist in order to grasp the violative nature of a TSA agent groping an elderly woman who simply wants to see her grandchildren.

One speaker who managed to capture the essence of this diversity of action was Chris Lawless, otherwise known as Ron Paul’s giant, who delivered a fantastic speech exploring how each person can contribute something useful to the battle for a freer civilization. One of his contributions, in addition to his work on the Paul campaign, was moving to the state of New Hampshire as part of the Free State Project, a nationwide endeavor to create an enclave of libertarian thinking and autonomous, decentralized decision-making within the United States.

Lawless emphasized that his choices would not necessarily be the choice of others, and perhaps shouldn’t be, and that the multitude of talents and ambitions within this movement ensured that each person had a role to play in advancing the cause of liberty. Historians and economists are two vocations that are amply represented within libertarianism, which I was reminded of when I saw Austrian Economist Robert Murphy chatting with some of my friends.

Murphy is perhaps best known as the hungry challenger in the ever-elusive Robert Murphy-Paul Krugman debate, a contest which-despite its seeming win-win outcome-is just as likely to occur as the much-hyped Floyd Mayweather vs. Manny Pacquiao boxing match. Although Krugman has postulated some interesting theories about why he’s thus far rejected Robert Murphy’s generous offer, some libertarians have given more convincing explanations as to why Krugman is wise to dodge this confrontation.

Tom Woods of Liberty Classroom discussed the Krugman-Murphy debate during his speech, which served as the capstone to Libertyfest. He also touched upon a lot of pressing issues facing the liberty movement as it tries to build upon the momentum of the Paul campaign. Ron Paul’s presidential campaign was unique in the sense that it was not about winning primaries or accumulating power. Rather, it served as a platform to educate the electorate on the principles of self-governance and interacting with others by means other than the coercion of state agents. He correctly pointed out that the supporters of Ron Paul’s primary opponents, e.g. Herman Cain, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich, among others, had disappeared once their campaigns had run their course, whereas the Ron Paul revolution continues to thrive, despite the fact that he is not the Republican presidential nominee.

The truth is that the more the Paul campaign veered away from its principles-often at the behest of political strategists such as Jesse Benton-the less support it attracted among the Republican electorate. This dedication to core values was highlighted by an anecdote involving an appearance Tom Woods made on Dennis Prager’s nationally syndicated radio program earlier this year. After agreeing for much of their conversation, which focused primarily on domestic economic and fiscal matters, the discussion shifted to foreign policy; there’s the rub. The upshot is that Tom Woods is no longer welcome on Mr. Prager’s show.

Although he would, theoretically, be able to reach more people if he had elided the issue-or obscured his true beliefs regarding national security/foreign policy-it would have been at the expense of maintaining his integrity. The tradeoff, in his view, was not worth making this sacrifice. This was perhaps the most important part of his speech that day, because it illustrated what the liberty movement should keep in mind when it’s marketing itself to the broader public.

While some believe that downplaying the essential tenets of this philosophy will spread its popularity, that belief is mistaken. Tom Woods’s own experience during the 2012 Paul campaign-where he was exposed to different strands of libertarianism he had never heard of, and forged lasting friendships with people he didn’t know existed a year ago-demonstrates that liberty brings people together.

As CNN reports, the Chinese have started:

a 100-day campaign to “clean out” non-Chinese living or working illegally in the city. Until the end of August, all foreigners are expected to always have on them a valid passport, visa and resident permit…

If not, they will face repercussions, which range from fines to police detention and deportation.

A number for a hotline locals can call to report suspicious foreigners was also included in the announcement. Since then, the police presence in the main expat and student areas of the city has noticeably increased, households and companies have been spot checked, and queues at local police stations to register residency are large.

 

This month’s Rattle brings us a host of stories that the mainstream media didn’t cover sufficiently-preferring instead to shower accolades upon the man responsible for abandoning immigration enforcement in the name of political opportunism. We’ll cover everything from the latest spate of violent crimes committed by illegal aliens to Barack Obama’s continued roll out of administrative amnesty, which now includes directives to ignore both interior enforcement and border security.

But first, we’ll examine this administration’s ongoing obstruction of Congress’s investigation into the ever-broadening gun-walking scandals. Courtesy of Sipsey Street Irregulars-whose coverage of Fast and Furious is non pareil-we learn that the White House is blocking testimony from Kevin O’Reilly, a former staff member of the National Security Council who wants to speak with the Senate Judiciary Committee and House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. This administration’s invocation of executive privilege is just the latest example of obstruction of justice  relating to Fast and Furious.

It should be recalled that last July the acting head of the ATF told Congress that his agency was paying FBI agents to ignore the law in pursuit of this administration’s bizarre and opaque political goals. Immigration control, not gun control, is a solution that Barack Obama’s Justice Department dismisses out of hand. We can only hope that, as Katie Pavlich reports in Town Hall, Chairman Darrell Issa pursues this investigation to its conclusion, which hopefully will result in a more than a few stiff prison sentences. Speaking of Katie Pavlich, she has a fantastic new book about Fast and Furious entitled-appropriately-Obama’s Bloodiest Scandal, which I urge you all to read.

Obfuscation and evasion are hallmarks of this administration, especially as it pertains to immigration and border security, as an insightful commentary from Michael Cutler published by Fox News Latino illustrates. The former INS agent and current immigration watchdog points out that Janet Napolitano’s Department of Homeland Security is effectively “cooking the books” by relying solely upon  documented arrests-a misleading statistic-in order to pretend that this administration is cracking down upon illegal entry into the United States. FAIR’s Legislative Update further dissects this policy, which is drawing increasing scrutiny from Congress-particularly Chairman Darrell Issa and Rep. Jason Chaffetz- notwithstanding what Tom Tancredo accurately describes as a bipartisan conspiracy to hobble border security and immigration enforcement. By not logging and tracking the number of illegal border crossers who were not detained, Customs and Border Protection is painting a rosy picture of a much more dire situation.

The deceit of this administration extends beyond the CBP and encompasses virtually every aspect of immigration enforcement, both at the border and inside of the United States. Even though ICE is touting the Cross Check raids it initiated earlier this month-intended to apprehend ostensibly violent criminals, absconders and  fugitives from justice-this is merely a political expedient designed for election year consumption. The truth is that Barack Obama’s administrative amnesty proceeds apace, with four cities ordered to halt deportations, according to the Dan Stein Report. Remarkably, the Executive Office for Immigration Review has closed San Francisco’s immigration court and plans to completely halt its proceedings for the entire summer. Jim Kouri reports on yet another component of Barack Obama’s administrative amnesty, the decision to suspend deportations of illegal aliens with “families,” inside of the United States.

And while illegal aliens are not being deported, they will be able to enjoy state-of-the-art detention facilities, including some new amenities such as beach volleyball and cable TV. Lamar Smith excoriates this administration for its skewed priorities in a must-read op-ed published in The Hill. Although this new detention manual  might seem farcical, it’s far from a laughing matter. As Jim Kouri points out in his Examiner column, the Department of Homeland Security has taken virtually no action against foreigners who overstay their visas. This negligence persists over a decade after the September 11th massacres, which were committed by a cadre of jihadists whose visa applications are symptomatic of our country’s dysfunctional immigration bureaucracy. This is not merely an hypothetical problem, even after the destruction of the World Trade Center, as the case of illegal alien Amine El Khalifi demonstrates. The fact that this indifference to the lives of American citizens continues unabated, despite repeated pressure exerted by the GAO serves to illustrate this administration’s fundamental lack of accountability.

Even as it lags behind in locating and detaining criminal aliens, the administration of Barack Obama has deigned to grant Temporary Protected Status to thousands of Syrians living in the United States. As we’ve pointed out in the past, Temporary Protected Status is anything but temporary. In fact, it is merely another expedient used to grant de facto amnesty to a group of illegal aliens who can prove “hardship” circumstances, most of which persist indefinitely-making their stay in the United States permanent. This is even more disturbing when juxtaposed against the State Department’s recent decision to bar inspection of a visiting Egyptian delegation consisting of Muslim Brotherhood officials. Of course, Egypt isn’t the only country where the Ikwhan has a strong foothold.

The problem is that Barack Obama’s ostensible opposition, i.e. congressional Republicans, are doing virtually nothing to investigate the egregious overreach of his administration on immigration matters. Quite the contrary, some are hard at work developing proposals that would only worsen the situation, such as DREAM Lite, in hopes of  cultivating the ever-elusive Hispanic vote. Republican leaders in the states are not faring much better in this regard, as the difficult struggle in New Hampshire to prevent illegal aliens from capitalizing upon in-state tuition benefits demonstrates.

In an update to a story that we’ve covered recently, the North Carolina General Assembly held another hearing on illegal immigration and potential enforcement mechanisms. Unfortunately, according to NC Listen, it was dominated by illegal aliens and their supporters in the legislature, including some of the very people who had disrupted a previous hearing about these problems. Heading further south, we learn that the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhood Act has been killed in the Mississippi State Senate. Apparently, Judiciary Chairman Hob Bryan has caved knuckled under to the Mississippi Poultry Association and its desire for cheap labor, notwithstanding the harm such a decision may inflict on innocent Mississippians. Its neighbor to the East, Alabama, has revisited HB 56, the landmark legislation that targeted illegal aliens living in that state. Rep. Micky Hammon has decided to alter some of the provisions that have been enjoined by a federal court, but maintains that he and his fellow Republicans will not repeal the law, which is welcome news.

In not so good news, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle has decided to defy Immigration and Customs Enforcement and refuse detainer requests for criminal aliens housed in her county’s jails. Saul Chavez is one beneficiary of Preckwinkle’s benevolence, having fled the country upon being released from jail after killing William McCann. The carnage our government’s policies wreak is not limited to the odd vehicular manslaughter though, as the massacre at Oikos University in California makes clear to any impartial observer. Limits to Growth has an insightful story about mass-murderer One L. Goh which explains the circumstances surrounding his rampage which the main stream media willfully ignores. Oikos was apparently more concerned with harvesting tuition payments by foreign students-often with loans backed by American taxpayers-than ensuring the safety of its student body. It brings to mind  9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, whose entrance to the United States was facilitated by a campus administration eager to recruit students from the Middle East, heedless of the potentially deadly repercussions.

The fact that there are visa mills exploiting the F-1 Visa program should come as no surprise to people who are aware of the extensive fraud and exploitation present in the legal immigration system. Just as in Canada-which recently charged attorney Sandra Zaher with inventing false refugee claims-the United States is plagued by immigration fraud so pervasive that the conviction of Earl Seth David, aka Rabbi Avraham David, head of a New York law firm, headlines an ICE press release. The irony of an agency headed by John Morton-who’s tasked with expediting illegal immigration-spotlighting the conviction of someone for immigration fraud is apparently lost on this administration.

In another prime example of abuse, a lawsuit by two former employees of Larsen & Toubro InfoTech Limited Inc alleges systemic fraud at the India-based IT firm for which they once worked. Joining an earlier class action filed against the firm, this suit asserts that the plaintiff was forced to not only forge documents related to H-1B visas-a program rampant with corruption and fraud-but told not to report the crime to outside authorities. Read the sickening story for yourself, if you feel you have the requisite stomach. The baffling purposes of the H1-B visa program weren’t illuminated by a recent decision by Judge Gregory Frost, who ordered suppressed almost all information related to the case of  Geza Rakoczi, who is described thusly,

…a young alien man with a mysterious legal status, probably an illegal alien, who has a bachelor’s degree from a marginal educational institution, a private one that accepts all applicants, and his employer, a mortgage finance company in trouble in two different states.

Putting the lie to the idea that these visas are reserved for “highly-skilled” immigrants. More often than not they are merely convenient bodies used to replace the more demanding, highly-compensated Americans who they’ve made redundant. If you don’t believe me, just ask the wife of unemployed semiconducter engineer Darin Wedel, who is still waiting to hear back from President Obama. But do not fear, the virtual border fence is back on track,which I suppose is small comfort to the thousands of hard-working Americans like Mr. Wedel.  However, India is not the only nation to take advantage of the nebulous, easily exploitable H1-B visa program. As Phyllis Schlafly  points out, the Islamist Gulen movement in Turkey has used these same visas in order to indoctrinate Muslim students in American charter schools. The dangers posed by the Gulen movement have been explored ad nauseam in other forums, but it should be noted that even if you ascribe the most benign of intentions to the Gullenists, the idea that fundamentalist Muslim teachers are somehow highly skilled workers is implausible on its face.  Focusing on yet another rising Asian power, the New American has an interesting story about the PRC’s use of the EB-5 immigrant investor visa program in the state of Idaho which is well worth reading.

Returning to more timely issues, we discovered this past week that it’s not all that difficult to register to vote using a fabricated identity, or even assuming the persona of the current Attorney General  of the United States. Thanks to James O’Keefe we’ve discovered how simple it is to game the system, although officials at the increasingly misnamed Justice Department don’t seem to agree. Of course, acknowledging that vote fraud exists would require the Obama administration to prosecute those responsible for it, which wouldn’t bode well for the electoral prospects of Barack Obama’s party. From New York to Florida, from Indiana to Arizona, stealing elections has become quite commonplace, even as the White House-and its complaisant cronies in the media-scoff at the notion. Some Democrats, though, readily admit that trying to manipulate the outcome of elections is a routine practice, and a few even have the integrity to support measures that would rectify this betrayal of democracy.

In an ironic twist, labor unions-which were some of the most vehement supporters of President Obama’s Stimulus plan-are now complaining about some of the jobs stemming from stimulus projects going to Korean workers. I suppose the lesson is to be careful what you wish for, especially if it is over 700 billion dollars worth of taxpayer-financed boondoggles.

In more border violence, two illegal immigrants were murdered just northwest of Tucson on Thursday by two camouflaged gunman, echoing an attack that occurred  near the same city in 2007. This sort of bloodshed is rare but not unheard of in Arizona, especially in the Tucson sector, where over forty percent of this nation’s  illegal aliens come through. It is yet another reason why the constitutionality of SB 1070 must be upheld by the Supreme Court, in spite of the hostility of open borders dogmatists such as the misleadingly named Democrats in the House of Representatives.

Our final story is related to our relationship to the state as individuals, and how that relationship is changing as a result of our government’s decades-long recalibration of this country’s demographics. Courtesy of the Pew Hispanic Center, we now know that over seventy percent of Latinos want the government to provide more services to Americans, not less. Limits to Growth has a fascinating summary of the survey’s other findings, which include a belief among Hispanics that they should learn English in order to succeed in the United States, but not in order to integrate into the broader society. The findings about faith in government are worth exploring though, because they reinforce something that our side has been saying for a very long time. Namely, that Hispanic voters’ support for Democrats and generally left wing political candidates has very little to do with the GOP’s position on immigration, but a lot to do with their endorsement of redistributive economic policies.

The findings of the Pew Hispanic Center demonstrate that the cause and effect most often cited in declining Republican Party affiliation among Hispanics-embodied by the specious narrative about Pete Wilson and the waning fortunes of the California GOP-is reversed. Hispanics do not support the Democratic Party because it advocates open borders, the Democratic Party supports open borders because it enhances its ability to win future elections. In effect, what is happening is that the political elite is electing a new people. This dynamic needs to be remembered whenever we hear mealy-mouthed Republicans exhorting us to abandon any attempt to impose reason upon an anachronistic immigration system that is designed to thwart the wishes of the vast majority of the American public.

It’s going to be a long, tumultuous election year.

With the New Hampshire presidential primary fast approaching, it might be time to look at two of the Republican candidates who’ve often drawn comparisons in the mainstream media. Namely, former Utah governor Jon Huntsman and 2008 GOP runner-up Mitt Romney. The rap on both men is very similar, i.e. both are technocratic, not very inspiring-yet seemingly competent-moderates who have extreme difficulties rallying the Republican faithful. And while Mr. Huntsman has increased the pace of his attacks on Governor Romney in recent days, you can’t help but notice the similarities between the two candidates.

While many conservative pundits have attempted-unsuccessfully in my view-to argue that Huntsman is an unabashed conservative, you can’t help but get the impression that supporters of past presidential campaigns by Pete McCloskey, John Anderson, Arlen Specter, and Lynn Martin, among many other liberal politicians who sought the GOP nod, said the very same thing about their preferred candidate. The fact remains that Huntsman-much like Mitt Romney, who garnered only one percent of  voters who labeled conservatism as their top priority in the Iowa caucuses-appeals predominately to those Republicans who are outliers within the party. They both garner plaudits from institutional left wing media organs and earn scorn from right wing opinion shapers, although Huntsman’s seemingly conscious effort to attack conservative sacred cows, and like defeated presidential candidate John McCain-one of Romney’s newest supporters-gratuitously insult conservatives, no doubt makes him a preferable opponent of President Obama to people like Stephen Colbert. 

Granted, there are some differences, both substantive and superficial, between the two men that require acknowledgement. While Mitt Romney’s rhetorical bellicosity towards China has been much remarked upon during this campaign, Huntsman-reflecting his history as a diplomat-has gone out of his way to allay concerns that a trade war between the PRC and the United States is imminent. Another distinction between the two is their approach with respect to national security and foreign policy issues. A perfect illustration of how they differ can be found in this exchange between the men over what should be done in the Afghanistan theater of war. But perhaps the greatest divide between the two candidates lies in an issue that has thus far escaped critical scrutiny, which is to say immigration.

While Huntsman has adopted the line of the open borders lobby-including the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, whose leadership has slandered any patriotic American who embraces sensible immigration policies even as Mormons die as a result-Romney has thus far espoused one of the toughest stances against illegal immigration to be found among Republican challengers to Barack Obama. He has pledged to veto the DREAM Act, opposed sanctuary cities, supported E-Verify, and highlighted the importance of employer sanctions, which everyone recognizes as the keystone of any successful regime of immigration enforcement in this country. It was the relentless criticism of Romney-and to a lesser extent, Michele Bachmann-that torpedoed the presidential aspirations of Rick Perry, which we can all be grateful for. And perhaps most impressively of all, when pressed to explain how he would deal with illegal aliens who remain in this country despite stepped-up enforcement efforts, he gave the perfect answer.

Even so, there are good arguments to be made against Mitt Romney’s presidential candidacy from a patriotic immigration reform perspective. Beyond the accusation that his tough stance against illegal immigration is merely a cynical political ploy-an accusation whose refutation is not helped by gaffes like these-there is Romney’s distressing support for H1-B visas and legal immigration mechanisms that are not only rife with fraud but existentially harmful to American citizens. However, even when you take into account these severe limitations, Mitt Romney still can be said to have a far superior record on issues of immigration and border security than his fellow Mormon ex-governor, Jon Huntsman. Whether good enough is good enough is a question that Republican voters will have to answer for themselves.

Update: Welcome to readers from Creeping Sharia. Thanks, once again, to Pamela for the link! We always love getting readers from Atlas Shrugs.

Earlier today I took it upon myself to journey to Foley Square in Manhattan, where an anti-NYPD, anti-intelligence agency gathering sponsored by CAIR, Al-Awda, and Desis Rising Up & Moving, among other Islamic activist organizations, was taking place. For a full recap of what occurred I suggest you check out my Twitter account, which I used to live-tweet the event as it was occurring. However, for now I’ll just lay out my impression of the gathering and thoughts about its message, then let the photographs speak for themselves. The question of whether American citizens should be surveilled, watched, and interrogated for potential terrorist conspiracies is always a touchy one. As Americans we have problems with the notion that domestic investigative and law enforcement agencies are monitoring our activities, regardless of the merits of the case they may be able to mount, and react viscerally to any perceived encroachment upon our privacy.

However, when you have organizations such as CAIR-which was an unindicted co-conspirator in the largest terrorism financing case in this nation’s history and whose antecedent organization, the Islamic Association of Palestine, was an offshoot of Hamas-operating inside of your country, to ask agencies charged with protecting us-such as the FBI-to lay off is a bit much. When a group such as the Muslim American Society-another co-sponsor of this rally-which all but admits that it’s a branch of the same tree as the Muslim Brotherhood, is allowed to operate on American soil the notion that Americans would not be interested in their activities is a bit preposterous.

That’s why I think the best solution to this unique dilemma of retaining our open society, yet preventing both terrorism and the loss of our freedoms, is to eliminate the chances of a fifth column developing on American soil. There’s no reason we should allow the mass migration of people who can or will not adapt to American cultural norms to our shores. However, that’s the solution today’s demonstrators rejected wholeheartedly. Now on to the photos.

There was a sparse crowd at the beginning of the rally:

But it began to fill up as the day progressed. I’d estimate that there were somewhere between 70 and 85 people at the height of the rally, including the ubiquitous, green-hatted members of the Marxist National Lawyers Guild.

As well as the self-consciously imposing Muslim “toughs” acting as security for the day’s speakers.

This is a banner from the Muslim Solidarity Committee, an organization founded in order to raise funds for the family members of Yassin Aref and others convicted of rendering support to the Pakistani terror organization Jaish-e-Mohammed.

There were scads of lawyers and law students present, including those from the City University of New York:

And lots of praying, including the adhan, which is not nearly as mellifluous as some people would have us believe.

I wasn’t keeping track, but I did count at least three separate prayers during the time I was there.

And where there’s Islam, there’s proselytization:

There was no love lost between those in attendance and the New York Police Department.

Not that the Central Intelligence Agency was a fan favorite either.

Police Commissioner Ray Kelly was a frequent target of enmity, with calls for his dismissal echoing from the speaker’s podium and the crowd.

There were a large number of East Indians in attendance:

Most speakers tried to draw a parallel between the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations that had taken place only a few blocks away, at Zuccotti Park, and today’s festivities. To be fair to the Muslims, they at least had a semi-consistent message going for them.

Not that inveterate, elderly Marxists didn’t try to muddle things a bit.

Their incongruous ally:

Speaking of Marxists, I ran into this gentleman, who denounced “all religions” and talked over one of the many calls to prayer-for which he was chastised by a Muslim participant in the crowd. Perhaps the Red-Green alliance isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, as the Mujahadeen e-Khalq learned the hard way.

One of the more disconcerting images from the rally in Foley Square, aside from the representative of CAIR praising the Detroit imam who was shot by the FBI, was the presence of both the mother and father of three men who were part of the terror plot involving an attack upon Fort Dix. Even though they were not given prime speaking slots-as was the mother of one of the men convicted in the Herald Square bomb plot-the fact that their case was used as an illustration of law enforcement overreach led me to question the true motives of those behind this demonstration.

They knew who the real guilty ones were, i.e. the people assisting the prosecution of terrorist suspects:

Many of the speakers denounced the notion of government informants, evoking images of the more widespread stop snitchin‘ campaign prevalent among many African-Americans living in urban communities. Overall, it was a slightly dispiriting experience, although it should be noted that there was at least one East Indian speaker who struck a distinctly conciliatory tone, and yet another speaker who went so far as to commemorate the massacres that occurred on September 11th, 2001, albeit only in the context of condemning other atrocities he saw as being of greater magnitude, e.g. the trans-Atlantic slave trade, expulsion of Native Americans from the interior of the country, and countless other sins we still haven’t atoned for as a nation, according to him.

I think that a lot of the issues raised would be resolved by a more sensible immigration policy, as opposed to the ad hoc, needlessly dangerous and stupid philosophy our government currently espouses, but that’s just my opinion. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions.