Cagle World

A direct relationship exists between high immigration levels and the phone research of pro-expansionists, which insists immigrants are making a significant fiscal contribution to the economy.

Economists tout the “more immigration is better” argument, even though their logic is sophomoric and cannot stand up to the obvious flaws in their reasoning. The three-year long border surge that has given the green light to releasing eight million or more illegal immigrants into the U.S. interior is economic good news, shills insist. Instead of worrying about unvetted illegal aliens settling into established communities nationwide, Americans should rejoice in their contribution to higher gross domestic product – or so the story goes.

Last month, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that legal and illegal immigration will generate a $7 trillion boost to gross domestic product over the next decade, a conclusion the agency arrived at after including the recent immigration surge. Wall Street is euphoric about millions of unvetted, unskilled, under-educated, non-English speaking border surgers. If only the general population could see the labor and societal advantages to an open border instead of wringing its hands about, as President Biden refers to them, the “newcomers,” then all would be hunky-dory.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc., which revised up its near-term economic growth forecasts, JPMorgan Chase & Co. and BNP Paribas SA were among banks that acknowledged the so-called economic benefits from surging immigration. In her letter to its forty-two million clients,

Janet Henry, HSBC Holdings global chief economist, wrote that no advanced economy has benefited from immigration as much as the United States. Henry wrote “the impact of migration has been an important part of the U. S. growth story over the past two years.”

HSBC Holdings reported a 2023 $30.3 billion pre-tax profit.

Before analyzing the “impact of migration” that Henry touts, the obvious must be addressed. Per capita growth, not GDP, is the true measure of a society’s prosperity. While it is accurate that a larger population invariably results in a greater aggregate economy – more workers, more consumers, and more government spending – all expand the GDP. But a nation’s standard of living is determined by per capita, i.e., per person, GDP, not the overall size of the economy.

Studies like “The Effect of Population Growth on Economic Growth” have shown that population growth negatively affects economic growth. Another study, “Is Low Fertility Really a Problem? Population, Aging and Consumption,” found that low fertility rates, which the media bemoans, increase per capita economic growth and raises standards of living. The authors conclude that “low fertility is not a serious economic challenge,” and instead, they find that “The effect of low fertility on the number of workers and taxpayers has been offset by greater human capital investment, enhancing the productivity of workers.” They added that “Targeted immigration policy might be helpful, although we are somewhat skeptical on this point.”

By targeted immigration, the authors mean thoughtful – an immigration policy that works on behalf of, not against Americans. Biden’s immigration agenda does the opposite; his open northern and southern borders harm all.

Immigration’s “impact” depends on who and where the illegal aliens have settled. The assumption is that the illegal immigrants benefit from coming to the U.S. But not all are better off – some are working for slave wages in meat processing plants, others are sex trafficking victims, and still others are sleeping on the streets, hustling for food, or stealing. Illegal aliens have perpetrated numerous violent crimes against innocent citizens. Chicago, Denver, Boston, and New York residents have watched helplessly as illegal aliens have transformed their communities. Displaced citizens have no voice in the elitist federal, state, and municipal governments’ destruction of their communities.

More on Henry’s immigration “impact” that she overlooked, perhaps because it doesn’t fit the designated media narrative. Millions more people mean more stress on vital services essential to a properly functioning society – schools, hospitals, roads and housing. After three years of Biden’s open border, all those services have undergone negative, undesirable “impacts.”

Immigration expansionists never mention the multiplier “impact.” The millions that have arrived will soon petition their family members left behind, grow their existing families, or start new ones. Today’s eight, ten or twelve million illegal aliens – don’t forget to include 1.5 million gotaways – will be because of family reunification and anchor baby births, within a couple of decades, 20 or 25 million.

Recent history proves that immigration is the main population driver that brings with it substantial challenges. From the Center for Immigration Studies: “immigration from 1982 to 2017 added 52.7 million people to the U.S population — 35.78 million immigrants and 16.93 million descendants – 16.03 million U.S.-born children and 890,527 grandchildren… immigration accounted for 56.3 percent of U.S. population growth from 1982 to 2017.”

When Wall Street economists with their advanced Ivy League degrees opine about immigration, they project an air of credibility which a large segment of the public buys into. That’s too bad because, when the subject is immigration, most economists are selling a self-serving bill of goods without even a passing mention of the negative consequences.

–

Copyright 2024 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at [email protected].

During the spring of 1969, spirits were high in the nation’s capital. The cherry trees along the Potomac River were in bloom. Cautious optimism prevailed that newly inaugurated President Richard Nixon would fulfill his campaign promise to end the Southeast Asian war.

But more than anything for DC’s sports’ fans, legendary Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi had agreed to assume the Washington Redskins general manager and head coach positions. And Hall of Fame great Ted Williams, “The Kid,” accepted owner Bob Short’s offer to manage the moribund Washington Senators.

Short, a trucking and hotel mogul, had previously owned basketball’s Minneapolis Lakers and moved the team to Los Angeles before selling the Lakers for $5.2 million. Among Short’s goals were to entice more Senators fans and turn a profit. To achieve those objectives, he wanted a big name to take the Senators’ helm.

Williams was certain that he could help the punchless Senators. When Short offered a five-year, $65,000 salary with perks that included a $15,000-a-year hotel suite, an unlimited expense account, a title as vice president and an option to buy 10 percent of the team for $900,000, Williams became the new Senators manager, and set out to prove that he had leadership skills.

The woebegone Senators that Williams inherited were mocked throughout baseball, including in their home city. The 1968 Senators finished in 10th place, dead last, with baseball’s worst record, 65-96. The team also drew the fewest fans, 565,000, a 206,000 decrease from 1967.

The 1968 club had a .623 on-base-plus-slugging percentage, fourteen points below the league average. In 1969, Senators batters had a .708 OPS, eighteen points above the league’s .690. The Senators drew 630 walks in 1969, compared to 454 the previous season. Even with the rule changes that lowered the pitcher’s mound and tightened the strike zone, the Senators showed an astounding improvement of 176 free passes. Williams understood the age-old axiom that a walk is as good as a hit.

Pitchers also improved under rookie manager Williams. The hurlers listened to Williams’ daily spring-training sermons on hitting and how to exploit American League opponents. In 1968, the Senators ERA of 3.64 was sixty-six points above the league average, 2.98. The next season, Washington’s pitchers reduced their ERA to 3.49, 14 points below the rest of the AL, 3.63. Williams’ 1969 Senators won eighty-six games, a 21-game improvement over 1968 and the team’s best record since 1945.

Fans flocked to Robert F. Kennedy Stadium to watch the Senators; the team drew 900,000 paid admissions, and Williams won the Manager of the Year Award. Unfortunately, the 1969 Senators proved to be a one-year wonder, returning in 1970 to their habitual doormat as “first in war, first in peace, and last in the American League.” A 70-92 record landed the Senators in sixth and last place in the American League East

Despite high-profile trades, which brought Curt Flood and a washed-up Denny McLain to the Senators in 1971, the team declined to 63-96. The Cleveland Indians spared them last place in the American League East.

Short had raised ticket prices, and fans refused to pay more to watch a lousy team play in an unsafe neighborhood. Senators’ frustrated fans – 14,500, about twice the daily 1971 attendance – saved their worst behavior for September 30, the final American League game played in Washington.

When the fans destroyed the field, umpire James Honochick forfeited a Senators’ 7-5 lead to the visiting Yankees. The fall out: a long-anticipated September 1971 announcement that Short was moving the Senators to the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex, to the ingloriously named Turnpike Stadium. The Senators were renamed the Texas Rangers.

Williams befuddled the baseball world when he agreed to accompany the limping Senators to Texas. One disastrous year in Texas was enough for “The Kid.” The Rangers lost one hundred games, had a .217 team batting average, a 15-game losing streak, and finished 20-1/2 games behind the next to last California Angels. Williams retired, and headed home to Islamorada to pursue bonefish, a skill that gained him a place in the International Game Fishing Hall of Fame.

For more than three decades and through multiple league expansions, Washington unsuccessfully sought a major league team. Finally, in 2005, the Montreal Expos moved to D.C. to become the Washington Nationals, the 2019 World Series champions.

–

Copyright 2024 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Society for American Baseball Research and Internet Baseball Writers’ Association member. Contact him at [email protected].

The date: September 7, 1892. The place: New Orleans. The event: the World Heavy Weight title battle, featuring challenger John J. Corbett taking on champ John L. Sullivan.

No Super Bowl has so captivated the nation’s attention and aroused its passion more than the bout between Gentleman Jim and Corbett, who most referred to as John L. “the Boston Strong Boy,” America’s first sports hero.

Corbett and Sullivan were both sons of Irish immigrants. Sullivan had won the title ten years earlier and had defended it against all comers, including a 75-round bare-knuckle title defense marathon in 100-plus degree heat against Jake Kilrain.

Sullivan was the last of the bare-knuckle champions, pugilists who slugged each other fearlessly in fights that lasted for hours. He won the bare-knuckle title 1882 from another intrepid Irishman, Tipperary-born Paddy Ryan, six years older, at least ten pounds lighter, but an inch or two taller, which gifted him with greater reach.

With the crowd estimated at 5,000 and following an old tradition, Sullivan tossed his hat in the ring at 11:45 am, and Ryan entered moments later. The men then approached the scratch line in the center of the ring and shook hands. From the first round, Sullivan took charge. After nine rounds and only twenty minutes, Sullivan knocked Ryan out with a final right-handed punch, the last-ever bare-knuckle heavyweight championship.

In the decade between capturing the crown from Ryan and accepting Corbett’s challenge, Sullivan defended his title dozens of times, which led to his braggadocio dare: “I can lick any SOB in the house.” Sullivan had a well-deserved reputation as a street brawler and a drunk.

When Sullivan and Corbett faced off, boxing was in transition from a mostly illegal to a legitimate sport. Corbett’s ascendency to the top challenger’s slot helped improve boxing’s image. College-educated and a bank clerk before he turned to boxing, Corbett began his career in 1886. He fought his matches wearing padded gloves that the new Marquis of Queensberry rules permitted. Other revolutionary changes included three minutes rounds followed by a minute of rest; declared wrestling illegal, imposed the mandatory ten second count, and introduced weight divisions

Because he wore his hair in a full-grown pompadour, dressed fashionably and used excellent grammar, Corbett became known as “Gentleman Jim,” and because of his advance, then retreat style, became recognized as modern boxing’s father.

On the big night, a crowd of over 10,000 jammed the arena. Sullivan weighed in at 212 lbs. – 25 lbs. heavier than his challenger. Betting was heavy with Sullivan, a prohibitive favorite. Two thousand miles away and connected by telegraph, beacon lights atop New York City’s Pulitzer Building alerted the fans below as to which fighter was winning – red for Sullivan, white for Corbett.

Years later, Corbett published a book which described the blow-by-blow. From the first round, Sullivan was aggressive; he wanted to eat Corbett up right away.

“I sidestepped out of the corner and was back in the middle of the ring again, Sullivan hot after me. I allowed him to back me into all four corners, and he thought he was engineering all this, that it was his own work that was cornering me,”Corbett wrote. “But I had learned what I wanted to know – just where to put my head to escape his blow if he should get me cornered and dazed. He had shown his hand to me.” Sullivan taunted, “Sprinter!” The fight’s pattern had been established.

By the time the 21st and final round arrived, Sullivan had been beaten as much by his advancing age as by the skills of the younger boxer. Bruised, bloodied, and beaten, Sullivan hung on to the ropes to address the crowd, still chanting his name, “Gentlemen, I stayed once too long. I met a young man. I’m glad the title remains in America.”

Sullivan’s only career defeat came against Corbett.

Sullivan retired to his farm in Abington, and after a lifetime of overindulging in alcohol and food, died a pauper at age 59. Corbett treasured his title and held on to it as a vehicle to promote other ventures. In 1887, Bob Fitzsimmons knocked Corbett out in the 14th round. In 1933, age 66, Corbett died of liver cancer.

–

Copyright 2024 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Society for American Baseball Research and Internet Baseball Writers’ Association member. Contact him at [email protected].

New York, Illinois, and California are among the states most closely associated with embracing illegal border crossers and assorted other asylum seekers. But perhaps because the state is smaller than the major destinations and somewhat off the beaten media path, Maine’s over-the-top illegal alien red-carpet layout is less well-publicized.

Maine Governor Janet Mills ranks on a par with other Democratic governors, including New York’s Kathy Hochel, Illinois’ JB Pritzker, and California’s Gavin Newsom, as overt illegal alien coddlers.

Maine is normally considered a vacationer’s paradise. In the winter, visitors can snowmobile in Aroostook County, a vast landscape larger than Rhode Island and Connecticut combined. Come summertime, 3,500 miles of tidal shoreline attracts sailors, sea kayakers and windjammers.

Despite its scenic appeal to visitors, residents must endure Maine’s hardcore migrant outreach, and the pocketbook-busting fees associated with aiding and abetting illegal immigrants.

During Mills’ tenure, Maine’s large southern municipalities have struggled to house thousands of migrants, mostly from Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Haiti. COVID-19 brought federal money that the state used to house migrants at hotels, motels, and shelters. The federal funds bonanza has dried up, and the state is on the hook for the ever-increasing cost of providing food and shelter to the mostly homeless migrants. The fortunate are living inside the Portland Exposition Building, originally designated as a sports and exhibition venue. Most of the migrants speak limited English, have little money, and had no living arrangements when they arrived in Maine. They are heavily dependent on taxpayer-funded resources for charity.

In May, 2022, Maine’s growing migrant overflow prompted Kristen Dow, then-Portland’s Health and Human Services director, to send an ominous e-mail to Customs and Border Protection, FEMA, Democratic Rep. Chellie Pingree, Portland’s city council and mayor, and its so-called community partners warning there was no further shelter or hotel capacity in Portland.

In a predictable immigration-expansionist response to a migrant-overwhelmed state, Mills proposed to add 75,000 more illegal aliens by 2029, and in the process, throw citizens further under the bus. The vehicle that Mills will rely on to provide for the unlawfully present aliens is her newly developed Office of New Americans, created through the governor’s executive order. Mills’ plan would work toward “making Maine a home of opportunity for all, by welcoming and supporting immigrants to strengthen Maine’s workforce, enhance the vibrancy of Maine’s communities, and build a strong and inclusive economy.”

The illegal aliens would be called “New Mainers.”

Mills and Maine’s immigration lobby have come up with what they view as the perfect solution – new, free housing. As local news station WCSH-TV reported, Brunswick will open 60 new migrant apartments, with 24 of the units already completed. The units, built at a $13 million cost and which residents disparagingly refer to as the ‘Taj Mahal’ are specifically designed for migrants awaiting their work permits, a process that can take more than a year.

The taxpayer funded Maine State Housing Authority leads the apartment project and has put into place a unique rental schedule. The state – taxpayers, in other words – will help pay for migrants’ rent using state legislature-approved funds. Taxpayers will be on the hook for two years, but migrants will need to pay 30 percent of their rent once they find a job that earns at least $30,000, half the average $60,000 local annual income. Such a rental structure is a strong inducement to never look for a job. Living rent-free is so much better. And while a migrants’ lease may expire after two years, that doesn’t necessarily mean he’ll vacate. Nationwide, squatters’ rights are all the rage.

In this era of illegal aliens first, Americans last, no audacity is too outrageous. State Rep. Deqa Dhalac, the bill’s primary sponsor and the first Somali-born mayor in the United States, defended the fact “new Americans” would receive priority in job searches over military veterans because, in her words, vets “have the advantage of speaking the language [English].” Punishing vets for speaking their native language in their home country is scraping the barrel’s bottom.

To Mills and other Democratic officials, establishing the Office of New Americans, building rent-free condos, and giving jobs away to illegally present foreign nationals at Americans’ expense is all normal governance, even though not a single supporting vote from the Pine Tree State’s citizens has been cast in favor of Maine’s radical policies.

–

Copyright 2024 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at [email protected].

In 1937, Dominican Republic President Rafael Trujillo, a one-time cattle rustler, forger, blackmailer, and then-dictator, decided that, in the name of national unity and to demonstrate his absolute power, he would create Hispaniola’s best baseball team.

Trujillo, who preferred polo and sailing to baseball, turned over the Dragones de Ciudad Trujillo’s daily operations to Dr. Jose Aybar, a dentist. Aybar, fearful that failure to please Trujillo could lead to his untimely and permanent disappearance, reached out to the Pittsburgh Crawfords and Homestead Grays, teams which had many black American stars still unfairly banned from Major League Baseball.

Leroy “Satchel” Paige was Aybar’s goal and the tooth doctor left for New Orleans where the Crawfords were in spring training. In desperation, Aybar ordered his limo driver to block Paige’s vehicle. The agent, allegedly brandishing a pistol, offered the pitcher $30,000, or the equivalent of $675,000 in today’s money, the total to include six of his Crawfords’ teammates.

In Larry Tye’s book, “Satchel: the Life and Times of an American Legend,” Paige recalled that Aybar told him “You may take what you feel is your share.” Abyar’s offer represented more money for a month’s pitching than Satchel earned in a year of barnstorming.

Upon their arrival in the Dominican Republic, Paige and his teammates got an abrupt awakening to Trujillo’s power and the extent to which the dictator would go to win. Provinces, mountains, buildings, and bridges were all named Trujillo. At an introductory press conference, a journalist pulled Paige aside, and told him “Trujillo won’t like it if you lose.”

Trujillo assigned armed guards to follow the players around town – at the beaches, restaurants, hotels, and at their games to assure that they follow the straight and narrow path that would culminate in a championship season.

The Dominican season consisted of forty-four fiercely competitive games, played on steaming hot weekend mornings. The police often intervened to settle fistfights among wagering fans over called balls and strikes. Satchel’s Dragones debut was inauspicious. The team prevailed, but another pitcher got credit for the victory. When Paige hit his stride, reporters called his pitching arsenal “black magic,” his curve ball “enigmatic,” his fastball “terrifying,” and his intelligence “highly developed.”

An eight-game series between Paige’s Dragones and the Santiago Aguilas would settle the Dominican championship. As Paige retold the events, winning was the difference between life and death. In a Colliers Magazine interview, Paige said that Trijillo’s henchmen, looking like “a firing squad,” armed with knives and rifles surrounded the field. Lose, Paige feared, and “nothin’ to do but consider myself and my boys passed over to Jordan.”

Paige entered the deciding game in the 9th inning and blew an 8-3 lead before the Dragones eked out an 8-6 win; local fans rated Paige’s overall performance as, at best, mixed. By the time Paige returned to the U.S, he found himself the target of bitter criticism from the NNL, and from the black press for abandoning friends and country. The Pittsburgh Courier, a black weekly, wrote that Paige was less dependable than “a pair of second-hand suspenders.” Since the NNL ban on the traitorous players was still in effect, Paige established the Satchel Paige All-Stars, and the team hit the road for a successful barnstorming tour.

In 1948 on Satch’s 42nd birthday, Cleveland Indians owner Bill Veeck signed Paige to a major league contract. Paige was MLB’s fourth black player; Jackie Robinson, Larry Doby, and Roy Campanella preceded him. A record night-game crowd of 78,383 fans watched Paige make his first appearance in Cleveland’s Municipal Stadium, a relief stint against the St. Louis Browns. Later, in his first starting role on August 3, he defeated the Washington Senators in front of 72,434. During the season’s remainder, Paige posted a 6-1 record with a 2.48 ERA. He pitched two-thirds of an inning in Game Five of the World Series. At age 59, the oldest to pitch in a MLB game, Paige tossed three shutout innings for the Kansas City Athletics.

In 1971, the newly formed and controversial Committee on Negro Baseball Leagues elected Satchel Paige as its first Hall of Fame inductee. Many writers were outraged that the Hall had created a separate wing for black stars and would admit only one African American player each year. Nevertheless, Paige engaged the 2,500-strong, mostly white audience with his tales. Paige shared that he once pitched 165 consecutive days and concluded his remarks boasting that he was ‘the proudest man in the place.”

After Paige died from a heart attack in 1982, Washington Post baseball scribe Thomas Boswell wrote that through his excellence, Paige proved that “50 years’ worth of black-league players had been wronged more severely than white Americans ever suspected.”

–

Copyright 2024 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at [email protected].

The monthly Bureau of Labor Statistics report should be called the original “fake news.”

Each month, the District of Columbia’s anonymous civil servants grind out much-anticipated jobs data that Wall Street and financial journalists latch onto as the nation’s financial health indicators. Market analysts tout the monthly data to reaffirm their existing economic beliefs, be they good or bad. The first Bureau of Labor Statistics commissioner, Carroll D. Wright, described the agency’s mandate as “the fearless publication of the facts.” Its website claims that “Just the Facts” is a core value. When asked, “Is the glass half empty or half full?” the Bureau responds elusively that it sees an 8-ounce glass containing 4 ounces.

Such is the case with the January 2024 report which announced that the economy added 353,000 jobs.

A few years ago, a critic called the labor report “the big lie” because among its other flaws the original monthly data was subject to revisions, often significant. These late changes concern Federal Reserve officials. ‘We must make decisions in real time,” Federal Reserve Board of Governors member Christopher Waller said late last year. “Whatever data is released, that’s the data I have to use. The problem with data is it gets revised.”

Revisions, which can come more than months after initial reports are published, wouldn’t necessarily be so much of an issue if they were relatively small. However, many revisions over the past few years have been game-changers.

January’s report could trigger history’s biggest game-changing revision. Zero Hedge, which lists as one of its manifestos, “to skeptically examine and, where necessary, attack the flaccid institution that financial journalism has become” mocked the January release as a “clown show,” and as the election season heats up, fulfilling its mandate from the White House “to make the economy look double super good-good.” And, speaking of revisions, Zero Hedge noted that in January, the Bureau conducted its “annual re-benchmarking and update of seasonal adjustment factors.” The bottom line – what was until December a decline in jobs has now been miraculously transformed into gains.

The glowing report ignored the following lay-offs as a total percentage of their workforce: Twitch, 35%; Hasbro, 20%; Spotify, 17%; Levi’s, 15%; Xerox, 15%; Qualtrics, 14%; Wayfair: 13%; Duolingo, 10%; Washington Post, 10%; eBay, 9%; Business Insider, 8%; PayPal, 7% Charles Schwab, 6%; UPS, 2%; Blackrock, 3%; iRobot, 31%; Citigroup, 20,000 employees; and Pixar, 1,300 employees. This month, nearly all Sports Illustrated staffers received layoff notices from the Arena Group, devastating the 70-year-old magazine that once set the standard for sports journalism. Most staff received 90-day notices, but many were immediately laid off.

More inconvenient truths Zero Hedge exposed: The Bureau reported that in January 2024, the U.S. had 133.1 million full-time jobs and 27.9 million part-time jobs. The totals may sound good but look back one year to find that in February 2023, the U.S. had 133.2 million full-time jobs, slightly more than the economy did one year later. Predictably, the job growth is in low-paying, part-time jobs, which have increased by 870,000 since February 2023 from 27.02 million to 27.89 million.

The mainstream media, which had 20,000 job losses in 2023 across broadcast, digital and print industries with more recent media layoffs that include CBC, Vice Media and others, mostly ignored the most important fact buried in January’s report – the number of native-born workers tumbled again, sliding by a massive 560, 000 to just 129.8 million. Add to this the December data, and a near-record 1.9 million plunge in native-born workers has occurred in the past two months.

Not only has all job creation in the past four years gone exclusively to foreign-born workers, but since July 2018 there has been zero job-creation for native-born workers.

With the illegal alien invasion poised to continue throughout the remainder of Biden’s first term – eleven months – and legal permanent residents added at one million-plus annually, the labor market will expand by about two million foreign-born workers each year. The Biden administration has unlawfully given about one million aliens parole, an immigration status that includes work permission.

Foreign-born workers displacing Americans is an ongoing and accelerating tragedy that President Biden willfully imposed on citizens. Biden’s malfeasance should provide talking points for the White House and congressional candidates that seek to remove office holders who support the status quo.

–

Copyright 2024 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at [email protected].

Washington D.C.’s conventional wisdom holds that Democrats prefer a 2024 candidate other than President Joe Biden, but feel that the incumbent has earned the right to run.

Seven months remain until Chicago hosts the Democratic National Convention, an eternity in politics, and doubly so if party leaders and donors perceive that presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump continues his upswing, while Biden drops even further in national polling.

Influential Democrats and deep-pocketed party supporters could lean hard on Biden to withdraw gracefully with their promise that on his way out, they would hail him as a modern-day FDR. If Biden resists, Democrats could play hardball, a technique the party is familiar with. Since there are no secrets in Washington, everyone who’s anyone knows about Biden and his family’s nefarious dealings. Threaten to leak internal dope on the Biden family to the Republican-led Judiciary and Oversight committees and Biden might change his mind. The scenario may appear improbable, but it’s not impossible.

Should Biden exit, voluntarily or otherwise, that would solve only half of the Democrats problems. The other half would be to choose a viable replacement. Many of the names floated don’t resonate with the general public – Vice President Kamala Harris, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, and Energy Secretary and former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm. All have net negative polling.

Still available is California Gov. Gavin Newsom, anxiously waiting in the wings, fingers crossed and ready to pounce should the opportunity present itself. If Newsom is tapped, a vexing hurdle remains – the governor would need to script a platform that will connect nationally, a tough task given his abysmal governance record.

Typically, a stumping candidate highlights his successes. Not only does Newsom have no tangible, tout-worthy achievements, his failures and misjudgments are colossal. The elitist, multimillion net worth governor will never shake his Napa Valley French Laundry birthday party fiasco. During the COVID-19 pandemic when Newsom shutdown Orange County beaches, he dined maskless with lobbyists. The incident, which showed Newsom’s disregard for his constituents, will haunt him.

The dinner is a small potatoes blotch compared to California’s exploding homelessness, wide-spread poverty, soaring housing prices, rotten public education system that ranks 44th nationwide, rampant smash-and-grab crime, and dramatic cost of living spikes.

Although California’s bullet train fiasco has dropped from the national news, the story reflects another costly Newsom blunder. Four years ago, when Newsom unveiled his scaled-down concept for the bullet train, he proposed constructing a 171-mile starter line in the Central Valley that would begin operating in 2030 and cost $22.8 billion. Today, the projected costs are $35 billion, and exceed by $10 billion future committed funding. Adding to the bullet train’s woes: an official estimate of future ridership has dropped by 25%, and the operating schedule has been pushed further into the future.

Waste, waste, and more waste on a project that Californians didn’t want, and few would benefit from.

Newsom’s gravest miscalculation is his immigration advocacy, especially during a sustained southern border illegal alien invasion. California’s official government website prominently includes a section captioned “California for All,” which reads as follows: “every person can achieve a better life regardless of where they start out,” an open invitation to illegal immigrants.

Newsom is out of step with public opinion. At a time when the nation is coping with an estimated eight million aliens released into the interior since Biden’s inauguration, Newsom is providing all low-income illegal aliens – regardless of age – Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid program.

As many as 764,000 illegal aliens could be added to Medi-Cal, costing California taxpayers an extra $3.1 billion annually. The rub is that pursuant to the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996, illegal aliens are generally barred from receiving federally funded means-tested public benefits like Medicaid. Therefore, the burdensome cost falls solely on California’s residents, a foolish, inexplicable decision since the state is sinking under a $68 billion deficit.

Deservedly, California is synonymous with failure. Residents are fleeing for more hospitable states. Newsom would have to be a magician to sell his California as a model for the other 49 states. If Democrats examine Newsom’s résumé and conclude he’s not electable, then they may be stuck, like it or not, with an equally unelectable Biden.

–

Copyright 2024 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at [email protected].

Around financial markets, the conventional wisdom is to “let the trend be your friend.” What happens in the market on one day will also likely occur on the following. Investors, the theory goes, should ride the “trend” until it “bends,” then bail out.

The phrase sums up the southwest border crisis. The invasion continues seamlessly one day after another, and during 2023 ramped up to a record number of migrant crossings with a December seven-day average of more than 9,600, a Homeland Security official told CNN. The record-smashing figure represents the average across the nation’s entire southern border.

In November, total encounters stood at 6,800, meaning that the southern border has seen a month-over-month influx of 3,000 more daily arrivals as migrants continue to pour through the border.

During its 2023 fiscal year (which ran from Oct. 1, 2022 to Sept. 30, 2023) U.S. Customs and Border Protection recorded more than 2.4 million encounters at the southwest border and more than 3.2 million encounters nationwide. During the current fiscal year, 169 individuals on the terrorist watchlist were apprehended attempting to enter the country illegally, and at least 1.7 million known gotaways have evaded apprehension since the 2021 fiscal year. Since President Biden took office, there have been 7.5 million encounters nationwide and 6.2 million encounters at the southwest border, in addition to 1.7 million known gotaways.

Also in the 2023 fiscal year, Border Patrol agents arrested 35,433 aliens with criminal convictions or outstanding warrants, including 598 known gang members, 178 of those being MS-13 members. The agency also seized enough enough fentanyl coming across the Southwest border to kill about six billion people, the House Homeland Security Committee estimated.

The data are included in the committee’s fiscal year-end report titled “Startling Stats,” but it’s findings did nothing to influence the administration to end the invasion. Not only did the illegal alien influx remain steady, it accelerated unabated. If the House’s year-end summary had no effect on the Biden administration’s mismanagement of the border disaster, nothing will. Proof that the border crisis will continue unchecked: in December, Border Patrol processed and released 302,000 aliens. Since the start of the new fiscal year, which began on Oct. 1, Border Patrol agents have encountered more than 785,000 aliens at the southern border alone.

As alarming as the raw statistics are, they understate the invasion’s inevitable consequences. Factor in chain migration and the certainty that arriving aliens will either start new families or grow their existing ones, and population growth will continue upward. Citizens who live in high density cities should brace for more overcrowding driven by Biden and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ criminal disregard of federal immigration laws.

A Center for Immigration Studies analysis detailed that the Census Bureau’s Current Population Survey showed the total foreign-born or immigrant population, both legal and illegal, was 49.5 million in October 2023 — a 4.5 million increase since Biden’s inauguration and a new record high. At 15 percent, the foreign-born share of the U.S. population is the highest percentage recorded in U.S. history. Since Biden took office, the foreign-born population has grown on average by 137,000 a month, compared to 42,000 a month during Trump’s presidency, and 68,000 a month during President Obama’s two terms.

These unsustainable population increases generate urban sprawl and drain already diminishing natural resources like water and farm acreage.

Creating an equitable immigration system under Biden that benefits citizens and migrants alike is a long shot, but still possible. Congress returns from its winter recess on Jan. 8, and will resume discussions over numerous thorny issues. At the top of the House GOP’s to-do list is, before authorizing funding for Ukraine and Israel wars, to demand that the immigration provisions encompassed in HR-2, which it passed in May, must be included. Key among those provisions is mandatory E-Verify which would end the jobs magnet that lures thousands of foreign nationals to the U.S. with employment expectations and to curb the administration’s parole abuse. Parole is intended for extraordinary circumstances, usually granted to one individual, and not intended to be given out en masse.

HR-2 represents the best chance that legislators have to restore operational control of the border. Otherwise, the invasion will continue until at least January 2025. Based on the latest Border Patrol monthly statistics, without HR-2 another 3 million illegal aliens will cross during the 2025 calendar year.

–

Copyright 2024 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at [email protected].

The endless college football bowl season is upon us. Beginning last weekend with the Mrytle Beach Bowl, and mercifully ending on January 8 with the College Football Playoff National Championship game, 43 games will be played.

No football game ever played, or ever to be played, will exceed the drama surrounding the Mosquito Bowl, played on insect-infested Guadalcanal in 1944. The 4th and 29th U.S. Marine Corp regiments faced off before their next stop, Okinawa.

The Mosquito Bowl evolved from a bold claim that Brown University and eventual New York Giants superstar John McLaughry made to his father. Young McLaughry claimed that the 4th Regiment could go toe-to-toe with the NFL champion Chicago Bears. McLaughry backed off a bit but still maintained that the 4th and the 29th combined could beat any team, anywhere.

To lift the Marines’ spirits, the brass okayed a football game between the 4th and the 29th for Christmas Eve 1944. The regiments had long debated which would prevail if they ever met on the football field. By kickoff time, there was a regulation-size field with goalposts, programs with roster information, a marching band and more than a thousand spectators. The excitement was so high that the Marine Corps radio network broadcast the game, and wagering was at a feverish level.

With its six early round professional draft picks, the star-studded 29th took the field against the 4th, which had players who had professional careers with the Detroit Lions, the Green Bay Packers and the Chicago Cardinals.

The gridiron was dirt and gravel without a blade of grass. Two-handed tag, the official rule, was ignored. The Marines played in t-shirts and torn-off khakis. Although they came away battered and bruised, no one complained. The game, which ended in a 0-0- tie, distracted from training for the Okinawa invasion which they correctly described as being “bound for hell.”

Of the 65 Mosquito Bowl players, 56 played in colleges, including Notre Dame, California, Purdue and Wisconsin, and five were team captains. Fifteen died during the fierce Okinawa fighting, the Pacific War’s bloodiest battle. After 82 days of brutal combat, more than 240,000 people had been killed, a 3,000 daily average. The American loss rate was 35 percent of the force, totaling 49,151 casualties. Of those, 12,520 were killed or missing, and 36,631 were wounded in action.

Wisconsin teammates Robert Bauman and David Schreiner were among those killed in action. Heavy Japanese fire blindsided Bauman’s platoon, and a bullet to his head shattered his skull. Bauman, age 24, became the 12th Mosquito Bowl player killed. On the day before Okinawa was declared secure, Schreiner was shot in the upper chest. Schreiner had weathered 81 of the 82 days that the battle lasted before dying in the hospital on the 82nd day. Schreiner was the 15th and final Mosquito Bowl fatality.

Ironically, Schreiner could have stayed behind. He rejected a medical school deferment and instead enlisted. Schreiner wrote in a letter to his parents: “I’m not sitting here snug as a bug, playing football while others are giving their lives for their country…If everyone tried to stay out of it, what a fine country we’d have!”

After learning of their sons’ deaths, the mothers of Schneider and Bauman corresponded. Bertha Bauman to Anne Schreiner: “Our two darling boys were real pals and went through everything together and seems they could not be separated and for that reason, God took them both.” Anne replied: “Are your days and nights getting any better, Mrs. Bauman? I find mine are getting harder and harder.”

In 1947, Anne wrote to Bertha again after Bauman and Schreiner’s fiancées had married. Although Anne was happy that Odette, a WAVE and her faithful friend throughout, now would have the chance “to build another future for the one that was taken away,” she was saddened because “she [Odette] had been David’s, and oh, oh, doesn’t it hurt?”

Anne lived until age 105, and to her the Badgers were always “her boys.” Before she moved into a nursing home at age 99, she kept David’s room exactly as it was the day he left for the Marines.

The lucky, living 50 Mosquito Bowl competitors returned home, but most were never the same. After receiving a telegram McLaughry sent from San Francisco that read “short time, then home soon, love,” his mother picked him up at Grand Central Station. Gone was the Brown University swagger, replaced by, in his mother’s words, a reclusive, jittery man who was an “empty shell that held empty eyes.”

The three and a half hours long Mosquito Bowl that the 65 Marines reveled in may have been the last and longest sustained joyous moments the brave young soldiers ever experienced in their war-shortened lives.

–

Copyright 2023 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Society for American Baseball Research and Internet Baseball Writers’ Association member. Contact him at [email protected].

Even the lowest hanging fruit is beyond the hapless Grand Old Party’s reach.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ impeachment, a ripe peach waiting to be picked, never happened.

Republican legislators have long promised to restore border security which, under Mayorkas’ criminal, anti-constitutional, impeachable refusal to enforce immigration law, has devolved into chaos. At the time that then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy released the Commitment to America, Mayorkas had allowed 3.8 million illegal aliens to cross, and 900,000 gotaways to escape into the interior. In all, foreign nationals from more than 160 nations had been processed and released. There are 195 countries in the world.

The invasion continues unabated. Over the past 12 months, Customs and Border Protection has encountered 3.2 million illegal aliens, and the gotaway total has likely doubled.

A closer look at the 2023 statistics reveal more criminal disregard for Americans’ safety and security. In FY 2023, Customs and Border Protection caught 52,000 Chinese nationals. China is America’s greatest threat, according to the FBI director and others. Customs and Border Protection also encountered a record-high number of aliens who appear on the FBI’s suspected terrorist watch list: 172. Of this number, 169 were attempting to evade capture at the southern border, and three were apprehended trying to sneak in through the increasingly porous northern border.

The DHS guideline for a secretary’s competency is whether his agency has “operational control” of the border. The statistics cited above, and thousands of online and nationally broadcast videos, prove that unlawful entries have flourished since President Biden’s inauguration in January 2021.

Because aliens keep arriving and continuously accessing costly affirmative benefits like medical care, education, housing and transportation, pinpointing the precise cost to citizen taxpayers is impossible. The House Committee on Homeland Security provided a dollar-cost range. But what a staggering range it is – from $150 billion to $451 billion annually.

Before Congress left on its Thanksgiving recess, the GOP had a golden opportunity to impeach Mayorkas, but it punted. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene brought Articles of Impeachment against Mayorkas to the House floor as a privileged resolution, which means that members would vote on it within 48 hours. But eight Republicans joined with Democrats to vote 209-201 to send Greene’s resolution to the House graveyard for possible consideration at some undefined future time.

Mayorkas gets off, free to keep the status quo of wide-open borders alive and well. Among the eight Republicans who joined Democrats was California’s Tom McClintock, the influential Chairman of the Judiciary Committee’s Immigration Subcommittee.

If the GOP can’t count on high-ranking officials like McClintock to support the overdue Mayorkas impeachment effort, then border security is a fantasy. McClintock’s defense of his vote overlooked the national crisis that Mayorkas has encouraged and enabled.

While McClintock acknowledged Mayorkas had opened the border to drugs, terrorists and criminals, he concluded those crimes represent policy disputes and didn’t rise to impeachment level. Then, traveling far afield from Mayorkas’ malfeasance, McClintock said Republicans must not “allow the left to become our teachers,” a reference to the Democrats’ two unsuccessful impeachment attempts made on President Donald Trump.

In McClintock’s view, drugs, terrorists and criminals are okay, but the sanctity of the House impeachment process is more important than protecting the homeland.

Even though the Senate would never have upheld a House vote to impeach, the opportunity missed was huge. Impeaching Mayorkas would show that the Republicans are serious about protecting Americans from the danger that unvetted migrants represent. A related takeaway from a successful Mayorkas impeachment would be that the GOP also has its eye on the soaring costs of funding illegal immigration, a concern that taxpaying Americans share.

The most devastating outcome of shelving Mayorkas’ impeachment is that, over the coming months, hundreds of thousands of aliens will be processed and released into the interior – not an exaggeration. In South Texas, to select one example among many, border officials reported encountering 1,200 migrants daily, exposing the treasonous handiwork of Mayorkas.

By the time Inauguration Day 2025 arrives, likely more than 8 million people from locations across the globe will have been released into the general population in cities and towns across the U.S.

–

Copyright 2023 Joe Guzzardi, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at [email protected].