Ohio Senator introduces bill to help feds enforce immigration laws

Most Ohioans do not perceive illegal immigration to be a crisis in this state; so the pressure does not exist as it does in Arizona to take action on our own.

However, Ohioans want to see the laws enforced, so this may be a good approach to seeing that done. Following is the text of SB 98, introduced Feb. 23 by Sen. Jimmy Stewart (R-Albany):

A BILL

To enact section 109.45 of the Revised Code to direct the Attorney General to pursue a memorandum of agreement that permits the enforcement of federal immigration laws in this state by law enforcement officers.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF OHIO:

Section 1. That section 109.45 of the Revised Code be enacted to read as follows:

Sec. 109.45. (A) The attorney general shall pursue a memorandum of agreement under the federal "Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996," 110 Stat. 3009, 8 U.S.C. 1357(g), between the state of Ohio and the United States attorney general or the appropriate federal agency the United States attorney general designates, to permit the enforcement in this state of federal immigration laws, both criminal and civil, including the apprehension, detention, and investigation of illegal aliens located in this state.

(B) Any memorandum of agreement entered into pursuant to this section shall be signed on behalf of this state by the Ohio attorney general or as the memorandum otherwise requires.

(C)(1) The attorney general shall designate appropriate law enforcement officers to be trained in the enforcement of the relevant federal immigration laws as specified in the memorandum of agreement. Any law enforcement officer the attorney general designates to receive training shall be trained as specified in the memorandum.

(2) A law enforcement officer who is certified as trained in accordance with the memorandum of agreement shall enforce the federal immigration laws the memorandum specifies while performing within the scope of that law enforcement officer's authorized duties.

(3) No law enforcement officer shall enforce the federal immigration laws specified in the memorandum of agreement unless that law enforcement officer has received the training required in this section.

(D) The participation of any local law enforcement agency in a memorandum of agreement entered into by the attorney general is permissive.

DC and Mexico hypocritical on immigration policy

Mexico, because it builds a wall on its southern border; and DC, because it doesn't criticize Mexico either for restricting immigration from Guatemala or for sending immigrants up here.

Dave Gibson at the National Examiner cites an article from the Inter-Press Service (Wikipedia link, no direct link available) with the following very interesting news:

The Inter-Press Sevice (IPS) is reporting that the head administrator of the Mexican Superintendency of Tax Administration, Raul Diaz, has confirmed that his government is building a wall in the state of Chiapas, along the Mexican/Guatemalan border.

The official reason is to stop contraband from coming into Mexico, but as Diaz admitted: “It could also prevent the free passage of illegal immigrants.”

According to Mexico's National Commission on Human Rights, 500,000 people from Central America cross into Mexico illegally every year.

Just as Mexican authorities have opposed the construction of a fence by the U.S., along our border with their country, Mexico is now receiving a great deal of criticism from the Guatemalan government.

... undoubtedly for the same reason that Mexico protests any effort to curb illegal immigration into the United States.

So why do we let Mexico have it both ways, against our own national interest? Let me suggest a reason. There is no political advantage to Guatemalan immigration into Mexico -- but if you can keep bringing in the illegal immigrants and load them up with federal entitlements, they will keep the Democrats in power forever.

However, if the elections go the way the pundits are predicting, the new Congress might have something about this. Or am I being too optimistic? Perhaps I ought to say, "the new Congress should have something to say about this."

Virtual buckeyes to Mike McCool.

How to win friends and influence people

Spray paint "Impeach [Arizona Governor Jan] Brewer" and "Deport [Sheriff Joe] Arpaio" on the U.S. and Arizona flags, lay them on the ground, walk on them, and put a toilet seat on the stars of the U.S. flag. I won't show the pictures here, but they are disgusting even to a secessionist. It was reported by KOLD-TV 13 in Phoenix.

While the protesters undoubtedly were reveling in their First Amendment rights, it is yet another example of things people can do, but shouldn't, if they want any support at all. I guess they figure that with our weak border security, reconquista is just a matter of time.

Virtual buckeye to Dave Dickensheets.

Further evidence that Congress is irrelevant

If you're the Department of Homeland [In]Security, and Congress isn't passing the illegal alien amnesty act that your boss favors --- well, just ignore Congress and it'll go away...

I'm not kidding. the Houston Chronicle reported yesterday that DHS is in the midst of dismissing large numbers of deportation cases, because the illegal immigrants in question "have no serious criminal records."

Let me see if I understand this. "Illegal immigration" is not a crime, but illegal means "not according to or authorized by law" and crime means "a gross violation of law."

I guess I'm just having trouble getting the hang of this doublethink thing.

Virtual buckeye to Old Rebel at Rebellion.

Why Arizona should secede, part II

Here's part I .

Uh, don't we have this backward?

Photo published in Human Events (and elsewhere) of a sign posted in Arizona about 80 miles from the border with Mexico:

Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding was that the federal government is supposed to protect us from invasion, not the other way around.

This sign is an attempt to restrict U.S. citizens from open land within the territory of the United States, because the federal government is not fulfilling its responsibility to protect the borders. There is no question that the federal government is capable of protecting the borders. We still have a large military with sophisticated weaponry. The federal government, for reasons difficult to fathom, has chosen to effectively cede a strip of land up to 80 miles wide south of I-8 to Mexico.

This is why Arizonans are angry. It's their land (even where it is owned by the U.S. government).

Arizonans should be starting to give some serious thought to secession.

Decentralism works!

Here's proof:

Voters in Fremont, Nebraska have demonstrated that local action can be an effective way to control immigration: the only way the American people can enact much-needed border security.

Here is the story from KTPM Fox42 in Omaha:

The ordinance will require employers to check their workers through the federal E-verify database to see if they're illegal or not. For landlords it means all renters over the age of 18 must get an occupancy license from the Fremont Police Department, where their immigration status will be checked.

The votes of the special election will not be made official until Monday. The ordinance will then go through the city council.

Over 45% of registered voters made their way to the polls compared to a 28% voter turnout in the primary election.

Mike Tuggle at Rebellion comments (and I wholeheartedly agree with him):

The high turnout reveals a basic truth: People can make more of an impact where they live. That's where their loyalties lie. And smaller, local governments are more attuned to their friends and neighbors than a distant central government could ever be. That's why political power should devolve down to the smallest possible level.

That's also why those special interest groups who hate and want to transform America, from Neocons to the NAACP to La Raza, all want a powerful central overnment as an engine of reconstruction.

This further confirms an observation I made years ago. City councils see very few professional lobbyists. Why? Because there are too many cities. Lobbyists can't spread themselves that thin. This is the power of decentralism!

Boycott the boycotter

Columbus Mayor Michael Coleman has come out in support of the boycott against Arizona by forbidding city workers from attending any conferences in Arizona until they repeal their immigration law.

I'd boycott Columbus, but I live here...

Taking a stand on illegal immigration

The Dayton Daily News reported yesterday that Butler County Sheriff Richard K. Jones and state Rep. Courtney Combs plan to ask legislators to back an immigration bill similar to Arizona’s.

Last year Rep. Combs (R-Hamilton) introduced a bill that would require employers to check the Social Security numbers of new employees to assure they are in the country legally. Combs said in May 2009 the bill about giving jobs to Americans and taking away a paycheck from illegal immigrants during tough economic times. Sheriff Jones said the bill also is about giving law enforcement more teeth to stop illegal immigrants with fake documents.

As introduced last year, the bill would require all public and private employers to check Social Security numbers against the federal government’s free E-Verify system before hiring someone. Their action comes as protests have erupted in Arizona, since the governor there signed an immigration bill into law last week. The bill makes being an illegal immigrant a state offense. Police can ask suspected illegals for documentation, and arrest them if they don’t have papers.

Opponents say the law will lead to rampant racial profiling and turn Arizona into a police state with provisions that require police to question people about their immigrant status. But supporters of the law, set to take effect in late July or August, say it is necessary to protect Arizonans from a litany of crimes committed by illegal immigrants.

Arizonans have been putting up with illegal immigration on their border with Mexico, which consists straight lines mostly in the middle of desert. Their immigration bill can indeed make their state a police state, and thus is a setback for liberty; but Arizona cannot pass its own laws governing immigration. That power was delegated to the federal government by the Constitution; but Arizona does have the right to protect itself when the feds fail to perform the most basic function of border control.

Ohio shares a water border with Canada, which does not pose the kind of problems states face that are next to Mexico. I am in favor of strict enforcement of immigration laws, but it is not necessary for us to adopt such extreme measures here. A better idea would be for Ohio to pass some immigration enforcement laws that mirror the federal law, but enable county sheriffs and city police to enforce them as state law.

An even better idea would be for Congress to get off of carbon emissions taxes and handouts to Wall Street, and pass some reasonable immigration legislation -- but I suppose I am whistling into the wind.

California spinoff

Leave it to California to take a fresh approach to an old idea. Instead of speaking of secession, with all those bad vibes from the War of 1861, some Californians are now talking of spinoff. Not surprisingly, it is not the Tea Parties that are getting Californians to think this way, but their pocketbooks. From FutureofCapitalism.com:

[T]he big news in California is less the Senate race than the quietly brewing talk of secession -- or, as the Silicon Valley types much prefer to call it, a spinoff.

Not only are California's high income citizens being milked by progressive taxation to support the rest of America, but coal-rich states like West Virginia and Ohio* are hampering the state from pushing a low-carbon (wind, solar) economy, and nativists outside of California are preventing the state from running a pro-immigrant, pro-growth policy on green cards. Not to mention that California is under-represented in the Senate, with just two senators for all those Californians -- the same number as states with much smaller populations. Or so the argument goes, so far as I could follow the description of it from the California bureau. First it was Vermont, now California. Not to mention Rick Perry's victory this week in the Texas gubernatorial primary after warning that Texas may get so fed up that it wants to secede. The California bureau [of FutureofCapitalism.com] recommends reading Harvard economics professor Alberto Alesina on The Size of Nations.

Secession has a bad name for us in the North because of the Civil War and the horrors of slavery, but the American Revolution was a secession from Great Britain, after all. "Spinoff" avoids all the Civil War connotations. As Thomas Friedman paraphrased one Silicon Valley chief executive as putting it, the Obama Team is "very good at listening to Silicon Valley," but "not so good at responding."

And then, there's this: As with every other state (except North Dakota), the Feds are bankrupting the state governments. Californians are hurting that way more than most. A corporate "spinoff" might be just what the doctor ordered. (And just think, we'd be rid of Nancy Pelosi!)

* I know what they're saying; but for the benefit of non-Ohio readers, I would point out that the Buckeye State is building windmill farms and actively pursuing alternative sources of energy, as well.

Mark Twain's War Prayer

As we now go into Yemen, we need to remember that when we seek victories of war on foreign soil, this is what we are, in effect, praying:

O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle – be Thou near them! With them, in spirit, we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it – for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.

The "War Prayer," written by Mark Twain, was written during the U.S. war in the Philippines in 1905; but was not published until 1923, thirteen years after his death.

How any Christian can hold that in his heart is beyond my understanding; even in self-defense. (In my opinion, "self-defense" means the minimum amount of force necessary to repel invasion).

Support the Troops: End the Wars.

One way we can do this on the state level is to demand that Gov. Strickland refuse any further deployments of National Guard troops from Ohio.

So you think DC really is protecting us?

New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd seems to be having some second thoughts about the Obama Administration in light of the attempted airliner bombing December 25:

If we can’t catch a Nigerian with a powerful explosive powder in his oddly feminine-looking underpants and a syringe full of acid, a man whose own father had alerted the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria, a traveler whose ticket was paid for in cash and who didn’t check bags, whose visa renewal had been denied by the British, who had studied Arabic in Al Qaeda sanctuary Yemen, whose name was on a counterterrorism watch list, who can we catch?

One of the most common questions I hear about Ohio independence is, how will we protect ourselves from the terrorists? Surely, an Ohio immigration division would protect us better than this, even with 275 miles of straight-line land boundaries!

Virtual buckeyes to Rebellion and The Other McCain.

A challenge to Gov. Strickland and Mr. Kasich

Support this. This is part of the platform of Republican gubernatorial primary candidate Ray McBerry, called "Georgia First." Mr. McBerry is promising, if elected to aggressively nullify unconstitutional federal statutes.

He also advocates abolition of all income and property taxes, right to life, Second Amendment gun rights, a clampdown on illegal immigration, rein in governmental intrusions on privacy and liberty, restrict eminent domain, ensure secure elections through auditable paper trails, and support for the idea of citizen initiatives.

Conservative Times reports that he is winning straw polls among Georgia Republicans.

Dissident Republicans? Libertarians? Constitutionalists? Here's your opportunity!

Virtual buckeye to Rebellion.

Today's puzzle pic

How do you explain to this child, whose parents can't find jobs, that the U.S. still needs to bring in 125,000 foreign workers each month? Especially when 15,000,000 of us are unemployed, including 618,000 Ohioans. (Click on the image to enlarge).

Virtual buckeye to The Indentured Servant Girl.

Quotation of the day

From Georgie Anne Geyer, on the Swiss constitutional amendment banning the construction of minarets in that country:

[T]hey can hardly be blamed, because they have acted to protect their culture and their principles. There is everything wrong with prejudice and hatred. But there is also something very wrong with not being permitted to defend what you have against those who would not join it but change it.

Let me add a comment. Minarets are not essential to the construction of a mosque. They are a cultural preference. As evidence, I present a photo of the Noor Islamic Cultural Center in Hilliard, near Columbus.

While the building definitely has Middle Eastern influences, it does harmonize with the suburban area around it; which reflects my personal experience with Muslim coworkers.

European-Americans should not be expected to commit cultural suicide any more than anyone else. Unique cultures are built on the harmonization of influences from the people who live within them, which is based on mutual respect -- a concept apparently foreign to Islamic extremists and certain "politically correct" activists.

Riddle me this, Batman

Please explain to me again why it is racist or offensive to send a person who has entered this country illegally back to their homeland, especially when there are many people who live here legally who are of the same race or ethnicity as those being deported?