Immigration

One of the most popular stories at Yahoo! News on Monday featured Daisy Cuevas, the Peruvian girl who told Michelle Obama her mother was an illegal immigrant. In a story with no space for border-enforcers, AP reporter Carla Salazar relayed that the girl is famous in Peru, and Peru's president sounds just like Mexico's president in lecturing Arizona:

Daisy, meanwhile, has become a celebrity in Peru. "I'm really proud that a young girl of Peruvian origin is highlighting the enormous problem with Latin American immigration in the United States," President Alan Garcia told reporters last week.

He said it would be scandalous if her parents were deported. "Do you know how much President Obama and Mrs. Michelle Obama would stand to lose?" he said. Garcia called the Arizona law a "completely irrational response" to the illegal-immigration question, and said he would express his thoughts on the matter to President Obama during his visit to Washington.

For over a year, America's media have been depicting Tea Partiers as homophobic racists citing inflammatory signs at rally events as evidence.

On Saturday, pro-illegal immigration supporters in Phoenix, Arizona, carried signs quite similar to what our press found repulsive and extreme when present at conservative protests.

Will swastikas and the Arizona governor being referred to as "Adolf Brewer" be equally unacceptable to America's media?

Before you answer, consider the following news segment from NBC12 in Phoenix wherein an anti-SB 1070 protester was interviewed holding a sign emblazoned with swastikas claiming "Republicans Breed Ignorance," and the reporter didn't even bat an eye (video follows with commentary and additional pictures):

Another pro-illegal alien protest and, once again, the networks champion the cause. Four weeks after the broadcast network evening shows trumpeted May Day marches against Arizona’s effort to enforce federal law, another round of marches prompted ABC and NBC on Saturday night to push the left-wing cause.

“Day of outrage, anger on the streets of Phoenix and across this country tonight,” ABC anchor David Muir declared, pleading: “Will an army of protesters be heard?” Reporter Jeremy Hubbard began his story for World News: “In their most massive numbers yet, a deluge of adversaries rally and rail against what could soon be the law of the land in Arizona.”

On NBC, Telemundo’s Janet Rodriguez also presented the subject through the prism of those against the popular law: “Critics say the law unfairly targets Hispanics who make up about a third of the state's population. Recent college grad Martin Moreno worries about racial profiling” while another protester claimed “this law violates our fundamental principles of human dignity,” before Rodriguez featured a woman holding a sign from ANSWER LA, the far-left/communist-affiliated group. Rodriguez, however, described her simply as “from Long Beach.” The woman smeared as “racists” the majority of Americans who support the law.

Over the past two years, yours truly has noted how the economy in Oklahoma has with very little media attention outperformed most of the rest of the nation. The Sooner State's much lower unemployment rate, higher GDP growth, and higher personal income growth have "strangely" coincided with the passage of a strict illegal immigration law-enforcement measure in 2007.

Now there's another significant news item out of Oklahoma that the establishment press has also virtually ignored. In November, voters there are going to decide whether to opt out of the statist health care legislation passed by Congress in March, also known as ObamaCare, by passing a state constitutional amendment.

Oklahoma is not alone. Two larger states will also have state constitutional opt-outs on the November ballot.

Rush Limbaugh brought the Oklahoma news to his listeners' attention yesterday, and linked to this LifeSiteNews.com story. If that seems an odd choice, it's because press coverage in general has been either curt, dismissive, or non-existent.

Here are key paragraphs from Peter J. Smith's LifeSite report:

Catching up on an item from the Thursday, May 20, The View on ABC, comedian George Lopez appeared as a guest and made a few anti-Sarah Palin cracks as he joked with the group about the new immigration law in Arizona, asserting that if Palin were to become President, he and other Latinos would flee the country: "This is the answer to immigration, I'm going to tell you right now. This is how to get every Latino to go back to where they came from: Elect her President in 2012. ... We will leave voluntarily. We'll leave. We'll go voluntarily and take Canadians with us."

He soon joked about Palin fitting the "profile" of a Latina: "Sarah Palin needs to be careful because she fits the profile of a Latina. ... Her and her daughter have a kid the same age. ... She works and her husband don't. ... She talks a lot of smack and he don't say one word. That's very Latino. But he's a stay-at-home dad. Where I come from, if you're a stay-at-home dad, your ass is unemployed."

On the Friday, May 21, The O’Reilly Factor, host Bill O’Reilly highlighted the latest right-leaning musical parody produced by singer Ray Stevens, this time taking aim at illegal immigration and noting the tougher treatment of illegal immigrants in other countries. The song, titled "Come to the USA," begins:

If you thinkin’ about illegal immigration,

Be careful when you’re choosin’ the nation

‘Cause breakin’ the law in some countries is frowned upon.

Imagine that.

Last January, O’Reilly interviewed Stevens, showing clips of his "We the People" parody attacking ObamaCare.

On Friday, the FNC host also highlighted a parody by comedian and Saturday Night Live veteran Will Ferrell attacking Arizona’s new immigration law from the left.

Below are the lyrics of the Ray Stevens song, "Come to the USA":

Media Research Center President Brent Bozell appeared again on last night's "Hannity" for the weekly look at the MSM's liberal pathology in a segment entitled "Media Mash."

The first topic: the liberal media are slowly waking up to the president's incompetent handling of the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Mr. Bozell compared that to how it took a mere 72 hours after Katrina's landfall in New Orleans for the media to slam then-President Bush.

The NewsBusters publisher also addressed how Sam Donaldson compared Mexican President Felipe Calderon's scolding Arizonans for their anti-illegal immigration law to how President George H.W. Bush rebuked the Communist Chinese after the Tiananman Square Massacre.

For the full segment, click the play button on the embed above at right.

Despite the latest NBC/MSNBC/Telemundo poll showing 61 percent of Americans support Arizona’s new immigration law, MSNBC anchor Andrea Mitchell on May 26 failed to interview a single supporter for MSNBC’s special, “A Nation Divided.” She did, however, manage to scrounge up plenty of vocal opponents, including two high-profile Democrats who believe the law is unconstitutional.

New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa agreed that the legislation Arizona Governor Janet Brewer (R) signed into law in April divides the country along racial lines and think the federal government should pass comprehensive immigration reform.

“But the fact of the matter is this is a divisive measure, it’s unconstitutional,” insisted Villaraigosa, who supports the Los Angeles City Council’s decision to boycott Arizona. “It violates the rights of people in Arizona and it’s the wrong way to go.”

Instead of asking Richardson and Villaraigosa to explain how the new law is unconstitutional and divisive, Mitchell fired off bursts of piercing, penetrating questions, such as:

On Monday’s The O’Reilly Factor, during the show’s regular "Reality Check" segment, FNC host O’Reilly seemed to pick up on a NewsBusters item which highlighted ABC’s Sam Donaldson and Cokie Roberts defending Mexican President Felipe Calderon using his speech in Congress as a forum to criticize Arizona’s effort to enforce laws against illegal immigration. In their defense of Calderon on Sunday's This Week show's Roundtable segment, the the two ABC News veterans brought up past American Presidents criticizing communist dictators in China and the Soviet Union.

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the "Reality Check" from the Monday, May 24, The O’Reilly Factor on FNC:

"Psycho Talk" is a regular segment on Ed Schultz's regular MSNBC show.  But after his bizarre outburst this evening, you really have to wonder whether Ed's the one ready for the rubber room . . .

Interviewing a liberal Dem congressman, Schultz expressed concern that the 1,200 National Guard troops that Pres. Obama has ordered to the Mexican border may have been issued "shoot to kill" orders.

Ed, have you forgotten who's Commander-in-Chief?  If you're truly worried that the president has issued shoot-to-kill orders on illegal immigrants, then PBO is certainly in much worse political shape than even the most pessimistic observers have imagined.

Schultz indulged his paranoid fantasy while chatting with far-left Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Illinois).

MSNBC’s May 26 special on immigration reform, “A Nation Divided,” was replete with unbalanced interviews with liberal activists and one-sided segments featuring only liberal positions on the controversial issue.

MSNBC anchor Contessa Brewer pitched softballs to Democrats Michael Nowakowski, vice mayor of Phoenix, and Raul Castro, former Arizona governor, without brining on guests to counter their liberal perspectives.

“The other thing that this really does is it puts businesses in the enforcement business, and responsible for making sure that their employees are here legally,” Brewer told Nowakowski. “The consequences for which could mean business owners lose their livelihoods.”

In the same interview, Brewer set up Nowakowski to bemoan the supposedly high cost of enforcing Arizona’s new immigration law, which empowers state authorities to inquire into a person’s legal status if there is reasonable suspicion that a person is in the country illegally.

NBC's Natalie Morales, on Wednesday's Today show, introduced Telemundo's Maria Celeste Arraras to tell the story of a South Florida family that has been separated by immigration laws in a segment that painted plight of the illegal immigrant in the most sympathetic tones. The tale of a Colombian mother deported back to her home country because she overstayed her visa, was part of, as Morales put it: "an NBC wide look at A Nation Divided." Arraras interviewed the children of Claudia Ramirez who were, as the story seemed to intimate, forced to fend for themselves in the U.S. after, as her daughter Kathy described, two "big guys with I.C.E. jackets" took their mom away. 

Arraras mainly focused on the perspective of the family as she interviewed Claudia, her three children and an immigration lawyer, and only allowed one dissenting voice, a former INS agent who pointed out if "we find all these exceptions for people to be able to stay here, even though they violated the law, why should anybody ever go through the legal system?" Arraras, herself, did point out to the daughter "Some people may say, 'Well, this is a very sad case but too bad, your mother should not have come here in the first place.' What, what would you say to that?" To which Kathy guilt-tripped Today viewers by responding: "Have a heart." [audio available here]

The following is a transcript of the full story as it was aired on the May 26 Today show:

On Tuesday’s Joy Behar Show, HLN host Behar again suggested that an activity by the state of Arizona could be compared to Nazi Germany, as she discussed plans by the state’s education department to stiffen English-speaking requirements for teachers. Introducing the subject with comedians Mo Rocca and Colin Quinn, after taking a shot at former President Bush’s speaking skills, she asked does the requirement "remind you of any country, 1940ish?" Behar:

The Arizona Department of Education is cracking down on teachers with thick accents or who make grammatical errors when speaking. Well, there goes Snooki`s shot at teaching Algebra in Phoenix. Okay, and what about George Bush and his grammatical errors all those years? They are getting rid of teachers because they have accents in Arizona. Remind you of any country, 1940ish?

Over the past several weeks, during debates over Arizona’s attempt to enforce laws similar to federal immigration laws, Behar has repeatedly made direct and indirect references to Nazi Germany both on the Joy Behar Show and on ABC’s The View to disparage the Arizona law.

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Tuesday, May 25, Joy Behar Show on HLN:

Durring a protest against the Arizona immigration law and for open borders, ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis was arrested. Apparently she believes in purposely breaking the law in order to advocate for those that purposely break U.S. immigration laws.

Make sure you visit this post on the Eyeblast Blog for more details on what happened

CNN did its part to perpetuate the liberal talking point about Arizona's supposedly racist campaign against illegal immigrants by airing a report three times on Monday that spun the state's standards for English teachers as an "accent ban" or "crackdown." Anchor Kyra Phillips even opined that it was "just wrong to judge a teacher by his or her accent as to judge on their hair or skin color."

The network's American Morning program first aired correspondent Thelma Gutierrez's report 27 minutes into the 6 am Eastern hour. Three minutes earlier, anchor John Roberts previewed the upcoming segment by noting that "some schools in Arizona [are] cracking down on English teachers who have accents." Roberts then introduced Gutierrez's report, stating that "state education officials want immigrant teachers with heavy accents removed from classes for students who are still learning English. They say they're simply following federal guidelines that were set up by the Bush administration back in 2002. But critics are calling it an ethnic witch hunt."

The "guidelines...set up by the Bush administration" line by Roberts was actually a reference to the No Child Left Behind law which passed with bipartisan support in Congress in 2001, and signed into law by then-President Bush in January 2002. Gutierrez mentioned this during her report as she introduced the Arizona state education official defending his state's guidelines: "State School Superintendent Tom Horne says, as part of No Child Left Behind, he's been monitoring ELL teachers for bad grammar and mispronounced words for the past eight years." But instead of mentioning this detail, the CNN anchor labeled it as being from the Bush administration.

In an article published in Human Events on May 18, titled, "Our Founders' Solutions for Illegal Immigration, Part I," actor Chuck Norris cited the views of some of the Founding Fathers in calling for America's government to get control of illegal immigration. After quipping, "How is it that we can secure borders in the Middle East but can't secure our own?" he went on to recount that the Founders believed in the importance of "assimilating" new immigrants into the American culture, and quoted George Washington:

America's Founders also were concerned with properly assimilating immigrants so that their presence would be positive upon the culture. George Washington wrote, "By an intermixture with our people, they, or their descendants, get assimilated to our customs, measures, laws: in a word soon become one people."

Norris then relayed the views of Thomas Jefferson, whose political faction is known historically for being pro-immigration, and pointed out that even he saw the need for prudence in its management:

Why is Oklahoma's economy more than OK these days?

The latest piece of evidence supporting that truth arrived on Friday, when Uncle Sam's Bureau of Labor Statistics released April's Regional and State Unemployment Summary.

The report tells us that Oklahoma had a seasonally adjusted unemployment rate of 6.6% last month. That's far lower than the 9.9% reported for the entire USA two weeks ago. No state with a larger population has a lower unemployment rate than the Sooner State (states with lower April unemployment rates were KS - 6.5%; NE at 5.0%; ND - 3.8%; SD - 4.7%; and VT - 6.4%).

As seen in the chart below, Oklahoma's unemployment rate has been significantly lower than the national rate for well over two years, and on average in 2009 was that way across all major ethnic groups (source data for 2006 to 2009 can be accessed here; scroll down to "Annual Average Statewide Data"):

On Thursday’s The O’Reilly Factor, FNC’s Megyn Kelly appeared to give her take on the Arizona immigration law that the has so upset the left in America, relaying her conclusion that the law actually holds the police to higher standards against racial discrimination and the conditions under which police can enforce the law than current federal laws. Kelly: "And my legal opinion is, it is a little bit like the federal law, but if anything, it's less problematic. Did you know that the Supreme Court already ruled a few years ago that under federal law, cops can pull you over for no reason and demand to see your immigration papers? For no reason. They don't have to have reasonable suspicion."

She went on to recount a relevant Supreme Court case:

And the court, this was written by then-Chief Justice Rehnquist who said in that case, hold on, let me get it because it's here in front of me some place. He said the officers did not need reasonable suspicion to ask Menia for her name, date, and place of birth, or immigration status. The cops do not need reasonable suspicion to ask you about immigration status. Under Arizona law, they do. They do.

Referring to restrictions against police application of the law, Kelly concluded: "It's tougher. Arizona's tougher."

She later summed up:

The Associated Press's Sophia Tareen has apparently had a lot of time on her hands the past couple of days, and her wire service bosses couldn't find much for her to do. How else to explain Tareen's devotion of almost 1,000 words to the burning question of whether cartoon character Dora the Explorer is an illegal immigrant?

You read that right, but it's worse than that. Tareen claims that images of Dora "are being used by those who oppose and support Arizona's law," but could only cite actual instances of usage by leftists at the Huffington Post and at a a Facebook page whose category is "Just for Fun - Outlandish Statements."

Along the way, Tareen oh-so-predictably resurrects the late-1990s "Teletubbies are Gay" kerfuffle (incompletely, of course); waits until the 27th paragraph to tell us that the image at the top right, which "is circulating widely in the aftermath of Arizona's controversial new immigration law," has really been around since last year (originating at freakingnews.com); and quotes a "gender studies" professor at the University of Arizona who -- undisclosed to readers, naturally -- is virulently anti-capitalism.

Having appropriately forewarned everyone, here are samplings of Sophia's choice chestnuts:

The top story at NYTimes.com Friday afternoon, presumably headed for the front-page of Saturday morning’s newspaper, touted how: “Immigration Law in Arizona Reveals G.O.P. Divisions.” All but one paragraph of the 30-paragraph report by Jennifer Steinhauer described the dilemma for Republicans torn between popular sentiment in favor of Arizona’s pro-enforcement stance, and the need to not alienate Hispanic voters.

Fair enough. But the Democrats are ostensibly in worse shape, having publicly and visibly denounced (with the President of Mexico) a popular law that 64% of Americans support, according to an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.

But the Times casts the GOP as stymied by the “delicacy of the issue,” even going so far as to seek wisdom from Karl Rove (not a Times favorite), identified with the soft-line approach that helped erode President Bush’s popularity among conservatives a few years ago:

CNN's Casey Wian on Friday's Newsroom filed a one-sided report on an illegal immigrant activist who was arrested for participating in a sit-in at Senator John McCain's office on Monday. Wian omitted the liberal affiliation of the activist's group, oversimplified the DREAM Act (the cause of the activist), and neglected how it would open the path for illegals to receive in-state tuition.

Wian's interview of Lizbeth Mateo aired 10 minutes into the 11 am Eastern hour. An on-screen graphic mentioned Mateo's affiliation with an organization called Dream Team Los Angeles, but the correspondent didn't mention this explicitly during his report. The 25-year-old illegal immigrant, who came to the U.S. with her parents when she was 14, wore the T-shirt of another organization she leads called The DREAM is Coming.com. This organization's website has a donate page which links to a Causes.com page for the United We Dream Network, a coalition which includes liberal organizations such as the National Council for La Raza, the Center for American Progress, and the New World Foundation.

On Thursday's Situation Room, CNN's Jack Cafferty blasted President Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon for their criticism of Arizona's new anti-illegal immigration law, stating that the two were "whining" about the law. Cafferty singled out Calderon for having "a lot of nerve...complaining" about the Arizona law and labeled Congress's standing ovation for the Mexican leader "disgusting."

The commentator devoted his Cafferty File segment 13 minutes into the 5 pm Eastern hour to slamming the two leaders' criticism of the Grand Canyon's State's newly-passed legislation. Cafferty wasted little time and targeted Calderon first for his criticism of the law on American soil: "Mexican President Felipe Calderon has a lot of nerve coming into this country and complaining about Arizona's immigration law, when all the state wants to do is protect itself against a flood of illegal immigrants from Calderon's country." He continued that "Calderon and President Obama are both whining about the Arizona law. Calderon, who also took the message to a joint meeting of Congress, is calling Arizona's law discriminatory."

All three broadcast evening newscasts have repeatedly touted, as if it is a valid representation of national sentiment, the “boycott” of Arizona by liberal municipalities such as San Francisco and Los Angeles. But when the Arizona Corporation Commissioner on Tuesday made a tongue-in-cheek offer to help Los Angeles out in its boycott by shutting off the electricity flow, CBS and NBC were silent.

The only network to mention the proposal to test the depths of the city’s commitment to liberal sanctimony was ABC, MRC intern Matthew Hadro discovered. White House correspondent Jake Tapper first noted how President Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon both criticized Arizona’s new immigration law at the White House, then reported:

JAKE TAPPER: The debate is intense. The Los Angeles City Council voted last month to boycott all official business in Arizona, prompting an Arizona utilities commissioner to all but threaten to cut off the electricity Arizona power plants provide L.A.
GARY PIERCE, ARIZONA CORPORATION COMMISSIONER: You can’t call a boycott on the candy store, and then decide to go in and pick and choose candy you really do want.

On Wednesday's The Situation Room, Wolf Blitzer gave Mexican President Felipe Calderon every chance possible to refute the argument that sneaking into Mexico from the south is much more perilous than Mexicans stealing into Arizona.

BTW - This segment of the 'exclusive' interview is not available for viewing on the CNN website.

 

ABC, CBS and NBC all showcased a second grader's question to First Lady Michelle Obama, about her apparently illegal mother. The girl pleaded: “Barack Obama is taking everybody away that doesn't have papers,” but “my mom doesn't have papers.”

ABC suggested it demonstrates the need for immigration “reform” as anchor Diane Sawyer proposed “a child's fear brings a new focus to the debate” since “the First Lady had to respond to a child's poignant question” which, reporter Jake Tapper relayed, “immigration reform advocates called...the most meaningful exchange of the day.” [Audio available here]

With “THE QUESTION” on screen (jpg), NBC anchor Brian Williams teased: “The question that a little girl asked Michelle Obama that put her smack in the middle of a big debate.” On the CBS Evening News, Katie Couric cued up the video showing “a second-grader had a tough question for Mrs. Obama on immigration.”

Liberal reporters always think that the liberal politicians they’re covering are the smartest people in the room. In fact, when they’re opposing something, they’re so smart that they don’t have to read the policy they’re discussing. They have a clairvoyant sense of how wrong it is.

Congressman Ted Poe of Texas exposed this liberal arrogance on May 13 at a House Judiciary Committee hearing. He was questioning Attorney General Eric Holder on the “controversial” (to the media, that is) Arizona immigration law. He asked an elementary question, although to liberals, it was shocking in its insolence: “Have you read the Arizona law?”

Holder’s response: “I have not had a chance. I grant that I have not read it.”

An incredulous Poe shot back that it wasn’t exactly a night’s worth of reading: “It's 10 pages. It's a lot shorter than the health care bill, which was 2,000 pages long. I'll give you my copy of it, if you would like to have a copy.”

Taxpayers may be forced to foot a portion of the bill for a new movie that has become a stark -- and violent -- message against the recently passed Arizona immigration law. The liberal political stance is nothing new in the movie world. That the film is still being considered for indirect public funding, however, is quite striking.

An online trailer for the film "Machete," released on Cinco de Mayo (and embedded below the fold), begins with the title character saying he has a "special message...to Arizona!" That special message, as the New York Post writes, seems to be "They just f---ed with the wrong Mexican."

Some commentators believe that the film could actually provoke violence. But at the very least, "Machete" seems to be making a very strong and provocative political statement about an extremely divisive issue -- while at the same time applying for tax breaks from the Texas state government. So Texans may be forced to help pay for a statment to which -- if national polls are any indicator -- many are opposed.

Editor's Note: Video and audio available below the fold.

Los Locos Yet another liberal bemoans the unbridled free speech that resulted from President Ronald Reagan's 1987 call to no longer enforce the so-called "Fairness" Doctrine.

This time it's Phoenix, Arizona Democratic Mayor Phil Gordon.  (He is not the Phil Gordon who plays poker.  The latter seeks to relieve you only of your money, not of your First Amendment rights.)

Mayor Censor participated in a May 14 panel discussion put together by the George Soros-funded, John Podesta-run, Marxist Van Jones permanent job place-holding Center for American Progress entitled "When Federal Government Failure Leads to Local Upheaval-Arizona and Beyond." 

At which Mayor Censor designated the absence of the mis-named "Fairness" Doctrine and the free market radio choices made by the American people that resulted as in part contributing to the passage of Arizona law 1070, which calls on state law enforcement officers to enforce federal immigration laws.

Says Mayor Censor:

Catching up on an item from ABC’s The View from Monday, April 26, as the group discussed the new immigration law in Arizona that attempts to enforce federal immigration law, co-host Joy Behar invoked Nazi Germany and suggested that those who oppose the law should be inspired by the story – which is apparently just a legend – of King Christian X of Denmark and other Danes wearing the Star of David on their arms during World War II to make it difficult for Nazi occupiers to discern who was Jewish. After making her first Nazi reference of the day by asserting that "this smells very much of, ‘May I see your papers?’" she soon continued:

During World War II, in one of the countries where the Nazis were occupying – I believe it was Denmark – the king of Denmark also wore the Jewish star. So then everybody had the star, and the Nazis did not know who was Jewish and who wasn't. I suggest that the people in Arizona all get out there and protest this and get some kind of thing to show that they don't like this.

After co-host Barbara Walters pointed out that 70 percent of the people of Arizona "like" the new law, Behar looked for a silver lining in the poll numbers:

Since the passage of Arizona's new immigration law, Gov. Jan Brewer (R) has been fighting back against rhetorical attacks on her state. Her tenacity certainly isn't lost on Rush Limbaugh.

Make sure you check out The Right Scoop for move videos like this.