Posted on 04/02/2007 6:23:35 PM PDT by kc8ukw
The history of America is the story of men and women who have devoted and sacrificed themselves to the survival and success of that idea. Americans have fought and died for this cause in every century of our existence, and on every continent on the planet, for one purpose: to protect the gift of human liberty entrusted to us the Founders.
That gift is our birthright; its defense is our duty.
Today that idea, the idea of America itself, is under attack. But not only by who you think.
While we fight around the world to defend our nation, we are entrenched now in a struggle here at home to define it. The crisis of illegal immigration threatens not only our economy and our security, but our very identity - the idea of America is under attack.
Nearly 20 million illegal aliens are living in the United States today - roughly equivalent to the populations of New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, and Philadelphia combined. Unlike legal immigrants, who have for more than 200 years come to be a part of our nation, illegal immigrants today come to be apart from our nation.
The great tradition of American assimilation has broken down. The melting pot has cracked, and our Founding ideals are leaking through.
Illegal immigrants wait in no lines, pay no dues, and thus assume no responsibility for or devotion to America's founding ideals and traditional values. They enter illegally, demand social services, refuse our language, and take our jobs, asking not what they can do for their country, only what our country can do for them.
This attitude has been tolerated and even encouraged by our political and economic elite, for reasons ranging from the misguided to the cynical to the treasonous.
Some might ask what it says about a country who cannot defend its borders. I ask what it says about a country who chooses not to in deference to criminals loyal to another nation, and corporations loyal to none.
For too long Americans have been force-fed candidates who ignore or mock their valid concerns about the security of our borders, the enforcement of our immigration laws, and the survival of our national heritage. That ends today.
I am running for President to give Americans a voice, to win this fight, to preserve the sacred ideals of the nation our soldiers are fighting to protect, and to succeed in this struggle for our identity and survival.
One last chance for the last, best, hope of earth.
Go Tom !
go to http://www.mickelson.libsyn.com/ and get today’s show, and listen to the first hour...
Didn’t know there was audio available. Thanks for the tip.
Thanks for the link, I’m listening to him now. I sure hope he gets a lot of support from people...
Regards,
Star Traveler
Bump
Is Tancredo a candidate for President in order to address an issue (namely immigration) and thus force everyone else to address it, too — or — is he doing the “Presidential thing” in order to really win?
Of course, I’m also aware that a candidate is never going to answer that particular kind of question, other than “to win”. But, in reality, I think some run knowing that they won’t win — but to address issues and force others to address issues.
Regards,
Star Traveler
P.S. — I’m for supporting him for both reasons...
The Tancredo Interview
Posted by Hugh Hewitt | 7:34 PM
http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/g/2dceeff9-2964-4e68-b595-dd465d9c8756
Tom Tancredo declared for the presidency today. His website is TeamTancredo.org.
Tom has been a guest on many occasions in the past, but has been dodging the show for some time, scheduling and then canceling appearances. Today finally agreed to appear, and then showed up half-way through the segment. he originally refused to stay longer but then agreed.
The Tancredo supporters are upset with me for bringing up Tom’s support of American Independent Party and Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist versus the Republican nominee now Congressman John Campbell in the ‘05 special election.
They are also upset that I find it very irresponsible for Tom to run for president without ruling out another run for Colorado’s 6th Congressional District, a move that telegraphs he wants the “fun” of running a single issue campaign while keeping his job security.
But mostly they are angry that I dare suggest the McCain-Kennedy bill be renamed McCain-Kennedy-Tancredo because of Tom’s pivotal role is securing its passage by leading the GOP majority of 2005-2006 into opposition of any legislation on the illegal alien issue last year. Tom successfully turned up the rhetoric on an issue that matters an enormous amount to a relatively small percentage of voters, and mortgaged the majority to a single issue constituency. Yes, Senator McCain’s blunder in co-authoring the ridiculous Senate bill with Ted Kennedy, but it was Tom Tancredo who did so much to make the issue radioactive for conservatives, many of whom overreacted to any idea of a bill that achieved enforcement, border security and regularization.
Now we are going to get little in the way of enforcement, less in fencing, and near amnesty. We could have had three quarters of the pie and kept the majority, but we got zip and lost the majority. Give credit where creditis very much due: Tom Tancredo made a lot of the music of 2006. He wants an encore in 2007-08, and he wants job security to boot.
I’ll believe it when he cuts his ties to the 6th District. In the meantime, a serious Republican should declare and start raising money in the 6th. I don’t think Tom will win after his New Hampshire dance is done.
The transcript of the interview will be posted here later, and the audio here.
UPDATE: From the transcript:
HH: I’ll get right to the chase. Is this a protest candid[acy] or is this is a real campaign?
TT: No, sir, it is for real. I mean, once you make the decision to do this, to actually announce, you’ve got to do, you can do everything you can to win the race. And if you just simply say I’m running because of an issue, one issue, and I want to make a statement? Forget about it. I do want to do that, and it is certainly an issue that propels me. But no, you have to do it 100%.
HH: Okay, then let me test that out. Have you endorsed someone to replace you in the 6th District in Colorado?
TT: No, I have not, and certainly don’t have to make that decision until I see if we can actually make it through these primaries.
HH: Are you ruling out reelection in the 6th District?
TT: No.
HH: Well then…
TT: I’ve got to see what happens. I’ve got to see whether we can make it through this thing. And I certainly…I can’t make that decision now.
HH: So you want it both ways? You want to run for Congress and the presidency?
TT: Well, I want to do my job as a Congressman while I am running for president, let’s put it that way, and we’ll make that decision later.
HH: But you haven’t ruled out, you know, getting wiped out in New Hampshire, and going back and keeping your job in Colorado?
TT: Correct.
HH: Well, doesn’t that tell a potential supporter that you’re not really in it for good, Tom, if you’re not willing to, you know, burn the bridges and do the Sherman thing, and say I’m in it, all in?
TT: Well, all in, you can be all in, can you not, and do exactly what I’m doing? I intend to live up to my responsibilities as a Congressman, I intend to fight as hard as I can for the nomination of the Republican Party for president of the United States. I think I can do those things.
HH: Yeah, but doesn’t it hurt the party to have the 6th District on hold when Democrats will target it…
TT: No.
HH: …and we need a candidate in there raising money. So you’re asking the party in Colorado to just stand around?
TT: Believe me, believe me, Hugh, the party, the 6th Congressional District will be fine, and we will keep it in Republican hands. That I can guarantee you. And it will be a good candidate, should I not pursue that particular course, I guarantee you that a good Republican candidate will succeed me in that district.
HH: All right. I think that’s having it both ways, but let me move on. GOP question, just two years and three months ago, Tom, you endorsed an American Independent Party candidate over the Republican nominee in a special election out here in Orange County. Is that material to a campaign for the GOP nomination, that you threw the Republican overboard just two years ago?
TT: Well, I’ll tell you, I’ve said this before, that issues matter to me greatly. And you know, I have been a Republican all of my life, Hugh. And I mean, back in high school, when we had a…I remember a mock election with…this is in 1960, at Holy Family High School, had a mock election for president of the United States, and this was in a Catholic school, okay?
HH: But Congressman, that’s nice, but two years ago, you went AIG.
TT: …surprise…well…
HH: You threw the Republican overboard.
TT: The reason I have been a Republican all my life is because for the most part, everybody, when I’m looking for a candidate, that’s where I come down on.
_________________________________
Click on Link for more
He’s done all the heavy lifting on the illegal immigration and border security issues. I owe the man my vote and he’ll get it.
Reply 9
“But mostly they are angry that I dare suggest the McCain-Kennedy bill be renamed McCain-Kennedy-Tancredo because of Tom’s pivotal role is securing its passage by leading the GOP majority of 2005-2006 into opposition of any legislation on the illegal alien issue last year. Tom successfully turned up the rhetoric on an issue that matters an enormous amount to a relatively small percentage of voters, and mortgaged the majority to a single issue constituency. Yes, Senator McCain’s blunder in co-authoring the ridiculous Senate bill with Ted Kennedy, but it was Tom Tancredo who did so much to make the issue radioactive for conservatives, many of whom overreacted to any idea of a bill that achieved enforcement, border security and regularization.”
Hopefully Tom will get some much-needed support here on FR.
Valin, whar presidential candidate are you supporting?
I’m not ready to drink anyones kool-aid yet.
Have you posted information or comments in threads about otehr presidential candidates? If so, what presidential candidates?
Hugh Hewitt has written a book about Mitt Romeny and is a Mitt Romeny supporter.
Hugh Hewitt supports the “regularization” of illegal aliens by giving them legal status and a path to citizenship.
Do you support giving illegal aliens legal status and a path to citizenship?
I’m sure he will get some support. There are some here who look at the candidate, assess their record, evaluate their positions on the issues, examine their campaigns. Then choose the candidate least likely to win and declare that this person is the only true conservative in the race and the only hope for America, and anyone who doesn’t pledge undying loyalty is a traitor.
Post number 15 should have read: “Have you posted information or comments in threads about other presidential candidates? If so, what presidential candidates?”.
Hugh Hewitt has written a book about Mitt Romeny and is a Mitt Romeny supporter.
Yes? And?
What presidential candidates do you believe would believe would make a good president?
What is your opinion of Mitt Romney? Do you believe Mitt Romney would make a good president?
Have you looked at the candidates? Have you assessed their records? Have you evaluate their positions on the issues? Have you examined their campaigns?
I could pretty much vote for any of the GOP candidates..well except for McCain, there’ll be playing hockey in hell before I vote for him. Don’t trust him never did, never will. The question is who can win, and that ain’t Tancredo.
Sentence number three in post number 23 should have read: “Have you evaluated their positions on the issues?”.
Who can win?
Toasty Tancredo.....where are these people coming
from? Oh, Yeah, another Crusader for bashing the
illegals....it just makes the legals PO’and that
helps the cause?? Sure? Colorado has enough mountains
to hide ilegals..go there....after Al Gore’s warming
solution..melts the ice?? JK
“Oh, Yeah, another Crusader for bashing the
illegals”
Shoud illegal aliens be given legal status and a path to citizenship?
What presidential candidate are you supporting?
I’m sure he’ll bring in the votes of those Americans of Cuban descent, LOL.
We didn’t need Florida anyway.
Not Tannycredo....I’ll go with Thompson or Gingrich..
What the hell makes the crowd bashing the ilegals, when
the illegals have been pouring over here for mucho
years. Blame anybody or anyone you want..but with the
legal individuals, like normal citizens, want legality,
but they sure don’t appreciate the constant bashing of the illegals who have not boarded airplanes and crashed
them into buildings?? Want to solve the problem....
Do it..but don’t denigrade people for trying to better
their siuation....help them... JK
Do you support giving illegal aliens legal status and a path to citizenship?
At least three of the Middle Eastern Islamic terrorists that participated in the terrorist plot on September 11, 2001, that resulted in the murder of approximately three thousand (3,000) Americans were illegal aliens by virtue of having overstayed their visas. They were illegal aliens just as much as any individual that crosses the border illegally is an illegal alien.
In 20004, Heather McDonald published an article entitled “The Illegal-Alien Crime Wave”. Here is a link to the article:http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=11730. Copied below is a portion of that article:
The Illegal-Alien Crime Wave
By Heather MacDonald
City Journal | January 14, 2004
Some of the most violent criminals at large today are illegal aliens. Yet in cities where the crime these aliens commit is highest, the police cannot use the most obvious tool to apprehend them: their immigration status. In Los Angeles, for example, dozens of members of a ruthless Salvadoran prison gang have sneaked back into town after having been deported for such crimes as murder, assault with a deadly weapon, and drug trafficking. Police officers know who they are and know that their mere presence in the country is a felony. Yet should a cop arrest an illegal gangbanger for felonious reentry, it is he who will be treated as a criminal, for violating the LAPD’s rule against enforcing immigration law.
The LAPD’s ban on immigration enforcement mirrors bans in immigrant-saturated cities around the country, from New York and Chicago to San Diego, Austin, and Houston. These “sanctuary policies” generally prohibit city employees, including the cops, from reporting immigration violations to federal authorities.
Such laws testify to the sheer political power of immigrant lobbies, a power so irresistible that police officials shrink from even mentioning the illegal-alien crime wave. “We can’t even talk about it,” says a frustrated LAPD captain. “People are afraid of a backlash from Hispanics.” Another LAPD commander in a predominantly Hispanic, gang-infested district sighs: “I would get a firestorm of criticism if I talked about [enforcing the immigration law against illegals].” Neither captain would speak for attribution.
But however pernicious in themselves, sanctuary rules are a symptom of a much broader disease: the nation’s near-total loss of control over immigration policy. Fifty years ago, immigration policy might have driven immigration numbers, but today the numbers drive policy. The nonstop increase of immigration is reshaping the language and the law to dissolve any distinction between legal and illegal aliens and, ultimately, the very idea of national borders.
It is a measure of how topsy-turvy the immigration environment has become that to ask police officials about the illegal-alien crime problem feels like a gross faux pas, not done in polite company. And a police official asked to violate this powerful taboo will give a strangled response—or, as in the case of a New York deputy commissioner, break off communication altogether. Meanwhile, millions of illegal aliens work, shop, travel, and commit crimes in plain view, utterly secure in their de facto immunity from the immigration law.
I asked the Miami Police Department’s spokesman, Detective Delrish Moss, about his employer’s policy on lawbreaking illegals. In September, the force arrested a Honduran visa violator for seven vicious rapes. The previous year, Miami cops had had the suspect in custody for lewd and lascivious molestation, without checking his immigration status. Had they done so, they would have discovered his visa overstay, a deportable offense, and so could have forestalled the rapes. “We have shied away from unnecessary involvement dealing with immigration issues,” explains Moss, choosing his words carefully, “because of our large immigrant population.”
Police commanders may not want to discuss, much less respond to, the illegal-alien crisis, but its magnitude for law enforcement is startling. Some examples:
• In Los Angeles, 95 percent of all outstanding warrants for homicide (which total 1,200 to 1,500) target illegal aliens. Up to two-thirds of all fugitive felony warrants (17,000) are for illegal aliens.
• A confidential California Department of Justice study reported in 1995 that 60 percent of the 20,000-strong 18th Street Gang in southern California is illegal; police officers say the proportion is actually much greater. The bloody gang collaborates with the Mexican Mafia, the dominant force in California prisons, on complex drug-distribution schemes, extortion, and drive-by assassinations, and commits an assault or robbery every day in L.A. County. The gang has grown dramatically over the last two decades by recruiting recently arrived youngsters, most of them illegal, from Central America and Mexico.
• The leadership of the Columbia Lil’ Cycos gang, which uses murder and racketeering to control the drug market around L.A.’s MacArthur Park, was about 60 percent illegal in 2002, says former assistant U.S. attorney Luis Li. Francisco Martinez, a Mexican Mafia member and an illegal alien, controlled the gang from prison, while serving time for felonious reentry following deportation.
Good luck finding any reference to such facts in official crime analysis. The LAPD and the L.A. city attorney recently requested an injunction against drug trafficking in Hollywood, targeting the 18th Street Gang and the “non–gang members” who sell drugs in Hollywood for the gang. Those non–gang members are virtually all illegal Mexicans, smuggled into the country by a ring organized by 18th Street bigs. The Mexicans pay off their transportation debts to the gang by selling drugs; many soon realize how lucrative that line of work is and stay in the business.
Very well said.
Now we can expect the left slime machine to go into action and invent lies about him which the media will promote as truth.
I support the Preasident’s plan. They still have
not identified Mexican illegals as terrorists..lawbreakers,
yes. Many grown up legals (by birth) have parents who
were illegal entrants..they were wrong..but our lazy
Congress let it go on and on and on....so to get back
to square one...there has to be a little give and take,
not just throw them all out..secure border by shutting it
down for a period of time and regrouping...I have not
ween a workable plan yet..by anyone..including Toasty T. JK
It’s just good to have a choice at this point.
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