Friday, May 15, 2009

Is Obama about to waste $100 billion in education "stimulus" spending? That's the implication of this mild-mannered Andrew Rotherham article .  ... 1:28 A.M.

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Perplexing Party Line:  Net immigration from Mexico to the U.S. is down by half, says the NYT . Is that due to the economy or stepped up enforcement? According to the Times ' fourth graf, "Mexican and American researchers" say it's the economy and lack of jobs. That's the party line of pro-legalization forces, who would like to deny that stepped-up enforcement can have, and has already had, a big impact. But then the Times buries paragraphs like this:  

The enforcement buildup along the border, which started during the Bush administration, has made many Mexicans think twice about the cost and danger of an illegal trek when no job awaits on the other side, scholars said.

Obviously both factors are at work. But only one factor is PC. ...

The

ed board might want to revisit

:  

Nor have the forces of global economic migration magically adjusted to fit the American mood.

I don't even understand why the Times ever made that claim--wouldn't it be smarter, if you were a pro-legalization advocate, to argue that free immigration is no threat because in periods of recession the flow does "magically" adjust (reduce) itself? 

The Times --and the rest of the pro-legalization lobby--seemed to believe it was more important to stamp out the idea that enforcement--or anything, for that matter--can stop or slow the inevitable tide of immigration to which we all just have to adjust ("whether you like it or not," as Gavin Newsom might put it). Someone should remind them that the sales pitch for "comprehensive" reform is precisely that enforcement will work once existing illegals are amnestied. If enforcement is powerless, "comprehenisve" reform is a fraud.  ...  

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**This Times ed board passage , for example, comes close to saying that any enforcement strategy is doomed:

[I]t helps to remember that the country has ... [snip] ...spent decades and billions to seal the border as tightly as possible.

It stages raids to pull people off assembly lines and out of their beds and cars. It has added hundreds of thousands of prison beds to hold illegal immigrants and enlisted local police officers to enforce federal laws. It has done everything it can to make illegal immigrants miserable in the hope that they will abandon their jobs, houses and citizen-children and tell everyone back home to forget about America. And how has that worked? It hasn't.

The Times dismisses even the idea that stricter enforcement can discourage would-be immigrants who are still back in their home countries . Isn't it "comprehensive" reformers who say that--once existing illegals are "out of the shadows"--stricter enforcement will discourage would-be immigrants who are still back in their home countries? Cecilia Munoz needs to have a talk with the NYT. ... 1:27 A.M.

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I've been an admirer of Carlos Watson ever since the New Hampshire primary of 2004, where he managed to talk for a half hour with Robert Novak and never make a dull or familiar or bogus point (not easy to do when 3,000 journalists have already chewed over the material). But wow, this is an awfully ambitious new web site .  It's as if one man were turning out Slate . ... Elizabeth Spiers seems to be involved in some way, which is another good sign. ... 1:26. A.M.

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