Let’s take a minute away from politics for a few minutes, and check out another fun thing to do in Idaho. If you have no fear of heights, love adrenaline, a day off, and a spare $99, look what you can do up at Tamarack Resort
That looks like a hoot.
Archive for June, 2007
So, the Bush-Kennedy Amnesty Bill has been defeated… today. But it isn’t over. The current administration isn’t doing any more enforcement of immigration laws than the last administration did. Our borders are still a sieve, the fence is just another line on your Senator’s resume, and too many employers are looking the other way and hiring illegal workers, while the rest of us pay for their services. No, this isn’t over.
Did you bother to go read Senator Larry Craig’s website over the last few days of the immigration bill battle? He must have gotten hammered pretty hard because of his stubborn pro-bill stance… he even started his own mini immigration blog (although he called it a journal). He stands up for the need in Idaho for cheap labor for the ag industry. I’m all for helping our farmers too, and the construction industry, and the landscape industry, and the beef industry, and the…
But the answer is NOT a blanket amnesty and a reward for breaking the law. Come on Senator Craig, this isn’t that hard to understand. Let the marketplace work, but let it work LEGALLY. If farmers can’t get enough help, then let them try raising their pay rates, the same as any other business in America. Idaho, and the Treasure Valley, have notoriously low wages, and always have. This state has exported its young people to other states for literally thirty years or more, because they couldn’t find employment at attractive wages. Now, in the midst of serious growth, those low wages are beginning to pinch, and it isn’t just farmers and ranchers having a difficult time finding good emloyees at the “usual rates” here in the Valley. One of the biggest shocks people relocating to Idaho have is the low wage structure here. But with an unemployment rate below 3%, there will be increasing pressure on businesses to raise wages in order to attract the best help. And that is a GOOD thing. It is the way markets work.
Why should the ag industry get a free pass with what amounts to sanctioned slavery, by crafting a special bill to allow it a source of below market rate labor? That is a serious question. I read on a leftist blog the other day about how depressing life is for an illegal family in America, and how it is up to us to fix it. Let me see, living in a foreign country, can’t speak the language, doing menial labor for slave wages, living in substandard housing with a high crime rate… yeah, that is depressing. But I don’t understand the jump in thinking that says it is our fault and we should reward them with food stamps, free medical care, and higher education at rates lower than our own citizens have to pay.
Here is John Hawkins writing over at Townhall. He says it well
Those of us in the conservative movement have always been friendly to the business community. We believe in low taxes, a light touch on regulation, and we’re stalwart champions of the free market…
That’s why it was so disappointing that none of that seemed to mean anything to the “Chamber of Commerce” crowd when it comes to the illegal immigration issue. Their attitude, right from the beginning to the bitter end of the bill in the Senate yesterday was, “We want to bring in as much cheap labor as humanly possible now, next year, and forever more to fatten our wallets and we want everyone else to pick up the tab for it. If it puts American workers out of a job, we don’t care. If it drives their wages down, so much the better, because that means we make more money. If we have to leave the borders open and risk another 9/11, that’s fine with us. If we have to get the bill through by demonizing as racists the very people who have staunchly defended us on issue after issue, it doesn’t both us a bit. Long story short, if anyone doesn’t like what we want to do, tough, because we bought these senators with our campaign contributions, we own them, and it’s our way or the highway.” In other words, for a lot of these companies that knowingly hire illegals, this is all about raw, unbridled greed.
Bullseye! Those who sneak into the country are here illegally. And those who hire them are breaking the law as well. There are laws already on the books about both. Simple deal, just enforce what we have. It isn’t good enough to say that we killed this one, so we’re safe from an amnesty bill until after the 2008 election. We need to keep the pressure on to enforce what’s already on the books. Build the fence. Senator Craig, you voted for that, and you touted that vote as proof you’re looking out for our best interests. If you ok’d work done on your personal home, wouldn’t you check back to make sure the work was being done? So, uh, why not check up on that fence thing for us? How’s that coming along?
The people won one this time. Let’s use that and keep up the pressure on Congress and the President to enforce what we have. And Senator Craig, you know how we feel on this issue. Let’s see what you’ve got. What are YOU going to do in the next year to reassure us that you really are looking out for the rest of us, and not just another Senator in the pocket of a special interest group?
A couple weeks ago I wrote a post about taking the wife shooting, and in the comments I had mentioned that there was a story behind the .22. I have heard my wife tell the story about how she told a boy once not to knock on her front door because “Dad has a really big gun”. Her Dad taught her to shoot shotguns and rifles, but that “big gun” always bugged her, and she has a certain “hesitation” when it comes to handguns. I’ve never been able to get her to join me at the range.
So this morning, we decided it’d been too long since we’ve gone out for an adventure, so I suggested we take a couple of the guns out to the desert and shoot some targets and clays. She said yes (oh boy)! So we loaded up the thrower and some clay, her Dad’s Hi-Standard .22 and my Dad’s Browning A5, and we headed out to the BLM land where it’s open for shooting. We had a wonderful time, got cooked to a crisp, broke a bunch of clay, and poked holes in some paper. My sweet Idaho girl remembered what the shotgun feels like ;-) and she even got to shoot her Dad’s “big gun”… the first time she’d ever handled it. Took the top off of a plastic pop bottle, did that one! (proud and puffed up like a toad, yup, that’s me)
On the way back to civilization we saw burrowing owls and a badger, and my wife said “Next time we’ll have to come out earlier”… YES!
In light of the immigration bill shenanigans, the so-called energy bill, and McCain’s recent dustups with his fellow senators, I find it interesting that we also have more and more calls to shut up the talkers and bring back the so-called Fairness Doctrine (can bloggers be next?). Here’s Trent Lott and Diane Feinstein trying to explain it
we’re too ignorant to understand the complexities, eh Trent?
explosive hyperbole, and overwhelmingly one way, eh Diane?
and here’s John Kerry, no hyperbole and simple, sew we kan unnerstan it (hat tip Michelle)
Conservatives squeezed out opposite views? That would be awful, were it true… that’s why we’re getting this immigration bill rammed down our throats right? Because the eeevilll conservatives have taken over and don’t allow opposing views.
Pay attention to this one. There is plenty of time before the next election to change the playing field. Let’s see, if there are 12 million new Democrat voters, and the government forces all the talkers to hire their own version of Alan Colmes, Hillary! ought to start thinking about renting a hall or two, ya think?
Something about this immigration battle doesn’t sit well. For all the bitterness of our political battles, there’s at least the sense that the government responds to the drift of public opinion. The Republicans in Congress turned into big spenders and the war in Iraq went poorly. As a result the Democrats prospered in 2006, if narrowly. That’s how democracy works. Our politics are often angry and ugly (and that’s a problem), but this is because the public is deeply divided on issues of great importance. Deep down, we understand that our political problems reflect our own divisions.
Somehow this immigration battle feels different.
Yeah, nobody wants it, but the masters of the universe in Washington are going to give it to us anyway. According to a new Rasmussen poll
Among the public, there is a bi-partisan lack of enthusiasm for the Senate bill. It is supported by 22% of Republicans, 23% of Democrats, and 22% of those not affiliated with either major party. It is opposed by 52% of Republicans, 50% of Democrats, and 48% of unaffiliateds.
From an ideological perspective, the bill is opposed by 59% of conservatives, 54% of liberals, and 45% of political moderates. Among those for whom none of the traditional ideological labels apply, just 20% are opposed.
Support is found from 20% of conservatives, 32% of liberals, and 18% of moderates.
Just 32% believe it would be better to pass the current bill instead of doing nothing.
Are we going to have to depend on the House Republicans to kill this thing? According to the Washington Times, it looks like that is the only place brains and guts still reside
Even if the bill survives the Senate this week, the House may be a bigger challenge for Mr. Bush, who faces a full-scale revolt in his own party on the issue.
House Republicans voted 114-23 yesterday to pass a resolution disapproving of the Senate bill, a stark move that sends a signal to Mr. Bush, House Democrats and Senate Republicans.
House Minority Leader John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican, said he gave a “heads-up” to the White House that the vote was coming and “they weren’t happy about it.”
But Republicans said they needed to make a statement to distance themselves from the bill, which they fear could be labeled a “Republican” bill because of the support of Mr. Bush and Senate Republicans.
“This is not a Republican bill. The House Republicans don’t want to be associated with this bill, and are opposed to it,” said Rep. Peter T. King, New York Republican.
The direction the House wants to go, at this time, seems to emphasize border security and enforcement of current laws rather than the amnesty and special visa provisions of the Senate version. If the Senate insists on passing this bill tomorrow, the House Republicans will get their chance to put their votes where their mouths are. And regardless, we get our chance to vote later on…
Remember “Read my lips…”? Today it’s “it’s NOT amnesty… and I won’t build the fence or enforce the other laws already on the books unless you give it to me.”
This might fit as well if you substitute Idaho and Senator Larry Craig
Ok, one more time. Consider this clip from a good Heritage Foundation article on the problems inherent in the amnesty bill “No President Left Behind” time
The comprehensive immigration bill before the U.S. Senate (S. 1639) has been roundly and justly criticized for what it would do up front: grant immediate amnesty to virtually all illegal aliens now in the country and jeopardize U.S. national security. However, that is only half of the problem. S. 1639 would also create a legal morass that would entangle immigration courts, as well as newly created administrative courts, for years to come.
S. 1639 would grant immediate amnesty (in the form of a “probationary” Z visa) to between 12 million and 20 million illegal aliens. According to Section 601 (f)(2) of the bill, the amnesty must begin within 180 days after the bill is signed–no border enforcement triggers need to be met. Under Section 601 (h)(1), the bill allows the government only one business day to conduct a background check to determine whether an applicant is a criminal or a terrorist. Unless the government can find a reason not to grant it by the end of the next business day after the alien applies, the alien receives a probationary Z visa.
The 24-hour requirement is particularly inexplicable, considering that the ombudsman for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS)–the agency that would implement the amnesty–recently released a report revealing that, even without the tripling of the workload that the amnesty will bring, FBI name checks on aliens seeking benefits routinely take 90 days or more to complete.
From the same article, a little light for Senator Craig
S. 1639 offers an especially sweet deal for illegal agricultural workers once they obtain their Z-A visas. In Section 622 (b), the bill states, “No alien granted a Z-A visa may be terminated from employment by any employer during the period of a Z-A visa except for just cause.”
Employers who dare to fire newly legalized aliens holding Z-A visas would do so at their own peril. The bill would create yet another administrative court system to review complaints by Z-A agricultural workers “who allege that they have been terminated without just cause.” If the administrative hearing officer finds that the alien has established reasonable cause to believe that he was fired without just cause, the alien and the former employer must enter binding arbitration proceedings supervised by an arbitrator whose fees are paid by taxpayers. The burden is on the employer to demonstrate by a preponderance of the evidence that he fired the alien for just cause.
Remember this for the next election… there are a lot of lessons here. Homeland Security and National Defense. Right. “Read my lips…”
I can hardly wait for 10 or 12 years from now, when George and Hillary! are on the Good Cause Train, just like George and Bill.
The article in the Statesman, via the AP of course, says “Surge of Suicide Blasts in Iraq kills 29″. Doing their best to liberate the word “surge” from the President and his generals, the AP story only discusses the gloomy news from Iraq of the sort calculated to increase war fatigue and impatience in a reader. You know, the old “We can’t do anything right over there, and it’s just a waste. We should quit right now, and bring all our poor young men home. It’s just a civil war and we shouldn’t take sides,” blah blah blah. The sidebar suggests related stories like “How MySpace is Changing the Face of the War” and “Al-Sadrs Ambitious Plans”, along with the ever present death count.
SO, in order to find out a more complete picture of what’s going on over there, why not check out what the milbloggers, the Defense Department, and other assorted sources are trying to tell us? Have you even heard of something called Arrowhead Ripper? Michael Yon is with the 3-2 in Baqubah where a very large offensive against al Qaeda has been underway the last couple days. Go read why he says al Qaeda’s only choices there are soon to be Surrender or Die.
The combat in Baqubah should soon reach a peak. Al Qaeda seems to have been effectively isolated. The initial attack on 19 June achieved enough surprise that al Qaeda was caught off guard and trapped. They have been beaten back mostly into pockets and are surrounded and will be dealt with.
How about the DOD?
“The end state is to destroy the al Qaeda influences in this province and eliminate their threat against the people,” said Army Brig. Gen. Mick Bednarek, deputy commanding general of operations for the 25th Infantry Division. “That is the No. 1, bottom-line, up-front, in-your-face task and purpose.”
About 10,000 soldiers, with a full complement of attack helicopters, close-air support, Strykers and Bradley fighting vehicles, are taking part in Arrowhead Ripper, which is still in its opening stages. Elements of the 1st Cavalry Division’s 3rd Brigade Combat Team from Fort Hood, Texas, the 2nd Infantry Division’s 4th Brigade Combat Team from Fort Lewis, Wash., and the 25th Combat Aviation Brigade from Schofield Barracks, Hawaii, also are participating in the operation.
IBDeditorials noted the slanted mainstream coverage of the operation
After getting some initial front-page treatment in major U.S. newspapers, the story was pushed back to page 18 in the Washington Post Thursday and Page 10 in The New York Times on Friday. The Los Angeles Times ran a front pager Thursday, then nothing.
Meanwhile, NPR radio this week highlighted U.S. soldiers’ deaths during the assaults, with nary a mention of the bigger context for the soldiers’ sacrifices.
The Associated Press’ dispatches focused on U.S. casualties: “U.S. military says 15 American troops killed in last 48 hours.” CNN ran with: “12 U.S. troops killed in Iraq in 48 hours.” The New York Times headline read: “14 U.S. Troops Killed in Iraq in 2 Days.”
The Iraq Report over at The Fourth Rail the other morning said
Operation Arrowhead Ripper, the name of the U.S. and Iraqi offensive in Diyala province remains the hottest front in Operation Phantom Thunder, the overarching operation in the Baghdad Belts. Since the start of the operation on June 16, U.S. and Iraqi forces have killed 59 al Qaeda operatives, captured 40, destroyed 28 roadside bombs and 12 booby-trapped buildings, and uncovered 16 weapons caches in Baqubah and the surrounding regions. U.S. and Iraqi forces have begun to distribute aid to civilians in the city.
They’re also reporting that perhaps this isn’t going to result in the big battle against al Qaeda that had been hoped for. The same report also includes this item
In Mosul, U.S. and Iraqi forces raided “a large factory used to make home-made explosives, improvised explosive devices and vehicle-borne improvisedexplosive devices” after receiving a tip from a local resident on Saturday. Thirty-two insurgents were captured at the site, which “consisted of three separate buildings with one building used to prepare VBIEDs, a second used as an HME/IED factory and the third, a storage area for VBIED and IED-making materials. Each of these buildings was connected by a tunnel that had openings into each part of the structure.”
I’ve heard it said of conservatives that we don’t have open minds… OK, all of you wise and open minded, there is a whole lot more going on in Iraq than suicide bombers and insane clerics. Put the Statesman down and seek out other voices. You just might learn why so many people you look down your noses at support our troops and support what they are doing over there.
Remember those purple fingers? Remember how wonderful it was to think of a people coming out from repression and tasting freedom and self rule for the first time? Michael Yon this morning reminds us who we fight and updates us on their vision for Iraq
There is much work to do here, especially if the Iraqi Police continue to perform below expectations. The absence of strong local leadership is a large part of the reason AQI was able to move in and set up a shadow government in Baqubah, complete with its own court system, torture house and prison. These three pegs of the AQI justice system have been found here in the past week. The judges who administer Sharia law and issue fatwas are called Muftis. A Mufti is a “high value target” because he would have deep connections in AQI in order to have such a trusted position of power.
Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) had tarnished its name here by publicly attacking and murdering children, videotaping beheadings, all while imposing harsh punishments on Iraqi civilians found guilty of violating morality laws prohibiting activities like smoking. The AQI installed Sharia court had sanctioned the amputation of the two “smoking fingers” for those who violated anti-smoking laws. In part because local sentiment was shifting against it, AQI synthesized with other groups and undertook an image makeover, christening itself “The Islamic State of Iraq.” But the new name was just lipstick on a pig here.
Arrowhead Ripper is still going on. It, like the whole Iraq action is not going to find a quick, easy, nor cheap ending. It would be so easy to dismiss it all as “their problem, not ours”… but the real question is “al Qaeda’s vision, or ours? Sharia, or freedom?”
Pay attention.
This story from NWCN could have had a whole different outcome
TACOMA, Wash. - A Tacoma police officer was hospitalized Saturday after three men and one woman assaulted him during a routine vandalism call on the east side of Tacoma.
Around 6 a.m. Saturday, the Tacoma police officer was responding to reports of people spray painting graffiti on a neighborhood wall. About a block away, he saw some young men with spray paint cans. The officer was in the process of arresting them when they attacked.
“They assaulted him. The first two were joined by others. One actually left and returned and they continued kicking and beating the officer until help arrived,” said Mark Fulghum, of the Tacoma Police Department.
But a neighbor and his wife saw the commotion, and while she dialed 911, this sheepdog went to help.
Help arrived first from Don Heinkle, who lives in the neighborhood. He was getting ready to walk his dog when he heard the commotion. He ran over from his house and jumped in to protect the officer.
“These four people - one was sitting on him and the others were hitting and kicking him,” Heinkle said.
They were also trying to get the officer’s gun unholstered. Wonder what they had in mind for that? After the 911 call, a number of other officers arrived quickly.
Heinkle - an ex-marine - says the four suspects did a lot of damage to the officer.
“I mean he had a welt on his head, on his chin,” Heinkle said. “His nose was bleeding, his mouth was bleeding, then I realized this was not just kids — they were trying to hurt him.”
The four suspects — a 19-year-old man, his 16-year-old brother, a 17-year-old cousin and a 21-year-old woman — were all arrested.
The young men who were arrested live in the neighborhood.
Say what you will about Tacoma and gangs, but this could happen just about anywhere, including here in Idaho. The wolves are out there, and there can never be enough sheepdogs. Thank you Don Heinkle!
Good Sunday morning to you all. Here’s Helen Baylor singing “Worthy”
Do you remember the photograph of the Taliban funeral? The chance that wasn’t taken… because our PC culture dictates that we don’t fire on cemeteries and funerals? How about this thought
America is at war with al Qaeda — on that surely we can agree — and we know that al Qaeda has bases in Pakistan. In fact, it is probable that Osama bin Laden resides at one of those bases. But we can’t fight al Qaeda in Pakistan because Pakistan is an ally, and America does not violate the territorial integrity of its allies.
This from an article by Cliff May at NRO, talking about where we fight. He talks about Somalia, and Lebanon, and Gaza. All places where we know that al Qaeda operates, but where we don’t go for various reasons. May mentions Europe as well
Al Qaeda cells operate in Europe. But it is problematic for American operatives to kill or capture terrorists there: To do so sparks allegations from the “human rights community” and the media about violations of international law, torture and secret prisons. Also, as has happened in Italy, it can lead to criminal prosecutions of Americans thought to be involved. So America’s ability to fight al Qaeda in Europe is limited.
We have a political culture that is increasingly bent over for every whining PC complaint, and an entire political party (and often half of another one) that is so spineless on the one hand, and power seeking-belly button gazing on the other, it leaves me speechless when people like Harry Reid criticize people like General Peter Pace and proclaim that the war is lost… and except for bloggers and talk radio, most of America doesn’t seem to care.
May continues
But many politicians, looking at polls showing Americans fatigued by a war that was not supposed to be so prolonged or arduous, now favor withdrawing from Iraq — retreating from the battlefield al Qaeda calls the central front in their jihad against us.
If this is where members of Congress want to go, they ought to be honest about where it leads: Al Qaeda will still be waging a war against us, but we will no longer be waging much of a war against al Qaeda.
Almost a decade ago, Osama bin Laden said that Americans were “unprepared to fight long wars.” Secure in his Pakistani redoubt, he must be pleased that his analysis is proving so uncannily accurate.
The best answer I have to those politicians is not anything I can write, rather it is something Andrew Olmsted, one of our fighting men wrote
It pleases me to no end that if I end up getting killed in Iraq, at least my wife can take comfort in knowing my death may help the Democrats win the White House in 2008. Really, that makes it all worthwhile.
Shame on you all!
(Andrew Olmsted is an Army Major currently getting ready to depart for Iraq and blogging now at Rocky Mountain News. Read his stuff.)
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