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updated: 2015-12-29
 

"Effective creative compensation... must incorporate both the 4 factors of productivity (efficiency, effectiveness, consistency, & contribution), & the 3 levels of performance (individual, group, & organizational)." --- Robert E. Kelley 1985 _The Gold Collar Worker_ pg 67

 
 

2008 June

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29	30

 
 

"The ultimate authority... resides in the people alone." --- James Madison

 
 
 

captain William Scott's flag for the Republic of Texas.

2008-06-01

2008-06-01
Lew Rockwell
Bob Barr

2008-06-01
Rekha Basu _Des Moines Register_
Political parties leave us blurry-eyed
Bob Bar 2008: Liberty for America
Chuck Baldwin Live

2008-06-01
Derek Harper _Atlantic City Press_
Voter Guide
"Morristown Mayor Donald Cresitello, 61... made national news in 2006 with his attempts to enforce national immigration laws with local police.   He favors secure borders, with a path to citizenship."

2008-06-01
Rob Sanchez & Vince Wade _Job Destruction News-Letter_ #1873
America's Skilled Worker Glut: US tax-victims subsidizing foreign students
Vince Wade: America's Skilled Worker Glut video
Vince Wade: shaft our nation video
US Ambassador to Red China
"As high as American tuitions can be -- more than $30K per year for some private universities, between $15K and $25K for state universities -- the tuition and other fees charged to students only cover a share of the whole cost of the education.   Generalizing for the state universities in 50 states, tuition covers perhaps one-fourth of costs.   Another way to say this is that a student receives a dollar's worth of education for perhaps 25 cents.   The university's other costs are supported by the [tax-victims], which means the farmers and factory workers and business people of 1 of the 50 states...   Another way to look at this is that every student admitted to an American university receives an (unstated) scholarship, or perhaps a subsidy, from American society.   Every state debates the amount of money allocated for higher education each year.   Every state wants to keep education fees low to benefit its own low-income students.   But every year, states agree to use tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to subsidize the students that come from foreign nations."

2008-06-01
Steve Sailer _V Dare_
Even 4th generation immigrants from Mexico are failing

2008-06-01
"kdawson" _SlashDot_
OPT extension challenged in court: IRLI, AEA, PG, BFJ filed class-action suit
Alice Lipowicz: Washington Technology
Patrick Thibodeau: CIO
Ed Frauenheim: Work-Force Management
Fierce CIO
see also earlier coverage
 

2008-06-02

2008-06-02
Peter Brimelow & Edwin S. Rubenstein _MarketWatch_
Debt is not the only problem; there's also interest burden

2008-06-02
Dudley Price _Raleigh News & Observer_
Economic woes shutting down businesses
"Bankruptcies historically rise during economic down-turns.   This time, lawyers and court officials are seeing a surge in filings by businesses connected to the real estate industry, which has suffered as the nation's mortgage crisis deepened and bankers tightened credit.   'The last time we had this many real-estate related bankruptcies was in the 1980s during the savings-and-loan crisis.', said Marjorie Lynch, bankruptcy administrator for the U.S. Bankruptcy Court Eastern District.   For the 4-county region of Wake, Durham, Orange and Johnston, first quarter bankruptcy filings totaled 777 -- or a 6.58% increase over a year ago, according to data from the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District.   The totals include Chapter 7 liquidation for individuals and businesses, Chapter 11 reorganization for businesses and Chapter 13 repayments for individuals.   Through May 27, 38 Triangle businesses declared bankruptcy.   There were 20 over the same period last year...   The trend follows the nation: Bankruptcies jumped 37% from 2006 to 850,912 last year, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute.   It estimates filings will hit 1.2M this year."

2008-06-01
R. Pope _Ag Weekly_
NAFTA perpetuates abysmal working conditions, takes Americans' jobs
"The loss of jobs in America is attributed primarily to treaties such as NAFTA which move jobs to those countries where people are willing to work long hours for slave wages.   There was a time not too long ago when Americans were so proud of what we were that we actually hunted for products bearing the 'Made in America' label.   Today, if you find such a label then you are extremely fortunate -- and even then the product may not be truly 'Made in America'.   Instead, its parts will have been made in some third-world country such as Mexico, Thailand, or Venezuela, then passed through American factories only long enough for some amount of assembly to be performed on its parts to satisfy the claim that the product was made in our once-proud nation.   Treaties such as NAFTA have taken jobs from American men and women who are ready, willing and eager to work for honest wages, and has placed that work into the hands of child laborers who cannot stand up and fight for fair wages in the sweat-shops that they toil away in.   I have seen those sweat-shops first-hand, and they are definitely nothing that Americans should ever be proud to have a part in."

2008-06-02
Sheldon Richman _Future of Freedom Foundation_
Obama & McCain Are Both Wrong

2008-06-02
Geoff Mulvihill _AP_/_Philadelphia Enquirer_
Low turn-out expected for tomorrow's NJ primary
Robert Schwaneberg: NJ Star-Ledger
Courier Post
"Democratic State Chairman Joe Cryan, who is also a state Assemblyman, said he expects the two big-spending U.S. Senate candidates, incumbent Frank Lautenberg and U.S. representative Rob Andrews, to give extra attention on get-out-the-vote efforts.   Cryan didn't expect the same kind of push for the third candidate, Morristown Mayor Donald Cresitello."

2008-06-02
Faye Flam _Philadelphia Inquirer_
Campaign to preserve Amerindian languages
"Grounds learned from his own family how Indian languages were systematically squelched.   His grand-mother, he said, grew up speaking Euchee, but, as a teen-ager, was forced into an English-only boarding school where teachers would wash her mouth out with soap when she uttered a word of her native tongue.   In the last few years, he has been racing to coax all the words and wisdom he can from tribal elders.   And yet, at the meeting, a number of young people spoke and even sang in Euchee, Lenape, Miccosukke, Lakota, Miami [Twightwee?], and other endangered languages -- something that Grounds said gave him hope...   The Miami language contains wisdom about which foods are healthful -- something that today might have helped Indians avoid being disproportionately affected by Type 2 diabetes, Baldwin said.   Today, [Daryl Baldwin is] working to perpetuate the language as director of a program called the Myaamia Project at Ohio's Miami University.   In the Maskoke language, time and space are seen very differently from Western perception, said Marcus Briggs-Cloud, who is a member of the Maskoke Nation of Florida and a theology graduate student at Harvard.   In English, time is more linear, whereas it's more cyclical in Maskoke.   There's a cyclical nature to space as well, and some ceremonies focus on the renewal of space."
Endangered Languages

2008-06-02
_Campaigns & Elections_
Rising Stars 2008: David All, Shane Cory...
"Before going to work on the Hill at age 24, David All never really considered himself a 'tech guy'.   He had already served as a speech-writer for a U.S. senator and managed a Republican congressional campaign...   When Shane Cory took over the helm of the Libertarian National Committee in 2005, he worked overtime to turn the financial situation of the organization around.   After 2001/09/11, the LNC suffered financially due to a lack of contributions and other budgetary constraints.   But slowly, largely through direct mail efforts, Cory stabilized the LNC's finances, and even brought them into the black.   His prudence served the organization well, along with his constant mantra of thriftiness to his staffers.   There was the time, for instance, that he decided to remove the office water-cooler.   No, it wasn't a prank; he apparently didn't want people lolling around the machine wasting time.   Late this spring, Cory moved on from the LNC to take a position as president of the Internet division at American Target Advertising, as well as to serve as a senior political adviser to Libertarian Party presidential candidate Bob Barr."

2008-06-02
David Weigel _Reason_
Bob Barr to StormFront: Drop Dead
"Barr campaign manager Russ Verney released this statement: 'The Barr campaign is not going to be a vehicle for every fringe and hate group to promote itself.   We do not want and will not accept the support of haters.   Anyone with love in their heart for our country and for every resident of our country regardless of race, religion, nationality or sexual orientation is welcome with open arms.   Tell the haters I said don't let the door hit you on the backside on your way out!'   Barr consultant Steve Gordon sent me the statement and added: 'We denounce anybody who doesn't want to treat everybody equally under the law.'"

2008-06-02
David Weigel _Comment Is Free_
Bob Barr's come-back
Manchester Guardian
"The Libertarian party helped to end Bob Barr's political career.   In 2002, when Barr was still a Republican congressman from Georgia's conservative Cobb County, the Democratic-led legislature drew a new map that placed him in a new, unfamiliar seat held by another Republican.   Libertarians licked their chops.   Barr became a target of the party's 'incumbent killer' strategy...   The Libertarians beat Bob Barr.   Six years later, Bob Barr is the Libertarian party nominee for president of the United States.   There have been wilder (and higher-stakes) political turnarounds, but Barr's re-emergence on the national stage is a scintillating chapter in the larger political story gripping Americans right now: The wheezing and sputtering of the conservative movement.   For a time in the 1990s, there was no stauncher Republican than Barr, and few Republicans were more beloved by the base.   Barr impeached Bill Clinton before impeachment was cool, attacking him not just on sex scandals, but on... abuses of power.   Now he's running, in part, because George Bush has abused power in ways he never dreamed, and he's got no problem wrenching the Republicans out of power by taking votes from John McCain."

2008-06-02
Priyanka Joshi _WashTech_
Other Costs of Off-Shore Out-Sourcing part 2: Competition and Mental Health
 
5% of IT workers in Bangalor regularly consider suicide, according to a survey done by leading news magazine, India Today.   The survey further reports that 36% of Bangalore's IT workers can be classified as "probably psychiatric" cases, while 10% report severe, continuous mental stress.   These findings are surprising especially since India is on the rise, with stratospheric salaries, opportunity available on an unprecedented scale, and global avenues within reach.
 
Why is the Indian IT worker so unhappy?   Incessant international travel making him feel rootless, fear of the pink slip, impossible deadlines of the global economy and constant guilt of not meeting demands of the spouse and family have been quoted as the main stressors in his/her life.   This again, in an India that is paying stellar salaries to its young work-force, enabling them to buy swanky apartments, expensive cars, and the latest gadgets -- proving perhaps, that money, verily, cannot buy you happiness?
 
The roots of the dysfunction start early.   India, with its near epic tales of a water-tight work ethic, and the brainy, highly competitive professionals its been sending into the world, today tops the world in suicide among teen-agers, and severe pressures from the "culture of competition" are to blame, according to an April cover story of India Today.   The magazine reports in an April cover story that Indian teenagers lead the world at 16 suicides per day, which comes to an attempt every 90 minutes, with one successful every 6 hours, at 6K suicides a year.   56% of these suicides happen between March and July each year -- the time when Indian high schools and colleges hold annual examinations.
 
The statistics, compiled by the National Crime Records Bureau, contrast with the India Today report showing that suicides among teens in the West are leveling off in comparison.   In an HSBC survey done among Mumbai's elites this year, results showed parents pinned their happiness on being able to send their children to the best schools and colleges abroad.   Dr. G. Gururaj, head, department of epidemiology at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMHANS), says children who have been given too much too soon often are unable to cope with life's disappointments, and have a distorted sense of entitlement.   They give up too soon and do not fight back at life's challenges.
 
Instant gratification, self-absorption, blithely willful action, also remind us of the actions of certain powerful American corporate head honchos.   For instant gratification -- "Out-sourcing today will net me xyz amount of profit" -- they send American jobs to other countries while the employees struggle to support families juggling low pay, fear of job loss, high inflation and health care costs.   Their sense of entitlement and self absorption ensure that they treat employees not as human beings, but as mere statistics in their company's growth.   They care nothing for the IT professional who has worked hard, accumulating student debt and has a family to support, while they conveniently out-source his/her job away, or invite cheaper guest-labor for him to train and then take over his job!
 
Imagine the level of stress that the average IT employee is faced with, in Real World America today!   How can we, then, hope for a mentally healthy society when we are damaging the sense of security and well being of so many people?
 
And, what about the American teen-ager, working hard, wanting to go to a good college, and is already looking at grim IT job prospects?   What about the idea of living a life that is rich holistically, and not just materially?
 
The report on suicide says 43% of teen-agers cite fear of examination (which translates into a fear of disappointing their parents), as the main reason for Indian teens committing suicide.   "Parents cram their children's every waking hour with study related work, not giving them credit for any other activity they excel in, like painting, music, or athletics.   This ends up damaging their self esteem so badly, that they do not perceive life as worth living anymore.", says Kolkata psychiatrist Aniruddha Deb.   Indian parents today, anxious for their children's future, want them to get into an IIT, IIM if not Harvard, and the resultant pressure has resulted in 150 teen-agers committing suicide in India's examination season through 2008 March-April alone.
 
The Rubicon that separates an Indian family pushing its kids to death in the name of achievement, and the American family confused with how to get a gainful career for its kids in IT, is blurring with many chaotic voices hurtling at each other at break neck speed.   It is now up to the individual to decode a balanced way to lead a professionally satisfying life under overwhelming odds.   Like the tooth-paste factory worker in _Charlie and the Chocolate Factory_ [or the character in the Twilight Zone episode], displaced by the very machine he helped acquire, the answer may lie buried under frosty darkness, and the golden ticket, unlike the movie, may or may not arrive in his life-time.
 
Input from India Today has been used in this article.
 
-30-

2008-06-02
Edwin S. Rubenstein _V Dare_
The USA is becoming a nation of emigrants: Numbers of expatriots approaching legal immigration levels

2008-06-02
Terry Shawn & Jennifer Kaplan _DoL ETA_
DoL auditing permanent labor certification applications filed by Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy LLP, the largest filer of PERM applications in the USA
"The department has information indicating that in at least some cases the firm improperly instructed clients who filed permanent labor certification applications to contact their attorney before hiring apparently qualified U.S. workers.   The audits will determine which, if any, applications should be denied or placed into department-supervised recruitment because of improper attorney involvement in the consideration of U.S. worker applicants...   The department's regulations specifically prohibit an employer's immigration attorney or agent from participating in considering the qualifications of U.S. workers who apply for positions for which certification is sought, unless the attorney is normally involved in the employer's routine hiring process.   Where an employer does not normally involve immigration attorneys in its hiring process, there is no legitimate reason to consult with immigration attorneys before hiring apparently qualified U.S. workers who have responded to recruitment required by the permanent labor certification program [thus giving a big boost to the immigration lawyer industry by encouraging their regular use].   In 2004, the department adopted reforms streamlining the permanent labor certification process by moving to an attestation-based system [rather than one requiring any form of proof]."
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring e-News-Letter_
pre-eminent immigration law firm audited by DoL
I usually do NOT post articles here about employers being investigated or fined by the DoL for violating H-1B law or regulations.   This may seem odd, as many of the anti-H-1B-visa activists are thrilled when such a thing occurs, but as I've mentioned many times, these incidents are NOT important, because the vast majority of employers are abusing the [E-3, F, H-1B, J, and L programs] in FULL COMPLIANCE WITH THE LAW, due to loop-holes.   Indeed, I've pointed out that the industry lobbyists love these incidents, because it allows them to divert attention from the real issue, which is the loop-holes.
 
But the case described below is special, really special, because it involves the largest immigration law firm in the nation, Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy, LLP.   Mr. Fragomen literally "wrote the book" on H-1B, in fact lots of books on employer-sponsored immigration, all considered standard references.
 
So when there is an audit, amounting to an accusation that the Fragomen firm is violating the law on employer-sponsored green cards, this is of keen interest to me.   Mind you, I do NOT think they did anything illegal -- once again, they simply took advantage of loop-holes -- and I still have the same concern that this investigation will distract the H-1B/green card dialogue from the real issues.   But I must say it's interesting for me to see Fragomen [and the immigration lawyer associations] squirm.
 
And in fact the case actually highlights the central role that the loop-holes play, as you'll see.
 
The DoL says (see their statement, above) that "The department has information indicating that in at least some cases the firm improperly instructed clients who filed permanent labor certification applications to contact their attorney before hiring apparently qualified U.S. workers."   What does this really mean?
 
Recall the set of videos posted on YouTube in which a prominent Pittsburgh law firm, Cohen & Grigsby [in their 7th annual seminar], showed employers some of these vital loop-holes I keep citing.   [See coverage of Cohan & Grigsby's 7th annual seminar on employment and immigration law.
Matloff article 1.
Matloff article 2.
Matloff article 3.
Matloff article 4.
Matloff article 5.]
 
In video [part] 12, they show how to pay H-1Bs and green card sponsorees below-market wages, in FULL COMPLIANCE WITH THE LAW.   But it is video [part] 9 that has gotten the most attention, as they show employers who wish to sponsor a foreign worker for a green card how to avoid hiring American workers.
 
In those presentations, the Cohen & Grigsby firm promises to work with their clients, i.e. employers of foreign workers, to insure that the employers' goal is met -- to avoid hiring Americans.   That's basically what Fragomen seems to be accused of [except in a subtle legalistic detail of being called in ONLY when there's a capable and willing US worker that the employer wants to disqualify].
 
Yet as the ILW editorial points out, these employers are merely exercising their right to legal counsel.   Sure, it's counsel regarding odious loop-holes that undermine the putative intent of the law, but as long as the loop-holes are there, the employers have the right to use them and to get advice from counsel as to how to do so.   Their doing so is no different from using a good tax accountant who knows all the loop-holes.   Again, I think the whole thing is outrageous, but I really don't see that DoL has a case [because Dr. Matloff doesn't see the subtle difference between vetting all hires and only being called in when the employer is having an especially difficult time trying to come up with a rationalization for declaring an able and willing US employee to be "disqualified"].
 
Now, I urge everyone to see another video, this one by journalist Sue Kwon at the CBS affiliate in San Francisco.
 
There you'll see unemployed programmer David Huber, telling the viewing audience exactly what happened when he applied for a job at Cisco Systems.   Turned out that the contact person stated in the Chicago Tribune ad was a lawyer with... Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy, LLP.
 
Kwon's piece also includes snippets from the Cohen & Grigsby videos, but it has something even more important from my point of view, a brief interview with a representative of Tech Systems.   The rep does exactly what I described above, and have described so often: He says that yes, they hear of some employers under-paying H-1Bs, but the vast majority comply with the law, so all the system needs is more enforcement.   That of course hides the fact that THE LAW IS THE PROBLEM, DUE TO GAPING LOOP-HOLES.   So, if you look at Tech Systems' records on the DoL H-1B data-base you'll see that they hire tons of H-1Bs, most at wages in the $50K-60K range, about $20K below the national median and even further below the median for Silicon Valley, the location of most of their hires -- but all fully legally.
 
The Tech Systems guy was giving the line developed by the industry lobbyists, "Some firms cheat, but most obey the law, so all we need is better enforcement of the law."   It's completely misleading, deliberately so in order to divert attention from the core problem, the loop-holes.
 
As senator Grassley put it so well recently on the industry lobbyists' slick PR, "Nobody should be fooled."
 
Norm
-30-
campaign contributions made by Fragomen

2008-06-02
Greg Pierce _Washington Times_
Congress's approval ratings at all time lows
"Wall Street Journal columnist Kimberley A. Strassel [wrote,] 'With Congress's approval rating at record lows, the time is ripe for a slam campaign.   Barack Obama won't do it, since his Democratic colleagues are running the joint.   But it's a huge opportunity for Mr. McCain, who could play Congress' failings off his promises for reform.   Even as Republicans sagely warn their nominee to distance himself from the president, they're beginning to see that his more productive option might just be to throw them -- and Congressional Democrats -- under the Straight Talk bus.', the writer said...   'Today's Congress is ripe for a shredding.   The GOP kicked off an era of public disgust with its corruption and loss of principle, a reputation it has yet to shake.   Democrats have, impressively, managed to alienate voters further with inaction and broken promises.   Congress has come to represent the institutional malaise that so frustrates voters.   That distaste explains this year's appetite for change.'"

2008-06-02
_Dice_
Dice Report: 86,648 job ads

2008-06-02 (5768 Iyar 28)
Rabbi Doctor Asher Meir _Jewish World Review_
Is it OK to lie to a discriminator?

2008-06-02
Richard Winger _Ballot Access News_
NC Poll shows Bob Barr at 6%
Bob Bar 2008: Liberty for America
Chuck Baldwin Live
 

2008-06-03: 22 weeks to federal elections of president and congress-critters

2008-06-03
Marc Gallagher _Liberty Maven_
The Path to Ron Paul for many is through Bob Barr
Bob Bar 2008: Liberty for America
Chuck Baldwin Live

2008-06-03
Austin Cassidy _Independent Political Report_
Bob Barr to hold June 10 press conference on Iran

2008-06-03
Toni Bowers _Tech Republic_
IRLI, PG, AEA, BFJ filed class-action suit against DHS to stop OPT extension
earlier coverage
earlier this month
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring e-News-Letter_
law-suit filed against OPT extension
 
Before this year, even many critics of the H-1B program [described in 8 USC 1101(a)(15)(H)(i)(b)] were unaware of a program that plays a key role in the hiring of H-1Bs from the pools of foreign students studying at U.S. universities, called Optional Practical Training (OPT).   Now DHS' decision to extend OPT, done by administrative fiat rather than legislative action, has triggered a law-suit by groups that wish to see the H-1B program reduced in scope.
 
In order to understand the law-suit, it's important to be aware of the goal of OPT, a goal that is reflected in the law and regulations.   In this light, the validity of the law-suit is very clear, I believe, as you'll see.
 
The F-1 visa program was established to "educate the world", especially the impoverished countries of the world.   OPT was intended to supplement a foreign student's book learning with some practical experience to take back home.   OPT allows the student to work for some U.S. employer for one year.
 
Up until at least the mid-1990s, the graduate student faculty adviser in the student's department had the responsibility of writing a letter in support of the student's request to the INS for OPT status.   The professor would affirm that the job the student was about to take would provide the student with practical experience which would be valuable to the student when he returned to his home country.   The experience had to be of a nature not readily available back home.   I wrote such letters for many students (though I added that this would be useful only if the student really did return home; more on this below).
 
Later the responsibility was moved from professors to university foreign student advisers.   I'm not sure why, but in this business most actions have sinister reasons.   My guess is that the INS found too many professors writing something like what I did, stating that to our knowledge the student wasn't going home anyway -- which of course contravened the supposed goal of OPT.
 
Whatever the INS did, the facts remain that
(a) the F-1 student visa requires the student to state up front that he will return home and
(b) OPT is intended as training for work in his home country.   Note for instance this statement on the web page of the International Office at Dartmouth:
 
If you have applied for post-completion OPT (i.e. for OPT after graduation), it is not recommended that you travel outside the U.S. until you receive the actual EAD [Employment Authorization Document] card.   If you do, you could be denied re-entry to the U.S.A.   However, if you must travel, in order to ensure re-entry to the U.S.A., you should have... [lists various documents].   Immigration or Consular Officers can ask you to prove non-immigrant intent, and though this is not commonly used as a reason to deny entry under OPT, it is possible.   To be safe, you should have some evidence that you plan to return to your home country after you complete your OPT, such as a job offer in your home country, evidence of strong family ties there, or property ownership, etc.
 
See also this one at Oklahoma State University:
Practical training allows international students to accept paid work in the U.S.A.   Practical training should allow them to gain experience in their field of study, which they normally could not obtain in their home country.
 
Yet in practice OPT has devolved to a means to stay in a holding pattern until the student's employer can get an H-1B visa for him.   As you can see from the information above, this is quite counter to what OPT is supposed to be about.
 
At any rate, this holding pattern used to be necessary for just a couple of months, but in the last few years the H-1B program has been over-subscribed, with the result that a student could exhaust his 12-month OPT time and thus lose his legal right to work in the U.S.A.
 
So, under pressure from the industry lobbyists -- and remember, this includes the American Immigration Lawyers Association -- the DHS approved extending OPT from 12 months to 29 months for students in the STEM areas.
 
The DHS took this action under an obscure law that says that in "emergency" situations, an administrative agency can, in effect, make its own laws.   But it's pretty hard to see what the "emergency" is in this case.   If the purpose of OPT is really to make foreign students more effective when they return home, the "emergency" would have to be in their home countries.   Well, which countries does DHS have in mind, and what emergencies do they have?   Of course, this is silly; the only "emergency" is the urgent need for both major political parties to get campaign donations from the industry lobbyists in this election year.
 
The Programmers Guild and other groups critical of H-1B have now challenged this action in court.   They contend that it is a backdoor way to expand the H-1B program, bypassing Congress.   It certainly seems that way to me too.
 
Do PG et al have standing to sue?   Well, they certainly can show harm coming from DHS' action.   Even the congressionally-commissioned NRC report, compiled by a largely industry-friendly committee that included members from Intel and M$, pointed out that the H-1B program brings some harm to American workers in the fields in which H-1Bs are hired.   And today, remember that salaries for new graduates in CS and EE have been flat or falling, after accounting for inflation.   Thus the foreign students making use of OPT are cutting into job opportunities for the domestic students.
 
So, to me, as a non-lawyer, it seems very clear that these groups have standing to sue.   DHS will no doubt argue the opposite.   It will be interesting to watch.
 
Norm
comments submitted in response to proposed rule change

2008-06-03 (5768 Iyar 30)
Daniel Pipes _Jewish World Review_
Some candidates' positions on the Middle East

2008-06-03 (5768 Iyar 30)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
For any politician, what matters is the track record of that politician in the years before the election
 

2008-06-04

2008-06-04
jgo
THANKS TO the nation's dysfunctional immigration system and the dysfunctional Congress that keeps it that way, tens of thousands of promising, intelligent, ambitious and highly skilled US professionals, including thousands receiving advanced degrees from American universities this month, will be denied a chance to contribute their expertise and energy to the American economy.   Few policies match this one is terms of sheer irrationality, and few will do as much damage to this country's long-term prospects and competitiveness.   Yet Congress, mired in a political swamp of its own making when it comes to immigration, seems incapable of extracting itself.
 
Because the United States welcomes unlimited numbers of foreign students and subsidizes their education in engineering, physics, computer science, medicine and other disciplines, US students face increasingly steep obstacles to educational opportunities and employment here.   So do educated US workers whose skills are needed in the American work-force.
 
This year, some 163K applicants from both categories vied for over 85K H-1B work visas [described in 8 USC 1101(a)(15)(H)(i)(b)] -- 65K for foreign workers with bachelor's degrees or less and another 20K for foreign alumni of U.S. graduate schools plus unlimited numbers employed by US colleges, universities, local, state & federal government, and non-profit research organizations.   These visas are so under-priced that in April, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) was so swamped it stopped accepting applicants after 5 days, while last year, they stopped accepting applicants after 2 days.   Recipients were selected at random by computer lottery rather on the basis of which applicant was best or brightest.   The US government barely charges enough to cover their costs of paper-shuffling.   Proper background investigations are not conducted on applicants.   The US government is focused on rubber-stamping the applications as rapidly as possible.   As a result, the number of applications was a third higher than last year and shows no sign of abating.
 
All of that might seem fine and fair were it not for the fact that American-born scientists and PhDs have been in excess supply for a couple decades and that technology executives, among others, are clamoring to hire cheap, more easily t brow-beaten foreigners, particularly those trained at U.S. universities.   And it's not just worker bees who are drawn from the pool of foreign talent; so are the executives, while bright, creative, well-educated US citizens, who create jobs and fuel the economy, are being actively denied opportunities to exercise their talents, leverage their knowledge and benefit from their leadership skills.   This was most glaringly revealed in the 7th annual employment and immigration law seminar by prominent, award-winning law firm Cohen & Grigsby last year.
 
During the 10 years that ended in 2005, foreign-born workers started a quarter of the new engineering and technology firms in this country, while US citizen engineering and technology workers were denied the opportunities and resources to do so.   A similar proportion of international patent applications filed in the United States in 2006 originated with immigrants.   To the pro-US citizen crowd that notes that executives in both business and academe prefer to fatten their own pockets over patriotism, those facts should be troubling.
 
The truth is, America will be a feebler place without a continuing and adequate flow of US-born brain-power.   America's loss of US-born experts translates directly into gains for Red China, India and other rapidly developing competitors.   While the presidential candidates are stepping gingerly around the immigration debate, the ongoing destruction of the best and brightest US citizens should give them, and the nation, pause.
-30-
 

2008-06-04
Chuck Baldwin _Renew America_
In praise of marriage and parenting
Border Fire Report

2008-06-04
Chuck Baldwin _Small Government Times_
Open borders prove that the "war on terror" is superficial

2008-06-04
_Third Party Watch_
Democrats for Bob Barr

2008-06-04
Austin Cassidy _Independent Political Report_
Chuck Baldwin: Free trade with all, englangling alliances with none

2008-06-04
Susan Jones _Cybercast news Service_
Bob Barr challenges other presidential candidates to weekly debates
Biloxi Sun Herald
News Blaze
Street Insider
Earth Times
Liberty Maven
"'Let us argue the issues, after which the American people can make their decision on Election Day.   Surely the citizens of the greatest nation on earth deserve no less...   I, and the Libertarian Party, offer a very different alternative to the American people: limited, constitutional government dedicated to protecting individual liberty.   I look forward to a vigorous contest this fall and meeting my fellow candidates to debate the many important issues facing our nation.'"

2008-06-04
Nathaniel Hoffman _Boise Weekly_
Idaho's Giant Sucking Sound: 2008 November
"Many will support McCain.   Some turned to Ron Paul, and may move on to Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party presidential pick.   Some will go back into the woods and wait patiently for redemption, or 2012, whichever comes first."

2008-06-04
Rose Marie Goupil _Institute for Supply Management_
2008 May Non-Manufacturing ISM Report on Business "8 industries reported increased employment, 7 industries reported a decrease, and 3 industries indicated employment is unchanged from April.   Comments from respondents include: 'Hiring freeze and incentives to retire'; 'Permanent positions reduced'; and 'Planned - variable staff' [i.e. Real employment down, bodyshopping up... again.]...   The industries reporting a reduction in employment in May are: Health Care & Social Assistance; Management of Companies & Support Services; Transportation & Warehousing; Educational Services; Retail Trade; Professional, Scientific & Technical Services; and Wholesale Trade."

2008-06-04 09:25PDT (12:25EDT) (16:25GMT)
Elise Labott _CNN_
US State Department reports that slave labor is driving economic development in Red China, Brazil & India
"The department's annual 'Trafficking in Persons Report' found increased allegations of forced labor made in connection with a variety of agricultural products and manufactured goods in developing countries...   thousands of trafficked and forced laborers had been found on plantations growing sugar cane for Brazil's booming production and export of the biofuel ethanol.   The report cites shrimp processed in Thailand and Bangladesh; clothing from Bangladesh, India, Jordan and Malaysia; and bricks made in India, [Red China] and Pakistan as being among the products of booming industries in which workers are subjected to forced labor, debt bondage and hazardous working conditions.   Laws are not adequate to punish those responsible, it adds.   [Red China] was found to have a 'significant' problem with forced labor, including forced child labor.   Children as young as 12 are reportedly subject to forced labor under the guise of 'work and study programs' and subject to excessively long hours, dangerous conditions, low pay and physical abuse.   The report found [Red China's] growing brick industry is fraught with [attempted] cover-ups of the problem...   Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait and Oman were listed as destination countries... Algeria, Myanmar, Cuba, Fiji, Iran, Moldova, North Korea, Papua New Guinea, Sudan and Syria."

2008-06-04
"Ferdinand" _Op Ed News_
Big Media Fear Libertarian Philosophy and Politics, but Why?
"I recently wrote an article discussing how the libertarian philosophy has been attacked repeatedly on this and many other sites by many different groups of people.   The article was not published for one reason: I claim Bob Barr to be less [consistently libertarian] and more main-stream than Ron Paul.   The administrator informed me that I misrepresented the Libertarian Party by this statement.   It is disappointing to see educated (apparently, who knows) people mistake 'libertarian' with Libertarian.   One is a philosophy and the other is a party trying to obtain political power.   There is a huge difference.   I mean what I said and I said what I mean...   If libertarians are not going to be taking over the country any time soon and will not play a significant part in this up-coming election, why are so many people worried?   I believe it is because the libertarian philosophy is attractive.   The philosophy transcends party politics.   With a country facing imminent collapse, such a radical idea becomes an intriguing option.   Have not both parties been responsible for bringing us to the brink of destruction?   Why should government increase in size and scope every year?   Why must our civil liberties be destroyed?   Why not obey the Constitution?   Cannot change be affected at the local level most effectively?   Does the United States really need to police the world?   Would people not be more prosperous if their labor was not taxed by the federal government to pay for boondoggles?   Why is our money backed by nothing?   Why does the Federal Reserve debase our currency?"

2008-06-04
James Carlini _Carlini's Comments_
Midwest's State of Denial

2008-06-04 (5768 Sivan 01)
Jonathan Tobin _Jewish World Review_
Misgivings on the road to Damascus

2008-06-04
Stephen Dinan _Washington Times_
Dissatisfied voters rallying behind Bob Barr
Bob Bar 2008: Liberty for America
Chuck Baldwin Live

2008-06-04
Peter Brimelow _V Dare_
The Libertarian case against excessive immigration
"The way immigration works in the welfare/transfer state like the USA is that employers are privatizing profits from imported labor and socializing costs, such as education, health care, etc."
John Hospers 1998 Summer Journal of Libertarian Studies "A Libertarian Argument Against Opening Borders"

2008-06-04 (5768 Sivan 01)
Jonathan Rosenblum _Jewish World Review_
A different sort of "religious broadcaster"

2008-06-04 (5768 Sivan 01)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Sorting out the stupid from the ill-informed
 

2008-06-05

2008-06-05 05:30PST (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
current press release
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 299,405 in the week ending May 31, a decrease of 27,271 from the previous week.   There were 263,527 initial claims in the comparable week in 2007.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.1% during the week ending May 24, unchanged from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 2,768,287, a decrease of 39,217 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 1.7% and the volume was 2,261,581.   Extended benefits were not available in any state during the week ending May 17."
graphs

2008-06-05 07:20PDT (10:20EDT) (14:20GMT)
Chris Isidore _CNN_/_Money_
CGC says 103,522 announced lay-offs in May
iStockAnalyst
Investor's Business Daily
Black Enterprise
Gant Daily/AHN
Earth Times
Boston Globe
Central Valley Business Times
Bloomberg
Composite: "According to a survey by Challenger, there were 103,522 planned lay-offs announced in May up from 90,015 in April and from 71,115 in 2007 May, a level not seen since 2005 December when 107,822 planned job cuts were announced.   That makes 394,193 so far this year, compared to 337,773 for the 1st 5 months of 2007.   The report said car manufacturers led the areas reducing employee numbers, cutting 30,011 in May.   Tuesday, GM announced it would close 4 plants making trucks as it places more emphasis on cars, and 19K workers would take early retirement.   Financial firms planned to cut their work-force by 16,206 in May.   The transportation sector announced 9,705 planned lay-offs.   The report found 394,193 jobs were eliminated through May, up 17% compared to the first five months of 2007.   An ADP and Macroeconomic Advisers report that said the economy added 40K jobs in May, while a Challenger, Gray and Christmas report said job cut announcements had hit a 29-month high in the same month."
graphs

2008-06-05
Richard Winger _Ballot Access News_
Bob Barr: The Interesting Details Are on Page 2
"The Washington Times... story quotes Barr's campaign manager, Russ Verney, as saying that the campaign will be using social science and polling data to find specific counties and regions in which an all-out advertising campaign would be most effective."

2008-06-05
W. James Antle III _Politico_
Dissatisfied citizens prefer candidates not back by big media

2008-06-05 15:00PDT (18:00EDT) (22:00GMT)
Mark P. Mills _Forbes_
BrownOut: What the enviro-fascists have wrought
"Right now the nation has 760GW of power plants to meet current consumption, with another 154GW in reserve capacity to maintain grid reliability.   But in fact only 10GW is truly excess capacity.   The other 144 is utterly essential to keep lights on when unexpected demand arises from heat waves, outages or maintenance downtime.   That reserve will begin to shrink quickly.   NERC estimates that over the next decade 135GW of new capacity will be needed to meet the growth in consumption.   But right now plants producing a total of 57GW are planned.   90% of electric power is fueled by 'non-renewable' coal, natural gas or nuclear power.   Renewable sources will not cover the growth in demand.   While wind is gaining ground (and now supplies 1% of power), hydro's share (7%) is shrinking as dams are dismantled.   Solar, at 0.01%, is an inconsequential contributor...   Coal is cheap, but it has no friends.   Anti-coal activists brag that 59 coal-fired plants were canceled in 2007.   Nearly 50 more in 29 states are being contested.   Recall how the private equity buyers of Texas utility txu agreed last year to cancel eight power plants to defuse environmental opposition.   It takes years to plan and at least 6 years to build a large power plant.   Also playing into this is the possibility of a carbon penalty.   Whether taking the form of a visible tax or imposed through a cap-and-trade scheme, a $30-per-ton tax on carbon dioxide could propel a 60% to 150% rise in the cost of electricity, even without further price hikes in raw fuel, according to the Department of Energy."

2008-06-05 (5768 Sivan 02)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
Not since 1972 have we been presented with two such painfully inadequate candidates as Obama & McCain
 

2008-06-06

2008-06-06 07:24PDT (10:24EDT) (14:24GMT)
Rex Nutting _MarketWatch_

Seasonally adjusted unemployment rate reached 5.5%; Establishment survey says pay-rolls were cut by 49K
graphs

2008-06-06
Michael Cutler _Border Fire Report_
Illegal aliens & the abuse of them are American issues

2008-06-06
Thomas E. Brewton & R.R. Reno _View from 1776_
"Freedom" brings servility: Personal Freedom without Political Liberty

2008-06-06
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
Hostile Government Take-Over Bid

2008-06-06 (5768 Sivan 03)
Rabbi Pinchas Stolper _Jewish World Review_
Revelation: The basis of faith

2008-06-06

DJIA	12,209.81
S&P 500	1,360.68
NASDAQ	2,474.56
10-year US T-Bond	3.94%
crude oil	$138.54/barrel
gold	$899.00/ounce
silver	$17.43/ounce
platinum	$2,081.30/ounce
palladium	$433.80/ounce
copper	$0.22625/ounce
natgas	$12.693/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline	$3.548/gal
heatingoil	$3.974/gal
dollarindex	72.343
yenperdollar	104.85
dollarspereuro	1.5777
dollarsperpound	1.9698

I usually get this info from MarketWatch and the "Futures Movers" and "Metals Stocks" columns (and BigCharts and FT Interactive).
 
 
 

2008-06-07

2008-06-07
Cory Nealon _Beaver County Times_
Voters deserve better
"It has left some Republicans, such as Eckelberger and Myrtle Kindelberger, 76, of Beaver, pining for [better candidates].   'I cannot believe in this whole nation of men and women, we couldn't find someone better than either of them.', Kindelberger said.   It is people like Kindelberger who are prompting long-shot candidates, such as former GOP congressman Bob Barr, to enter the presidential race.   Barr, a social conservative with a strong record against abortion and gun control, gained the Libertarian Party's nomination on June 1."
 
 

2008-06-08

2008-06-08
_Library of Congress_
Bill of Rights proposed to congress by James Madison
transcript

2008-06-07 22:27PDT (2008-06-08 01:27EDT) (2008-06-08 05:27GMT)
Michael J. Panzner _For Ex Hound_
They're Dead Wrong
"Instead of questioning the track records of these 'Wrong Way Corrigans' and analyzing why they might have an interest in presenting a distorted view of reality, reporters and editors have been mesmerized by affiliations and credentials, not to mention over-confidence and smooth-talking charm...   While businesses -- especially those that export [and thus have customers not devastated by the poundings of the last 30 years] -- are holding up, the economy is being dragged down by the cement shoes of [US consumers in dire straits]."
Bloomberg outs the protection rackets

2008-06-08
Julie Hirschfeld Davis _AP_
Repucrats duck on immigration
 

2008-06-09

2008-06-08 19:05:22PDT (2008-06-08 22:05:22EDT) (2008-06-09 02:05:22GMT)
Pat Crowley _Rhode Island's Future_
Signal Workers' Hunger Strike Nearing 30-Day Mark
"In late 2006, US and Indian recruiters defrauded over 500 Indian workers of $20K apiece for an American dream -- false promises of good work and green cards -- and delivered them to an American nightmare: temporary 10-month visas binding them to one employer, deplorable conditions at Signal International shipyards, and constant threats of deportation from the company.   When workers started to organize in 2007 March, Signal hired armed private security who detained and attempted to forcibly deport the organizers, driving one of them to a suicide attempt, then fired them'Workers continued to organize, and in 2008 March, 120 of them escaped from Signal's labor camps, reported the company and its recruiters to the Department of Justice's Criminal Anti-Trafficking Unit, and filed a federal class-action law-suit against the traffickers."

2008-06-09
Mark Houser _Pittsburgh Tribune-Review_
iGate isn't only villain refusing to consider employing US high-tech workers
"Computer consulting firm [body shop] iGate Corp. of Findlay paid the Justice Department $45K in April to settle charges it discriminated against U.S. workers by posting on-line job ads seeking foreigners with special visas.   The fine for favoring holders of H-1B visas, which go primarily to computer and engineering specialists, is the highest yet, said Justice Department spokeswoman Jamie Hais...   'Everybody is a villain here, not just iGate...   It's also IBM, Intel, M$, Oracle, and so on.', said Norm Matloff, a University of California, Davis, computer science professor and prominent H-1B critic...   Critics contend admission of thousands of skilled workers each year diminishes opportunities for U.S. workers and depresses salaries.   About 75K computer specialists are unemployed nationwide, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics [which does not include in that number former computer specialists who are no longer actively seeking work, and those who are now employed in other fields]...   The Justice Department investigation focused on iGate Mastech, specifically 30 on-line ads it posted in 2006.   One example, for a Java developer position in Illinois, said 'only H-1s apply'.   Federal law prohibits discrimination in hiring because of citizenship status...   John Miano, a former programmer, said his frustration after several colleagues were laid off led him to establish the New Jersey-based membership organization and lobbying group in 1998.   Miano said of the $45K iGate fine, 'For us that's great, but that came out of petty cash for them.'   He said his group has filed nearly 100 Justice Department complaints like the one about iGate.   'I thought after we started doing this the companies would catch on and the ads would disappear.   But they keep popping up.', he said."

2008-06-09
Michael Cutler _Border Fire Report_
Immigration Fraud in the USA

2008-06-09
_KRNV_
Nevada universities & state budget
"Raggio said that there might be a way for the system to access additional maintenance funds that could soften the blow of the targeted 14.2% budget cuts...   'A total of $246.69M in funding was approved coming from states sources and $53.44M from other sources.', Raggio said.   Raggio disagreed with Chancellor Rogers' comment that 'the State of Nevada now funds higher education at 86% to 85% of the minimum required to meet essential needs and compete against other mediocre systems.'...   Raggio wrote to Rogers' that he is aware and applauds the proposal to access a $50 per credit surcharge to help meet the deficit but that FY2006, Nevada was among the lowest 3 states nationally in terms of net tuition as a percent of public higher education revenue."

2008-06-09
Dave Newbart _Chicago Sun-Times_
Major shifts at universities
"'Students today view the university as job training.', said Rick Pearce, associate director for academic affairs at the Illinois Board of Higher Education.   'What can I do to get a job?'   That could explain why the number of business, marketing and management majors, which decreased in the 1990s, jumped nearly 50% in the past decade and has remained the most popular major for more than 20 years.   Health and biological fields also saw increases, as did history and psychology...   Meanwhile, the number of students majoring in computer science dropped statewide, as did the number of students in engineering.   Enrollment held steady at about 5K students at the state's largest engineering college at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.   But within that college, fields like computer engineering have lost students.   Part of that was because of the dot-com bust, officials said.   In those fields, 'There is a perception that it is more difficult to get a job if you work with computers... and there is more out-sourcing of jobs to India and [Red China].', said Umberto Ravaioli, interim associate dean of academic affairs in the College of Engineering."

2008-06-09
Frank Tortorici _Conference Board_
New Employment Trends Index (ETI)TM Suggests More Labor-Market Weakening to Come
 

2008-06-10: 21 weeks to federal elections of president and congress-critters

2008-06-10
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring e-News-Letter_
dramatic admission by lawyers' publication: Recruiting U.S. workers is a "charade"
 
Immigration Daily, a publication for immigration lawyers, runs several times a week on the Internet.   It contains the latest news on immigration legislation and litigation, and claims 17K+ subscribers.
 
Each issue typically contains a couple of news items, some Help Wanted ads for law offices, and an editorial.   ILW has now come out with a doozy of an editorial in its June 10 issue, dramatically stating that the PERM requirement, under which employers wishing to sponsor foreign workers for green cards must first recruit Americans for the job, is all play-acting, in ILW's own words a "charade" and a "circus".   I couldn't have said it better myself. :-)
 
But is this a giant mea culpa, a cathartic tell-all titled "How I Used Every Loop-hole in the Book to Help My Clients Avoid Hiring Americans"?   Au contraire, it's a complaint that Congress set up this charade and now makes employers play along.
 
This is highly disingenuous.   The lawyers are making tons of money out of this very charade -- they'd go broke if the whole process consisted of a simple one-page form that was rubber-stamped.   But now this audit is making them worried.   Fragomen is a big fish, the biggest, and all this publicity is not good for the lawyers.   They wanted things to stay the way they were, giving the appearance that American workers were protected, while the lawyers were busily making use of every possible loop-hole to enable their employer clients to avoid hiring Americans.
 
All this fuss can be traced directly back to "TubeGate" [7th annual seminar on employment and immigration law and] the video posted on YouTube [by] a prominent Pittsburgh law firm, Cohen and Grigsby, [which] showed employers some of these vital loop-holes I keep citing.   (See my base posting on this [and the much more coverage, including links to the videos].)
 
The relevant tape in the set is video 9, which shows employers who wish to sponsor a foreign worker for a greencard how to avoid hiring American workers, in FULL COMPLIANCE WITH THE LAW.   (In [part 12 of the video], they show how to pay H-1Bs and green card sponsorees below-market wages, again fully legally.)
 
Forgive me for speaking so bluntly, but the immigration lawyers are showing themselves to be out-and-out liars.   That's nothing new, of course.   Programmers and engineers have known for years that the green card process was stacked against the American worker, and I pointed out some of the loop-holes that make this possible.   Then immigration attorney Joel Stewart said it publicly: "Employers who favor aliens have an arsenal of legal means to reject all U.S. workers who apply" (Joel Stewart, "Legal Rejection of U.S. Workers" Immigration Daily 2000 April 24).
 
But people on Capitol Hill didn't know it until the Cohen & Grigsby videos came out, showing that all those assurances the AILA and others gave Congress that the system protects American workers were bald-faced lies.   Many of you remember what C&G attorney Larry Lebowitz said in [part 9 of the video], but few of you know that Lebowitz was actively lying to the outside world, saying exactly the opposite of what he told his clients "privately" in [part 9 of the video].   This is what Lebowitz said in his op-ed in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 2000 May 21:
 
U.S. companies that bring in foreign professionals usually do so as a last resort...   These rules actually help U.S. workers, too, by...ensuring that U.S. workers are not displaced...
 
But in the "private" video, he said
 
And our goal is clearly, not to find a qualified and interested U.S. worker.   And you know in a sense that sounds funny, but it's what we're trying to do here.   We are complying with the law fully, but ah, our objective is to get this person a green card, and get through the labor certification process.   So certainly we are not going to try to find a place [at which to advertise the job] where the applicants are the most numerous.   We're going to try to find a place where we can comply with the law, and hoping, and likely, not to find qualified and interested worker applicants.
 
Similarly, another Cohen & Grigsby attorney, Matt Phillips, told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Crush of Applicants for Visas Has Firms Fearing Staff Losses, Anya Sostek, 2007 April 5):
 
The visas are so essential, [the employers] say, because there just aren't qualified Americans to fill the jobs...   If the numbers [of U.S. workers] were available in the economy, no one would pay us to do this [visa application process].
 
But in the "private" videos, he was saying just the opposite, showing how to avoid hiring Americans.   Meanwhile, in [part 12 of the video], his colleague Jen Pack was showing how to pay below-market wages to both green card sponsorees and H-1Bs, again fully legally, and thus making it definitely worth that expensive visa application process Phillips referred to.
 
So, you have both Lebowitz and Phillips assuring the public that the law protects American workers while these two lawyers are telling their clients (accurately) that it doesn't.
 
Remember, the lame excuse they gave for lying to the public is that employers already have a worker in hand, the foreign national who they hired earlier as an H-1B, and thus don't want to look for an American.   And it's even worse than that, because in offering this excuse they were hiding the fact that when the employers hired their H-1Bs, there was NO requirement that they recruit Americans.   IOW, what the lawyers really want is there to be no U.S. recruitment requirement at ANY stage, period.
 
Getting back to ILW, the point is that today's editorial, dramatically describing the green card law's recruitment requirement as a "charade", shows that Cohen & Grigsby is not some rogue law firm, some isolated instance.   On the contrary, their behavior is STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE.   Attorney Stewart's book quote that too -- he wrote a standard reference on the green card process -- as does the fact that the AILA basically stated that Cohen & Grigsby were working along standard lines.   Now we have Immigration Daily, a prominent publication for immigration lawyers, saying it too.
 
I'm including a response by one Katy Preston in the law office of Zhang & Associates to the Cohen & Grigsby video.   She starts out by assuring us that
 
The labor certification process benefits U.S. workers by ensuring that no U.S. worker is being denied a job when an employer seeks permanent residence for one of its foreign workers.
 
But then she lets the cat out of the bag:
 
The PERM process is really meant to test the job market, not to recruit someone for that specific position.   Even if an employer does find a qualified U.S. worker for a particular position, the employer does not have to hire that worker.
 
Which is exactly ILW's point, and exactly why I keep trying to explain that the entire process is one giant loop-hole.
 
Preston has the nerve to then add,
 
So U.S. workers are not necessarily being displaced when a labor certification application is approved.
 
I hope everyone keeps in mind -- once again -- that all of this is about LOOP-HOLES.   DoL might find some minor violation on Fragomen's part, but as you can see from ILW's editorial, the entire process is a CHARADE.   The LAW is the problem, not enforcement of the law.
 
Norm
-30-
 

2008-06-10
Deb Perelman _eWeek_
IT Salaries Taking a Recessionary Hit

2008-06-10
Gary Beach _CIO_
H-1B visas don't need to be capped.   They need to be eliminated
Network World

2008-06-10
Paul Craig Roberts _V Dare_
Why the price of oil has risen
"IMO, the 2 biggest factors in oil's high price are the weakness in the U.S. dollar's exchange value and the liquidity that the Federal Reserve is pumping out."

2008-06-10
Sean Scallon _American Chronicle_
The new fusionism -- bringing together Libertarians and Constitutionalists

2008-06-10
"bobby" _Ag Weekly_
NAFTA leaves a bad taste in my mouth
"All vegetables and fruits from Mexico tastes horrible!   No kidding.   I hate NAFTA for what they have done to us!   I miss the wonderful taste of vegetables and fruits that made in USA!   Please shut NAFTA out for good."

2008-06-10
Sabrina Goucher _Ag Weekly_
Captains and Kings
"The book _Captains and Kings_ describes NAFTA.   Americans are the last in the world to know how much are freedom is being drained away.   If you want to save our country shop local not global."

2008-06-10
Austin Cassidy _Independent Political Report_
Bob Barr on Bloomberg: Every American has a libertarian heart
 

2008-06-11

2008-06-10 18:23PDT (2008-06-10 21:23EDT) (2008-06-11 01:23GMT)
Robert E. Kessler _NewsDay_
6 men held in immigration fraud scheme
"The scheme centered on a computer consulting firm in Edison, NJ, Cygate Software & Consulting.   Its principal, Nilesh Dasondi, certified that the 3 Long Islanders had technical skills that were needed by his company, but for which United States citizens could not be easily found, officials said...   Between 2004 and 2007, the 3 Long Islanders provided monthly payments totaling tens of thousands of dollars to Dasondi, according to the papers filed by Assistant U.S. Attorney Burt Roberts.   The money was used in a process called 'running the pay-roll', the papers said, and outlined the scheme as follows: First, false pay stubs, pay-checks and health insurance payments were created and submitted to the government as 'proof' of the employment of the three as computer experts at Cygate.   Next, some of the money was used to pay state and federal taxes owed on supposed pay.   Lastly, an unidentified amount of the money given to Dasondi was returned to the 3, and Dasondi kept some...   Kishor Parikh, 42, of 8 Avenue J, Ronkonkoma, who operated VMR Cards and Gifts, Medford, and paid $73K to Dasondi.   Devang Patel, 31, of 143 Webster Ave, Ronkonkoma, who operated the 50% Off Card Store, 312 Portion Rd., Lake Ronkonkoma, and L & A Cards, 209 W. Main St., Sayville.   He paid $104K.   Chetan Trivedi, 40, also of 143 Webster Ave., Ronkonkoma.   His employment was unknown and he paid $71K."
Cygate's LCAs

2008-06-11 09:51PDT (12:51EDT) (16:51GMT)
James Pethokoukis _US News & World Report_
Who is Libertarians' best option for president?

2008-06-11
James Carlini _Midwest Business Technology News_
Another Chicago-Area Hospital Bites the Dust
"According to a 2006 survey by the American College of Emergency Physicians, 73% of emergency departments in the United States 'had inadequate on-call coverage by specialist physicians'.   Many people going to an emergency room should be going to a local clinic or a primary care center.   IOW, emergency rooms are jammed with non-emergency customers...   Carol Plato -- director of corporate business services at Mark Memorial Medical Center -- points out 2 cases of illegals racking up more than $1.5M a piece in hospital care without picking up any of the tab.   She also points out that the Florida Health Association says $100M was spent in 2007 alone to treat illegal patients.   That is only one state.   Hospital officials in Florida have complained that federal authorities do nothing when notified about illegals."
Carlini's Comments

2008-06-11
Miranda Hitti _Web MD_
Life Expectancy At Birth Exceeded 78 Years in USA: Death Rate Fell for 11 of 15 top causes
Dental Plans/Health News Digest
Health News Digest
abc
CNN
full report from NCHS (pdf)
Composite: "U.S. life expectancy has hit a new record: 78.1 years for babies born in 2006, says the CDC...   White women: 81 years; African-American women: 76.9 years; White men: 76 years; African-American men: 70 years...   The 2006 age-adjusted death rate fell to 776.4 deaths per 100K population from 799 deaths per 100K in 2005.   The preliminary infant mortality rate for 2006 was 6.7 infant deaths per 1,000 live births, a 2.3% decline from the 2005 rate of 6.9.   Heart disease: down 5.5%; Cancer: down 1.6%; Stroke: down 6.4%; Chronic lower respiratory diseases (lung diseases): down 6.5%; Accidents: down 1.5%; Alzheimer's disease: down 0.9%; Diabetes: down 5.3%; Influenza and pneumonia: down 12.8% due to a relatively mild flu season; Kidney disease: unchanged; Septicemia (an infection that affects the blood and other parts of the body): down 2.7%; Suicide: down 2.8%; Chronic liver disease and cirrhosis: down 3.3%; High blood pressure: down 5%; Parkinson's disease: down 1.6%; Homicide: down 1.6%...   infant death rate dropped 2.3% from 2005 to 2006...   Guam had the lowest death rate, followed by Hawaii, the Virgin Islands, Minnesota, California, NY, UT, FL, CT, CO, MA, VT, WA, AZ, NH... OK, LA, WV, AL, MS, Northern Mariana Islands, American Samoa."

2008-06-11
Fiona Macrae _Mail on Sunday_
Being brainy can add 15 years to your life
"Researchers found those with rogue copies of a gene linked to intelligence are unlikely to survive beyond the age of 85.   However, those blessed with good versions of the gene could live to be 100.   The gene governs an enzyme which destroys a chemical known to dampen brain activity and cause drowsiness.   The enzyme -- succinic semialdehyde dehydrogenase, or SSADH -- also detoxifies the brain by getting rid of excess acid, protecting cells from damage which can accelerate ageing.   The gene comes in 2 common forms, with the so-called 'T' version working 20% less well than the 'C' variety.   Previous studies have shown that men and women with 2 copies of the 'T' version do less well in IQ tests than others."

2008-06-11
Dennis Cauchon _USA Today_
State & local governments are reneging on pension obligations
"[Kentucky] governor [Steve Beshear] says he expects to win legislative approval to raise retirement ages for new hires, limit annual cost-of-living adjustments to 1.5% and charge employees 1% of their salaries to help fund retiree health benefits...   [Oregon slashed] benefits promised to existing workers.   The result was law-suits over whether the state's action was legal and hard feelings that linger today.   But the pension went from a $17G deficit in 2003 to a surplus today...   Cleary estimates that about $5G of the $17G short-fall was eliminated by benefit cuts.   The rest was made up by stellar investment returns, including a well-timed effort to borrow $6G at low rates 5 years ago and invest it just before stock prices soared.   Retirees say the retroactive benefit cut was a breach in trust.   'If the state paid me and others like me what they promised, it would cost $800M more over our life expectancy.   My answer is: You knew that when you hired me.', says retired university administrator Marc Feldesman, who runs a blog critical of the overhauled retirement system."

2008-06-11
Pete Yost, Jakes Jordan, Ted Bridis & Laure Kellman _Orangeburg Times & Democrat_/_AP_
Congress' computers hacked by Red Chinese
Philadelphia Inquirer
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Washington Times
Town Hall
Jason Ryan: abc
Richard B. Schmitt: Los Angeles Times
"Multiple congressional computers have been hacked by people working from inside [Red China], law-makers said Wednesday, suggesting the [Red Chinese] were seeking lists of dissidents.   Two congressmen, both long-time critics of Beijing's record on human rights, said the compromised computers contained information about political dissidents from around the world.   One of the law-makers said he'd been discouraged from disclosing the computer attacks by other U.S. officials.   Representative Frank Wolf, R-VA, said 4 of his computers were compromised beginning in 2006.   New Jersey representative Chris Smith, a senior Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said two of the computers at his global human rights subcommittee were attacked in 2006 December and 2007 March.   Wolf said that following one of the attacks, a car with license plates belonging to [Red Chinese] officials went to the home of a dissident in Fairfax County, VA, outside Washington and photographed it.   During the same time period, The House International Relations Committee -- now known as the House Foreign Affairs Committee -- was targeted at least once by someone working inside [Red China], said committee spokeswoman Lynne Weil...   Wolf said the FBI had told him that computers of other House members and at least one House committee had been accessed by sources working from inside [Red China].   The Virginia Republican suggested that Senate computers could have been attacked as well...   Last week, [the Red Chinese government] denied the accusations regarding Gutierrez's lap-top and the alleged effort to hack Commerce Department computers...   Smith has introduced the Global On-Line Freedom Act which would prohibit U.S. Internet companies from cooperating with [governments] such as [Red China] that restrict information about human rights and democracy on the Internet.   Wolf and Smith both traveled to Beijing 17 years ago seeking the release of 77 people imprisoned or under house arrest because of their religious activities."

2008-06-11
Linda Christman _Cape Coral Daily Breeze_
Burt Saunders in run for Florida's 14th congressional district
"Jeff George... Robert M. Neeld... Larry Byrnes"

2008-06-11
Mark Albright _St. Petersburg Times_/_Lakeland Ledger_
Credit cards charging $2.50 or more per gasoline fill-up for "interchange fees"
"Other stores say the roughly 10 cents a gallon they hand over to card companies is twice their profit selling gas.   Retailers pay interchange fees of 2% of the purchase price, but sometimes more, which are baked into the retail price of most everything put on plastic.   The average America household will pay $427 in interchange fees this year, up from $159 in 2001."

2008-06-11
Troy Smith & Jan W. Rivkin _Harvard B-School_
A Replication Study of Alan Blinder's "How Many US Jobs Might Be Off-Shorable?"
"Abstract: In a 2007 working paper, Alan Blinder assessed the 'off-shorability' of hundreds of U.S. occupations and estimated that between 22% and 29% of all U.S. jobs were potentially off-shorable.   This note reports the results of an exercise in which members of Harvard Business School's MBA Class of 2009 collectively attempted to replicate Blinder's study.   Overall, the MBA students' assessments of off-shorability matched Blinder's well.   Across occupations, the correlation between Blinder's off-shorability rating and the students' was 0.60.   The students estimated that between 21% and 42% of U.S. jobs are potentially off-shorable.   Echoing Blinder, the student data suggested a positive correlation between off-shorability and education.   The student data also revealed a positive or inverted-U relationship between off-shorability and wage level, where Blinder found no correlation.   While Blinder found a slight wage penalty for the most off-shorable jobs, the student data exhibited no evidence of wage depreciation from job contestability due to off-shoring...   Private-sector researchers vary widely in their estimates of the number of U.S. jobs that have moved off-shore, will move off-shore, or could move off-shore -- from hundreds of thousands to over 10M...   Blinder's conservative and aggressive estimates are, respectively, 25.2M and 31.8M jobs potentially off-shored...   The comparable, HBS-based conservative and aggressive estimates are 28.4M and 57.2M jobs -- between 21% and 42% of the total work-force...   For the HBS data, the Spearman correlation between annual median wage and off-shorability rating was found to be 0.15 and highly significant.   This suggests that high-wage jobs are more likely to be off-shored...   high-wage workers such as surgeons and chief executives are safe from off-shoring pressures, as are low-wage workers such as janitors, waiters, and nannies... but medium-wage workers are at risk... [Blinder] found a wage penalty of 14% for the 5.7M most off-shorable jobs, a penalty he attributed to job contestability.   In a similar regression with HBS data, we found no effect...   off-shoring deserves the attention of policy makers and scholars."

2008-06-11
John Nichols _Madison WI Capital Times_
Is Bob Barr libertarian enough

2008-06-11 (5768 Sivan 08)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
Cocky ignorance

2008-06-11 (5768 Sivan 08)
Jonathan Tobin _Jewish World Review_
UNRWA and NGOs: the real UN insult
"This committee is comprised of such exemplary democracies as China, Cuba, Pakistan and Egypt as well as other countries.   The current chair of the group is Sudan.   Despite the fact that its government is responsible for genocide in Darfur, Sudan still parades around international forums as if it were not a pariah regime."

2008-06-11 (5768 Sivan 08)
Rabbi Avi Shafran _Jewish World Review_
What would Hillel say?

2008-06-11 (5768 Sivan 08)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Are Americans pro-slavery?
Voice of the Times
Anchorage Appeal Democrat
DeSoto MS Times
 

2008-06-12

2008-06-12 05:30PST (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
current press release
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 370,711 in the week ending June 7, an increase of 69,715 from the previous week.   There were 302,368 initial claims in the comparable week in 2007.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.1% during the week ending May 31, unchanged from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 2,831,583, an increase of 73,670 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 1.7% and the volume was 2,267,710.   Extended benefits were not available in any state during the week ending May 24."
graphs

2008-06-12 05:34PDT (08:34EDT) (12:34GMT)
Rex Nutting _MarketWatch_
Prices on imports to USA up 2.3% in May
"Import prices for April were revised upward, to 2.4%...   U.S. export prices, meanwhile, rose by 0.3%, the smallest monthly gain since 2007 September."

2008-06-12 06:18PDT (09:18EDT) (13:18GMT)
Rex Nutting _MarketWatch_
Retail sales up 1% from April to May

2008-06-12
_Science Daily_
US still leads the world in science & technology
"a new RAND Corporation study.   The United States accounts for 40% of the total world's spending on scientific research and development, employs 70% of the world's Nobel Prize winners and is home to three-quarters of the world's top 40 universities...   'Much of the concern about the United States losing its edge as the world's leader in science and technology appears to be unfounded.', said Titus Galama, co-author of the report and a management scientist at RAND, a non-profit research organization.   'But the United States cannot afford to be complacent.   Effort is needed to make sure the nation maintains or even extends its standing.'"
My recommendations:
 
* Include monitoring and analysing U.S. science and technology performance and the condition of the nation's science and engineering work-force as a part of the president's constitutionally mandated duty to track and report the state of the union.
 
* Make it easier for US citizens who have graduated from U.S. universities with science, math, music, psychology, classics and engineering degrees to continue in graduate programs in the United States with improved stipends that cover the opportunity costs.
 
* Discourage abuse of adjuncts, endless post-docs, and other bodyshopping arrangements by colleges and universities.
 
* Adjust tax and other incentives to encourage US firms to employ highly skilled United States citizens to ensure the benefits of expanded innovation are captured in the United States and to help the United States remain competitive in research and innovation.
 
* Continue to improve K-12 education in general, and math, science and technology education in particular by discarding instructional approaches of recent decades which go out of their ways to discourage interest in these fields.
-30-

2008-06-12 09:20PDT (12:20EDT) (16:20GMT)
_Forbes_/_AP_
HP spent $400K on lobbying in 2008Q1

2008-06-12
Lalita Aloor Amuthan _My Central Jersey_
Zoning board official in Edison, NJ, Nilesh Dasondi, charged with work visa fraud
Star-Ledger
"Dasondi, a naturalized citizen, is the founder and president of CyGate Software and Consulting, [a cross-border bodyshopping and off-shoring operation] with head-quarters at 22 Meridian Road, and offices in India and Canada...   Dasondi, 41, is accused of filing federal work visa and immigration documents for 8 people who did not work for his company between 2003 and 2007, authorities said.   In exchange, they made payments to Dasondi's company of more than $850K, authorities said.   The money was used to support phony pay-roll disbursements back to the 8 people, fund tax payments and, in some cases, pay for health insurance, authorities said."
yesterday's coverage

2008-06-12 07:08PDT (10:08EDT) (14:08GMT)
Kristin d'Agostino _Salem Gazette_
Facing lay-offs: Tech teacher says students will be missing out
"NP's position is being eliminated along with at least 6 other technology positions in town -- all at the elementary and middle school level."

2008-06-12
Nicole Gaouette _Los Angeles Times_
US citizens and guest-workers being abused via visa programs

2008-06-12
Tom Smith _Muscle Shoals Times Daily_
For teens, summer jobs are difficult to land
"Teenagers who are looking for summer employment may find the job market more challenging this year as adults compete for the same jobs and more teens work year-round...   Sutherland said a lot of people are working more than one job in order to make ends meet.   He said his office often gets teen-agers coming into the Career Center looking for summer jobs...   Andrew Sum, a researcher with the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston, said the summer job market is dwindling for teenagers.   '(The summer job market) is at the lowest ever.', Sum said.   'In the 1980s, there were more than 4M summer jobs; now it's about 2.2M.   That's a tremendous decrease.'...   'When the labor market experiences growth, teens get an above share [sic] of jobs.', Sum said.   'But when there isn't labor market growth, there isn't summer job growth.'   He said from 2003-07, because of the economic struggles, teens have struggled to find summer jobs.   'The lowest employment for teens 16-19 was 35%; we project that will even be lower this summer.', Sum said...   The Northeastern study predicts the 2008 summer teen job market to be the lowest in the last 61 years.   'The 2007 summer teen employment rate was the worst on record in post-World War II history.   Unfortunately, the 2008 summer outlook is even worse.', Sum said."

2008-06-12
Robin Erb _Detroit Free Press_
Adults competing with teens for jobs
"Just 35% of 16- to 19-year-olds in the United States had a job last year, the lowest teen employment rate since World War II, according to the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston.   In a sputtering economy, employers -- if they're not downsizing -- can bypass teens for more qualified adult applicants, said Andrew Sum, director of the center.   'You're not going to bring in interns when you're laying off their parents.', he said.   The competition for jobs comes not only from adult workers who have lost jobs, but also from those 55 to 70 who are punching checkout registers and bagging groceries to supplement their retirement.   And in some states, immigrant workers also are filling jobs traditionally held by teens."

2008-06-12
Anna Phillips _NY Sun_
Socialist Insecurity Numbers & housing info of thousands of Clumbia University students posted on web

2008-06-12
Nicholas Wilbur _Kingman Daily Miner_
Local group works to "Fire Nancy McLain"

2008-06-12
John Ribeiro _Network World_/_IDG_
Gartner: Indian bodyshops and off-shorers gaining global share

2008-06-12
Patrick Thibodeau _Computer World_/_IDG_
Wrangling over H-1B issues puts US tech workers, guest-workers of all kinds, executives and farm managers at odds
Fierce CIO
"The only person on the panel called to testify in opposition was Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, who argued that highly skilled workers are not really that highly skilled.   'Contrary to the claims of the lobbyists, these workers aren't necessarily the best and brightest.', said Krikorian, citing a study by Norm Matloff, a computer science professor at the University of California at Davis."
Mark Krikorian's testimony
"in 1910, only 13% of American adults had graduated high school and fully one-quarter had no more than 5 years of [education].   At the same time, only 2.7% of Americans had college degrees...   there's no reason any employer should be permitted to make an end run around our vast continental labor force of more than 150M people unless the prospective immigrant in question has unique, remarkable abilities, and would make an enormous contribution to the productive capacity of the nation.   Perhaps the simplest way to approach this would be to admit anyone who scores above 140 [I would have said 180+] on an English-language IQ test."
 
 

2008-06-13

2008-06-13 03:04PDT (06:04EDT) (10:04GMT)
Steve Goldstein _MarketWatch_
RealtyTrac: U.S. foreclosure activity rose 7% in May: up 48% from the same period last year

2008-06-13 08:06PDT (11:06EDT) (15:06GMT)
C.J. Graham _Conservative Voice_
International organizations meddle in US elections

2008-06-13 08:15PDT (11:15EDT) (15:15GMT)
Rex Nutting _MarketWatch_
CPI up 0.6% from April to May

2008-06-13 08:15PDT (11:15EDT) (15:15GMT)
Susan Gawlowicz _Rochester Institute of Technology News Service_/_Manufacturing Business Technology_/_Ascribe_/_Lexis-Nexis_/_Reed Elsevier_
Off-Shore Out-Sourcing Harming American Gold- and White-Collar Workers
PhysOrg
"'What [executives are] saying is that increasing the guest worker program (H-1B and L-1 visa programs) will keep jobs here and save jobs from being off-shored.', says RIT's Hira.   'When in reality those programs are being used to do knowledge transfer to transfer jobs over-seas.   The business community is on the one hand saying out-sourcing is good, and on the other using the threat of out-sourcing to change immigration policy.'"

2008-06-13 09:19PDT (12:19EDT) (16:19GMT)
Ruth Mantell _MarketWatch_
UMich consumer sentiment index fell from 59.8 to 56.7
Blogging Stocks
"RealtyTrac reported that U.S. foreclosure activity rose 7% in May, or up 48% from the same period last year."

2008-06-13 09:35PDT (12:35EDT) (16:35GMT)
_World Net Daily_
"The Money Masters" exposes massive Federal Reserve fraud

2008-06-13
Katherine Skiba _US News & World Report_
Blue dog democrats flex their muscle
"Today, the Blue Dog Democrats claim a fat war chest—their political action committee has raised more than $2M this cycle—and they're heady from two special-election wins in GOP districts this Spring.   The victories in Louisiana and Mississippi came after the Blue Dogs endorsed candidates and lavished them with money and advice and, out on the trail, donated their shoe leather and sweat.   Already, four challengers seeking House seats in November have garnered Blue Dog endorsements, which come with cash: $5K to both candidates and their state party...   House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio has charged that time and again, the Blue Dogs have capitulated to their party leadership's desire for 'more wasteful Washington spending', deriding them as 'all bark and no bite'."

2008-06-13
Seane Kinane _WMNF_
USF makes cut-backs
"the College of Arts and Sciences will be divided into 3 'schools': Behavioral and Social Sciences, Humanities, and Sciences...   USF trustees voted to increase in-state graduate and under-graduate tuition 6% to 10% -- an increase of about $105 per semester for under-grads.   Out-of-state graduate students in some programs will see their tuitions decrease by 10%, Wilcox said...   Charlie Crist announced on Thursday that his office will withhold 4% of the budgets of all state agencies, including universities, because sales tax and other revenues are anticipated to be below expectations.   That means about another $14M cut for USF."

2008-06-13
Scott Rothschild _Lawrence KS Journal World_
Kansas Regent: We are on the cusp of an academic crisis
"During the past legislative session, higher education received a $30M increase, or 3.6%, while overall state funding increased 4.4%.   Regents staff members have proposed a 'keeping up' budget to track inflation, which would require a 4%, or $32M increase.   But even that could be in jeopardy."

2008-06-13
Nancy C. Rodriguez _Louisville KY Courier-Journal_
Some universities cut employment, ditch raises
"Kentucky Community and Technical College System's Board of Regents is scheduled to vote on its $670M operating budget, which will reflect a cut of more than $13.5M in state funding...   U of L President James Ramsey described the $243M general-fund budget for 2008-09, approved by the university's board of trustees yesterday, as 'ugly'...   1.7% increase over this year's budget...   The budget is the result of a 6 percent decrease in state funding for public universities and colleges in the fiscal year that begins July 1.   For U of L, that amounts to a $10.1M revenue loss.   In response, the budget approved yesterday includes $6.1M in cuts that will affect everything from faculty and staffing levels to the number of periodicals in the university's library.   The budget also includes a 9% tuition increase for in-state under-graduate students, and $297,002 for Ramsey's base salary.   Trustees are to determine how much of a raise he should receive next month.   It also includes $313K worth of cuts to 13 university programs that are mandated by the General Assembly, including those that assist in rural and urban health care, and the Urban Studies Institute, which includes the Kentucky State Data Center...   U of L's budget does include $7.7M for some initiatives, including $4.4M for financial aid and scholarships; $3M for staffing at a new Biosafety Lab, new fellowships for doctoral programs and research faculty positions; and $330K for diversity and community engagement."

2008-06-13 07:06PDT (10:06EDT) (14:06GMT)
Peter Williams _Richmond County NC Journal_
Perdue Farms ordered to hire hundreds of US workers & pay $800K
Del Marva Now
"The federal agency [Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, OFCCP] said 783 [women and minority applicants for work at Perdue Farms] must be offered positions at 3 of its plants as part of the deal.   Perdue has also agreed to pay $800K [to improperly rejected applicants] to settle charges it discriminated against more than 5K non-Hispanic workers who sought jobs with the company.   Of the 783 new hires, 433 must come from a pool of applicants that had applied at the Rockingham, NC plant and were denied employment.   Another 210 are to be offered jobs at the Monterey, TN plant and 140 will be offered jobs at the Dillon, SC facility.   The federal government is giving Perdue 180 days to make the hires.   The reality is there aren't currently 433 vacancies at the Rockingham plant.   Julie DeYoung, vice president for corporate communications for Perdue said at present there are 65 vacancies.   The plant employs about 1,200 people...   According to the latest report issued by the Employment Security Commission there are about 1,600 people unemployed in Richmond County...   [between 2004-01-01 and 2006-06-30] There were 4,548 total applicants who applied for laborer jobs at the Rockingham plant...   Of those, 1,477 were Hispanics and 3,071 were non-Hispanic.   'The contractor denied 2,783 qualified non-Hispanic applicants equal opportunity employment as production workers at the Rockingham plant during the review period.', reads a statement from the DoL...   since August, the department has made 8 similar findings at other poultry plants.   17 poultry companies have been cited for hiring violations between 2001 October and 2008 March."

2008-06-13
Patrick Thibodeau _Computer World_/_IDG_
AFL-CIO says student visa OPT extension puts downward pressure on compensation
"Ana Avendano, director of the AFL-CIO's immigrant worker program, wrote, in comments posted Thursday on Regulations.gov, that 'by extending the OPT period and work authorization period, the interim final rule turns a student visa program into a labor market program, and essentially lifts the cap that Congress has placed on the H-1B program.'   Moreover, Avendano said the rule change 'allows employers to completely bypass' any of the protections in the H-1B program that prevent employers, for instance, from using foreign workers to break a strike.   Moreover, students working on OPT won't have to be paid the prevailing wage as required under the H-1B program.   An OPT employee could, theoretically, work for minimum wage, she wrote...   Opposition groups, including the Programmers Guild, are seeking a temporary injunction in U.S. District Court in Newark, NJ, against the rule change.   They are also arguing that the decision to extend the OPT time period encourages some employers to advertise specifically for recent graduates, helping to skew the market against U.S. tech workers.   In court papers, they included ads from on-line job sites Dice and Monster from employers encouraging OPT workers to apply."
comments submitted on proposed rule change
AFL-CIO comment submitted on proposed rule change

2008-06-13 08:40:19PDT (12:40:19EDT) (16:40:19GMT)
_AScribe_
Out-Sourcing Jobs Leaves the American White-Collar Worker Behind; A Revised and Updated 'Out-Sourcing America' Calls for Action

2008-06-13
Steven J. Davis, R. Jason Faberman, John C. Haltiwanger & Ian Rucker _American Enterprise Institute_
Adjusted Estimates of Worker Flows and Job Openings in JOLTS (pdf)
"The [JOLTS/BED] adjusted lay-off rate is more than 60% greater than the published lay-off rate.   Time-series properties are also affected.   For example, hires exhibit more volatility than separations in the published statistics, but the reverse holds in the adjusted statistics.   The impact of our adjustment methodology on estimated job openings is more modest, raising the vacancy rate by about 8%...   our adjusted measures of hires and separations exceed the published JOLTS estimates by about one-third...   Our adjustments virtually eliminate the discrepancy between non-farm private sector employment growth in the CES or BED and the cumulative difference of hires and separations in JOLTS...   The under-weighting of establishments with sharp negative growth rates in JOLTS yields an under-count of lay-offs and an over-statement of the quit/lay-off ratio...   Wohlford et al. (2003) point to education (mostly in State and Local Government) and temporary help [bodyshopping] (part of Professional and Business Services) as the main sources of the JOLTS-CES divergence.   Using published JOLTS data, we confirm that the employment path implied by JOLTS hires and separations exhibits an especially large divergence from the CES employment path in Professional and Business Services.   The cumulative discrepancy for this industry group is 3.6M jobs, or 20.5% of the industry's 2006 December CES employment value...   The adjusted worker flows are much larger than the published estimates.   Hires and separations are about 5% of employment per month according to the adjusted estimates, as compared to 3.7% or 3.8% in the published statistics.   The adjusted lay-off rate, at 2.3% of employment per month, is nearly two-thirds greater than the published lay-off rate.   Our adjustments also lead to a higher quit rate.   The adjusted job openings rate is 2.9% of employment per month compared to 2.7% for the published rate.   Clearly, reweighting the cross-sectional growth rate density to conform to the BED and capturing the role of entry and exit has a major impact on the estimated levels of worker flows and job openings...   Finally, we note that our adjustment method can be applied to 'backcast' worker flows and job openings before the period covered by the JOLTS sample.   In particular, one could combine historical data on the cross-sectional distribution of establishment growth rates from the CES, BED or other source with JOLTS-based data on the cross-sectional relations displayed in Figures 4 and 5 to construct historical time series for worker flows and job openings.   Such an endeavor would greatly expand the time-series dimension of data available for the study of labor market dynamics."

2008-06-13
R. Jason Faberman & Eva Natypal _Philadelphia Fed_
Quits, Worker Recruitment, and Firm Growth: Theory and Evidence (pdf)
"quits decline, and hires and vacancies increase, with establishment growth...   The model distinguishes between recruiting to replace a quitting worker and recruiting for a new position, and relates this distinction to firm performance...   The JOLTS evidence shows that both quits and lay-offs increase with the size of an employer contraction but do so at di¤erent rates.   Lay-offs are a much higher share of large contractions, while quits account for the majority of smaller contractions...   High-productivity firms offer higher wages...   over 90% of employment is at establishments with absolute growth rates of less than 10%..."

2008-06-13 (5768 Sivan 10)
Michael Feldberg _Jewish World Review_
Moses Michael Hays in the era of the America Revolution

2008-06-13 (5768 Sivan 10)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Peace with friends

2008-06-13 (5768 Sivan 10)
Rabbi Berel Wein _Jewish World Review_
Seizing Opportunity

2008-06-13 (5768 Sivan 10)
Rabbi Yitzchok Rubin _Torah.org_
Tehillim: Rhythm of the Heart: Chapter 51: Repent

2008-06-13

DJIA	12,307.35
S&P 500	1,360.03
NASDAQ	2,454.50
10-year US T-Bond	4.26%
crude oil	$134.86/barrel
gold	$873.10/ounce
silver	$16.56/ounce
platinum	$2,037.00/ounce
palladium	$454.45/ounce
copper	$0.224375/ounce
natgas	$12.625/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline	$3.4626/gal
heatingoil	$3.8368/gal
dollarindex	74.03
yenperdollar	107.99
dollarspereuro	1.5383
dollarsperpound	1.9698

I usually get this info from MarketWatch and the "Futures Movers" and "Metals Stocks" columns (and BigCharts and FT Interactive).
 
 

2008-06-14

2008-06-14
Steven F. Hotze _Houston Chronicle_
We won't be fooled again
"In 2007 August, after he was safely re-elected to what I am sure he thought was his final term as our governor, you may recall how Rick Perry took the opportunity he had before the foreign media in Mexico City to criticize what were mostly Republicans in Congress who opposed passing an immigration amnesty bill that would legalize millions of workers.   Perry also told his Mexican hosts he supported a system that would temporarily legalize foreign workers.   According to the Chronicle, Perry said such a system would allow for a "free flow of individuals between these countries who want to work, who want to be an asset to our country and to Mexico.'   Of course, there might be nothing wrong with this statement had Rick Perry not made getting tough on immigration one of the central planks of his re-election campaign leading up to 2006 November.   Quite the contrary, he featured tough border security as a TV ad and publicly endorsed a concept to empower web users worldwide to watch Texas' border with Mexico and phone the authorities if they spot any apparently illegal crossings."

2008-06-14
_Houston Chronicle_
Cornyn strives to destroy US & Texas economies
"Q: You supported a virtual fence on the border to halt illegal immigration, then voted against it and then voted for funding for partial fencing at hot spots.   You supported the DREAM Act to provide a college education to the children of illegal immigrants and then voted against it.   How do you explain these shifts?
A: I have always supported securing the border and enacting comprehensive immigration reform that could be enforced.   Securing the border will require a number of steps, including increased numbers of Border Patrol agents and fencing in appropriate locations.   Occasionally, there have been votes on competing plans, or on measures that include objectionable additional spending, but my approach has been consistent.   Similarly, on the DREAM Act, I voted for one version of that in committee, and voted against considering an entirely different proposal on the Senate floor years later.   While I support the overall intentions of the DREAM Act, the recent version that came before the Senate was poorly written.   For instance, there was not a requirement to complete background checks.
Q: Should the Constitution be amended to deny automatic citizenship to children born in this country of illegal immigrants? And should illegal immigrants be required to leave the country to apply for re-entry as a condition of gaining citizenship?
A: There is no serious support for a constitutional amendment in the Congress now.   The issues associated with abuse of the current situation can best be resolved by securing our borders, enacting comprehensive immigration reform and enforcing the law.   My 2005 immigration reform legislation did require those who entered illegally to leave the country before getting legal status."

2008-06-14
Robert Gehrke _Salt Lake Tribune_
Congressional debate heated

2008-06-14
Paul Mulshine _New Jersey_/_McClatchy_
If Mexicans can ask United States citizens for their papers, why can't United States citizens ask Mexicans for their papers?

2008-06-14
_Raleigh News & Observer_
NC sheriffs helping deport illegal aliens
"We'll have more counties qualified for the federal 287(g) program than any other state...   Sheriffs particularly cite high rates of drunken driving among Hispanic immigrants and the tragic fatalities those drivers have caused..."

2008-06-14
_Economic Times of India_
Many Indian job aspirants give fake educational documents
"among the job aspirants who cheat, nearly 85% resort to giving fake educational documents.   First Advantage specialises in background screening for 90K companies globally...   The findings of the 2007 study had come as a shock to firms and their human resource managers.   'And in our 2008 first quarterly report, we have found that almost all industry sectors witnessed an increase in both employment and education related discrepancy as compared to the previous quarter.'...   21% of the candidates had inflated their previous designations, 44% had given an incorrect tenure and 21% had provided false employment information like incorrect company name, employment status and reasons for leaving."

2008-06-14
_Ithaca NY Journal_
Tompkins Cortland Community College board of trustees propose 3.3% tuition hike for full-time students
"The Tompkins Cortland Community College Board of Trustees has adopted a $32.3M budget for 2008-09 that includes tuition increases of 3.5% for full-time students and 3.1% for part-time students.   The budget also includes a 5% increase in [tax-victim] dollars provided by Tompkins and Cortland counties...   The State University Board of Trustees will act on the budget in September.   If the budget is approved as adopted by the trustees, full-time tuition would go from $3,325 per year to $3,440 per year and part-time tuition from $128 per credit to $132.   Overall, the college projects revenue from tuition and fees will be just under $15M, an increase of 7.69%.   The budget is 7.7% larger than the spending plan approved for 2007-2008.   Major factors behind the increase include enrollment growth of 4%, new staff positions, contracted salary increases and higher health insurance premiums.   Projected enrollment for 2008-2009 is 3,600 full-time equivalent students.   The increase comes from anticipated growth in the core Fall and Spring terms and the College's Global Disney program, which allows students from international partner institutions to enroll at TC3 and spend a semester working at Walt Disney World.   The new jobs budgeted for total about 7 full-time equivalent staff positions.   This includes new faculty, peace officers, financial aid staff, technical support, and existing staff positions previously funded through a Perkins grant.   The amount spent on employee benefits is projected to increase 9.7%, which includes increased health insurance costs, retirement system contributions, and additional staffing."

2008-06-14
Mary Ellen Klas _Miami Herald_
Florida universities to raise tuition 6% to 15%
"University of Florida trustees approved a 15% tuition hike Friday for freshmen and sophomores, while Florida State University and University of South Florida officials will apply the 15% to new under-graduates and transfer students.   The 3 schools joined with most of the state's 8 other universities and approved a 6% tuition hike for all students, as well as enrollment caps and job cut-backs...   Florida International University announced Thursday it will eliminate 23 degree programs, close six research centers, lay off 38 faculty members and increase tuition 6%.   Florida Atlantic University had already announced a 6% tuition hike and the University of Florida had previously announced it will also lay off 400 people and reduce enrollment by 4K over the next 4 years...   UF, FSU and USF trustees combined the 6% tuition hike authorized by legislators this year with a 9% tuition increase legislators approved last year for the state's 3 largest universities to recruit faculty, boost research and retain top talent.   The 6% tuition increase will apply to all 52K students at UF in the fall.   The additional 9% increase -- about $415 a year -- will affect about 9,400 freshmen and sophomores, Orlando said.   The 15% hike will amount to a $517 increase for most incoming FSU students, said spokeswoman Browning Brooks...   Under the tuition hike approved Friday, average in-state tuition for freshmen and sophomores at UF will rise to $3,788 and average tuition for other under-graduates will rise to $3,568, Orlando said.   At FSU, the average in-state tuition will be $3,987 for new under-graduates and transfer students and the average tuition for other under-graduates will be $3,779.   Exempt from the tuition hikes will be students with need-based scholarships or Florida students with prepaid tuition.   FSU president T.K. Wetherell in a statement Friday that the lack of funding has already led to the loss of 62 faculty members who have left since August for higher-paying jobs."

2008-06-14
_Economic Times of India_
85% of Indian job aspirants give fake education credentials
"In the first study of its kind in India, an employee background screening company has found that among the job aspirants who cheat, nearly 85% resort to giving fake educational documents.   First Advantage specialises in background screening for 90K companies globally...   For example, it was found that 21% of the candidates had inflated their previous designations [job titles], 44% had given an incorrect tenure and 21% had provided false employment information like incorrect company name, employment status and reasons for leaving."
 

2008-06-15

2008-06-15
John Miano _Center for Immigration Studies_
Most new science & tech jobs going to visa-holders, while most US S&T pros are unemployed and under-employed
Front Page Magazine
"There is no cause and effect relationship between H-1B visas and job creation.   Adding H-1B visas does not create additional jobs for U.S. workers.   Since 1999, the United States has approved enough H-1B visas for computer workers to fill 87% of net computer job growth over that period.   Since 1999, the United States has had a net loss of 76K engineering jobs.   Over the same time period, the United States has approved an average of 16K new H-1B visas each year for engineers.   If current employment trends continue and the H-1B quota remains unchanged, the United States will approve enough H-1B visas for computer workers to fill about 79% of the computer jobs it creates each year.   Pending legislation would increase the number of H-1B visas for computer workers to above the number of computer jobs created each year.   The data suggest that a large percentage of those who legally enter United States on H-1B visas go into the illegal alien pool."
 
According to figures in NCES' Digest of Education Statistics, from 1999 through 2006, US citizens earned 424,203 computer degrees, and 605,536 engineering degrees, and a total of some 2,052,715 STEM degrees.
 
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring e-News-Letter_
 
CIS has just published a new study by Programmers Guild founder John Miano, which debunks the industry lobbyists' claim that rather than H-1Bs taking American jobs, they actually create American jobs.
 
This industry claim can clearly seen to be false without any data analysis.   If any "multiplier" job creation effect comes from the position an H-1B fills, not from the H-1B.   You would get the same effect by filling the job with a qualified U.S. worker.   There would be two potential exceptions to this, neither of which holds here.   One exception would be a situation in which qualified U.S. workers don't exist; but that doesn't hold here, as the statistical evidence shows we don't have a tech labor shortage (e.g., starting salaries, adjusted for inflation, have been flat or falling).   The other possible exception would be if the H-1B is especially talented; but my own CIS article showed that the vast majority of H-1Bs are ordinary people doing ordinary work.   (See my e-newsletter posting Neither Best Nor Brightest regarding both of these points.   Note too my analysis of the flaws in one industry study.)
 
So, the "H-1Bs create jobs" argument is fallacious to begin with.   Miano then demonstrates it statistically.   A couple of his findings were aired tonight on the Lou Dobbs show, whose transcript is enclosed below.   (There appear to be a couple of typos.)   Miano's study [has] a lot of interesting material in there, and I urge everyone to take a look.
 
Norm
 
Lou Dobbs
Americans losing more jobs as numbers of visas increase, and Congress want to make it even easier to hire cheap foreign workers instead of Americans
Bill Tucker: In the 2 years from 2003 to 2005, about 125K new computer jobs were created in this country.   During that same time, more than 98K H-1B visas were issued for computer workers.   That was enough to fill 78% of the jobs created.   Leaving only about 27K jobs for American workers.   That's a conclusion by a report from the "Center of Immigration Studies" after an analysis of government data.   The center which lobbies for tighter immigration policy concludes there's no relationship between the program and economic need.   And it says the picture is worse for engineers.
 
John Miano: In 2005, the United States lost 3,200 engineering jobs.   In the same year, we imported over 12K H-1B engineers.   How do you argue with numbers like that?
 
Bill Tucker: The high-tech industry continues to argue it's short skilled workers and that the program needs to be doubled add the very least from the official cap of 65K visas a year.
 
Robert Hoffman, lobbyist for Compete America, former lobbyist for ITAA: These are job opening just within 5K companies in the U.S. economy.   There [are] 120K skilled job openings.   It is not in any company's interest to leave jobs unfilled.
 
Bill Tucker: According to the National Science Foundation, in 2005, we graduated 271K students with bachelors and masters degrees in science and engineering who were citizens or legal residents.
 
Bill Tucker: And for the more than 18K foreign students who graduated from American universities, the Department of Homeland Security gave them a nice graduation present earlier this year.   DHS doubled the length of time that foreign students can stay and work in the country after graduation to two and a half years.   A law-suit challenging that action is scheduled for preliminary hearing on July 7, Lou, so we'll see what happens with that.
 
Lou Dobbs: Yes, I still see Bill Gates standing before the committee chaired by Senator Ted Kennedy over a year ago.   The only witness, the only member in the committee with Bill Gates saying, I need an infinite number of worker advisories, H-1B visas.   The absurdity and to watch the way Congress just sort of fawns over him and (INAUDIBLE) and says, it doesn't really matter what happens to the voters, to our constituents, to working men and women in this country, just so you satisfy the corporate and political elites in this country.
 
Such balderdash.   It's ridiculous.
 
Thank you very much.   Bill Tucker.
 
8 of the top 20 companies requesting H-1B worker visas last year were based in India.   Did I say that?   Yes, I did.
 
Those firms want to bring cheap labor from India to the United States so they can out-source middle class jobs to those workers here -- so they don't have to go to all that trouble of sending them all the way to India.   The H-1B visa program is one of 10 guest worker programs that this country already has in place.   I know you're thinking, George W. Bush, the president of the United States, was saying, we need a guest-worker program.   But we actually have 10 of them already.   Ten, Mr. President -- 10 of them, as we've been reminding you for the past year.
 
Tonight's poll results -- 96% of you say you're outraged that the state of California would argue against verifying the legality of employees who would be doing work for the state of California.   Well, you -- it's hard to even have anything to say about that.   I mean, it's just -- it's insane what the state of California has chosen to do there, or at least at its state assembly.
-30-
 

2008-06-15
Joe Pryah _Daily Herald_
Jason Chaffetz in Utah's 3rd congressional district contest
"On [May 10], Chaffetz crushed supposed front-runner David Leavitt at the state GOP convention and fell just nine delegate votes shy of ousting long-time incumbent Chris Cannon for the U.S. House seat in District 3...   41-year-old Alpine resident...   He lambasts immigration policy (calling for the elimination of birth-right citizenship if the parents are illegal), federal meddling in schools (calling for the elimination of the Department of Education) and global warming (calling it 'a farce')."

2008-06-15 10:54PDT (13:54EDT) (17:54GMT)
_PhysOrg_
Hunger hormone, ghrelin, increases with stress, and may have anti-depressant effect
"'Our findings in mice suggest that chronic stress causes ghrelin levels to go up and that behaviors associated with depression and anxiety decrease when ghrelin levels rise.   An unfortunate side effect, however, is increased food intake and body weight.', said Dr. Jeffrey Zigman, assistant professor of internal medicine and psychiatry at UT Southwestern and senior author of a study appearing online today and in a future print edition of Nature Neuroscience.   Dr. Michael Lutter, instructor of psychiatry at UT Southwestern and lead author of the study, said, 'Our findings support the idea that these hunger hormones don't do just one thing; rather, they coordinate an entire behavioral response to stress and probably affect mood, stress and energy levels.'"

2008-06-15
Chris Casey _Greeley Tribune_
University of Northern Colorado struggles to reverse enrollment slide: Officials are clueless amidst depressed job markets
"This Fall, UNC expects a 5% slide in students on the Greeley campus.   That's after UNC absorbed a 5.5% overall drop -- including a 10.5% drop in first-year freshmen -- in 2007 Fall.   The tumbles have cost UNC a combined $6.5M in revenue over the past 2 years...   Cardenas recently reported to the Board of Trustees that UNC has received 22% more Latino and 12% more out-of-state student applicants for next school year...   Until last fall's decline, UNC posted 14.1% first-year freshman growth since 2002 Fall.   But it remains alarming and against-the-grain, considering U.S. public school enrollment is expected to hit a record of almost 50M students this year.   Also, college enrollments nationwide are expected to climb an average 6%...   Although CSU and CU have, like UNC, dramatically boosted tuition in the past two years -- including hikes of 9.5% at CSU and 9.3% at CU this fall -- both institutions are riding enrollment booms.   CU-Boulder collected a record 23K freshman applications this year, breaking last year's high of 20K, and officials expect the largest-ever freshman class of 5,750, a 3.6% increase from last year.   CSU enrolled a record 4,300 freshmen last fall and has seen freshman enrollment climb 12% since 2002.   The freshmen yield rate at CU -- the percentage of in-state students accepted who end up enrolling -- was 50% last fall, up 6% from the prior year, compared to UNC's rate of 41%.   Cardenas said UNC wants a yield rate of at least 45% to 48%.   Once those students are recruited and admitted, the key is to keep them enrolled.   Cardenas said it costs 60% less to retain students than to recruit them.   UNC's retention rate -- the cohort of freshmen from one year who are still at the university the next year -- is 67%.   Retention rates at CU and CSU are both 83%...   Flint said tuition rates -- UNC boosted tuition 9.9% for residents and 2.7% for nonresidents last year, and 9.5% across-the-board next year -- are the main deterrent to returning to campus...   'Students do report that it is harder to find jobs in town...'...   faculty have left due to low salaries...   In decades past, the university received about 60% of operating revenues from state and 40% from tuition and fees.   But now the proportions are reversed.   Next year, UNC will get about 55% of revenues from tuition and fees and about 45% in state funds."

2008-06-15
_Coosa Valley News_
Oklahoma rules still a barrier to getting nominee Bob Barr on ballot
"Oklahoma... requires Barr to collect 61,478 signatures by July 15th...   it will take around $100K to even have a shot at [getting his name on the ballots] in Oklahoma."

2008-06-15
"Dave G." _Digital Journal_
Bob Barr hopes to attract most of Ron Paul's voters
 

2008-06-16

2008-06-16
_Economic Times of India_
Indians faking education credentials
"In the first study of its kind in India, an employee background screening company has found that among the job aspirants who cheat, nearly 85% resort to giving fake educational documents."

2008-06-16
_Third Party Watch_
Bob Barr on bringing down Moloch
MarketWire
Street Insider

2007-06-16
_Swans_
Whose Party Are We Spoiling?
"The reign of the two-party system, which is steadily moving us ever farther away from true democracy; and the further degradation of free speech, which at last check still covered the right to run for office, and the right to vote."

2007-06-16
John W. Mashek _US News & World Report_
Libertarians are wild cards keeping left-leaning McCain in line

2008-06-16 08:11PDT (11:11EDT) (15:11GMT)
Deb Kollars _Sacramento Bee_
By 2015, Sacramento region won't be needing so many people with university degrees
"According to the forecast, the Sacramento region will see more than 337K jobs open up by 2015, including 163K new ones and 175K that will need filling when workers retire or change jobs..."
Career GPS data-base

2008-06-16
Alan Tonelson _American Economic Alert_
WSJ almost reveals biggest out-sourcing myth

2008-06-16 11:16PDT (14:16EDT) (18:16GMT)
Joe Biesk _Forbes_/_AP_
Kentucky program to employ grads in KY being cut
"Close to 79% of the program's operating costs come from the state, Cedeno said."

2008-06-16 09:49PDT (12:49EDT) (16:49GMT)
Joe Strupp _Editor & Publisher_
Sacramento-based McClatchy, USA's #3 newspaper chain, to lay off 1,400 == 10%
CNN/AP
Local10
Seattle Times

2008-06-16
Kevin Agnese _Politicker MD_
Donna Edwards vs. Peter James for Maryland's 4th congressional district
"Residents of Maryland's 4th Congressional District will go to the polls tomorrow to elect a new member of Congress to replace former representative Al Wynn (D-Mitchellville), who resigned May 31.   Activist Donna Edwards (D-Fort Washington) and high-tech developer Peter James (R-Germantown) are the nominees of their respective parties."

2008-06-16
_Virgin Islands Daily News_
UVI trustees approved tuition hike
"Board members voted 11-4 to raise tuition over the next 3 academic years.   Under the plan, tuition will increase by 5% for the 2008-09 academic year, 4% in 2009-10 and 4% more for 2010-2011.   Tuition will increase by $165 this fall, $135 more in fall 2009 and $150 in 2010.   For example, a resident of the territory who plans to enroll in the Fall at UVI as a full-time under-graduate freshman student and live on campus in a single room will pay $6,835 to attend UVI this Fall, or an additional $345.   That same student would have paid $6,490 for the same services during the 2007-2008 academic year...   Tuition currently accounts for less than 20% of the university's total operating revenues.   The increase will raise that figure to between 21% and 25%.   President LaVerne Ragster said tuition on average makes up 25% of revenues at most other universities and colleges."

2008-06-16 14:19PDT (17:19EDT) (21:19GMT)
_Forbes_/_AP_
Apollo Group/University of Phoenix to raise tuition 4% to 10% on July 1, depending on degree level
CNN/Money

2008-06-16
Adam Emerson _Tampa Tribune_
FSU requires all students to have health care insurance, thus worsening the problem of excessive reliance on it and putting upward pressure on prices
"Students have to show their family health insurance meets FSU's demands: coverage of $250K a year; a provider network for care in Tallahassee; and coverage for prescriptions, pregnancies and mental health.   If they can't, they may have to buy more coverage to meet FSU's demands, or enroll in the university's health plan at $1,443 a year.   That equals about 40% of the annual tuition and fees students pay for a public university education in Florida, and it's why most are waiting to see how critical the need is for students before jumping in...   Sacher says that 3,082 of the students new to FSU last year opted for the university's health insurance, while 11,302 waived the coverage because they had sufficient health plans.   She says she expects that 5K students will choose FSU's coverage this year.   Administrators made it easier to enroll and improved communication of the policy to families, she said.   Premiums won't increase this year.   The university negotiated with its provider, Aetna, to keep costs at $1,443 for students, Sacher said."

2008-06-16
Victor Reklitis _Investor's Business Daily_
India's Infosys wants to disperse risks from financial firms (with graph)
"Infosys Technologies (INFY) and other IT off-shoring firms have come under pressure because hard-hit U.S. financial firms are key clients...   Plus, many customers are looking to out-source more work to cut costs amid the U.S. economic slow-down...   Infosys helped pioneer off-shoring [and cross-border bodyshopping].   The Bangalore-based company, founded in 1981, has taken advantage of India's huge pool of English-speaking IT workers.   They cost much less than programmers in Western nations...   Analysts sometimes refer to [India's] big 6 as SWITCH: Satyam Computer Services (SAY), Wipro (WIT), Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services, Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTSH) and HCL Technologies."
class action against Tata
Tata median salaries by city
Wipro median salaries by city
Infosys median salaries by city

2008-06-16
Lalita Aloor Amuthan _My Central NJ_
Bail set at $800K for Cygate exec Nilesh Dasondi in H-1B visa fraud case: bank accounts siezed, house arrest with electronic monitor

2008-06-16
Jon Roland
Yvonne Schick nominated for US Senate from Texas
"On June 14 The Texas Libertarian Party nominated Yvonne Schick to be its candidate for U.S. Senator.   I urge all of you who want to get people like Ron Paul elected to public office to join me in supporting Yvonne, and other Libertarians such as Bob Barr for President.   I appreciate that many of you have been heavily invested in the Ron Paul Revolution.   That Revolution continues, just not with Ron Paul as its candidate.   Now supporters of the Revolution need to transfer their efforts, enthusiasm, and donations to other candidates.   This is not the time to become discouraged or reduce your efforts.   You will also want to read the new Platform adopted by the Texas Libertarian Party.   We substantially adopted most of the proposed planks.   They provide much that you may want to adopt in organizations with which you may be associated."

2008-06-16 (5768 Sivan 13)
Diana West _Jewish World Review_
Islam became a "depressing obsession" for academic research physician

2008-06-16
Christian V. Esguerra _Inquirer_
Why US school administrators want cheap, pliant Filipino teachers

2008-06-16
Frosty Wooldridge _News with Views_
Our troubled country is importing poverty
Border Fire Report
 

2008-06-17: 20 weeks to federal elections of president and congress-critters

2008-06-17
Anniversary of Battle of Bunker Hill (& Breed's Hill, Charlestown, MA)
Jimbo Wales's wikipedia (with maps)
city of Boston battle monument
Charlestown, MA battle monument
Dartmouth on Bunker Hill monument
Blue Darter's Guide to the American Revolution (with map)
Massachusetts Historical Society & Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati (with time-line, maps, contemporary accounts
Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Chris Groboske
British Battles
The Movie
IMDB
National Park Service (maps, interpretation, readings)
Library of Congress
American Revolution.org
Mount Alvernia HS
Ed Helper 6th grade level
Valley Oak elementary school
Early America (with map)
US History (with nice maps)
USA History
Patriot Resource
American casualties: 400-450
British casualties: 1000-1500

2008-06-17
Ephraim Schwartz _InfoWorld_
Purported labor market shortages not supported by the available evidence

2008-06-17
_Fort Myers News Press_/_Gannett_
FGCU expected to hike tuition
"Florida Gulf Coast University trustees are expected today to hike tuition by 6% and also charge students a new $10 convenience fee for those who pay for tuition with credit cards.   The proposed 2008-2009 operational budget is $140.2M, an increase of $10M, but that's because FGCU will generate more revenue through a new 408-bed residential hall and higher enrollment...   President Bradshaw is eligible for a $60K performance bonus."

2008-06-17
Meghan Gilbert _Toledo Blade_
University of Toledo trustees pass $753M budget
"The FY2009 budget is about $31M more than 2008 because of increased revenues from projected enrollment growth, tuition and fee increases for graduate students, and increased state support.   The biennial state budget passed in 2007 promised Ohio's public colleges and universities increases in state support -- 5.2% the first year and 9.8% the second -- in exchange for a zero under-graduate tuition increase.   There is a projected $10M reserve at the end of the 2009 fiscal year."

2008-06-17 09:41PDT (12:41EDT) (16:41GMT)
_Forbes_/_AP_
Micron Technology spent $310k lobbying in 2008Q1
2News Boise
Argus Observer
NWCN
Idaho Statesman

2008-06-17
_Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce_
Former milling machine power-house, Milacron, moving HQ to cheaper digs in Clermont county
"The Cincinnati-based manufacturer of plastics-processing machinery and metal-cutting fluids will move about 60 people from Florence Avenue into available office space at its main U.S. plant on Half Acre Road in Afton, outside of Batavia...   Milacron plans to invest in additional capacity at its Mount Orab manufacturing plant, which is about 10 miles further east, in Brown County.   That would add to the payroll there, where it now employs 240 people, out of [only] about 1K in the Cincinnati area...   Milacron was founded in downtown Cincinnati in the 1880s and maintained its head-quarters in Oakley from 1911 until 1998.   State officials offered just more than $1M in grants contingent upon Milacron expanding capacity in Mount Orab for the manufacture of mixed-generation and wind-power energy products...   Including its all-electric processing machinery that cuts energy costs by 50% or more compared to traditional hydraulic technology, Milacron already generates more than half its revenue from green products.   It was the first to market with all-electric machine controls 25 years ago, Brown said.   Other green-related initiatives include extrusion technology that uses waste materials -- wood scrap, plastic scrap and agricultural waste -- to make decking materials, window frames and architectural moldings.   Responding to customer requests, Milacron has developed ways to use peanut shells and corn-cobs to make such products...   At its industrial fluids unit in Oakley, the company has developed alternatives to oil-based fluids that instead are made with vegetable oil..."

2008-06-17
Frosty Wooldridge _Denver Post_
Law-Breaking Colorado Employers Are Not Prosecuted

2008-06-17
Ambrose Evans-Pritchard _London Telegraph_
Emerging markets face inflation melt-down

2008-06-17
Bruce Cohen
What the LP "Ought" to Do: The "My Way Is the Only Way" Fallacy

2008-06-17 (5768 Sivan 14)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Bush's rhetoric, Bush's policies

2008-06-17 (5768 Sivan 14)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Rview_
Is prestige worth it?: Inputs and results of colleges & universities
 

2008-06-18

2008-06-18 13:23PDT (16:23EDT) (20:23GMT)
Christopher Hinton _MarketWatch_
GAO back's Boeing's protest over $35G tanker contract initially awarded to EADS/AirBus & Northrup Grumman

2008-06-18
Mac Johnson _Human Events_
Shortage whiner Weiner thinks no really hot chick should be illegal: And besides, he wants to sneak in another back-door H-1B increase
David Seifman: NY Post

2008-06-18
_Boston Globe_/_AP_
Nokia spent $200K lobbying in 2008Q1
Forbes

2008-06-18
Eric Pianin _Washington Post_
Bob Barr blasted McCain

2008-06-18 (5768 Sivan 15)
Walter E. Williams _Mexia Daily_
Airport Tyranny by the Transportation Security Administration
Deseret News
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Harrisonburg VA Daily News-Record
Voice of the Times
Marysville CA Appeal-Democrat/Freedom
Capitalism Magazine
Jewish World Review
Patriot Post

2008-06-18 10:47PDT (13:47EDT) (17:47GMT)
Paul Jenkins _Huffington Post_
Voters have better alternative in Bob Barr
"In the general election itself, McCain will have to contend with former GOP Congressman Bob Barr, running on the Libertarian ticket.   This means that conservative voters and libertarian-leaning independents will not lack for choice"

2008-06-18
Robert Novak & Timothy P. Carney _Human Events_
Bob Barr is better
"Representative Ron Paul (R-TX), who garnered significant chunks of the Republican primary electorate in the late primaries, has made it clear he will not endorse McCain.   Paul's loud and enthusiastic following is small, but if they stay at home or vote third-party in tight states [the entrenched parties' candidates could be turned on their ears]...   The key question on the libertarian side of the ledger will be the strength of former Georgia representative Bob Barr, the Libertarian nominee.   Barr lacks the rock-star quality of Paul, and his mixed record on foreign policy, domestic security, and gay marriage will turn off some of the libertarian purists.   Will he appeal to disaffected small-government conservatives?   Barr sees his strongest region being the Mountain West...   The [hope] of Barr swinging his home state Georgia...   Bush won 58% in Georgia in 2004, and a higher black turn-out in 2008 would be partially off-set by the white Democrats who vote Republican."

2008-06-18 16:39PDT (19:39EDT) (23:39GMT)
Stewart M. Powell _Houston Chronicle_
Congress over-spends again... on NASA
"The House of Representatives defied the White House on Wednesday by overwhelmingly approving a $20.2G budget for NASA -- $2.9G more than sought by President Bush.   With Houston-area law-makers leading the way, House members crossed party lines to send a strong message to the White House by approving the measure on a vote of 409 to 15 -- far exceeding the two-thirds majority that would be needed to over-ride a possible presidential veto.   A total of 181 Republicans joined 228 Democrats to approve the measure.   Fifteen Republicans voted no...   Representative Ron Paul, R-Lake Jackson, cast the sole dissenting vote [among Houston-area congress-critters]."

2008-06-18
Adrian L. Arp, PhD _Ag Weekly_
USA needs to get out of NAFTA
"The Idaho and U.S. sugar industry is being destroyed by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) that is allowing unlimited, uninspected sugar from Mexico.   We can withdraw from NAFTA by passing House Concurrent Resolution 22.   This would block our president from forming a North American Union that is combining Mexico, Canada and the U.S. into a regional government run by unelected bureaucrats like the European Union.   This according to a plan developed by The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) to create regional government.   NAFTA, adopted in 1993, has been very destructive to American jobs.   Our trade deficit with Canada and Mexico was $9G before NAFTA, but it was $126G in 2005.   More than one million jobs have been lost, and it has ruined the Mexican economy as well.   NAFTA's unconstitutional tribunals (courts), operating under a United Nation's Commission, have been overriding our courts and ruling against U.S. commercial enterprises.   Henry Kissinger (CFR member) correctly stated in 1993 that the passage of NAFTA 'will represent the most creative step toward a new world order taken by any group of countries -- and a first step toward a free-trade zone for the entire Western Hemisphere'.   NAFTA has been destroying our constitutional rights and independence.   We must get out!   Please ask our senators and congressmen to cosponsor and pass [Goode's] HConResolution22 to withdraw from NAFTA, HConResolution40 to stop the North American Union and pass HR1146, sponsored by presidential candidate Representative Ron Paul, to get out of the tyrannical United Nations."

2008-06-18
John Tierney _NY Times_
Risks & Rewards of Off-Shore Drilling vs. Alternatives

2008-06-18
Paul Craig Roberts _V Dare_
John Yoo, Totalitarian

2008-06-18
Marcus Epstein _V Dare_
E-Verify is threatened in courts & congress because it is working

2008-06-18
Neil Cavuto _Fox_
Bob Barr
"There was another poll that was out there that showed that -- that, among true conservatives, I'm polling in double digits.   These are very, very preliminary.   What we're doing is, we are reaching out through an awful lot of meet-up groups that have formed, thousands of people that are coming to our web site, BobBarr2008.com."
Bob Bar 2008: Liberty for America

2008-06-18 (5768 Sivan 15)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
Tim Russert (1950-2008)
 

2008-06-19

2008-06-18 17:34PDT (2008-06-18 20:34PDT (2008-06-19 00:34GMT)
Robert Powell _MarketWatch_
Encore careers after 40
"6% to 9.5% of Americans ages 44 to 70, or as many as 5.3M to 8.4M people, are working in what are called 'encore' careers...   The remaining 80M Americans ages 44 to 70 are either slaving away in careers without purpose (half of them pine for an encore career), or taking it easy, living a more traditional retirement...   MetLife Foundation/Civic Ventures Encore Career Survey..."

2008-06-19 05:30PST (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
current press release
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 346,679 in the week ending June 14, a decrease of 26,208 from the previous week.   There were 290,951 initial claims in the comparable week in 2007.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.1% during the week ending June 7, unchanged from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 2,803,210, a decrease of 25,417 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 1.7% and the volume was 2,298,047.   Extended benefits were not available in any state during the week ending May 31."
graphs

2008-06-19
Austin Cassidy _Independent Political Report_
Evans & Novak wonder about the impact of Bob Barr

2008-06-19
Austin Cassidy _Independent Political Report_
Where's Wayne Allyn Root?

2008-06-19
Jason Hommel & Antal E. Fekete _SilverSeek_
On-going debate on inflation, silver markets, short-selling, and speculation
A Primer on the Silver Basis
Silver shorts are so naked they've gone wild
Why banning usury won't work

2008-06-19
Dan Reale _Norwich Bulletin_
Bob Barr is the only candidate for president who is focused on progress
"Libertarian presidential nominee Bob Barr offers actual change.   He has not only renounced the 2-party system, the Patriot Act and the Defense of Marriage Act, he's worked with the libertarian party, the ACLU and the NRA to undo decades of damage to our civil liberties.   There is much to be said for someone so entrenched in the system to not only admit wrong, but to take initiative in correcting it.   This is not something we can say for John McCain or Barak Obama, both of whom voted to fund the war and extend the Patriot Act.   Unlike Obama or McCain, who Barr rightly calls a vote for business-as-usual, he is committed to addressing our dependence on foreign oil, the falling value of our dollar and the $58T the 2-party system would have our grand-children pay off.   Barr is the only major contender willing to do this by addressing the cause of these problems -- not the pretend causes.   Barr offers real hope and actual change by unifying us as Americans, as citizens with unalienable rights and a servant government.   The sooner we embrace this vision, the sooner it will be achieved."

2008-06-19
Matt Towery _Town Hall_
Bob Barr and Airline Politics
Southern Political Report
National Ledger

2008-06-19
Sam Wood _Philadelphia Inquirer_
Libertarian Jason Schuerer on ballot for NJ senate
"Jason Schuerer will face-off against incumbent Frank Lautenberg, and Richard Zimmer, Sara Lobman, Daryl Brooks and J.M. Carter."

2008-06-19
Richard Daughty _Daily Reckoning_
Raising the roof on the debt ceiling
GoldSeek
"In case you were wondering, the national debt ceiling is currently $9.815T, and the debt itself stands at $9.428T.   The debt ceiling was raised less than a year ago from $8.965T, which means that the despicable Congress (except Ron Paul) authorized themselves to spend about $500G, which is a lot more than the stinking little $165G budget deficit claimed by the lying, stinking Congress (except, as I said, Ron Paul)."

2008-06-19
Charles S. Johnson _Billings Gazette_
Ron Paul to speak at Republican convention in Missoula
"Bob Kelleher, a perennial candidate who has previously run on the Democratic and Green Party tickets, is running against 6-term Democratic incumbent Max Baucus...   [Incumbent Denny Rehberg] faces Democrat John Driscoll and Libertarian candidate Mike Fellows in the general election...   Roy Brown of Billings [will run against incumbent Brian Schweitzer for governor]..."

2008-06-19
_Economist_
Clustering
"Americans are increasingly choosing to live among like-minded neighbours.   This makes the culture war more bitter and politics harder...   In 1976 Jimmy Carter won the presidency with 50.1% of the popular vote.   Though the race was close, some 26.8% of Americans were in 'land-slide counties' that year, where Mr. Carter either won or lost by 20 percentage points or more.   The proportion of Americans who live in such land-slide counties has nearly doubled since then.   In the dead-heat election of 2000, it was 45.3%.   When George Bush narrowly won re-election in 2004, it was a whopping 48.3%.   As the playwright Arthur Miller put it that year: 'How can the polls be neck and neck when I don't know one Bush supporter?'   County-level data under-state the degree of ideological segregation, reckons Bill Bishop, the author of a gripping new book called _The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded America is Tearing Us Apart_.   Counties can be big.   Cook county, Illinois, (which includes Chicago), has over 5M inhabitants.   Beaverhead county, Montana, covers 5,600 square miles (14,400 square kilometres).   The neighbourhoods people care about are much smaller...   Income is a poor predictor of party preference in America; cultural factors matter more."

2008-06-19
_PR News Wire_
Teamsters charge Capitol Beverage with pollution for dumping expired beer
WV Gazette
"Founded in 1935, Capitol Beverage distributes Miller and Coors beers, as well as a variety of imports including Corona and Guinness, in 26 counties in West Virginia.   Capitol Beverage broke off contract talks with the union on May 3.   Capitol employees are currently working without a contract.   Ken Hall, president of Local 175 and the union's international vice president, said Capitol wants to pay its truck drivers up to 40% less than other beverage distributors in the area pay their drivers and warehouse workers.   Capitol's contract proposals would require longtime employees to pay as much as $11K a year for family health-care coverage and would eliminate health benefits for retired beer delivery drivers, Hall said."

2008-06-19
R. Jeffrey Smith _Washington Post_
Abramoff used White House contacts to help get rid of foe
"That option was chosen by Jack Abramoff and his colleagues at the Washington office of Greenberg Traurig in the Bush administration's early days, to oust Alan Stayman from a State Department negotiating job.   Stayman had earned their ire by advocating labor reforms in the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. protectorate where Abramoff's clients [and certain members of the current Democrat congressional 'leadership'] wanted to keep paying immigrants less than the federal minimum wage to work in textile factories.   Stayman was supported by James A. Kelly, who was a White House aide to President Ronald Reagan and served as the State Department's assistant secretary of state for East Asia and the Pacific from 2001 to 2005.   Kelly, citing on-going negotiations with Micronesia and the Marshall Islands, told his department's personnel office on 2001 May 1, that he wanted Stayman to remain for two more years."
GN wrote:
"This article provides more evidence of the ruthlessness of M$ lobbyist Jack Abramoff who forced out Allen Stayman.   I know a professional colleague who was forced into retirement by Abramoff's actions in conjunction with the 'Stayman Affair'.   In contrast, Abramoff partner, former representative Tom DeLay collected millions of dollars -- 'Things of Value' in exchange for 'Official Acts' -- and has not been prosecuted under the RICO Statutes.   I recognize the massive corruption that masquerades as our national government -- and makes the Warren G. Harding administration look angelic."

2008-06-19
Frosty Wooldridge _News with Views_
Excess immigration's racial violence is spreading across the USA

2008-06-19
Theresa Blackwell _St. Petersburg Times_
Oldsmar officials beginning to cave in to Nielsen
"Gone are statements like, 'to think they have the gall to take [tax-victims'] money and then lay people off', as council member Suzanne Vale said in April...   'It's a global company.', Mayor Jim Ronecker said last week at a city work-shop.   'It's not all about America anymore, and we're right in the middle of it.'   At a City Council meeting Tuesday night, Ronecker said the city is negotiating an agreement with Nielsen that could be completed within 7 to 10 days.   But Nielsen has asked that the terms remain confidential in the mean-time, he said.   Oldsmar has paid $554K of the $3.1M the Nielsen Company has received over the past 6 years to create new jobs in Pinellas County."

2008-06-19
Ian Dew-Becker & Robert J. Gordon
The Rise in American Inequality
"Only the top 10% of US earners have seen their incomes grow faster than productivity since 1966...   For top corporate executives, however, non-market forces (CEO-Board complicity in pay setting) are important, so other policies are warranted...   wage increases of skilled occupations like engineers and computer programmers have been remarkably slow compared to the rapid income gains of managers...   This enrichment of the concept of SBTC helps to answer an objection we posed in our 2005 paper, where we cited evidence showing that there was no relative increase in the starting salaries of engineering and science BAs in the 1980s relative to humanities BAs, and in fact the reverse was true.   Further, there were no above-average wage increases for the occupational groups most directly involved with the development and use of computers, namely, 'engineers' and 'math/computer'.   During 1979–1997 fully half of the growth in the college wage premium can be attributed to the increased relative wage of the group called 'managers', and only 17% to the computer-related occupational groups...   Autor, Katz, and Kearney (2008) and Goldin and Katz (2007) emphasise a slowdown in the rate of growth of the relative supply of college workers from 3.89% per year from 1960 to 1989 to 2.27% per year from 1980 to 2005, due to college graduate rates reaching a plateau after decades of substantial growth...   The core distinction is that CEO compensation is chosen by their peers in a system that gives CEOs and their hand-picked boards of directors, rather than the market, control over top incomes.   The idea that managers, rather than [stock-owners], control directors goes back to Berle and Means (1932).   This idea that the principal-agent control of [stock-owners] should be reversed has been applied fruitfully by such authors as Bebchuk and Fried (2004).   They argue that managerial power lies behind some of the out-sized gains in CEO pay.   In general, we believe that better disclosure and better laws regarding corporate governance can help deal with high CEO pay.   Precisely determining what counts as reasonable pay is beyond the government's abilities.   However, there is some evidence, reviewed by Dew-Becker (2008), showing that increases in mandatory disclosure lead to better corporate performance and better designed pay packages."
 
 

2008-06-20

2008-06-20
Kevin James Shay _Gaithersburg MD Gazette_
Professionals & production workers: Visa caps should be lowered

2008-06-20
Joyce Gannon _Pittsburgh Post-Gazette_
Financial firms hiring women engineers, especially cheap guest-workers: Athena study of women in engineering
"'The perceived culture is friendlier' in the financial sector, said Laura Sherbin, director of research for the Center for Work-Life Policy, a New York-based organization that earlier this month released a study published in the Harvard Business Review about why women are dropping out of some technical fields, 'The Athena Factor: Reversing the Brain Drain in Science, Engineering and Technology'.   The Athena study found that 52% of highly qualified females working for science, engineering and technology companies quit because of the pressures of working in a male-dominated environment...   Many women bail out of science and engineering jobs in their mid- to late 30s when career and family pressures seem to intensify [and age discrimination begins to kick in]...   While only about 1 percent of the school's engineering grads accepted financial services jobs in 2003, that number swelled to 13% in 2005.   It was about 10% in 2007...   financial firms are more open than some manufacturing and engineering companies to hiring international students and sponsoring them for H-1B visas so that they can work in the United States...   Alcoa, which has its corporate center on the city's North Shore and some regional operations, was one of 5 companies that sponsored the Athena study.   The others were Pfizer, M$, Cisco, and Johnson & Johnson."

2008-06-20
"timothy" _SlashDot_
UK IT execs want cheap slave labor with knowledge only of their precise combination of platform, tools & applications

2008-06-20
Colleen Flaherty _Darien CT Times_/_Hersam Acorn_
Lee Whitnum challenges Jim Himes and incumbent Chris Shays
New Canaan CT Advertiser
Weston Forum
"Inside Norwalk City Hall, Whitnum, a substitute teacher and Greenwich resident, announced she had acquired enough voters' signatures to challenge Jim Himes for the chance to challenge 11-term incumbent Republican Chris Shays.   Himes, a Greenwich businessman, received the Democratic nomination in May...   The secretary of state's office Wednesday certified the petition for the primary, which is set for Aug. 12...   A former software engineer and part-time substitute teacher in Stamford, Whitnum said the biggest difference between herself -- 'an average American' -- and Himes, is that 'at his heart and soul, he's an out-of-touch Wall Street guy'.   Running on a platform of keeping American jobs for Americans, Whitnum said she'll 'fight like a wildcat' to curtail legal and illegal immigration by limiting H-1B and similar visas, and enforcing immigration on a local level."

2008-06-20
_Washington Observer-Reporter_/_AP_
Congress-critters' approval ratings remain at record lows
Dubuque Telegraph Herald
"Congress, under Democratic control since 2007 January, drew even lower approval ratings: 23% approved, 72% disapproved, roughly the same levels as in the April survey."

2008-06-20
Edward Johnson _Chester Daily Local_
Beware of snow jobs in help-wanted sector

2008-06-20 16:53PDT (19:53EDT) (23:53GMT)
_World Net Daily_
Congress wants to track your every purchase through Socialist Insecurity Numbers and finger-prints
"FreedomWorks said the provision is 'hidden deep in senator Christopher Dodd's 630-page Senate housing legislation'.   It was added by the bill's managers without debate and calls for a tracking and reporting system "on nearly every electronic transaction.'   'Privacy groups like the Center for Democracy and Technology [CDT] and small business organizations like the NFIB sharply criticized this idea when it first appeared earlier this year.', the FreedomWorks statement said.   'What is the federal government's purpose with this kind of detailed data?   How will this data-base be secured, and who will have access?   Many small proprietors use their [Socialist Insecurity Number (SIN)] as their tax ID.   How will their privacy be protected?   What compliance costs will this impose on businesses?   Why is senator Chris Dodd putting this provision in a housing bail-out bill?   The bill also includes the creation of a new national finger-print registry for mortgage brokers.'"
privacy links

2008-06-20
Joe Windish _Moderate Voice_
Georgia on their minds!
Grass-Roots for Bob Barr
Bob Bar 2008: Liberty for America

2008-06-20 (5768 Sivan 18)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Israel's Darkest Week

2008-06-20

DJIA	11,842.69
S&P 500	1,317.92
NASDAQ	2,406.09
10-year US T-Bond	4.14%
crude oil	$134.62/barrel
gold	$903.70/ounce
silver	$17.397/ounce
platinum	$2,062.40/ounce
palladium	$479.20/ounce
copper	$0.2395/ounce
natgas	$12.994/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline	$3.4392/gal
heatingoil	$3.7717/gal
dollarindex	73.05
yenperdollar	107.33
dollarspereuro	1.5622
dollarsperpound	1.9763

I usually get this info from MarketWatch and the "Futures Movers" and "Metals Stocks" columns (and BigCharts and FT Interactive).
 
 

2008-06-21

2008-06-21
Catherine Pritchard _Fayetteville NC Observer_
Public still disapproves of government officials
Politico
"In polls done this month, Congress' approval ratings were 23% (Associated Press/Ipsos); 19% (Fox/Opinion Dynamics and Gallup); and 13% (NBC/Wall Street Journal).   The respective disapproval ratings were 72%; 69%; 74%; and 79%.   (The figures don't always add up to 100% because some respondents may say they're unsure.)"

2008-06-21
Theresa Blackwell _St. Petersburg Times_
Nielsen continues to displace US workers, keeps past incentives, but says they will not seek more
"The Nielsen Company notified Oldsmar and Pinellas County officials this week that it will forgo up to $3.1M in future Oldsmar and county incentives for creating high-wage jobs.   After several meetings with Oldsmar's mayor and other officials, Nielsen opted to end its participation in the county's Job Creation Incentive program and won't file another claim.   The company has already received $3.1M in incentives and is scheduled to receive an additional $463,372 for 2007."

2008-06-21
Julian Pecquet _Florida Today_/_Gannett_
Many incumbents have little or no competition
 

2008-06-22

2008-06-22
Hunter Sauls _Brazoria County Facts_
Ron Paul unfolds new campaign, supporters turn to re-electing him to congress, Barr and Baldwin
"The exposure and support his organic, Internet-fueled libertarian-leaning crusade got along the way is an uncounted triumph, he said.   A triumph not for him in November's general election, but for his convictions in Novembers to come...   Paul's new endeavor, the Campaign for Liberty.   Paul spokesman Jesse Benton said the group's membership soon will top the initial goal of 100K, though details of the operation still are being worked out...   For now, the immediate goal of the tax-exempt, non-profit campaign is focusing Paul's national support on filling Congress with like minded representatives.   More than $4.7M left over from the $35M raised for the presidential campaign by April will kick-start that effort, Benton said.   Their loftier goal is to fundamentally alter what most Americans think about their government and Constitution...   The many 'no' votes Paul cast on legislation he calls unconstitutional haven't endeared him to party leaders.   He has fought off Republican challengers for his congressional seat, crushing Friendswood Councilman Chris Peden in March.   Paul said his supporters saw him as a representative guided by uncompromising principle instead of savvy political acumen...   As for whom Paul's voters will support in November, he predicted many would get behind third party candidates Bob Barr, the Libertarian Party nominee and Paul's 'good friend' from Congress, and Constitution Party nominee Chuck Baldwin, an anti-war Christian pastor from Florida."

2008-06-22
Mary Grabar _Town Hall_
You Need a Weatherman To Tell Which Way Obama Will Go
Steve Diamond: Global Labor: Who Sent Obama?

2008-06-22
Steve "MacRules" _usenet_
float vs. double
Wikipedia: IEE 754-1985
David Monniaux: Pit-falls of verifying floating-point computations

2008-06-22
Steve Sailer _TakiMag_
The Diversity Recession: How affirmative action helped cause the housing crisis

2008-06-22
Steve Sailer _V Dare_
The College Paradox: Not Everyone Gains by "Higher" Education

2010-06-22
Steve Lohr _NY Times_
Good luck finding work over age 40
"younger workers who had the same qualifications as older workers were more than 40% more likely to be called in for an interview than someone 50 or older.   In an industry survey, a majority of technology companies candidly said they would not hire anyone over 40."
 

2008-06-23

2008-06-23
Jack Cafferty _CNN_
Will spoiler Juan McCain drain votes from Bob Barr?

2008-06-23 (5768 Sivan 20)
Rabbi Doctor Asher Meir _Jewish World Review_
Diploma Dilemma

2008-06-23
Shalini Singh _Tech Gossip_
Indian student, the immigrant, recognizes guest-workers are under-paid, vows to run a nicer body shop & off-shoring operation
"Shravan Debbad grew up in Hyderabad and came to USA in 1987 to do a Masters at Oregon State University.   A few years later, he started a career as a Manager in an Indian body shop in the Silicon Valley, USA.   Shravan quit to join Oracle and later Nortel Networks as their internal recruiter making a healthy six figure income every year.   While working at recruitment at the body shop, Shravan noticed that the H-1B visa holders were being paid only a fraction of their real earnings and denied the choice of moving jobs to a preferred employer.   California-based Shravan, along with a partner, has been working with H-1B visa holder since 2003, under a different company name.   He says that he has learned from his mistakes, and will not under pay people.   Now that the length of time for H-1B employees of Indian origin to get a green card has dramatically increased, and consequently the workers abuse increased, he has now floated NRISoft.com which he calls the 'Un-sweatshop' to assist Indians on H-1b working visas get a better deal.   He told techgoss: 'The exploitation of H-1B visas holders is extremely bad.   The unfortunate part of the story is that it is Indians who are exploiting other Indians -- both in India, as well as in America.'"

2008-06-23 16:00PDT (19:00EDT) (23:00GMT)
Lou Dobbs _CNN_
Nielsen replacing US workers with cheaper foreign labor
Nielsen replaces workers with H-1Bs from Tata part 1
class action against Tata
 

2008-06-24: 19 weeks to federal elections of president and congress-critters

2008-06-24
Ruth Mantell _MarketWatch_
US consumer confidence plunged again in June
CNN/Money
Black Enterprise
Bloomberg
Blogging Stocks
Reuters
Wichita Business Journal
RTT News Global Financial News Wires (with graph)
Industry Week/Agence France-Presse
CEP Economic News
Conference Board press release
The confidence measure reached the lowest level since 1992 February, when the economy was in the midst of the so-called 'jobless recovery' following the 1990-1991 contraction.   Those saying jobs are 'hard to get' increased from 28.0 in April to 28.3% to 30.5% in May, the lowest since late 2003.   Those claiming jobs are 'plentiful' declined from 16.3% in April to 16.1% in May to 14.1% in June.   The percentage of consumers expecting fewer jobs in the months ahead changed from 32.4% in April to 32.3% to 35.5%, while those anticipating more jobs changed from 8.7% to 9.0% to 8.0%.   The monthly survey of roughly 5K U.S. households is conducted by TNS, for the Conference Board, a New York-based business and economics research group funded by major corporations globally.

2008-06-24
Ephraim Schwartz _InfoWorld_/_IDG_
H-1B visas do not create new tech jobs
"Using public data, Miano says that if the H-1B program is creating five jobs for each visa, then logically with 100K H-1B visas issued last year, there should have been at least 500K new high-tech jobs.   Obviously, this was not the case.   Actually, approximately 63K jobs were created during 2005.   Miano's figures are from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services [USCIS], which announced 116,927 H-1B visas for 2005 and 130,497 for 2004.   'I only use the number of new visas, not renewals and transfers in my studies.', Miano tells me.   Miano goes on to point out that not only are H-1Bs not creating new jobs, but in fact, 'the U.S.A. is approving H-1B visas for computer workers at a rate to fill at least 70% of the computer jobs created'.   Another interesting stat from the study is the fact that on average there are about 49K new H-1B visas approved for computer workers under the current law.   (The rest of the [over 100K] visas issued annually go to people working in other technology areas.)   So at an annual U.S. growth rate of 63K new computer jobs per year, the number of H-1Bs will be enough to fill 78% of the growth.   Finally, Miano looks at engineering jobs and finds that the discrepancy between available jobs and visas issued is even worse.   'Every year since 2001, the number of H-1B visas approved for engineers has been greater than the number of engineering jobs created.'   Since 1999, there has been a net loss of 76k engineering jobs, while during the same period the United States has approved on average 16k new H-1B visas each year for engineers."

2008-06-24
Patrick Thibodeau _Computer World_/_IDG_
Executive branch filed its response to suit for injunction to stop OPT extension
InfoWorld
"The government expects about 12K foreign students to seek a visa extension, and that figure represents 'barely 0.2% of the 5.5M' engineering and computer jobs in the U.S.A.   Opponents argue that growth in the H-1B visa program has had a huge impact on job opportunities for U.S. workers, and they contend that between 1999 and 2005 employment in computer fields grew by 332K jobs, while over the same period the U.S. [government] approved 330K H-1B visas.   Engineering employment declined by 123,900 jobs during that period."

2008-06-24
Ashley Phillips _abc_
Women dropping out of science careers
"According to a new study by the Center for Work-Life Policy and sponsored by a host of technology companies, 52% of women in private-sector science and technology jobs drop out without returning, a vast majority between the ages of 35 to 44...   According to the National Science Foundation, 211K women out of 486K students are pursuing graduate degrees in science, technology, engineering and math.   In the biological sciences, women dominate at the graduate level, making up 56% of the student population."

2008-06-24
Suzanne Gamboa _USA Today_/_AP_
Labor Department still looking into Fragomen's handling of H-1B visas
"The Labor Department said Fragomen may have broken the rules because some immigrant recruiting forms the law firm provides to the corporate clients say: 'After an interview, should any of the [US] applicants appear to be qualified for the position, please contact a Fragomen attorney immediately to further discuss the candidate's background as it relates to the requirements stated for said position.'"
earlier coverage on the 2nd
and more on the tenth

2008-06-24
_Bob Barr 2008: Liberty for America_
Give parents a choice in education

2008-06-24 11:35PDT (14:35EDT) (17:35GMT)
David White _Yahoo!_
"Destroying WV Jobs Is Tasteless" proclaim bill-boards aimed by teamsters at Capitol Beverage
"Capitol wants to pay its Miller and Coors delivery drivers and warehousemen up to 40% less than other beverage distributors in the area and force longtime employees to pay as much as $11K a year for family health care.   Capitols plan would also eliminate health care coverage for retired Miller and Coors beer delivery drivers.   After Miller delivery workers voted to reject the company's contract offer last month, Jim Waugh, the owner of Capitol Beverage, threatened to permanently replace workers who exercise their right to strike.   Capitols employees have filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board charging the company with violating federal labor law and refusing to bargain in good faith."
PR News Wire: Union also facing off with DBI Beverage in San Francisco
"DBI Beverage distributes beer in San Francisco for companies such as SABMiller, Molsen Coors Brewing, Crown Imports and Heineken. The company also owns Miller and Coors distributorships in Sacramento, San Jose, and Napa."

2008-06-24 16:00PDT (19:00EDT) (23:00GMT)
Lou Dobbs _CNN_
Fragomen under investigation, Red China's Cyber Threat
 
Lou Dobbs: Tonight, stunning charges that the nation's largest immigration law firm improperly helped corporate America hire foreign workers and not American workers.   We'll have that special report.   And outrage after Bush administration officials and communist China join forces to fight a state's efforts to ban dangerous imports.   We'll have complete coverage.   And new evidence that Mexico's war against the drug cartels is spreading across our border, drug cartels may have a hit list of American citizens...
 
Representative Zach Wamp (R-TN): Lou, I was in Shanghai in January and their responsibility is grossly lacking from the environment to responsibility on trade, a million issues, but I think that we're playing defense with China because everybody in Washington through one administration after the other thinks that we somehow have to suck up to them because they're such a big market, potentially, for us...
 
Lou Dobbs: The federal government is conducting an inquiry into one of the nation's largest immigration law firms.   The labor department now says it put Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen and Loewy on notice, that's a law firm, for helping corporations hiring cheap foreign labor instead of middle class Americans...
 
Bill Tucker: The law firm of Fragomen, Del Ray, Bernsen and Loewy is a very big and respected immigration law firm.   Its client list includes General Electric, IBM, and other fortune 500 countries.   On its website, Fragomen describes itself as "the leading provider of corporate immigration services and solutions and leading the way in global corporate immigration."
 
The firm can also add all guest worker visa filings by the firm on behalf of its corporate clients are now being audited by the Department of Labor, labor making this announcement.   "The department has information indicating that at least in some cases the firm improperly instructed clients who filed permanent labor certification applications to contact their attorney before hiring apparently qualified U.S. workers."
 
A spokesman explains that the department has the legal responsibility to make ensure that foreign workers are not hired to fill jobs where qualified, able and willing U.S. workers are available.
 
What prompted the audit was concern that the law firm was improperly involving itself in hiring decisions.   The law firm declined comment.   But network engineer David Huber is commenting.   He answered this ad in a Chicago newspaper for a job with a software company last year.   The ad didn't put him in touch with the company.   It put him in touch with Fragomen.
 
David Huber, network engineer: I found it really strange that somebody who worked at an immigration law firm would be the 'attention to' person in a newspaper ad placed by a high tech internet company.
 
Bill Tucker: Huber was not offered a job.
 
Bill Tucker: But he said a couple months after submitting his resume, he was conducted by a representative of and Indian out-sourcing firm who offered him a job doing work through them for the same company at 40 percent of the pay that he would have expected for somebody of his experience and background.
 
And Lou, I got off the phone with the lawyers just before I came out here, the attorneys that represent Fragomen and they insist their client has done nothing wrong, that they don't tell their clients who to hire or who not to hire.   They simply were there to give them legal advice in guiding them through the system that's been set up by the Department of Labor.
 
Lou Dobbs: An immigration law firm after immigration law firm after immigration law firm in this country all set up to do what?
 
Bill Tucker: To guide them through the system of the Department of Labor.
 
Lou Dobbs: What a bunch of beauties they are, too.   So the labor department discovered this practice was going on some years after the rest of the country figured out that this is a problem among a number of law firms in this country where Fragomen all of the boys and girls, I assume, are guilty of it or not.   I mean what is taking the labor department so long to awaken to this reality?
 
Bill Tucker: I don't know, Lou.   I did speak with the labor department.   They are saying, by the way, this doesn't mean they did anything wrong.   We're just auditing them.   We're looking to see what they're doing because we think they might be doing something wrong.
 
Lou Dobbs: But the lawyers for the lawyers say they're not doing anything wrong.
 
Bill Tucker: Lawyers...
 
Lou Dobbs: It's good when you have the lawyers for the lawyers.   Unbelievable.   How about just doing the right thing?   Forget about the lawful thing.   How about the right thing?   It would help even a lot of law firms who are representing law firms.   Thank you, Bill Tucker.
 
Well, the H-1B visa program is at least one of 10 guest worker programs in this country.   I know you're thinking George Bush wants a guest worker program.   No one apparently has ever had the guts to tell him there are currently 10 guest worker programs administered by the U.S. government.
 
There's a limit of 65K regular H1-B visas offered each year.   An additional 20K are set aside for high technology workers with advanced degrees, [with additional exemptions on top of those] bringing the total number of H1-B visas to [over] 85K [with well over 100K being approved each year].   However, there is a truth that goes beyond the number.   The number of H1-B visas approved is actually much higher.   The H1-B program is meant to bring "the brightest and best foreign workers into the country".   But only 11% of those visas go to highly skilled workers [some researchers put the figure at less than 5%].
 
And according to the latest numbers, 8 of the top 10 companies who apply for those H1-B visas, well, they go to Indian out-sourcing firms.   The H1-Bs are now issued on a three-year basis but that of course can be extended to 6 years and no government agency monitors those workers to make sure they leave the United States when those temporary visas expire at the end of say, 6 years.   How temporary is that? a good question...
video

2008-06-24 (5768 Sivan 21)
Frank J. Gaffney _Jewish World Review_
Guilty Knowledge
"The problem lies with 'Shariah'.   This is the term used by the most powerful -- and virulent -- Islamic authorities to describe their theo-political-military doctrine.   Its stated purpose is to replace sovereign, secular nations like the United States with a transnational Islamic order governed by a ruling authority, the Sunni's Caliph or his Shiite counterpart, with Shariah as its foundational law or constitution.   Under Shariah Law, violent means are ordered if necessary to effect the world's submission to Islam."

2008-06-24 (5768 Sivan 21)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
What were they thinking!?

2008-06-24 (5768 Sivan 21)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
The imitators, part 1
"The United States leads the world in too many areas for us to start imitating those who are trailing behind."
 

2008-06-25

2008-06-24 19:08PDT (2008-06-24 22:08EDT) (2008-06-25 01:08GMT)
_AP_/_Business Week_
Orange County Register to off-shore some editing to India
Julia Boorstin: Seeking Alpha
Thomas Lifson: American Thinker
ranked list of US news-papers by circulation

2008-06-25 06:33PDT (09:33EDT) (13:33GMT)
_CNN_/_Money_/_AP_
Sony Electronics spent $240K to lobby in 2008Q1
"product safety legislation, H-1B visa reform... transition from analog to digital television broadcasting, energy efficiency standards for consumer electronics and waste issues... customs... duties & trade measures..."

2008-06-25
_WLAC_
Big job cuts at Palm Beach Post
P.J. Gladnick: NewsBusters
"Our plan is to reduce our work-force of 1,350 by more than 300 full-time equivalent positions across the Palm Beach Post, Florida Pennysaver, and La Palma."
ranked list of US news-papers by circulation

2008-06-25
Frank MacEachern _Stamford CT Times_
Lee Whitnum makes it onto primary ballot to challenge Himes
"Whitnum said she forced the primary because of changes she wants to make in the country, and accused Himes of being out of touch with the common person.   She said he's avoided debating her ever since she challenged him to one last September.   'He feels that he's been coronated as the cardboard candidate that he is.', said Whitnum.   [The winner will face] Republican incumbent Chris Shays...   Whitnum said she's focused on the issues, specifically immigration reform.   She said laws have to be enforced on illegal immigration, and noted there has to be tighter scrutiny of foreigners coming to work in the country.   Whitnum said she has been affected by immigration.   'One act of Congress changed my life, one act of Congress can change it all back.', she said about H-1B visas.   She said Congress' decision to allow more skilled workers into the country on temporary visas has seen Americans, including herself, lose their jobs in hi-tech fields.   Whitnum, who currently works as a substitute teacher in the Stamford school system, said her career in the software application field 'dried up' in 1999 because of more foreign workers coming to the United States under the special visa.   It allows U.S. companies to sponsor foreigners who have [particular] skills, especially in the science, engineering and computer fields, to work in the United States.   She ranks immigration reform as one of her key planks, and said those workers should return to their countries because there are more than enough Americans to fill those positions.   'You came here, you made some money, now please go home.', said Whitnum.   She said the system has been abused and that it's hurting American-born workers who can't find jobs in their fields.   '[If you] save the American job, you save the American economy.', she said."

2008-06-25
Chris Vanocur _abc4_
Throw the incumbent bums out: Jason Chaffetz victorious in primary over incumbent open-borders fanatic Cannon
Time
Amanda Carpenter: Town Hall
KSL
Josh Kraushaar: Politico
Aaron Blake: The Hill
Brock Vergakis: Fox/AP
Salt Lake Tribune
NewsMax
National Journal
Michael Teitelbaum: Congressional Quarterly
CNN
Richard Winger: Ballot Access News (with interesting discussion)
Composite: "Just imagine.   Your opponent out-spends you by some half million dollars ($760K vs. $176K) and also gets the endorsement of President Bush, but Jason Chaffetz still managed to win a huge primary victory Tuesday by a margin of 60% to 40%.   Chaffetz may not have been well-funded and he was up against the local party establishment, but he did put together the kind of grass-roots effort with no paid staff of which any candidate would be jealous.   Cannon's support for yet another guest-worker program, and for a measure permitting states to charge in-state tuition to the children of illegal aliens, hurt his standing.   Cannon is the third sitting congressman to lose his seat in a primary this election cycle, following Republican Wayne Gilchrest and Democrat Albert Wynn, both of Maryland.   Cannon now says he will support Chaffetz in the general election.   Chaffetz's laudable positions on gradually deporting illegal aliens, elimination of citizenship at birth adn the anchor-baby gambit, that global warming is a sham, questions about the war, the federal budget and high gas prices all promise to make for a positively exciting contest.   Political analyst Dan Jones says the mood for change is high for November.   'People who turned out seemed to be angry.   They are angry about the way government is going.   And if you look throughout the state, most incumbents got beat.'   Voters decided to stick with several other members who faced primary challengers, including representative Daniel Lipinski (D-IL), representative Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), representative Ron Paul (R-TX) and senator Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ).   Chaffetz is near-guaranteed to become the next congressman from Utah's 3rd District, which is one of the most Republican districts in the country.   The seat, based in suburban Salt Lake City and Provo, gave President Bush 77% of the vote in 2004."

2008-06-25
_Bob Bar 2008: Liberty for America_
Bruce Fein & Bob Barr discuss Supreme court decisions and judicial nominations
"Since leaving Congress, Barr has been practicing law and has teamed up with groups ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to the American Conservative Union to actively advocate every American citizens' right to privacy and other civil liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights.   Along with this, Bob is committed to helping elect leaders who will strive for smaller government, lower taxes and abundant individual freedom.   Bruce Fein is a constitutional and international lawyer with Bruce Fein & Associates.   He served as associate deputy attorney general under President Ronald Reagan and was a member of the ABA Task Force on presidential signing statements."

2008-06-25
Lou Dobbs _CNN_
more on Nielsen displacement of US workers
Nielsen replaces workers with H-1Bs from Tata part 2
Theresa Blackwell: St. Petersburg Times
class action against Tata

2008-06-25 (5768 Sivan 22)
Steven Emerson _Jewish World Review_
Nicholas Kristof & NY Times: Never Mind the Terrorists

2008-06-25 (5768 Sivan 22)
George Friedman _Jewish World Review_
Mediterranean Fly-Over: Telegraphing an Israeli Punch?

2008-06-25 (5768 Sivan 22)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
The problem of ignorance

2008-06-25 (5768 Sivan 22)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
The imitators, part 2
 

2008-06-26

2008-06-25 20:56PDT (2008-06-25 23:56) (2008-06-26 03:56GMT)
John Spence _MarketWatch_
Countrywide Financial share-owners approved take-over by Bank of India while state prosecutors in CA, IL & WA target CEO Angelo Mozilo

2008-06-25 03:00PDT (06:00EDT) (10:00GMT)
James Brady _Forbes_
Pink slips at Hearst news-papers
"Victor Ganzi was ousted last week from his position as president and CEO..."

2008-06-26
Ben Nuckols _CT Day_
Tribune papers -- Hartford Courant, Baltimore Sun -- to dump employees
Hartford Courant
Composite: "The Hartford Courant, said Wednesday it plans to cut nearly 60 news-room positions and 25% of its news pages as the state's largest news-paper struggles with an industrywide decline in advertising.   The Baltimore Sun, another Tribune Co. paper, will cut about 100 jobs, including 55 to 60 in the news-room, through buy-outs, lay-offs and the closing of open positions.   The latest in a series of cuts to the venerable news-paper were announced Wednesday in a memo from publisher Tim Ryan to the news-paper staff.   The Sun is owned by Chicago-based Tribune Co., the parent company of the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times.   Earlier this month, Tribune CEO Sam Zell announced the company would trim pages and editorial content from all 8 of its daily news-papers, which have been losing circulation and advertising revenue as readers migrate to the Internet.   Tribune is selling businesses, including the Chicago Cubs baseball team, and a 97% stake in Newsday on Long Island, to pay back its debt, in addition to cutting costs.   On Wednesday, the company also said it might sell Tribune Tower in Chicago and Times Mirror Square in Los Angeles."
ranked list of US news-papers by circulation

2008-06-26 05:30PST (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
current press release
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 354,777 in the week ending June 21, an increase of 5,577 from the previous week.   There were 292,583 initial claims in the comparable week in 2007.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.1% during the week ending June 14, unchanged from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 2,856,654, an increase of 56,815 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 1.7% and the volume was 2,278,797.   Extended benefits were available in Alaska during the week ending June 7."
graphs

2008-06-26
_Moldova_
Conference Board's Help-Wanted Advertising Index continues to slide
Yahoo!/PR News Wire
PR News Wire
UPI
Reuters
"Says Ken Goldstein, Labor Economist at The Conference Board: 'There's no sign that improvement is just around the corner.'"

2008-06-26
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring e-News-Letter_
green card just as loop-hole riddled as H-1B
[Since my last issue several articles have been published] updating the DoL audit of Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy, the largest immigration law firm in the nation.   Recall that DoL says it has evidence that Fragomen over-stepped its bounds in advising employers how to legally avoid hiring U.S. workers, enabling the employers could sponsor foreign workers for green cards [in that it told the clients to contact the law firm whenever they had difficulty finding an excuse to declare a US candidate disqualified rather than to consult with them every time].
 
As I stated earlier in this e-news-letter, I doubt that Fragomen violated the law.
 
As always, my point is that THE LAW ITSELF IS THE PROBLEM, WITH HUGE LOOP-HOLES.   This is true for both H-1B and green cards, the latter being the focus here.   The Fragomen firm is, I believe, merely providing advice on how to use those loop-holes.
 
Immigration Daily, an on-line publication for immigration lawyers, says this quite succinctly in one of the enclosed items, repeating their earlier comment: "DoL's claim that the labor market test [in the green card process] protects US workers is bogus, and over-zealous enforcement is not going to make it one iota more effective."
 
A related point, of the utmost importance, is that Fragomen is a major firm, with major, main-stream clients.   The industry lobbyists have tried to dismiss abuses of H-1B and green cards as being confined to Indian-owned bodyshops represented by attorneys who counsel their clients to violate the law.   This is simply not the case, as seen by Fragomen's prominence and it's thoroughly-main-stream list of clients.   Note for example that the company referred to below as "a software firm" is a giant, Cisco.
 
Again, EVERYONE -- i.e. BASICALLY ALL EMPLOYERS AND ALL ATTORNEYS -- know and exploit these loop-holes.   It's just like the situation with the tax code -- every good tax accountant knows the loop-holes and all the major firms make full use of them.
 
Now, a couple of comments on the enclosures:
 
Aman Kapoor, founder of Immigration Voice, whose membership includes many immigrant workers going through the labor certification process, fears the only outcome will be even longer waits for green cards.
 
"No matter which way you look at it", Kapoor said, "whether it's the fault of the lawyer, or the fault of the agency or the employer, the person who is going to suffer at the very end is going to be a legal, law-abiding... immigrant."
 
Kapoor is NOT an immigrant.   He HOPES to be an immigrant, i.e. he HOPES his green card petition will be approved.   Good for him, but he's not an immigrant and thus his self-righteous tone is unjustified.   Furthermore, in all likelihood he is holding his job at the expense of some U.S. citizen or permanent resident, making that tone completely inappropriate.
 
The Dobbs program, though presenting a much-appreciated message, is missing the point, again because their report here presents the problem as one of lax enforcement by DoL, rather than fundamentally being due to the gaping loop-holes in the law...
 
Norm
earlier coverage on the 2nd
and more on the tenth
and the 24th

2008-06-26 07:39PDT (10:39EDT) (14:39GMT)
Audrey Mullen _Yahoo!_
Bob Barr called Heller decision on arms rights "One of the court's most important rulings on behalf of liberty"
Austin Cassidy: Independent Political Report
Penny Starr: Cybercast News Service
WLWT
UPI
Liberty Papers
NW Georgia Daily Citizen
"Today the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the individual right of Americans to own guns in District of Columbia v. Heller...   Todays decision marks a new era for gun rights in America, explains Barr, who is a member of the Board of Directors of the National Rifle Association.   Barr also drafted the Libertarian Party's amicus curiae brief in Heller.   By protecting an individual's right to keep and bear arms, the Second Amendment ensures that all Americans are able to participate in sporting activities, hunt, and protect themselves and their families, he explains...   But the Courts ruling, though welcome, is not enough.   It is important to have a president who also supports the right of Americans to own firearms, says Barr.   Prior to his congressional career, Barr was appointed by President Reagan to serve as the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, and also served as an official with the CIA.   Since leaving Congress, Barr has been practicing law and has teamed up with groups ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to the American Conservative Union to actively advocate every American citizens right to privacy and other civil liberties guaranteed in the Bill of Rights.   Along with this, Bob is committed to helping elect leaders who will strive for smaller government, lower taxes and abundant individual freedom."

2008-06-26
_Valley Wag_
Google plans over-compensation of CFO being recruited from Canada

2008-06-26
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring e-News-Letter_
George Will column asserting that we should block bright, well-educated US citizens from science & tech employment
 
George Will and I don't share the same political views at all, but I've usually given him credit for careful, tightly-reasoned analysis.   Yet unfortunately, no well-reasoned argument has much chance of being correct when it is based on false premises, as is Will's column [linked] below.   And some of the reasoning itself is strikingly poor.
 
Here is his key passage:
 
Two-thirds of doctoral candidates in science and engineering in U.S. universities are foreign-born.   But only 140K employment-based green cards are available annually, and 1M educated professionals are waiting -- often 5 or more years -- for cards. Congress could quickly add a zero to the number available, thereby boosting the U.S. economy and complicating matters for America's competitors.
 
Will may not be an expert on the education system or the tech industry, but even he should have realized that we aren't producing 140K new foreign PhDs in science and engineering per year.   The actual number in 2000, for example, was 29,951, for instance.   Moreover, PhDs get priority in the immigration queue.   So why does Will think 140K per year isn't enough?
 
To be fair, it must be mentioned that spouses and minor children are included in the cap.   OTOH, Will doesn't explain why we need all these PhDs anyway.   His main example, the late American inventor Jack Kilby, didn't have a doctorate, nor do Bill Gates, Larry Ellison, Steve Jobs or the vast majority of others who've made big impacts on the tech industry.   And one has to wonder why Will thinks we need to bestow green cards on, for instance, all those doctorates with dissertations on color change in chamaeleons.
 
It gets worse.   Though Will may be correct in his statement that "1M educated professionals are waiting [for green cards] -- often 5 or more years", had he done his due diligence he would have found that these people don't have PhDs, nor do they even have Master's degrees.   These are Bachelor's-level people, in the EB-3 category, the lowest of the 3 employment-based green card categories.   Those PhDs Will wants so much are in the EB-1 and EB-2 categories, and the wait in those categories is quite short.   Indeed, as of 2007 September, the wait was ZERO for EB-1, and it has been zero or short for a long time.   [Meanwhile, US citizens with American ancestors going back to the 1700s have been made to wait 4 years for passport.]
 
Will speaks of these foreign workers in the same breadth as Jack Kilby, inventor of the computer chip.   Yet he offers no evidence for this implicit comparison of brilliance or creativity.   On the contrary, the vast majority of the foreign tech workers being sponsored for green cards are ordinary people, doing ordinary work, for ordinary wages.
 
Will offers the argument that at worst, it doesn't hurt to have these people around.   Well, it DOES hurt.   If Kilby were to come of age and enter the field today, he likely would never get a chance to innovate.   Upon graduation, he would probably be shunted into one of the "talking" jobs, such as customer support or production control, while the foreign workers are hired to do the real engineering work.   If he did manage to get engineering work at first, he would find it more and more difficult to get such work once he reached age 35 or so, as young foreign workers are paid much less than older Americans.   Even the pro-industry NRC report, commissioned by Congress, documented extensively that engineers have trouble getting work in the field 10 or 15 years after graduation.   All this is even more interesting in light of the fact that Kilby filed his patent for the computer chip when he was 36.
 
In fact, Will's point that large numbers of the PhDs that U.S. universities produce are foreign students itself shows why it DOES hurt to have these people around.   Back in 1989 [well, from 1987-1990], our National Science Foundation called for an increase in the number of foreign students in order to keep PhD salaries down -- yes, this was their explicit rationale -- and moreover, the NSF pointed out that the resulting low salaries would drive domestic students away from pursuing doctorates, which of course is exactly what happened.
 
The proposals now in Congress to give automatic green cards to new foreign graduates in science and engineering would make things even worse than what the NSF wanted.   As mentioned above, young workers have lower wages than older ones, and almost all the new grads are young.   So the proposals would swell the labor pool at the young end, making it even harder for our Jack Kilbys to make a viable career out of engineering.   No wonder our brightest young people with top math talent are finding it far more lucrative to pursue careers in finance than in engineering.
 
Does that matter?   You bet it does.   America's only advantage over the rest of the world is its innovativeness.   Most of the foreign workers come from cultures which do not foster innovativeness and in fact tend to suppress it.   IOW, the muddled thinking Will exhibits here is ruining the only good thing we have going for us.   So YES, it matters.
 
Lastly, Will brings up that constant industry lobbyist refrain that "We'll lose these people to our competitors" if we don't give them green cards.   Again, the putative good ones, the ones in EB-1 (for "foreign nationals of "extraordinary ability" and for "outstanding professors") and EB-2 (for those who are either of "exceptional ability" or possess an "advanced degree"), are getting their green cards quickly, so we're NOT "losing" them.
 
However: Even with green cards, the fact is that they often don't keep their technology in the U.S. anyway.   The study by UCB prof. Annalee Saxenian found that many eventually return to their home countries even after attaining U.S. citizenship, that many who do stay here start businesses back home, and that more than 80% share technology with people in the home country.   This may not be all bad, but it certainly shows that the shrill "We've got to give them green cards to prevent them from helping our competitors" argument is nonsense.
 
Very poorly researched piece (or non-researched, if it was based on from those slick "educational" literature packets that the industry lobbyists send to journalists).   For shame, George!
 
Norm George F. Will on why we should block bright, well-educated US citizens from science & tech employment

2008-06-26
_Philadelphia Business Journal_
Bank of India to lay off 7,500 after take-over of Countrywide
John Spence: MarketWatch

2008-06-26
Lou Dobbs _CNN_
more on Nielsen displacement of US workers
Nielsen replaces workers with H-1Bs from Tata part 3
class action against Tata

2008-06-26
John Ribeiro _Network World_/_IDG_
Forester: India's biggest bodyshoppers and off-shorers are getting richer

2008-06-26
Eric Hjerpe _Xconomy_
Fear, Competition, Greed & Venture Capital

2008-06-26
_Consumerist_
Philadelphia man strikes back at Bank of India
I hate Bank of India

2008-06-26 (5768 Sivan 23)
Jonathan Tobin _Jewish World Review_
Real Friends and Real Enemies

2008-06-26 (5768 Sivan 24)
Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski _Jewish World Review_
Quantum leap to evil

2008-06-26 (5768 Sivan 24)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
The imitators, part 3
 
 

2008-06-27

2008-06-27
Paul Craig Roberts _Chronicles_
Off-Shoring Our Security
"According to the February 28 issue of Manufacturing & Technology News, our imports exceed our industrial production...   Off-shoring has reduced the availability of good-paying jobs for middle-class Americans.   It is not only manufacturing jobs that are being moved abroad, but software-engineering jobs, IT jobs, and a wide range of other professional occupations.   Consequently, the ladders of upward mobility are being dismantled.   Many of the professional jobs that remain are being filled with foreigners, especially engineers and IT professionals from India, who are brought in on work visas and paid less by U.S. employers, who falsely claim worker shortages.   Many thousands of U.S. employees are discharged after being forced to train their foreign replacements.   The pursuit of lower-cost foreign labor is eroding consumer purchasing power in the United States.   In the 21st century, all net new U.S. jobs have been in non-tradable domestic services, such as waitresses and bartenders, healthcare and social assistance, and wholesale and retail trade.   The U.S. labor force is taking on the characteristics of a Third World economy.   In 2007, we lost 374K jobs in goods-producing industries.   Job growth was confined to domestic services.   Waitresses and bartenders accounted for 29% of the 1.054M net new private-sector jobs in 2007.   Health care and social assistance accounted for 45% of them.   Wholesale and retail trade, together with transportation and utilities, accounted for 17%."

2008-06-26 20:40PDT (2008-06-26 23:40EDT) (2008-06-27 03:40GMT)
Shirin Parsavand _Riverside Press-Enterprise_
Students learning English do better in schools with students that already know English

2008-06-27
Eva Ruth Moravec _San Antonio Express-News_
Teachers are missing the mark in math
"Three Texas universities -- the University of Texas at Dallas, University of Texas at El Paso and West Texas A&M University -- were among the 77 colleges whose elementary education programs were evaluated by the National Council on Teacher Quality.   The study looked at teaching programs' syllabi and text-books to determine that 87% of schools studied, including all 3 Texas schools, 'failed to adequately prepare elementary teachers for the math demands of the class-room'...   Walsh's study said education schools have low expectations of their students, which are enhanced by low testing standards to get certified."

2008-06-27 07:41PDT (10:41EDT) (14:41GMT)
Rex Nutting _MarketWatch_
UMich consumer sentiment index fell from 59.6 in May and 56.6 in mid-June to 56.4

2008-06-27
Phyllis Schlaffly _World Net Daily_
American innovation supremacy at risk
Eureka Reporter
Town Hall
Right Side News
Human Events
Philadelphia Inquirer
"The high-priced corporate lobbyists walking Capitol Hill corridors have [had a] mantra [the last couple years]: innovation.   They demand that Congress bring in more guest-workers, especially from Asia, in order to maintain American innovation supremacy.   The lobbyists' backup buzz-word [for the last 20 years has been] 'the best and the brightest'...   Their argument lacks evidence: Economics 101 teaches that shortages in labor or goods produce higher wages or higher prices.   In fact, we have no shortage of engineers or computer techies, so their wages are stagnant and are certainly not going up.   In 2005, we graduated 271K students with bachelor's or master's degrees in science and engineering who were citizens or legal residents.   [While studies indicate US science, tech, engineering and math workers are the best in the world, the] dean of Duke University Engineering School says that 40% of his graduates do not get engineering jobs.   [Bill Gates's M$] and other multi-nationals simply prefer to hire Asians, particularly from India, who work for low wages and can be trained on the job.   Professor Norm Matloff examined the H-1B record and discovered that H-1B visa recipients are mostly employees of ordinary talent doing ordinary work.   Most of them work at levels I and II, described by the Department of Labor in terms akin to apprenticeship, while very few H-1B workers are at level IV, the level of expertise whose description is associated with innovation."

2008-06-27
_CNN_/_Money_
US Supremes deny cert. in case of body shop employer denying life insurance benefit: Amschwand v. Spherion, 07-841
Spherion, a body shop, switched insurors after the employee had been diagnosed with heart cancer and was unable to work.
Mark Sherman: AP

2008-06-27
_Bob Barr 2008: Liberty for America_
Bob Barr says USA must cut UN role and budget

2008-06-27
Andrew Satter _Congressional Quarterly_/_Yahoo!_
Some reasons polls give wildly different results
"Richard Morin, a senior editor at the Pew Research Center.   In an interview with CQ Politics, he said the discrepancy is probably a result of the Newsweek and L.A. Times/Bloomberg polls over-representing Democrats...   'if you do the math and apply the proper percentages to the L.A. Times/Bloomberg and the Newsweek findings, you find that their results change dramatically.'   In fact, Morin says, if the 2 polls that show Obama winning by a large margin were to modify their findings using the same percentage of Democrats and Republicans as other polls, Obama's lead would come down to somewhere between a toss-up and a small, single digit lead for Obama.   Morin cautioned that neither organization oversampled Democrats intentionally.   It's a tricky business, getting exactly the right mix that mirrors the entire population."

2008-06-27
Brandon Larrabee _Savannah Morning News_
Bob Barr submitted final paper-work to get name on ballot in Georgia
"Barr, who built much of his congressional career from 1995-2003 on dogging President Bill Clinton and supporting civil liberties, is trying to build off a base of disaffected conservatives and former supporters of U.S. representative Ron Paul, R-TX, whose primary bid for the presidency fell well short...   'It [Barr's candidacy] allows the Libertarian Party to actually provide a choice to the American people, a legitimate choice, come November.', he said."

2008-06-27
Chuck Raasch _Gannett_/_Tucson Citizen_
Major parties still fighting tooth and nail against holding REAL presidential debates
"With former representative Bob Barr and Ralph Nader mounting independent challenges from the [libertarian] and [populist], Kirk and Fahrenkopf said they're bracing for legal challenges about who will be allowed to debate."

2008-06-27
Jack Maher _9 News_
iGate Mastech slapped on wrist for discriminating against US citizens and green card holders
9 news
"Ryan says The Department of Justice recently announced that a Pittsburgh computer consulting company, iGate Mastech Inc., will pay $45K in civil penalties to settle allegations that for a month in 2006 iGate placed 30 job announcements for computer programmers that expressly favored H-1B visa holders to the exclusion of U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents, and other legal U.S. workers...   For more information about protections against employment discrimination under the immigration laws, call 1-800-255-7688 (OSC's worker hot-line) (1-800-237-2525, TDD for hearing impaired), 1-800-255-8255 (OSC's employer hot-line) (1-800-362-2735, TDD for hearing impaired), or 202-616-5594.   E-mail osccrt@usdoj.gov, or visit the web site."

2008-08-27
Dan Slater _Wall Street Journal_
Do Lawyers Help Companies Find Pretext Not to Hire U.S. Citizen Workers?

2008-06-27
Marc Gallagher _Liberty Maven_
Bob Barr to appear on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace
Fox
Bob Barr 2008: Liberty for America

2008-06-27 (flash-back to 2964 Sivan 23)
Rabbi Yonason Goldson _Jewish World Review_
Jeroboam of Israel prevents pilgrimage to Yerushalem

2008-06-27 (5768 Sivan 23)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Victimized families must not be allowed to dictate policy

2008-06-27

DJIA	11,346.51
S&P 500	1,278.38
NASDAQ	2,315.63
10-year US T-Bond	3.99%
crude oil	$140.21/barrel
gold	$931.30/ounce
silver	$17.71/ounce
platinum	$2,059.10/ounce
palladium	$471.20/ounce
copper	$0.2425/ounce
natgas	$13.198/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline	$3.5012/gal
heatingoil	$3.9066/gal
dollarindex	73.306
yenperdollar	106.17
dollarspereuro	1.5789
dollarsperpound	1.9949

I usually get this info from MarketWatch and the "Futures Movers" and "Metals Stocks" columns (and BigCharts and FT Interactive).
 
 

2008-06-28

2008-06-28
_USA Today_
Long Island millionaires convicted of slavery & abuse
 

2008-06-29

2008-06-29
_Fox_
Bob Barr
"Well, let's take, as just one example, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.   Nobody is really asking the question, 'Why does the government, our own government, need to be spying on its own citizens -- that is, U.S. citizens -- in this country, without some good reason?'   The legislation that is now pending before the Senate, that just passed the House, that Senator McCain supports would provide the authority for the federal government to surveille American citizens in their own country without any suspicion whatsoever that they're engaging in discussions with terrorists or about criminal activity.   This is a fundamental issue that goes to the very nature and power of our government, but nobody's really talking about it...   The government does not under this legislation need to establish any link whatsoever between the U.S. citizen that they're seeking to surveille and suspected terrorist activity or contacts.   All they have to do is establish that they think one of the parties to that conversation is not inside the United States.   This is far too broad an authority for the federal government to have."

2008-06-29
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
Bernanke's Inflationary Bust
Larry Kudlow, Washington Times: Fed Fall-Out

2008-06-29
Diana Jean Schemo _NY Times_
Diploma Mills
"The company became more inventive and bold, with revenues growing from $5K in 1999 to $1.65M in 2005, and churning out more than 10K diplomas for customers in 131 countries...   It is difficult to pin down how many diploma mills exist, or how many bogus degrees are bought each year, said George Gollin, a board member of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation, the federal government's recognized authority on accrediting agencies.   But Dr. Gollin, who assisted investigators in the case, estimated that such companies sold 100K to 200K phony degrees a year.   Officials say they are concerned by growth in the industry and about the potential for terrorists to use bogus degrees to obtain United States visas."
 

2008-06-30

2008-06-30 06:25PDT (09:25EDT) (13:25GMT)
_KTVZ_
Bob Barr makes appeal to voters at Portland conference

2008-06-30 09:33PDT (12:33EDT) (16:33GMT)
_CNN_/_Money_/_AP_
Jacobs Engineering Group spent $200K lobbying in 2008Q1
Pasadena Star-News

2008-06-30
Alexander Wolfe _Information Week_/_TechWeb_/_CMP_/_UBM_
Prevailing Wage H-1B green card

2008-06-30
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
The Socialist Political State in Action: Not Rebuilding the WTC

2008-06-30 (5768 Sivan 27)
Jonathan Rosenblum _Jewish World Review_
Remembering Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch

2008-06-30
Erin Carlyle _Orange County Register_
Orange County opponents of illegal immigration prefer Ron Paul, Chuck Baldwin, Bob Barr and look to seats in congress
 

2008-06-31
 
 
 

 
 

2008 June
David North _Center for Immigration Studies_
Who pays? Foreign students do not help with the balance of payments

2008 June
John Miano _Center for Immigration Studies_
H-1B Visa Numbers: No Relationship to Economic Need

2008 June
_Top 500_
top 500 fastest super computers LinPack bench-mark
 

"Vanderbilt became the leading American figure in trans-Atlantic shipping until the Civil War, when many American ships were taken over by the gov't...   in 1861, Vanderbilt was a strong supporter of the Union & offered his steamer 'Vanderbilt' to the gov't.   The offer was accepted & although the Commodore apparently meant to lend it only for the duration, the gov't thanked him profusely & kept the ship.   In late 1862, Vanderbilt undertook to outfit a number of ships to carry troops from the East Coast to New Orleans.   He did not ask any compensation, but... it was discovered that some of the ships were... unseaworthy..." --- Fon W. Boardman 1979 _America & the Robber Barons 1865-1913_ pp 28-29

 

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Proposed Bills 2008

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Presidential candidate fund-raising, expenditures, and debt
 
 

"The first object of my heart is my country.   In that is embarked my family, my fortune and my own existence. I have not one farthing of interest nor one fibre of attachment out of it, nor a single motive of preference of any one nation to another but in proportion as they are more or less friendly to us." --- Thomas Jefferson 1799 to Elbridge Gerry _The Writings of Thomas Jefferson_ memorial edition 10:78

Movies Coming Soon
 

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