Please, President Bush, another soft-on-crime Beltway back-slapper won't do (Michelle Malkin)

Jewish Wordl Review ^ | August 20th, 2002 | Michelle Malkin

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Jewish World Review August 21, 2002 / 13 Elul, 5762

Michelle Malkin

	Please, President Bush, another soft-on-crime Beltway back-slapper won't do http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | Good riddance to James Ziglar, the hopeless head of the Immigration and Naturalization Service who announced his resignation last week. This is a man whose main qualifications for the nation's top immigration enforcement job were his boyhood friendship with Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott and his effortless ability to suck up to Sen. Ted Kennedy. This is a man whose law enforcement background consisted of less than three years as the U.S. Senate's sergeant-at-arms and doorkeeper, protecting the Senate gavel and playing Senate hall monitor. This is a man who freely admitted before his confirmation that he had "no discernible experience in immigration law and policy." This is a man whose idea of increasing U.S.-Mexican border security was to give his beleaguered agents pepperball guns, and whose idea of leadership was to openly assure millions of illegal aliens earlier this spring that it is "not practical or reasonable" to deport them. Everyone knows the INS lacks the proper resources and manpower to do its job. But good grief, did we really need the nation's top immigration officer using his megaphone to advertise his own cluelessness and question the reasonableness of the laws he was supposed to enforce? But let's not be too hard on Ziglar. He didn't seek out the job. It was his elbow-rubbing pals who promoted his nomination, and it was President Bush who ultimately put him in power. Administration insiders are saying Ziglar wasn't pushed out. But when his impending departure is coupled with the recent "retirement" of the State Department's Consular Affairs chief, Mary Ryan-she was sacked after intrepid National Review reporter Joel Mowbray relentlessly blew the whistle on her office's terrorist-friendly visa policies-it seems on the surface that the Bush administration is finally getting rid of the pre-September 11 furniture and updating the bureaucratic front offices for the War on Terror. Whether or not the INS gets folded into the proposed Homeland Security Department, it needs top executives who understand that immigration in the post-September 11 era must be treated first and foremost as a national security issue-not as a politically correct entitlement, not as a social engineering experiment, not as a diplomatic tool, and not as a cash cow. The agency needs someone with: the dedication of Detroit-based Border Patrol officers Mark Hall and Robert Lindemann, who guard the northern border and, at risk of their own jobs, offered prescient warnings to Congress about the threat of terrorists and other criminal aliens exploiting lax immigration enforcement; the guts of Neil Jacobs, the former assistant director of investigations at INS's Dallas office, who suffered retaliation for helping expose the Clinton-Gore administration's corruption of the naturalization process; the foresight of Mary Schneider, a 20-year veteran of the INS in Orlando who warned a deaf Justice Department years before the September 11 attacks that aliens connected to Osama bin Laden were operating in Florida and illegally gaining residence; the wisdom of Bill King, a retired senior Border Patrol agent who knows the perils of granting mass amnesty to illegal aliens after having administered the 1986 amnesty program for the INS Western Region; and the administrative experience of Peter Nunez, a former U.S. attorney for San Diego who served under President Reagan and was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Enforcement in the first Bush administration, acting as liaison on border issues between the INS, the U.S. Customs Service, and Drug Enforcement Agency. In short, Ziglar's replacement should be someone from the enforcement side of the trenches. Someone who has led by example and who will send a message to INS employees that their jobs-patrolling the border, tracking down immigration outlaws, and kicking them out of the country-are not only "practical" and "reasonable," but more important than ever during the War on Terror. Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, warns wisely that perhaps we shouldn't hope too much: "After all, the State Department has nominated a clone to succeed Mary Ryan, and an important member of Ziglar's team remains dangerously in place: INS policy director Stuart Anderson, a libertarian ideologue who has crusaded tirelessly for years, in and out of government, for open borders." Please, President Bush, another soft-on-crime Beltway back-slapper won't do. Enjoy this writer's work? Why not sign-up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here. JWR contributor Michelle Malkin can be reached by clicking here. Michelle Malkin Archives © 2001, Creators Syndicate

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Michelle Malkin shoots! She scores!

Did you expect anything less?

Nope...

Information on INVASION here

[kennyo]

Good work Sabe!Although he's not as good-looking,I think Bob Barr would also be an excellent choice.If some of us push hard for Barr,maybe they'll "settle" for Malkin.This is the same moderate-extreme game that the leftists have perfected over the years to move the country to the left.

[Sabertooth]

Please add me to your Michelle ping list - she's great. I nominate Rudy G. for head of INS - wouldn't you just love to see him kick some illegal A**!!

I'm not sure this is the job for Rudy. IIRC, he's taken some rather soft stances on Illegals.

Put Giuliani at the FBI, that's where we need him.

You're on the list.

[Reaganwuzthebest]

Never would I argue with a Reagan Man, but I've been through the Reagan amnesty a thousand times on this site. The first amnesty was done for political, and yes philosophical reasons. I disagreed with that decision, I consider a mistake of his Administration, it was pushed by Alan Simpson and Romano Mazzoli.

Whatever, that was then, I'm trying like everyone else to see it doesn't happen again. We were told it was a one time thing, I expect them to keep their word on it.

[BOBTHENAILER]

You can put me on your Malkin Ping list.

For everybody on this thread who think that this issue is pandering for Latino votes, let's keep a couple thing in mind:

Nothing has been passed in order to garner those votes.

Beyond a brief flurry with the unpassed 245i, no other pandering has occurred

Gebhardt made the most serious effort at promising amnesty, and his was blanket.

Check this news out and see who's made the greatest strides in Latino votes, then tell me this is a bad thing. "Bush and Republicans make strides in Latino votes" http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,60901,00.html

[Reagan Man]

>>>We were told it was a one time thing, I expect them to keep their word on it.

Agreed!

[4Freedom]

Saber, please, keep me on the Michelle Malkin list.

RM, Michelle might not have the experience that a career government servant might have, but in this case that would be a good thing.

Michelle wouldn't be afraid to rock the boat. She's not beholden to anyone. She'd tell it like it is. An outsider in that office would ensure that something would have to be done. She wouldn't go along with any cover-ups. The office wouldn't go back to business as usual while she was there.

From what I've read on these threads, the Agents in the INS and the Border Patrol are so frustrated at having been prevented from doing their jobs that they'd bring her up to speed on what was lacking on the enforcement side and give her their support.

In the aftermath of Ziglar's resignation, maybe another name of a suitable replacement has surfaced from inside the department. How about it, MI? Any other names being tossed around by the agents themselves?

[BOBTHENAILER]

Excerpted from the Fox news article I flagged above. This is very good news.

In the survey, given in both Spanish and English to 1,000 Hispanic-Americans, 65 percent of which were of Mexican descent, registered voters gave Bush a 68 percent approval rating, while non-registered Hispanics gave him a 74 percent approval rating. They also said they prefer Bush over his 2000 opponent Vice President Al Gore 50 percent to 35 percent -- turning on its head a 2001 survey finding Gore ahead of Bush 54 percent to 28 percent.

Read the article and you'll find some surprising info. Absolutely nothing about Amnesty or its value in changing the approvals. Of those surveyed, how many thought Vicente Fox was a good leader (3.7%). These kinda numbers will have DemocRATs acquiring a sudden taste for tamales, green chile and my favorite, posole.

[Reagan Man]

Theres a couple threads up and running right now, on that very issue. Check'em out.

[4Freedom]

Bob, it was a bad thing.

Promised ain't the same as delivered.

Even if those votes are delivered, we've had to accept millions more illegals since Bush took office and as many as 10,000 more come in everyday.

They're not going to be voting for candidates that promise to cut our taxes and reduce social programs. No matter what they tell Bush, they just won't.

[mrustow]

Thanks for the ping, Sabe.

[sarasmom]

While it may not be on the political talking points list of issues, illegal immigration/invasion is high on the list of priorities of most of my peers, no matter their political party.

Bush better revise his act on this issue.While I generally support him, his actions, or lack therof on this subject is his achilles heel IMHO.

I sincerely hope he can be made to understand that this is a far more important issue to most people,whether or not they claim a political party label, than free drugs for elders or who gets a bigger tax cut.

I like Bush.Overall, he is doing a great job for all of us.I hope he chooses wisely here. If he does not, I believe he will not see another term.I hope it does not come to that point.I fear it will.

[Reagan Man]

>>>... Michelle might not have the experience that a career government servant might have, but in this case that would be a good thing.

You're entitled to your opinion. I think the idea is beyond hypothetical, if that's even possible. She would be overwhelmed from the get go. Definitely not qualified.

[BOBTHENAILER]

Theres a couple threads up and running right now, on that very issue. Check'em out.

Thanks for the heads-up and I have checked 'em out.

[Reaganwuzthebest]

That's great if he's reaching out to legal hispanics, or American hispanics and winning their support, especially if it translates into more votes in Congress, which I have my doubts about. But even so I still think it's important to separate legal from illegal as well as control the borders. If we don't do it now, we never will.

[mrustow]

I'm constructing a special Michelle Malkin ping list. Post to this thread if you'd like on or off (easier for me than Freepmail). Thanks.

Please put me on, Sabe. Just don't tell my wife.

[BOBTHENAILER]

They're not going to be voting for candidates that promise to cut our taxes and reduce social programs. No matter what they tell Bush, they just won't.

You and I have talked often and you know we agree on most things. I disagree that they would NOT want tax cuts and I disagree on the social programs, at least for the legals. Read the article, they have a very high percentage of Christians.

Amnesty was a bad idea, I've agreed to that.

Now, I'd at least like you to admit that given the razor thin margin of victory in many elections, we need all the help we can get. Particularly when the rats can get 80-90% of the black vote and not even deliver to them.

[FreedomPoster]

I'm there. Add me to the Malkin ping list. Thanks for your efforts.

[Reaganwuzthebest]

I like Bush.Overall, he is doing a great job for all of us.I hope he chooses wisely here. If he does not, I believe he will not see another term.I hope it does not come to that point.I fear it will.

Probably like most people on this forum I voted for Bush and consider him far preferable to Gore. But I agree with you, on immigration he's a little too soft. We had a terrorist attack, the first thing that should have happened was to close the borders and keep them closed, with the military if necessary. Folks all across the country are waking up to the immigration disaster, and it will come back to haunt him in 2004 if he doesn't take the issue more seriously.

[Marine Inspector]

Put me on the list.