Eeyores news and view

This topic may have been out of the news lately but seems to have come back with a vengenace lately. Which is a good thing here is an article on illegal imagration. Heavy emphases on ILLEGAL.

Feds shift gears on illegal immigration
The Department of Homeland Security is changing the way it tackles illegal immigration, in many cases remaking or rescinding Bush administration policies.
The changes put heavier emphasis on employers, including more investigations of hiring records and fines for violations, says John Morton, assistant secretary for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in DHS.
"We have to come to grips with the market for illegal labor," he says. "To get there, we have to move beyond individual cases."
The arrests of hundreds of illegal workers at a time in raids at factories and meatpacking plants were a visible component of President George W. Bush's immigration enforcement strategy.
The largest workplace raid under the Obama administration was in February, when 28 illegal immigrants were arrested at an engine manufacturer in Bellingham, Wash.
Guidelines issued since then make it clear that raids targeting employees won't be a priority. The agency still will arrest illegal immigrants as it conducts investigations, Morton says, but "we are going to place our focus … first and foremost on the employer."
On July 1, ICE notified 652 businesses that it would inspect their hiring records to make sure they verified their workers' legal status, and Morton says the push will expand. ICE began 503 such audits in all of last year.
Other changes:
• DHS announced on July 8 that it would rescind a Bush proposal to crack down on businesses that don't fire workers whose Social Security numbers don't match government records. The plan, tied up by court challenges, never went into effect.
The agency said it will move ahead with another Bush plan to require businesses with federal contracts to verify the legal status of employees using an online government database. The DHS says the system will catch inconsistencies earlier.
The department estimates that the rule will cover 3.8 million employees.
• Two days later, DHS announced new standards for a program that gives authority to enforce immigration laws to state and local law enforcement agencies that sign agreements with the department and undergo training. The revised contracts direct police to focus mainly on illegal immigrants who are already in jail or have been convicted or arrested in drug or violent crimes, not those involved in minor offenses such as traffic violations.
Tamar Jacoby supports the enforcement changes because, she says, ICE is using limited resources to target the worst offenders. Jacoby is president of ImmigrationWorks USA, a group of employers who want changes in the law to allow more foreign workers to enter the country legally.
"If we as a nation can prove to the public that we're able and willing and serious about enforcing the law, the public will be potentially more open to immigration reform," she says.
Rosemary Jenks of NumbersUSA, which calls for reduced immigration, criticizes the shifts, saying they will lead to fewer arrests of illegal immigrants. "The message is, if you come here illegally, you can get a job, you can stay under the radar, don't commit a crime and you'll be fine," she says. "It's essentially a de facto amnesty."
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2009-07-20-immigration_N.htm?csp=34

Watchdog: TARP tab could hit $24 trillion
Think last year's $700 billion Wall Street rescue package was beaucoup bucks to spend bailing out the nation's floundering financial system? That's chump change compared to what the overall price tag could be, a government watchdog says.
The inspector general in charge of overseeing the Treasury Department's bank-bailout program says the massive endeavor could end up costing taxpayers almost $24 trillion in a worst-case scenario. That's more than six times President Obama's proposed $3.55 trillion budget for 2010.
Much of the bailout's attention has focused on the Treasury's $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, which Congress hurriedly passed last fall. But about 50 other federal programs that began as early as 2007 could push the government's total financial support of the private financial sector to at least $23.7 trillion, says TARP Special Inspector General Neil Barofsky.
The estimate - which the Treasury strongly disputes - was included in Mr. Barofsky's second-quarter review of TARP on Monday.
"TARP does not function in a vacuum, but is rather part of the broader government efforts to stabilize the financial system," said Mr. Barofsky in a statement ahead of his appearance Tuesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee to discuss his report.
Extra costs include $2.3 trillion in programs offered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC), $7.4 trillion in TARP and other aid from the Treasury, and $7.2 trillion in federal money to support Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, credit unions, Veterans Affairs and other federal guarantee programs, he said.
The committee's top Republican, Rep. Darrell Issa of California, said the size and scope of the government's involvement in rescuing the struggling financial sector has reached a mind-boggling level.
"If you spent a million dollars a day going back to the birth of Christ, that wouldn't even come close to just $1 trillion; $23.7 trillion is a staggering figure," he said.
But the Treasury called Mr. Barofsky's estimate "inflated," saying that less than $2 trillion have been doled out to so far by all the programs he identified in the report.
The estimate also doesn't take into account the the repayment of TARP loans, the Treasury says, an increasing tally that so far has reached about $70 billion.
The Treasury has committed $643.1 billion of TARP money and has spent $441 billion.
In the nine months since Congress authorized TARP, the Treasury has created 12 programs involving funds that may reach almost $3 trillion, Mr. Barofsky said.
Although the Treasury is only authorized to spend the $700 billion approved last year by Congress and signed by President George W. Bush, the FDIC and the Federal Reserve are expected to invest up to $1 trillion each in partnering with the Treasury on TARP.
Mr. Barofsky complained that while the Treasury has taken some steps toward improving transparency in TARP programs, it repeatedly has failed to adopt many recommendations that his office considers essential to providing "the highest degree of accountability and transparency possible."
The Treasury for months has refused his recommendation that TARP recipients be required to reveal exactly what they do with the money, a practice that the Treasury has called "meaningless" in light of the inherent "fungibility" of money.
Oversight committee Chairman Edolphus Towns said he was disappointed that the Treasury hasn't done more to increase transparency, adding that Mr. Barofsky's report "demonstrates more than anything why we need" a TARP watchdog.
"If the banks can't tell us how they're spending TARP money, then maybe they shouldn't have it," the New York Democrat said. "How can Treasury commit billions - and potentially trillions - of taxpayer dollars, but not ask recipients what they're doing with the money? That takes 'burying your head in the sand' to a new level."
The report also shows that the inspector general's office authorized 35 criminal and civil investigations involving TARP money through June 30. These investigations include suspected accounting fraud, securities fraud, insider trading, mortgage-service misconduct, mortgage fraud, public corruption, false statements and tax investigations.
Mr. Barofsky told The Washington Times earlier this month that "almost certainly we are going to be seeing a number of [criminal] indictments" coming from the investigations.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/jul/21/watchdog-says-tarp-tab-could-hit-24-trillion/

Maloney apologizes for using N word
Posted: 05:20 AM ET
(CNN) – New York Rep. Carolyn Maloney, a Democrat, apologized Monday for using the N word in a recent interview while recounting a phone call she had received.
"I apologize for having repeated a word I find disgusting," Maloney said in a statement. "It's no excuse but I was so caught up in relaying the story exactly as it was told to me that, in doing so, I repeated a word that should never be repeated."
Maloney, who is challenging Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand for the 2010 Democratic Senate nomination in New York, used the full racial slur in an interview with the Web site City Hall while taking aim at Gillibrand's record.
"I got a call from someone from Puerto Rico, said [Gillibrand] went to Puerto Rico and came out for English-only [education]. And he said, 'It was like saying n—r to a Puerto Rican,'" Maloney said. "I don't know-I don't know if that's true or not. I just called. I'm just throwing that out. All of her-well, what does she stand for?"
Earlier Monday, the Rev. Al Sharpton — a supporter of Gillibrand's bid — sharply criticized Maloney for using the word.
"The quote by Congresswoman Maloney if accurate is alarming and disturbing at best," he said in a statement. "No public official even in quoting someone else should loosely use such an offensive term and should certainly challenge someone using the term to him or her."
The controversy comes the same day Maloney is set to hold a big-ticket fundraiser that includes an appearance from former President Bill Clinton. Clinton has also attended a fundraiser for Gillibrand.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/07/21/maloney-apologizes-for-using-n-word-2/