Month: July 2009

Immigration Daily shows its true colors

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Although I disagree with most of what they write in opinion pieces, I had the impression that Immigration Daily (ILW) was a publication for professional pro-open borders lawyers and such for straight news and information about their issues.  But, whew, when I saw this editorial just now I realize they are just one more leftist rag inflaming racial tensions, and it seems inflaming racial tensions is the only arrow in their quiver.  Look at this plea for signatures on a petition for America’s Voice.

Joe Arpaio, the anti-immigrant Sheriff of Maricopa County in Arizona, says that he believes in the Rule of the Law, and that that is his reason for hounding the undocumented, whose presence in the US offends the law, in his view. He believes that the 287(g) agreement that his law enforcement agency currently has with ICE permits him to use any excuse to stop anyone and demand that they prove that their presence here is authorized under our laws.

Of course, all this is pure poppycock. Mr. Arpaio’s real problem is no doubt the fact that those whom his deputies stop have brown skin. We do not believe that Mr. Arpaio’s people believe in harassing the undocumented from Europe. As many pro-immigrant bodies have long claimed, Mr. Arpaio does not believe in the Rule of the Law, rather he believes in the Rule of the Law only when it is convenient to him.

Besides the fact that very few European illegal immigrants would enter the US from Mexico, how the hell do you know if Arpaio’s deputies wouldn’t stop them as well?  What!  You truly believe that Arpaio’s guys ask someone who is breaking the law if they are perhaps illegal Albanians, and then say,”Oh go on your way, you are a white guy! ”  You people are nuts!  Where are your facts?

Here is what Dan Stein, writing at the Federation for American Immigration Reform website, had to say about America’s Voice last month. 

America’s Voice Struggles to Find a Voice

By Dan Stein, President of FAIR

America’s Voice, one of Washington’s newest “instant” organizations created by a handful of big foundations virtually overnight, is helmed by the legendary Frank Sharry – widely regarded as one of the most unsuccessful legislative prognosticators in the nation’s Capitol. Judging from its website traffic report, America’s Voice must be pretty soft. No one is listening.

Sharry created America’s Voice after he again miscalculated in a failed strategy to pass the mass amnesty bill in 2007. Now, Sharry and his allies have decided it is time to jettison their corporate allies who’d proven impossible to work with because of on-going disagreements over guest worker programs.

Under Sharry’s leadership, America’s Voice is basically a well-funded far-left smear blog designed to look like a clever “hit machine.” Working closely with the discredited Southern Poverty Law Center, Sharry’s group has been trying to smear America’s true immigration reformers on a daily basis.

Problem is, no one seems to be listening. Internet traffic surveys suggest America’s Voice isn’t generating much interest from the general public. It struggles to attract less than 10,000 unique users a month, and most of those are probably professional people on the same big foundation dole that Sharry rides. Just proves that all the money in the world won’t help if your ideas are bankrupt.

I guess that petition Immigration Daily is promoting is an attempt to drum up some traffic for a sluggish America’s Voice!

Angelina Jolie visits internally-displaced refugees in Iraq

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Angeline Jolie is in the refugee news again. We’ve posted on her trips to visit refugees before; see here for a list. She is a UN Goodwill Ambassador, whatever that is, and I’ve remarked before on how sensible she is. At a time when seemingly everyone involved with Iraqi refugees, including the UN, was saying that the solution to the problem was resettling them in the west — especially in the U.S. — she pointed out the obvious: that they needed to be taken care of where they were and returned to Iraq when it was possible.

We see how right she was in the continuous reports of the troubles Iraqi refugees are facing in this country. Ann has kept on top of this; see our Iraqi refugees category for details. Since Iraq has become pacified, there is more emphasis on resettling the refugees back in Iraq.

Jolie visited some internally-displaced (IDP) refugee families in Baghdad under the auspices of the UN, the San Francisco Chronicle and many other news sources report. That’s a category we don’t hear much about, since American refugee agencies don’t get involved in Iraq’s internal affairs. The Chronicle says:

Jolie observed some changes in conditions since her last visit, but admitted a lot still needed to be done before the refugees could return to normality.

She noted, “There are some changes. There are returns of displaced people, not a big number, but there is progress. This is a moment where things seem to be improving on the ground, but Iraqis need a lot of support and help to rebuild their lives.”

Jolie has vowed to return to do all she can to help refugees rebuild their lives, telling the families, “I want to come back and find you in a better place and in a different situation. We hope that UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) and the government will support you in getting a piece of land. You need help not because you are poor, but because you are the future of Iraq.”

As far as the overall picture of internally-displaced persons in Iraq goes, Reuters reports:

An estimated 1.6 million Iraqis remain uprooted within the country, while another 300,000 have returned to their homes amid a general improvement in security in the past year, UNHCR said. Syria and Jordan say that they have registered some 2 million Iraqis who have fled their country, but UNHCR says these are not all refugees or necessarily residing in those countries.

Phoenix: Four Liberian refugee boys ages 9-14 rape 8-year-old.

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update March 27th, 2010:  Oldest of the boys charged will go to juvenile justice system for therapy, here.

Update November 24th:  Girl’s parents arrested, here.

Update August 14th:  Language problems confuse investigation, here.

Update August 3rd:   Oldest of 4 boys indicted, here.

Update August 1st:  More here from Phyllis Chesler—Obama agreed to let them stay for another year.

Update July 27th:  Their violent country made them do it, here.

Here is the whole story from CNN that reader Susan sent yesterday:

(CNN) — Four boys ages 9 to 14 have been charged with sexually assaulting an 8-year old girl, police in Phoenix, Arizona, said Wednesday.

The girl was lured into a vacant storage shed by the suspects, who offered her chewing gum, police said at a news conference.

The girl was restrained while the boys — ages 9, 10, 13 and 14 — sexually assaulted her, police said of the July 16 incident.

All the suspects except for the 14-year-old live in the same apartment complex, according to Phoenix police Sgt. Andy Hill. The 14-year-old has been charged as an adult, Hill said.

Detectives said the girl was placed in the custody of Phoenix child protective services after the attack because of her parents’ attitude toward her.

The girl and the boys charged are all from families that have come to the United States from the West African nation of Liberia, police said.

Now before readers bombard me with comments about how American boys could just as well take an 8-year-old to a vacant shed and rape her, there is more.   The girl’s family, saying she shamed them, does not want her back!   She is now in the custody of child protective services.   From KPHO-TV Phoenix:

The outrage over the allegations has intensified when police said the girl’s parents criticized her after the attack and blamed her for bringing shame on the family.

“The father told the case worker and an officer in her presence that he didn’t want her back. He said ‘Take her, I don’t want her,'” Hill said.

Hill cited the family’s background as the reason the family shunned the girl. All five children are refugees from the West African nation of Liberia.

In some parts of Africa, women often are blamed for being raped for enticing men or simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Girls who are raped often are shunned by their families.

“It’s a shame-based culture, so the crime is not as important as protecting the family name and the name of the community,” said Tony Weedor, a Liberian refugee in Littleton, Colo., and co-founder of the CenterPoint International Foundation, which helps Liberians resettle in the United States. 

“I just feel so sorry for this little girl,” he said. “Some of these people will not care about the trauma she’s going through — they’re more concerned about the shame she brought on the family.”

More details are coming out this morning, here.

This is a heinous practice we are well aware of with followers of Islam—-blaming the rape victim.  But these Liberians are likely not Muslims, so I was interested to learn that this cultural problem was coming into the US with other refugee cultures as well.

Why so many Liberians in the US when that country is pretty stable now?

Apparently we have a category for temporary asylum (for humanitarian purposes!) and we brought thousands of Liberians here years ago.  In February, I reported that many where supposed to be deported to Liberia by March 31st, but a public relations campaign, spearheaded by Senator Jack Reed of one of America’s highest unemployment states, Rhode Island, was waged to keep them here.  Guess he won.  We lost.

Oh where, oh where have our tax dollars gone?

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

To projects for immigrants from everywhere!   The next time some bleeding heart refugee agency gives us the big sob story about how there isn’t money for proper refugee resettlement, we will harken back to this story from Ft. Wayne, IN.   Virtually every news story tells us that, boo hoo, the agencies only get $900 to resettle a refugee but they never tell you about all the other money flowing out of Washington for every aspect of a refugee’s life (and to pay salaries for their caregivers).

As a matter of fact, people ask me all the time what it costs for the refugees and asylees the taxpayers care for, but this (below) is why there is no way of knowing the answer to that question.  This is just for one city!

I had meant to sort from the list the programs specific to refugees and other immigrants, but when I looked at it, almost every one of these block grants applies to immigrants!

Nineteen Fort Wayne agencies have received a total of $235,000 in Community Development Block Grants (CDBG) for public services, given to the City of Fort Wayne by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

This year Fort Wayne will receive a total of $2.13 million in all categories of CDBG funding. The city expected a 10 percent to 15 percent reduction in CDBG funding, but Mayor Tom Henry said Tuesday that this year’s overall amount equals last year’s, and it is the first time since 2003 that funding has not dropped from the previous year. [Yippee!]

Public service grant recipients, amounts and programs funded include:

♦African Immigrants Social and Economic Development Agency – $10,000 for job coaching initiative

♦Associated Churches of Fort Wayne – $14,000 for food bank’s 26 member sites.

♦Blue Jacket Inc. – $10,000 for Career Academy for ex-felons transitional and/or permanent employment skills training.

♦Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend – $10,000 for case management and resettlement services to recently resettled refugees.

♦City of Fort Wayne – $17,000 for large trash containers and for hauling away abandoned tires and debris for neighborhood cleanup programs.

♦East Allen County Schools – $10,000 for Neighborhood Action Center at Autumn Woods apartments.

♦Fort Wayne Medical Society Foundation – $10,000 for Fort Wayne Medical Education Program; and $10,000 for healthier Moms and Babies program serving high-risk, low-income pregnant women.

♦Fort Wayne Parks and Recreation Dept. – $7,500 for Jennings Work Study Program providing job skills training for youths.

♦Fort Wayne Urban League – $7,000 for pre-employment skill training for adults to attain economic self-sufficiency; and $7,000 for pre-apprenticeship program for adults seeking construction trades employment.

♦Genesis Outreach – $8,000 for workforce development training center for homeless clients with paid training similar to internships.

♦Mental Health America in Allen County – $9,000 for client advocacy services to access options for care and treatment.

♦Burmese Advocacy Center – $8,000 for employment skills training program for refugees and immigrants.

♦Neighborhood health Clinics – $14,000 for medical and dental services for Burmese refugees living in Fort Wayne.

♦Super Shot Inc. – $9,000 for maintaining 26 free monthly immunization clinics for Allen County children.

♦The Reclamation Project – $10,000 – for English as a New Language (ENL) instruction for refugees.

♦Turnstone Center for Children and Adults with Disabilities – $9,000 for residential ramp building program for low-income residents needing wheelchair-accessible ramps at their homes.

♦United Hispanic Americans Inc. – $9,000 for bilingual employment support services, including computer literacy for job searching and application.

♦United Way of Allen County – $10,000 for the Ready to Learn program in schools serving educational-needy children; and $5,000 for Earned Income Tax Credit education program to low- and moderate-income workers.

♦Wellspring Interfaith Social Services Inc. – $14,000 for the agency’s food bank and personal hygiene needs assistance programs; $9,000 for the summer day camp program for low-income children; and $8,000 for the Wellspring older adult program providing nutrition and social/cognitive activities.

Ft. Wayne is a “welcoming” city and we have written about its refugee population on many occasions, so please just use our search function for related stories.