Free Republic

WASHINGTON (JTA) -- Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, a likely candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, will visit Israel. The Republican Jewish Coalition announced Tuesday that it would host Barbour in Israel Feb. 5-9. The RJC has hosted Barber in 1994, when he chaired the Republican National Committee. He will be the third potential Republican 2012 presidential candidate to visit Israel in recent weeks. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney visited Jan 13-14; ex-Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is currently touring the country. Barbour, like Romney and Huckabee, is scheduled to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other senior Israeli government...

Need to Know January 18, 2011 Ahead of the curve! Lib writer praises Jeb Bush Posted by Staff Ezra Klein writes: I think Jon Chait gets Jeb Bush very wrong here. When Bush says that "second-generation Hispanics marry non-Hispanics at a higher rate than second-generation Irish or Italians" and that "second-generation Hispanics' English language capability rates are higher than previous immigrant groups," he's directly answering a critique that has a lot of power among anti-immigration groups: that there's something different about this wave of immigrants as compared with previous waves of immigrants.

Seizing a window of opportunity before the new year ushers in a more conservative Congress, Democratic lawmakers and a handful of Republicans are leading a final charge to pass the DREAM Act, a youth-oriented immigration reform policy that would have its deepest impact in California. Illegal immigrants who entered the country before their 16th birthday would have a chance at citizenship through the DREAM Act if they can graduate from high school, go to college or into the military, and stay out of trouble. "They didn't come here through their own free choice," said Congressman George Miller, D-Martinez, who is...

The Obama administration agreed Tuesday to pay up to $680 million to American Indian farmers to settle an 11-year-old class-action lawsuit alleging discrimination by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, who took office promising to address longstanding complaints by minority farmers against the department, said eligible farmers and ranchers can receive up to $250,000 each for showing that USDA discrimination caused them economic losses. However, most farmers will probably opt for a uniform $50,000 payment, which involves less red tape. In the class-action suit, American Indian farmers allege that USDA bureaucrats denied them the low-interest rate loans

The link is to East Tennessee Catholic, and the article I'm responding to is "Triptych of Love," by Richard Stika, Bishop of the Diocese of Knoxville. (When you use the link, you'll have to go to page 3; I don't know how to link there directly.) The first half of Bishop Stika's article does a fine job of pointing out that the Biblical teaching of God's concern for "the widow, the orphan, and the stranger" can be applied in our day to the unmarried mother, the unborn child, and the immigrant. This much, I think, is true, accurate, and pastorally...

On Wednesday, Arturo Lopez, 18, was convicted of abducting and raping his foster mother in Henrico County, last April. The 55-year-old victim told the jury of her pain, and how she can longer trust anyone, ending her long service as a foster mother...The jury recommended a 20-year sentence for the abduction and 10 years for the rape. Lopez will be sentenced in November. On April 9, the woman called police to report that her foster son had just raped her at knife point. The victim was able to leave the house and call 911, after telling Lopez that she had...

NEW ORLEANS – Five years after Hurricane Katrina's wrath, President Barack Obama sought to reassure disaster-weary Gulf Coast residents Sunday that he would not abandon their cause. "My administration is going to stand with you, and fight alongside you, until the job is done," Obama said to cheers at Xavier University, a historically black, Catholic university that was badly flooded by the storm.

Companies using criminal records or bad credit reports to screen out job applicants might run afoul of anti-discrimination laws as the government steps up scrutiny of hiring policies that could hurt blacks and Hispanics. A blanket refusal to hire workers based on criminal records or credit problems can be illegal if it has a disparate impact on racial minorities, according to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The agency enforces the nation's employment discrimination laws. "Our sense is that the problem is snowballing because of the technology allowing these checks to be done with a fair amount of ease," said Carol...

Apparently, not all Hispanics have Harry Reid's permission to "come out of the shadows". From The Atlantic: Reid's Hispanic Pitch The Las Vegas Review Journal reports today on Harry Reid courting Hispanics in his re-election race, and the state's 24% Hispanic population (as of 2007; it's possibly grown since then) could certainly be a critical voting bloc for him. His opponent, Sharron Angle, is an outspoken supporter of Arizona's SB 1070 and has proposed making English the official language of Nevada; Reid supports giving illegal immigrants a pathway to citizenship, but the Democratic Senate has failed to move on immigration...

Two U.S. senators are slamming four federal stimulus funded initiatives in Connecticut as part of their national attack on President Barack Obama's $862 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. No. 14 on the GOP list is Connecticut's Mohegan Tribe, which got $54 million in rural development loans from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to build a four-story tribal government center, including a community center. The senators' main issue with the loans was that the center will also will serve as a practice facility for the WNBA Connecticut Sun basketball team. The team is owned by the Mohegan Sun casino, which...

WASHINGTON, July 30 -- The U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued the following news release: The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Pascua Yaqui Tribe today announced the production of the first ever Enhanced Tribal Card (ETC)--designed as a Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI)-compliant document that formally recognizes tribal membership and U.S. citizenship for the purpose of entering the United States through a land or sea port of entry. The Pascua Yaqui are the first tribe in the country to issue an ETC. "Our collaboration with the Pascua Yaqui Tribe has resulted in the historic development of the first-ever...

JULY 13, 2010 Obama's Immigration Fakery In 2007, then-Sen. Obama helped derail an immigration bill he claimed to support. He's no more serious about a bipartisan bill today. BY WILLIAM MCGURN Many of us in the press have had a field day noting Sen. John McCain's (R., Ariz.) transformation from immigration maverick to the Wyatt Earp of border control. Fair enough. Back when it counted, however, Mr. McCain was the only Republican presidential candidate to back the last real chance we had for passing a bipartisan immigration compromise. Meanwhile, a man who claims to favor immigration reform but helped derail...

"...he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with predominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering."

Published: May 21, 2010 The Times They Are a Changin’ Steve Jobs on ‘Freedom from Porn’ The following story comes from LifeSiteNews on May 18. CUPERTINO. Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computers, says his company will not be a party to the pornography industry and hopes that the iPad and iPhone revolution will help lead to a porn-free world. Jobs reiterated his position in a heated e-mail exchange with Ryan Tate, a writer for Gawker.com, which follows news and gossip in Silicon Valley and elsewhere. Tate, who admitted that he was home alone and slightly inebriated at the time, took...

(CNSNews.com) - President Barack Obama said his administration is taking a “very close look” at Arizona’s new anti-illegal immigration law, examining it for any “implications, especially for civil rights.” “I want everyone, American and Mexican, to know my administration is taking a very close look at the Arizona law,” said President Obama during a press conference on Wednesday with Mexican President Felipe Calderon. “We're examining any implications, especially for civil rights,” said Obama. “Because in the United States of America, no law-abiding person – be they an American citizen, a legal immigrant, or a visitor or tourist from Mexico –...

Mexican President Felipe Calderon has been ripping into Arizona's immigration law as he tours Washington -- while appearing to disregard the way his own country cracks down on immigrants along Mexico's southern border. Mexico repeatedly has been cited by human rights groups for abusing or turning a blind eye to the abuse of migrants from Central America. Until recently, Mexican law made illegal immigration a criminal offense -- anyone arrested for the violation could be fined, imprisoned for up to two years and deported. Mexican lawmakers changed that in 2008 to make illegal immigration a civil violation like it is...

Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Poizner's first Spanish-language radio ad is hitting the airwaves, treating listeners to some state-of-the-art, rhetorical acrobatics.Although Poizner has tacked hard right on illegal immigration, the ad accuses rival Meg Whitman of being the bad cop in the immigration debate. The ad also prominently features former Gov. Pete Wilson – chairman of Whitman's campaign and a longtime bogeyman for California Latinos."Here is the radio spot she doesn't want us to hear," the ad's announcer says before a short clip of Wilson introducing himself. The announcer then says, "The ex-governor Pete Wilson speaks about Meg Whitman's plan to...

If anyone was unclear about President Obama's distaste for the new Arizona immigration law, he cleared it up at his Cinco de Mayo celebration in the White House Rose Garden Wednesday night. "We can’t start singling out people because of who they look like, or how they talk, or how they dress," the president said. "We can’t turn law-abiding American citizens, and law-abiding immigrants, into subjects of suspicion and abuse." The law, which targets illegal immigrants in a way critics say is too broad, has repeatedly come under attack and been described by some as racial profiling. In a visible...

RNC Chairman Michael Steele said the GOP has not given Blacks a reason to vote Republican. As a black conservative Republican, I ask, what is the GOP suppose to do; serve soul food at Republican events? In other words, I reject the concept of dividing Americans into victimized groups and pandering to them. Besides, the Democrats are masters of insulting the intelligence of Americans by playing the old and tattered victim, race, and class envy cards. The GOP does not need to go down the same shameful disgusting road. Brother Steele, how about the GOP showing a little respect for...

PHOENIX -- Federal law enforcement officers have been sent to Arizona as fears surface of possible vigilante violence, experts said. Mid-April is a time of year law enforcement officers across the country, and in Arizona, are on high alert. "It's a time at which not only the Anti-Defamation League, but law enforcement, and I mean law enforcement at all levels -- local, state and federal -- are geared up,” said Bill Straus, the Arizona Regional Director for the Anti-Defamation League. The reason: there have been serious attacks on Americans by their fellow citizens during April. April 19 is the anniversary...