The Cancer That Is Justin Trudeau:
Friday, February 9, 2018
Is Trump right to blame illegal immigrants for a spike in crime?
US President Donald Trump is reportedly seeking $25 billion from Congress to fund a wall to be erected between the US and Mexico to keep criminals out. His detractors say he is wrong about crime. But what are the facts?
In his State of the Union address on January 30, Trump said: “For decades, open borders have allowed drugs and gangs to pour into our most vulnerable communities.”
He called on Congress “to finally close the deadly loopholes that have allowed… criminal gangs to break into our country,” and listed some points in his immigration-reform proposal, including the construction of a “great wall on the southern border” as well as securing the border.
Trump also proposed ending the visa lottery, “a program that randomly plans out green cards without regard for skill, merit, for the safety of American people,” and the “current, broken system” of chain migration allowing family reunification of even distant relatives.
Opponents of the border wall have been vocal in arguing that illegal immigrants do not commit crimes at a higher rate than Americans. They also claim that illegal immigration has boosted the economy, and that the cost both of deportation and the construction of a wall by far exceeds the benefits of both. But what are the facts?
In a study released in September 2017 by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) the huge cost of illegal immigration was revealed. “At the federal, state, and local levels, taxpayers shell out approximately $134.9 billion to cover the costs incurred by the presence of more than 12.5 million illegal aliens, and about 4.2 million citizen children of illegal aliens,” Matt O’Brien and Spencer Raley, authors of the study found.
This amounts to almost a $3 billion increase in the cost since 2013. This is five and a half times more… every year, than the single payment of $25 billion for constructing a wall.
Deporting illegal immigrants, is equally inexpensive, according to Steven A. Camarota, director of research at the Center for Immigration Studies. “…The average cost of a deportation is much smaller than the net fiscal drain created by the average illegal immigrant,” in part due to the fact that “illegal immigrants overwhelmingly have modest levels of education — most have not completed high school or have only a high school education…creating more in costs for government than they pay in taxes.”
And what about crime? Criminality among illegal aliens has been examined by John R. Lott, president of the Crime Prevention Research Center. According to Lott, an advantage of studying the Arizona Department of Corrections figures, is that “over our 32.5-year period, we know each prisoner who entered the prison system, their criminal convictions history, and whether he is a documented or undocumented immigrant. The only mystery is why this type of data has not been utilized until now.”
Lott added: “Undocumented immigrants are at least 142 percent more likely to be convicted of a crime than other Arizonans. They also tend to commit more serious crimes and serve 10.5 percent longer sentences, more likely to be classified as dangerous, and 45 percent more likely to be gang members than US citizens…There are dramatic differences between in the criminal histories of convicts who are US citizens and undocumented immigrants…
“Arizona’s prison population data allow us to compare undocumented immigrants’ share of the prison population with their estimated share of the state population…For the first time, we break down the data to examine differences between US citizens, undocumented immigrants, and legal permanent residents. One advantage of using convictions rather than just reported crimes is that convictions depend on a ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ standard of evidence and thus are much less likely to count innocent people.”
According to Lott “[Y]oung undocumented immigrants commit crime at twice the rate of young US citizens. These undocumented immigrants also tend to commit more serious crimes. If undocumented immigrants committed crime nationally as they do in Arizona, in 2016 they would have been responsible for...
Radical Islamic Scholar Hillary Let Back into U.S. as Sec. of State Jailed for Rape
A respected Swiss newspaper, Tribune de Genève, has also reported that Ramadan seduced and had sexual relations with teenage girls at a Geneva school where he once taught. The women say Ramadan told them they were special before having sex with them in the back of his car. One of the women was 14 at the time and the others were 15 to 18 years old. They say Ramadan used his authority as their teacher to seduce them. Oxford University placed Ramadan on a leave of absence after the rape allegations surfaced as well as other accusations of assault and sexual harassment. “Professor Ramadan’s teaching, supervising and examining duties will be reassigned, and he will not be present at the University or College,” reads a statement issued by Oxford in early November. “The University has consistently acknowledged the gravity of the allegations against Professor Ramadan, while emphasising the importance of fairness and the principles of justice and due process.”
As Barack Obama’s Secretary of State Clinton, a self-proclaimed women’s rights activist (her Hillary for America policy included confronting violence against women and has a section on sexual assault) went to bat for Ramadan. As part of an Obama administration effort to pursue a better relationship with Muslim communities, Clinton signed special orders to allow the reentry of two radical Islamic academics whose terrorist ties had for years banned them from the United States. One of them was Ramadan. As the nation’s chief foreign affairs adviser, Clinton exercised her exemption authority to allow Ramadan and South African sociologist Adam Habib, a critic of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, back into the country. The State Department had repeatedly denied their visa claiming the men present a national security threat.
Ramadan, one of the European Muslim world’s most prominent scholars, was the better known of the two. He openly supports the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, has worked for Iran and donates money to terrorist causes. His grandfather founded the Muslim Brotherhood, an influential Islamist group that advocates terrorism against Israel and the west and is known as the...
Mad Max violence stalks Venezuela's lawless roads
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| A child looks at a basket filled with mandarins while workers load merchandise into Humberto Aguilar's truck at the wholesale market in Barquisimeto, Venezuela January 30, 2018. REUTERS/Carlos Garcia Rawlins |
Like the Mad Max lifestyle? You will love socialism.
LA GRITA, Venezuela (Reuters) - It’s midnight on one of the most dangerous roads in Latin America and Venezuelan trucker Humberto Aguilar hurtles through the darkness with 20 tons of vegetables freshly harvested from the Andes for sale in the capital Caracas.
When he set off at sunset from the town of La Grita in western Venezuela on his 900-km (560-mile) journey, Aguilar knew he was taking his life in his hands.
With hunger widespread amid a fifth year of painful economic implosion under President Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela has seen a frightening surge in attacks on increasingly lawless roads.
Just a few days earlier, Aguilar said he sat terrified when hundreds of looters swarmed a stationary convoy, overwhelming drivers by sheer numbers. They carted off milk, rice and sugar from other trucks but left his less-prized vegetables alone.
“Every time I say goodbye to my family, I entrust myself to God and the Virgin,” said the 36-year-old trucker.
While truck heists have long been common in Latin America’s major economies from Mexico to Brazil, looting of cargoes on roads has soared in Venezuela in recent times and appears to be not just a result of common crime but directly linked to growing hunger and desperation among the population of 30 million.
Across Venezuela, there were some 162 lootings in January, including 42 robberies of trucks, according to the consultancy Oswaldo Ramirez Consultores (ORC), which tracks road safety for companies. That compared to eight lootings, including one truck robbery, in the same month of last year.
“The hunger and despair are far worse than people realize, what we are seeing on the roads is just another manifestation of that. We’ve also been seeing people stealing and butchering animals in fields, attacking shops and blocking roads to protest their lack of food. It’s become extremely serious,” said ORC director Oswaldo Ramirez.
Eight people have died in the lootings in January of this year, according to a Reuters tally.
The dystopian attacks in a country with one of the world’s highest murder rates are pushing up transport and food costs in an already hyperinflationary environment, as well as stifling movement of goods in the crisis-hit OPEC nation.
They have complicated the perilous life of truckers who already face harassment from bribe-seeking soldiers, spiraling prices for parts and hours-long lines for fuel.
Government officials and representatives of the security forces did not respond to requests for comment for this story.
Barred by law from carrying guns, the Andean truckers form convoys to protect themselves, text each other about trouble spots - and keep moving as fast as possible.
Aguilar said that on one trip a man appeared on his truck’s sideboard and put a pistol to his head - but his co-driver swerved hard to...
With hunger widespread amid a fifth year of painful economic implosion under President Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela has seen a frightening surge in attacks on increasingly lawless roads.
Just a few days earlier, Aguilar said he sat terrified when hundreds of looters swarmed a stationary convoy, overwhelming drivers by sheer numbers. They carted off milk, rice and sugar from other trucks but left his less-prized vegetables alone.
“Every time I say goodbye to my family, I entrust myself to God and the Virgin,” said the 36-year-old trucker.
While truck heists have long been common in Latin America’s major economies from Mexico to Brazil, looting of cargoes on roads has soared in Venezuela in recent times and appears to be not just a result of common crime but directly linked to growing hunger and desperation among the population of 30 million.
Across Venezuela, there were some 162 lootings in January, including 42 robberies of trucks, according to the consultancy Oswaldo Ramirez Consultores (ORC), which tracks road safety for companies. That compared to eight lootings, including one truck robbery, in the same month of last year.
“The hunger and despair are far worse than people realize, what we are seeing on the roads is just another manifestation of that. We’ve also been seeing people stealing and butchering animals in fields, attacking shops and blocking roads to protest their lack of food. It’s become extremely serious,” said ORC director Oswaldo Ramirez.
Eight people have died in the lootings in January of this year, according to a Reuters tally.
The dystopian attacks in a country with one of the world’s highest murder rates are pushing up transport and food costs in an already hyperinflationary environment, as well as stifling movement of goods in the crisis-hit OPEC nation.
They have complicated the perilous life of truckers who already face harassment from bribe-seeking soldiers, spiraling prices for parts and hours-long lines for fuel.
Government officials and representatives of the security forces did not respond to requests for comment for this story.
Barred by law from carrying guns, the Andean truckers form convoys to protect themselves, text each other about trouble spots - and keep moving as fast as possible.
Aguilar said that on one trip a man appeared on his truck’s sideboard and put a pistol to his head - but his co-driver swerved hard to...
Democratic Sen. Mark Warner texted with Russian oligarch lobbyist in effort to contact dossier author Christopher Steele
"We have so much to discuss u need to be careful but we can help our country," Warner texted the lobbyist, Adam Waldman, on March 22, 2017.
"I'm in," Waldman, whose firm has ties to Hillary Clinton, texted back to Warner.
Steele famously put together the anti-Trump dossier of unverified information that was used by FBI and Justice Department officials in October 2016 to get a warrant to conduct surveillance of former Trump adviser Carter Page. Despite the efforts, Steele has not agreed to an interview with the committee.
Secrecy seemed very important to Warner as the conversation with Waldman heated up March 29, when the lobbyist revealed that Steele wanted a bipartisan letter from Warner and the committee’s chairman, North Carolina Republican Sen. Richard Burr, inviting him to talk to the Senate intelligence panel.
Throughout the text exchanges, Warner seemed particularly intent on connecting directly with Steele without anyone else on the Senate Intelligence Committee being in the loop -- at least initially. In one text to the lobbyist, Warner wrote that he would "rather not have a paper trail" of...
The 90 Miles Mystery Box: Episode #162
You have come across a mystery box. But what is inside?
It could be literally anything from the serene to the horrific,
from the beautiful to the repugnant,
from the mysterious to the familiar.
If you decide to open it, you could be disappointed,
you could be inspired, you could be appalled.
This is not for the faint of heart or the easily offended.
You have been warned.
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