Our old friend Miranda Blue either went to the ACT for America gathering on Capitol Hill this week or watched on line (was it on line?). You can read her report here listing the Members of Congress who spoke to the pro-America, pro-western civilization activists gathering and a few things about what they said.
Miranda Blue is the research editor at People For the American Way. Her work has included investigations into the anti-abortion “personhood” and “rescue” movements, uncovering the work of American anti-LGBT activists around the world, and exposing attacks on voting rights. http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post_author/miranda-blue/
For the sake of time, I’m posting only what she said about Rep. Steve King. She is not a fan about his desire to save western civilization as I learned when she linked my comments to King’sprevious one:
“We can’t restore our civilization with somebody else’s babies.”
Here is Blue on what King said to the ACT gathering:
King, true to form, used his time to extol “American civilization” and criticize multiculturalism.
He told the audience the story of a liberal San Francisco woman whom he had met on a plane who had told him that “one of the most great experiences that she had was some event out in California where they had all the people there were speaking so many different languages, they brought so much different food, they wore so many different clothes, you looked at all that, and she saw all that diversity and it was one of the most wonderful experiences of her life.”
“And it sounded to me,” he said, “like the recreation of the Tower of Babel was what she thought was utopia for America. And I’m fine with all of the languages, we have all kinds of people in the world we need to communicate with. But there’s something that goes along with the English language that is a gift to this country.”
He was met with loud applause.
Endnote: Looking at Blue’s bio, I wonder does she work exposing Muslims who are anti-LGBT activists around the world in addition to Americans, or might that be too dangerous?
We are disturbed and deeply disappointed by the proposed presidential determination number of 45,000,” said Bishop Joe S. Vasquez of Austin, Texas, who is chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Migration. http://www.catholicnews.com/services/englishnews/2017/faith-groups-ask-government-to-reconsider-historically-low-refugee-cap.cfm
The US Conference of Catholic Bishops insisted that Trump admit 75,000 paying refugee clients to the US beginning October 1. But, not a word at Crux that they receive millions of tax payer dollars for their Christian charity as the largest of nine federal refugee contractors.***
During his weekly audience on September 27, Pope Francis will kick off a two-year “Share the Journey” campaign aimed to encourage Catholics to “encounter” migrants and refugees. In response, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) is calling for a National Week of Prayer and Action, scheduled from October 7-13.
The new campaign is focused on providing practical ways for Catholics to break down barriers of fear and build bridges with migrants and refugees.
Catholic Charities USA (CCUSA), Catholic Relief Services (CRS) and the USCCB are part of a global network of organizations participating in the campaign organized by Caritas Internationalis.
Pope Francis invited the invasion of Italy:
Throughout his papacy, Francis has made the cause of refugees and migrants one of special concern to him. His first trip outside Rome as pope was a day trip to the tiny Italian island of Lampedusa, where he celebrated mass to memorialize the thousands of refugees that had died there trying to reach Europe.
Pope Francis welcomes migrants to Lampedusa Italy in 2013, see what happened: https://refugeeresettlementwatch.org/2016/05/20/migrants-burn-down-refugee-center-on-lampedusa-thank-you-pope-francis/
[….]
The National Week of Prayer and Action comes at a time when many leaders of the U.S. Church have clashed with the Trump administration over its policies toward migrants and refugees.
Earlier this month, the administration announced that it would be ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program known as DACA, which provides protection from deportation for qualified immigrants. This decision prompted widespread outrage among members of the U.S. church hierarchy.
In the coming days, the president is also expected to set a ceiling on the number of refugees the U.S. will accept. Administration officials have suggested a limit of 50,000, while the USCCB is advocating for at least 75,000 to be welcomed.
(This story was posted at Crux before the final decision was announced. We know now that Trump came in at 45,000.)
Trump’s 45,000 capon refugees has the Bishops hopping mad, see here. (Not a word there either that the number admitted will affect the Bishop’s bottom line!)
***The UN/US Refugee Admissions Program will never be reformed as long as these nine federal contractors are allowed to accept federal funds and then lobby and otherwise community organize in order to keep the taxpayer-funded gravy train rolling.
UN short-circuiting the flow from Libya to Europe by sending migrants to the good ol’ welcoming USA?
Hillary, along with her gal pals Susan Rice and Samantha Power, are the leading culpritsin the Obama Administration’s disastrous involvement in the overthrow of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and the creation of a failed state that has become a primary route for the migrant invasion of Europe.
Susan Rice, Samantha Power and Hillary. Photo is from a blog called The Political Girl that asks: Are women leading the way in Libya?
Now we learn that the UN, partially in hopes of saving the present Italian government (Italians are pretty angry about the Libya to Italy express), is planning to open up a refugee holding facility in Tripoli where migrants will be detained until they can be moved to transit centers.
But, guess what! Most in the transit centers will go to Canada, Norway, and drum roll—the United States.
Hillary gloats about knocking off Gaddafi turning Libya into a completely unstable hell hole, and America gets more refugees!
ROME (Reuters) – The U.N. refugee agency is seeking to open a refugee transit center in Tripoli early next year to resettle or evacuate as many as 5,000 of the most vulnerable refugees out of Libya each year, a senior U.N. official said on Friday.
It is a small fraction of the total number of Libya’s migrant population, estimated at as many as 1 million, but would be a welcome outlet for the 43,000 refugees that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates are now trapped in Libya.
“We hope to have the (written) authorization soon,” Roberto Mignone, the UNHCR’s representative in Libya, told Reuters in Rome. The U.N.-backed Tripoli government has already approved the project verbally, he said.
[….]
Italy has become the main migrant route to Europe since an agreement between the EU and Turkey shut down smuggling through Greece last year, but arrivals have fallen sharply since July, when an armed group clamped down on departures.
With the backing of the European Union, Italy has financed, trained and equipped by the Tripoli-based coast guard. With a national election due early next year, Italy is also promising tens of millions of euros to Prime Minister Fayez al-Seraj and municipal governments to put a stop to smuggling.
[.…]
Italian Interior Minister Marco Minniti has said he is depending on the U.N. refugee and migration agencies to improve conditions for refugees and migrants now trapped in Libya.
“We can’t be the only solution,” Mignone said, also because Libya remains very dangerous and international staff still have very limited access to the country.
[….]
While the UNHCR hopes to resettle many of them, it is a lengthy process. Many countries do not have a permanent diplomatic presence in Tripoli, further complicating matters.
So the agency will seek to evacuate most of them, Mignone said, to emergency transit centers in Romania, Slovakia or even Costa Rica, where they will have more time to apply for resettlement.The agency is currently working to open another emergency transit center in Niger, he said.
Here is one articleI found telling us that ‘refugees’ in a transit center in Slovakia are destined for Canada, Norway and the US. And, I had previously written a post on the Costa Ricatransit center with our old friend HIAS being paid by the US State Department to work there. I better start paying more attention to these transit centers!
So, if the scheme goes through, illegal aliens in Libya will be moved to a transit center and ultimately Anytown, USA instead of pushing on to Europe.
I can’t spend a lot of time on this, but it warrants a bit of attention.
These US Senators have no shame!
Senator Grassley has been there 36 years and Feinstein 25 years. I would like them both to tell us when exactly was the Refugee Act of 1980 properly/legally carried out when it came to the provision involving the Presidential “determination” and “consultation” with Congress.
What the hell is Senator Grassley doing scolding the White House/State Department, complaining that the legal process was not followed on THIS year’s legally required consultation on the refugee CEILING/CAP.
For the last ten years (and probably the ten before I was watching), Congress never paid any attention to the law when it came to the President’s determination about how many refugees COULD be admitted in the coming fiscal year.
Someone from the Administration would come to the Hill in mid to late September, present the determination and report, and no one on the Hill said boo!
Whatever was sent up, even literally within days of October 1, Congress accepted.
Faux outrage!
Now, only now! are they screaming about how the process was subverted (because it is Trump?).
Go herewhere I told you almost a month ago what the process is (a process they never followed anyway!).
Here is the complaint initiated by REPUBLICAN Senator Grassley (chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee). Maybe he is getting too old to remember that he gave Obama a pass for the previous 8 years!
Grassley, Feinstein Blast State Dept. For Barely Consulting Them On Refugee Cap
In a blistering statement Wednesday afternoon, the leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) called out the Trump administration for its rushed consultation of the committee before announcing it would lower the refugee cap next year.
Grassley and Feinstein complained that they learned of the refugee cap in the news before they had a meeting with the administration, despite asking months ago for a meeting on the issue. State Department officials met with the members of both the House and Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday afternoon, and only scheduled the meeting on Tuesday, per Grassley and Feinstein.
“We are incredibly frustrated that the annual consultation for refugee admissions, which is required by law, was finalized just one day in advance. It is simply unacceptable to read in the press that the administration had reached its decision on the refugee cap before the mandated meeting with Congress had even been scheduled,” Grassley and Feinstein said in the statement.
This post is filed in my ‘Laugh of the day’ category, here. ROFLMAO!
One more thing: A number of years ago I asked my Congressman to see if I could be allowed to attend the “consultation” and was told that the public cannot attend. And, besides, I was told, there isn’t much to see—just a perfunctory handing-off of the determination report sometimes by an Assistant Secretary and not the Secretary of State himself or herself.
Nevermind, that the Refugee Act of 1980 gives the power to the President to set the CAP/CEILING*** for refugee admissions for the coming fiscal year which begins on Sunday.
I have to laugh because I can always count on the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society to be the first of the nine federal contractors to break from the gate on the next political action the refugee industry will take.
As CEO of HIAS, Hetfield makes an annual salary of $358,718 (doing well by doing good!). Will he take a pay cut if there aren’t enough paying ‘clients’ (aka refugees) entering the US this year?
For new readers, see how much of your money, your tax dollars, goes to each of the nine to resettle refugees on a per head basis, here.
There can never be serious reform while the nine are rolling in your money using it to hold rallies and lobby on the Hill while the media tries to make the public think that this is all about ‘humanitarianism’ and ‘religious charity.’
As you surely know by the keening sound coming from contractors like HIAS they aren’t happy with the 45,000 cap announced this week. (I can see huge bidding wars between the contractors as they bid for bodies in a smaller pool of refugees.)
I’m very unhappy with the number too, as I saidhere. The UN/US Refugee Admissions Program should be reviewed by Congress to determine if it is still even a program the US should continue.
If the President had suspended the program and said a ‘determination’ would not be sent until Congress reviewed the program, he might have achieved some important campaign promises. Sending a determination of 45,000 was meaningless—splitting the baby—and will do very little, if anything, to bring about needed long term change.
I digress, more later on what Donald Trump should be doing on the issue.
Here is HIAS telling its followers what to do:
This is a screenshot, so links are not hot. If you want to see the text of what they want their followers to send the Washington reps, go here: https://www.hias.org/stand-against-record-low-cap-refugee-admissions
This is what you should be doing today.
Tell the Presidentthat you are unhappy with 45,000. He clearly wimped out! And, tell your representatives in the House and Senate how you feel too because you are up against lobbyists, like those at HIAS (likely teamed up with global corporation/Chamber of Commerce lobbyists) working the halls of Congress.
*** You will be hearing more from me about the fact that the 45,000 is a CEILING (NOT A TARGET). Trump could stay well under 45,000 and still be operating within the law.
He doesn’t need an Executive order to stay under the ceiling—he never did!
