Not In the Tea Party Bible

“When a foreigner resides among you in your land, do not mistreat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God."

- Leviticus 19:33-34.

If the tea party actually read the Bible they wouldn't be so quick to bash immigrants. Unless they are racists.

The Chess Master is Really the Pawn

Obama's 3D chess strategy. When in doubt take the GOP position on immigration and piss off the Hispanic and labor base of the Democratic Party. Obama is the Bobby Fischer of midterm election strategy. Obama did so well during the 2010 midterms that RNC chair Michael Steele won.

Dubious Rubio Heckled by DREAMERS

If anyone thought that Sen. Marco Rubio can help get out the Hispanic vote than they are sadly mistaken. Rubio was heckled by DREAMERS at the Faith and Freedom BBQ in South Carolina.

United We Dream released a great statement.

“If Sen. Rubio wants us deported, we’re here to ask him to tell us to our faces,” she said. “We went to Sen. Rubio’s office in Florida, but his staff hid and closed the doors on us, so we’re here to let him know that Dreamers do not forget, and that we will fight to keep our DACA. The Florida immigrant community must see that Sen. Rubio does not stand for us.”

It is hard for the Rubio to say anything to the DREAMERS faces when they are getting kicked out of the BBQ. That is the point. The same thing happened to a DREAMER during a Paul Ryan book signing.

Quote of the Day

W/impeachment issue a few "brilliant" R's handed D's & now voting on immig exec action, R's have done what Obama couldn't- energize D base.

— Ana Navarro (@ananavarro) July 31, 2014

Obama could excite the base by talking about deficit reduction and bipartisan compromise. That is red meat for Democrats who have a Ben Nelson poster on their wall.

Jeb Bush At Odds With GOP On Immigration

I agree with Tengrain on Jeb Bush not running for President in 2016.

The best antidote to illegal immigration is a functioning system of legal immigration… Now is the time for House Republicans to demonstrate leadership on this issue. Congress should not use the present crisis as an excuse to defer comprehensive immigration reform.…we have too often seen what happens when the president oversteps his constitutional authority. Avoiding similar disastrous results will require legislative action by both parties.

Hell will freeze over before Republicans in the House "demonstrate leadership" on immigration reform. House Speaker John Boehner has blamed President Barack Obama for the fact that the House has not voted on immigration reform.

“We’re at a point where my colleagues don’t trust that the president will implement the law the way we would see it passed,” Boehner said at an event hosted by the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce in San Antonio. “So I’ve put the ball back in the president’s court. He’s going to have to do something to demonstrate some level of trustworthiness.”

Memo to John Boehner: Obama does not run the House of Representatives. You do.

Sen. Marco Rubio released a statement supporting sending new illegal immigrants back to their home countries faster.

“Today I reiterated with our Central American counterparts that it is they who must build a better future at home for their people, with the U.S. as a supportive partner. In light of the recent surge in unlawful border crossings, they owe it to their people to make clear that these dangerous journeys to the U.S. they’ve undertaken are not worth risking their lives for since they will inevitably lead them back to where they started.

Sen. Ted Cruz is proposing withholding funding from Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. All this would do is leave undocumented children in legal limbo for a lonfer period of time. Rubio and Cruz are grandstanding to secure the support of the tea party debate. The majority of the GOP establishment doesn't share Jeb Bush's desire to move forward on immigration reform.

Wingnut Alert: Stephen Steinlight

Via Peacock Panache: Stephen Steinlight is a policy analyst at the Center for Immigration Studies. If you don't know who he is. Don't feel so bad. I never heard of the guy before today.

The Center for Immigration Studies was founded by John Tanton. To say Tanton is a racist would be an understatement. Only a racist like Tanton would write a paper titled "The Case for Passive Eugenics." Tanton's paper is only four pages long. This is the final paragraph.

As with euthanasia, active eugenics will deservedly continue to be rejected by most persons, but passive eugenics should elicit their support. Far from being racist or genocidal, it seeks to improve the potential of minority groups, which will do more for their prospects than any increase in numbers which might be foregone through larger family size and reproduction outside the years of reproductive efficiency. Further, the beneficial demo-graphic effect of limiting the size of the human community will assure that more resources are available to nurture each child that is born.

Think Progress found a quote of Tanton desiring America to have a white majority. You know what kind of people want a white majority? White supremacists.

“I’ve come to the point of view that for European-American society and culture to persist requires a European-American majority, and a clear one at that.”

Steinlight is even more open and outlandish than Tanton in his views on immigration. The Southern Poverty Law Center has this outrageous quote by Steinlight.

But the history of CIS make clear that it has always been part of a broad-based and well-planned effort to attack immigration in all forms. CIS Senior Policy Analyst Stephen Steinlight pretty much captured CIS' brand of "independent" analysis when he told the Inter Press Service News Agency in 2005 that immigration threatens "the American people as a whole and the future of Western civilization."

Therefore it is not surprising that Steinlight would advocate for the impeachment and hanging of President Barack Obama. You can hear cheers from the few elderly tea party attendees.

"A rash of opinion polls which have come out, not push polls, real polls, including one by Gallup that showed that 65 percent of the American people don’t want any part of an Obama-style immigration reform. But the idea of this [lawsuit] is vintage Boehner, it’s a political loser. There is no court that is going to stop Obama from doing anything. We all know, if there ever was a president that deserved to be impeached, it’s this guy. Alright? I mean, I wouldn’t stop. I would think being hung, drawn, and quartered is probably too good for him."

Quote of the Day

"If he’s going to pick Rick Perry’s brain, that’s the definition of slim pickins."

Paul Begala, on President Barack Obama asking Gov. Rick Perry on advice on immigration.

Write A Caption: Anti-Immigration Edition

You silly liberals wish you were as smart as this man. Learn to speak Americana or go home.

Fox News Not So Fair and Balanced Toward Immigrant Children

President Barack Obama has eased restrictions for immigrant children residing in America. Gabe Ortíz tweeted this less than fair and balanced graphic Fox News used to report on white adult protesting against immigrant children. This is the same network that employs anti-immigration xenophobe Lou Dobbs. Bill O'Reilly floated the conspiracy theory that children maybe abducted from their villages across Central America and sent to the United States.

“The media is telling the folks that if they come to the United States now, because of the DREAM Act and some of the other things that have been proposed, they’ll be able to stay,” he told Dobbs. “So then the people smugglers, the human smugglers, which take the children out of their villages and shepherd them all the way through Mexico, they’re making a ton of money.”

O'Reilly is making a ton of money gining up fear with his 72 year-old demographic.

The median age for Mr. O’Reilly’s audience reached a new high, 72.1. And less than 15 percent of his audience fell within the 25-54 group. (He still dwarfs his news competition in terms of numbers: CNN averaged 145,000 viewers in that hour among the 25-54 year old audience, and MSNBC just 127,000.)

The Fox News audience is old and terrified of brown people. The coverage by Fox News plays into the fears of its audience.

Bonus Quote of the Day

I actually think Marco Rubio turning against his signature legislative accomplishment makes him a GOP frontrunner in the Romney/McCain mold.

— LOLGOP (@LOLGOP) March 6, 2014

Is that a flip or a flop we hear from Dubious Rubio?

What Was Alex Sink Thinking? (Updated)

I bet Alex Sink really wishes she could take this quote back.

"We have a lot of employers over on the beaches that rely upon workers and especially in this high-growth environment, where are you going to get people to work to clean our hotel rooms or do our landscaping?"

Alex Sink sees Hispanic people as cleaning maids and landscapers. How about future corporate executives or political leaders. Sink doesn't dream big.

Update: Dave Weigel provides context and the entire quote of Alex Sink's statement. Turns out the outrage over Sink's statement is much ado about nothing. Sink stressed the need for immigrants to have better opportunities. Sink told the story of the child of illegal immigrants who became a high school valedictorian and is now an attorney.

Immigration reform is important in our country. It's one of the main agenda items of the beaches' chamber of commerce, for obvious reasons, because we have a lot of employers over on the beaches that rely upon workers, and especially in this high-growth environment, where are you going to get people to work to clean our hotel rooms or do our landscaping? And we don’t need to put those employers in a position of hiring undocumented and illegal workers.

I believe that the Senate came together in a bipartisan way to forge a solution. It was a very tough negotiation, and Sen. Marco Rubio was a participant in that, and one of the leaders, and members of his own party has even come against him. For every example that you hear, I think about the high school valedictorian -- I believe he lives in this district now. High school valedictorian.

He was brought here when he was a young man, 9 or 10 years old. He didn’t choose to come here. His parents brought him. He was undocumented. And what does he do? How does he get an education? He did everything right. He became an incredible student. He even eventually ended up going to law school and becoming a lawyer. But right now he can't practice law because of his undocumented status. That’s not right. We need to bring these people out the shadows so that they're paying into Social Security, paying into Medicare, paying federal income taxes, so that they're not security issues. But they have to earn their way. So we need immigration reform and I would definitely join with Democrats and Republicans in the House and pass immigration reform as soon as possible.

I'm not the world's biggest Alex Sink fan but I do owe her an apology for not properly fact-checking her statement. Dave Jolly and the Republican Party of Florida should stop accusing Sink of racism.

Movement on In-State Tuition Rates

Florida state Sen. Jack Latvala is proposing in-state tuition rates for the children of illegal immigrants.

"These children are the children of taxpayers in Florida, who pay our sales tax, who pay our gas tax," Latvala said at a news conference Wednesday at St. Petersburg College's Clearwater campus. "I just think this is a disparity, a discriminatory issue that needs to go away."

State Rep. Ed Hooper appeared with Latvala at a press conference at St. Petersburg College. Hooper voiced approval for Latvala Senate bill. Rep. Jeanette Nuñez is working on a companion bill in the House. House Speaker Will Weatherford has indicated that Nuñez's bill will get a floor vote. The problem appears to be Senate President Don Gaetz doesn't support Latvala's proposed bill.

"I don't know how I explain to them that … we will subsidize families who didn't play by the rules," Gaetz said.

Without Gaetz children of illegal immigrants will not get in-state student rates. These children are being punished for their parents' citizenship status. This policy hampers the economic opportunities for young people that have been in America most or all their lives. These young people identify themselves as Americans. Yet they are denied the education to achieve the American dream.

KidCare Needs to Be Expanded

Florida House Rep. Amanda Murphy sent out this press release on her support of Medicaid expansion in Florida.

“There are many points with the plan that I agree with and plan on supporting, but it is missing one crucial aspect in protecting vulnerable Floridians and that is Medicaid Expansion,” said Representative Amanda Murphy. “As we learned last week, the decision to not take the Medicaid Expansion dollars last year could cost Florida businesses hundreds of millions of dollars. The Florida Legislature needs to have conversations about protecting the vulnerable by assuring access to affordable and quality healthcare and eliminating the possibility of millions in fines to our small businesses.”

Representative Murphy announced earlier this week her intentions to file a companion bill to SB 710 filled by Senator Garcia, Senate District 38, last week. The bill would provide increased benefits through the Healthy Kids and Healthy Florida programs. Healthy Florida uses available federal funding to assist individuals and families with purchasing private insurance coverage.

The Purpose of Sen. Rene Garcia's bill is to expand Kidcare coverage

Revising the components of Florida Kidcare; prohibiting a cause of action from arising against the Florida Healthy Kids Corporation for failure to make health services available; amending s. 409.8132, F.S.; revising the eligibility of the Medikids program component; revising the enrollment requirements for Medikids; amending s. 409.8134, F.S., relating to Florida Kidcare; conforming provisions to changes made by the act; amending s. 409.814, F.S.; revising eligibility requirements for Florida Kidcare

A reason why this bill might be dead on arrival is that coverage for the children of legal immigrants. There is some conflicting interest involved. Garcia is a KidCare activist.

Garcia present a previous version of this bill. These are the numbers Garcia said Kidcare expansion for children of legal immigrants would cost.

The maximum cost to the state of extending coverage to legal immigrant children would be $17.6 million.

To pay for it there is unspent state funds already earmarked for children’s health coverage as well as money freed up as a result of increased federal match rates. This means there is a bare minimum of $39.1 million in state funding available to fund this important coverage.

Investment in coverage of these otherwise uninsured children will draw down an additional $43.1 million in federal funds.

I’d be happy to provide to you and your staff with a cost brief detailing all of this information.

According to a Miami Herald article, Florida has the second highest rate of uninsured people under the age of 65 in America. The problem is Florida has a McJob economy.

Steven Marcus, chief executive of the Health Foundation of South Florida, a public charity that funds healthcare initiatives in the region, attributed Miami-Dade’s high rate of uninsured residents to the county’s large number of small businesses, many of which do not offer health insurance to their employees — the most common method for Americans to receive coverage.

“We’re a very small-business, service economy,’’ Marcus said. “Our small businesses have never supported healthcare.’’

Florida House Speaker Will Weatherford made a political decision to deny Medicaid expansion. This has an effect on the many children in Florida that is denied health coverage. There is no rationale moral reason to deny children health care.

Dubious Rubio's Immigration Failure

Columnist Ruben Navarrette sums up how Sen. Marco Rubio can no longer be taken seriously on immigration.

Given his retreat, Rubio may have actually diminished the GOP brand among Latinos. He sent the message that, despite their lip service about immigration reform, Republicans won’t stand up to right-wing nativists. He is lost, and so is the party.

Rubio was once front-page news, and now he is yesterday’s news. No one cares what he thinks about the immigration issue, because they know that –given time –it’ll change.

Ouch.

My question is why did anyone take Rubio seriously? When the going gets tough Rubio gets to choking. Cue video.

Quote of the Day

"We have no intention of ever going to conference on the Senate bill … I want us to deal with this issue, but I want to deal with it in a commonsense step by step way as we develop the principles, we’ll figure out how we’ll move ahead."

House Speaker John Boehner

Boehner knows full well that he has to go to conference to deal with any problems he may have with the Senate immigration bill. Boehner won't do that because the tea party members in his caucus would revolt if he touches immigration reform.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi responded to the Boehner press conference with this. tweet.

Actually it is easy, @SpeakerBoehner. With 190 cosponsors on H.R.15 and 28 Rs vowing support, we have the votes to pass #immigration reform.

— Nancy Pelosi (@NancyPelosi) November 13, 2013

The DNC should pound Republicans for their lack of action on immigration reform.

Dubious Rubio Flip Flops on Comprehensive Immigration Reform

Sen. Marco Rubio was one of the authors of the Senate's comprehensive immigration reform bill. Rubio is losing his appeal with the tea party. Rubio is now urging a piece meal approach to immigration reform.

"Any effort to use a limited bill as a ruse to trigger a conference that would then produce a comprehensive bill would be counterproductive. Furthermore, any such effort would fail, because any single senator can and will block conference unless such conference is specifically instructed to limit the conference to only the issue dealt with in the underlying bill,” Rubio spokesman Alex Conant told Breitbart News.

Translation: Rubio's spokesman makes it clear that the Senator doesn't even support going to conference with the House. This is an extremist position. Republicans refusing to have the House and Senate go to conference is one of the reasons why there was a federal government shutdown. The House and Senate cannot bring legislation to President Barack Obama's desk without going to conference. What Rubio is actually proposing is to kill immigration reform.

Rubio has repeatedly shown that he will choke when under political pressure. A perfect example is Rubio's bottled water moment during his State of the Union response.

Rubio participated in the Ted Cruz filibuster to defund Obamacare. When poll numbets turned against Republicans on the shutdown, Rubio lowered his media profile. The Rubio who advocated not funding to government until Obamacare is defunded suddenly went silent.

The Marco Rubio political playbook is take politically unpopular positions to appease the tea party, panic and then take another politically unpopular position to repair the damage to his conservative popularity. This is what a politician with no concern about policy does.

Write A Caption: Steve King

I wrote before about Rep. Steve King's anti-immigration rally in Virginia. As you can see, there were less people at King's rally than a midnight showing of Ishtar. Politico reported there were 60 people at King's rally. Where are those people in this photo?

Steve King's Lame Anti-immigration Rally

Iowa Republican Congressman Steve King traveled from Washington D.C. to Virginia for a highly-billed anti-immigration rally. There was just one problem. According to Politico, only 60 attended.

“Now think what that is,” King said to the 60 or so attendees at the rally. “If you bring people from a violent civilization into a less-violent civilization, you’re going to have more violence right? It’s like pouring hot water into cold water, does it raise the temperature or not?”

So now King is calling Mexicans violent savages. King bases this on no factual evidence.

Speaking of hot water, King got into some when he made the bizarre claim that Mexican children were drug mules and had "hands the size of cantaloupes."

He cites those illegals who were brought to the United States by their parents as young children, for instance. "Some of them are valedictorians —and their parents brought them in. It wasn't their fault. It's true in some cases, but they aren't all valedictorians. They weren't all brought in by their parents. "For everyone who's a valedictorian, there's another 100 out there who weigh 130 pounds —and they’ve got hands the size of cantaloupes because they're hauling 75 pounds of marijuana across the desert,” King tells Newsmax. “Those people would be legalized with the same act."

Housr Speaker John Boehner is going out of his way to distance himself from King. The xenophobia of tea party politicians like King have np true grassroots support. That doesn't stop the media from covering King and helping him spread his hateful rhetoric.

Wingnut of the Day: Rep. Steve King

Republican Rep. Steve King can't help but say racist things about Hispanics. King told Newsmax that the children of illegal immigrant are actually drug mules.

He cites those illegals who were brought to the United States by their parents as young children, for instance.

"Some of them are valedictorians — and their parents brought them in. It wasn't their fault. It's true in some cases, but they aren't all valedictorians. They weren't all brought in by their parents.

"For everyone who's a valedictorian, there's another 100 out there who weigh 130 pounds — and they’ve got hands the size of cantaloupes because they're hauling 75 pounds of marijuana across the desert,” King tells Newsmax. “Those people would be legalized with the same act."

How does King know that these children have "hands the size of cantaloupes"? Has King personally examined children of illegal immigrants. King says these crazy things without any facts. King doubled down and told Breitbart News that what he said was the gospel truth.

In an interview with Breitbart News on Wednesday, King pushed back against the Republican backlash by calling on people to review his remarks. He said, “they will understand that what I said is objective, it’s true and it cannot be logically challenged.”

Even fellow Republicans aren't buying it and are distancing themselves from King.

House Speaker John Boehner

“There can be honest disagreements about policy without using hateful language,” Boehner said in his statement. “Everyone needs to remember that.”

"Hateful language" is a polite way of Boehner admitting that King sounds like a racist.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor

”I strongly disagree with his characterization of the children of immigrants and find the comments inexcusable.”

Let's make things clear. Steve King is never going to march in a civil rights rally. King's has shown public disdain for gays and lesbians. King is against ENDA and made these bizarre remarks to Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council.

KING: And he said, “let me ask you a question.” “Am I heterosexual or am I homosexual?” And they looked him up and down, actually they should have known, but they said, “We don’t know.” And he said, “Exactly, my point. If you don’t project it, if you don’t advertise it, how would anyone know to discriminate against you?” And that’s at the basis of this. So if people wear their sexuality on their sleeve and then they want to bring litigation against someone that they would point their finger at and say, “You discriminate.” …This is the homosexual lobby taking it out on the rest of society and they are demanding affirmation for their lifestyle, that’s at the bottom of this.

King went as far as to accuse Attorney Eric Holder and President Barack Obama of racism. I love how racists project their faults on others.

When you look at this administration, I'm offended by Eric Holder and the President also, their posture. It looks like Eric Holder said that white people in America are cowards when it comes to race. And I don't know what the basis of that is but I'm not a coward when it comes to that and I'm happy to talk about these things and I think we should. But the President has demonstrated that he has a default mechanism in him that breaks down the side of race - on the side that favors the black person.

I hope the people in King's district are proud of their elected representative.

Quote of the Day

"From those incredible blood lines of Thomas Jefferson and George Washington and John Smith. And all these great Americans, Martin Luther King. These great Americans who built this country. You came from them. And the unique thing about being from that part of the world, when you learn about breeding, you learn that you cannot breed Secretariat to a donkey and expect to win the Kentucky Derby. You guys have incredible DNA and don’t forget it."

Ken Crow, of Tea Party Community, speaking at an anti-immigration rally at Upper Senate Park.

Crow worked in a Martin Luther King reference to not sound racist. I don't know how comparing the DNA of Hispanics to that of a donkey cannot be interpreted as being racist.