Posted on 03/08/2002 1:24:33 PM PST by sarcasm
Friday, March 08, 2002 - WASHINGTON - Rep. Tom Tancredo takes credit for thwarting the Bush administration's last effort to offer partial amnesty to thousands of illegal residents, but Thursday the outspoken immigration foe said he may have been outmaneuvered by the White House.
President Bush has struck a deal with the House leadership to place legislation that offers an extension of amnesty on its consent calendar before Bush heads to Mexico for a state visit next week, the Colorado Republican said. That action should ensure quick House passage of legislation that Bush has repeatedly sought from Congress. It would allow an undocumented person to receive legal standing, such as a valid green card, by filing a declaration with the Immigration and Naturalization Service. It presumably also would require the person to have been in the United States by a certain date and have filed a declaration with the INS from an appropriate sponsor, such as a relative or employer, and pay a $1,000 penalty. "The terms are still up in the air," said Dan Stein, executive director of the Federation for American Immigration, a group that has been allied with Tancredo. "We've heard to the effect that the president wants something to bring down to Mexico." The initial Bush proposal, designed exclusively for Mexicans, once was high on the president's legislative wish list, but it was delayed after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11. However, as the president noted Wednesday in a speech to the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, he now is pushing for the extension of the amnesty program known by the section of immigration law that covers it, Section 245I. The president hailed it as a way to reunite family, separated by the border. "If you believe in family values, if you understand the worth of family and the importance of family, let's get 245I out of the United States Congress and give me a chance to sign it," Bush told the chamber members. Tancredo, the head of a congressional caucus on immigration issues and proponent of halting virtually all immigration, said he had blocked a previous attempt by Bush to push an extension of the amnesty program through the House. But this time, he said House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., had agreed to place the issue on the suspension, or consent, calendar, making it difficult to defeat the proposal. The Senate might be more favorable to the bill than the House, expanding the numbers of individuals who can apply, Tancredo said.
People that I have seen who fried their brains in their youth never have never recovered their full mental capacities.
This is just a small part. Higher Healthcare cost for LEGAL IMMIGRANTS AND CITIZENS.
Sunday, February 17, 2002 - Most Coloradans will be surprised to learn that last year the state Medicaid program paid the hospital bill for 6,000 illegal immigrants.
The average cost was $5,000 a baby, for a grand total of $30 million. Nor is that all.
Because the U.S. Constitution makes every baby born in this country a U.S. citizen, those 6,000 babies immediately qualified for the full range of services provided under Medicaid, at a cost the state does not even tabulate.
The qualification process for Medicaid payments to illegal immigrants isn't complicated or difficult. Pregnant women may arrive at a hospital emergency room prior to birth and declare that they lack proper documentation of immigration status (that is, that they are here illegally) and state they can't pay for care.
Immigrant women aren't limited in their choice of hospitals. Denver Health (formerly Denver General) last year handled 1,850 births to illegal immigrants, or more than half of the total births in that facility. Just recently, hospital officials said they will ask taxpayers to approve a $150 million bond issue to pay for, among other things, a bigger obstetrics unit. The hospital director said the unit was built to handle 1,600 births per year but last year the total exceeded 3,500.
The program that covers the cost of these births is the emergency room Medicaid program. This is not to be confused with the regular Medicaid payments or with state and federal payments to the medically indigent. Hospitals sometimes suffer in providing non-emergency indigent services because payments don't cover the full cost. In the case of emergency care to pregnant immigrant women, the bill is paid in full.
There are a couple of stunning things about these numbers. The 6,000 births to illegal immigrants are a full 40 percent of the 15,500 births paid for as part of the Medicaid fee-for-service program. Medicaid also pays for some babies through a program using HMOs, but illegal immigrants can't enroll in the HMO program.
According to state officials, Medicaid now pays hospital costs for fully a third of all births in Colorado. This is a surprising percentage in view of the fact that last year was, at least until Sept. 11, a year in which the state's economy was doing very well. The births to illegal immigrants are a major factor.
As for other major Medicaid expenditures, there is no effective way to measure the impact that illegal immigration is having. Some of the most expensive Medicaid cases develop from an initial hospital visit. Two years ago, for example, a premature baby case eventually produced a tab of $1 million, and neonatal cases overall averaged $195,000. What percentage of these expensive cases involved illegal immigrants was not reported.
Last week, KOA Radio's Mike Rosen was interviewing Gov. Bill Owens when a female caller asked the governor why illegal immigrants seemingly had an easier time getting Medicaid coverage than do American citizens. The lady said she had been told that immigrants only had to say they were undocumented and that they needed the service. There wasn't time for the governor to fully respond, but as it turns out the lady was mostly correct. Illegal immigrants can easily get emergency room care, which includes the birth of a baby. It is not true that they can apply for and get other routine coverage under Medicaid.
There is no suggestion here that medical care should be denied any person in need. What is recommended is that the media do a better job of providing information on the impact of illegal immigration on Medicaid and other programs, especially public education. If the state's voters and the American public generally have access to accurate and timely information, it may be assumed it will be taken into account every time there is a debate over border security, amnesty, guest worker proposals or any number of current government programs.
There are many groups and interests that for one reason or another don't want this information to be available or to be discussed. Unfortunately, they currently outnumber and far outweigh in political influence those groups and interests that do.
Al Knight (alknight@mindspring.com) is a member of The Denver Post editorial board.
The ratio of 77 irate posters to 5 defenders of illegal aliens (boo hoo) is about right for the whole country in general. Last time I saw the polls 80+ of the population are against amnesties and want the border closed. People all over country reading this thread agree with us, and Bush and co. can count on paying a political price for this sellout. Like I said in a previous post, I want to support him, but not as long as he's more worried about illegal aliens than the people he's elected to serve. That's Americans. Remember us Mr Bush?
Bush is willing to pay a political price for selling us out on illegal aliens, but Bush isn't willing to pay any political price at all by vetoing the unconstitutional, anti-free speech Campaign Finance "Reform" law.
We should know by now where Bush is coming from, and who he really works for. Come on people, do we have to draw you a picture?
Well what is it worth?
Please tell me. Why am I not mistaken you would be the first one to bitch if apples were $3.99 per lb. at your local supermarket
Sorry, amnesties only apply to illegals.
Then can I renounce my citizenship? I mean, if rich billionaires can do this and jet off to an island to enjoy their tax-free status sans US citizenship, then the rest of us should have this option too, although since we aren't billionaires, we should get to stay in this country as non-citizens, just like the illegal aliens. I mean, fair's fair.
Your profession, perhaps?
Exactly....failing to register with the Selective Service automatically disqualifies males from obtaining financial aid for school.
Illegals, however, qualify for in-state tuition in Texas for just being illegal.
Please tell me. Why am I not mistaken you would be the first one to bitch if apples were $3.99 per lb. at your local supermarket.
As with so many other things, you are mistaken. You probably believe that everyone is motivated solely by economic concerns, as well. Homo Economicus - something which both the Marxists and the Capitalists agree on: Man lives by bread alone.
Yes that too. If they didn't bother to do that then there is absolutely no reason they should be given amnesty.
Fool me twice - Shame on me.
Fool me thrice - Shame on ...?.. Shame on ...who?
I'll type this slowly for you: It's not cheap apples vs. expensive apples--that would be easy enough for even you to decide. It's cheap apples and the host of problems that come along with illegal immigration vs. 'expensive' apples. Now consider the cost.
So no matter that lawbreakers come to our nation, you are willing to give them sanctuary? Does your signature underscore all those that are in contempt of US laws?
You just don't seem to understand - you can't qualify for amnesties of any kind.
Obviously someone with the screen name of sarcasm knows that I'm not being serious.
But this little exercise in sarcasm does nicely illustrate who has power, and who does not, in today's America, yes? And illustrates as well the true agenda of those who do have power.
Also the dogged determination of some on this thread to justify this illustrates another truism: no matter how grotesque, there will always be people who will justify the agenda of the ruling elite.
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