Oy, vey. I thought the Tea Parties were a way to revitalize the Republican Party. Apparently, they’ve opted instead to shoot themselves in the foot by inviting the anti-immigrant organization – Federation for American Immigration Reform(FAIR) that has been declared a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center(SPLC). The SPLC is a civil rights organization that was recently in the news after they correctly identified the Holocaust shooter as a white supremacist.
According to the Tea Party website, Jay O’Brien will be the Master of Ceremonies at the Prince William Tea Party. Excuse me, but wasn’t this guy removed from office by voters during the last election cycle? Also, noticeably absent from the agenda are any local politicians. Will Corey Stewart boycott because of the FAIR connection? What about Tito the Builder, who spoke at the last Tea Party? How can individuals accept the Tea Party movement now that they have decided to join forces with this anti-immigrant organization? And how very disappointing that Bob Marshall would agree to speak at an event with FAIR.
I wonder if FAIR’s speaker will explain their position of wanting to curb legal immigration? or will they just ‘focus’ on illegal immigration? If they speak about halting or severely restricting legal immigration then I predict that future tea parties will become increasingly void of any persons of color. How could this be our plan for regaining control at the state or federal level?
Oh what the heck, I just have to make a comment to get things rolling!
Can anyone tell me how to go about voicing an opinion which the SPLC doesn’t agree with when it comes to immigration without being referred to as a hate group member? So who made the SPLC the non-biased determiner of hate? One man’s difference of opinion is another man’s hate I guess. I guess to gang members, we law abiding citizens are nothing but a hate group from their point of view. Ok, let the comments rip!
I don’t know anything about FAIR. I also don’t know anything about SPLC, but I don’t see what relevance identifying the Holocaust shooter as a white supremacist has to anything. Are you trying to associate FAIR with the Holocaust shooter? That is hateful.
I do know Jay O’Brien and Bob Marshall. As far as I know, both are decent men. I also know what Obama and the Democratic Party are doing. Their policies are taking our nation in directions many of us do not want to go. We have the right to complain and to have of complaints taken seriously.
Frankly, this post reeks of attempt to scare people with unsupported accusations. Instead of honestly dealing with the issues, you are engaging in name calling. That is hateful.
Admin Note: Maybe you should investigate the speakers and their representative organizations before attending and promoting this event? You’re claims of ignorance only go so far. You now have the information, what are you going to do with it?
Once one starts peeling back the layers, FAIR doesn’t fair too well.
Citizen Tom, I think that was Alanna’s point. Why would they want to associate themselves with FAIR?
Tanton, creator of FAIR, is just a slick willy. 20 some years ago I belonged to a fairly liberal group, Zero Population Growth. The main objective of this organization was to encourage people to only replace themselves. It was pro-choice and pro-reproductive rights but talked about the earth becoming over-populated. I guess that made it a pro-environmental group also.
Guess who the founder of ZPG was? Come to find out, years later, it was Tanton, founder of FAIR. I guess he wanted to cover all his bases. Apparently the board of ZPG didn’t like his direction for the organization. ZPG no longer exists, to my knowledge.
I have seen how some people peel back the layers. They count the number of disagreements.
The point of freedom is that we don’t have to agree about everything. We just have to allow each other to live in peace.
Our government exists to defend this nation and our rights. That includes establishing appropriate immigration policies. Our government is derelict. What our government is effectively doing is taxing us so corporate interests can use our money to attract cheap labor across the border. Has that got some people angry? Of course it does. Are some people calling some of those angry people hateful? Seems to me that is the case.
We have a confused situation. It is similar to what happens when a woman is raped. In some cultures, it is not unusual to blame the rape victim. It is presumed that the victim somehow incited her attacker. Fortunately, that assumption is no longer acceptable in the USA. Nonetheless, such behavior still exists in the USA. Out of sympathy for the illegal aliens, we are forgetting the burden these aliens place on the average American taxpayer. In fact, when the taxpayer complains, we blame the victim.
—sigh—
Can we all agree that Tanton has created a multi-headed snake to accomplish his goals? FAIR and ZPG have nothing in common except the same ‘father.’
What has happened in our area seems to have less to do with corportate America and more to do with what happens when a few with a personal agenda, using the resources of FAIR, attempt to hi-jack our local government.
The Republicans in Virginia have been attempting for years to exploit the immigration issue. The results of such a tactic have included losing the governship (twice), one house of the legislature, and both Senate seats. Obama also defeated Mccain here in the last election.
When are the Republicans going to realize that the illegal immigration issue is a loser?
If insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, then the Repubs are ready for a padded cell.
Alanna, I hate to break this to you, but there are essentially no minorities at the “tea parties” as it is.
I am not a fan of the “tea parties,” nor am I a fan of F.A.I.R. and the anti-immigrant electioneering strategy. Thus, the fact that the two seem to be morphing into one is no great surprise, nor a cause for alarm. Since we are peeling back layers on this thread, let’s admit the fact that each of these “movements” stems from the same bankrupt and cynical approach to politics.
In the wake of Katrina, the Iraq fiasco, and the global credit meltdown, it is indeed a challenge for us to define, update, and reassert conservative political thought. To properly achieve such a rebirth we will need to allow some time for research, for many volumes of writing from new voices and from old ones, for critique and discourse and consensus building. But with elections every 2 years (or, tragically, every year as is the case in Virginia), hungry and hyper-competitive partisans in the Republican party are too impatient to even begin such a process.
Instead of engaging the public in a long term discussion that might, at times, get bogged down in factual details that require patience and focus to comprehend … instead of embarking on a philosophical journey that might take a few years to run its course but will lead to new ideas and new approaches, these talented but hasty operatives and electioneers prefer to exploit the false notions and banal prejudices that certain constituencies already posses. This is how racial prejudice and anti-immigrant sentiment suddenly becomes a political issue when before it was merely an unpleasant but gradually receding undercurrent. And, this is how rigid libertarian beliefs that, if taken to their logical conclusion, would simply lead to anarchy, become the battle cry for a series of “tea parties” organized by cable news producers.
Rather than lifting people into the exploration and consideration of new ideas that could carry us into a new, rebranded and modern conservatism, far too many Republican strategists are lowering themselves, and the party, in order to exploit a few very old ideas that we truly ought to be forgetting. It is little wonder that two lazy strategies are now fusing into one. They are each manifestations of a counter-productive and self-defeating school of thought.
Speaking of counter-productive, how exactly is the support of illegal immigration productive? I know, no one here supports illegal immigration, Right! If you don’t, then why all the anger at those who oppose illegal immigration? Sure seems to me by default that many here do indeed support illegal immigration.
SA,
We don’t support “illegal immigration”, we support the PEOPLE (HUMANS), that are illegal immigrants. If there was a path for them to get here legally, which is what we are all advocating, then there wouldn’t be a need for “illegal immigration”.
Lets see……..We don’t support crime, we support the criminals. Hmmmmmmmm Sounds very similar to me! Further, if we ended shop-lifting laws, then we would end shop-lifting convictions. What a concept! NOT
I can’t say the ILLEGAL ALIENS are completely to blame for the shape of our economy, but they are a BIG part of the problem. The ILLEGAL ALIENS send BILLIONS upon BILLIONS out of this Country every year, money we will NEVER see again. Does this help our economy?
How about the BILLIONS the American taxpayers fork out for the ILLEGAL ALIEN BABIES, the schooling of them, the medical care and the list goes on, and on, and on.
How about the MILLIONS upon MILLIONS paid to jail ILLEGAL ALIENS for the crimes, then the cost to deport them. Does this help our economy?
Then you have these activist groups, the Catholic Church and the ACLU that want AMNESTY for these ILLEGAL ALIENS. It would be absolute suicide for this Country if AMNESTY were granted to the 20 million or so ILLEGAL ALIENS. We have more and more people out of work everyday and they want to add another 20 million to this Country? I say, “NO”!
If AMNESTY were ever granted to these 20 million ILLEGAL ALIENS, you can bet big money that 3 years from now, there would be ANOTHER 3-5 million ILLEGAL ALIENS demonstrating on our soil for AMNESTY.
An end MUST come to this illegal immigration. The perfect tool we have so far is E-Verify. It MUST be used by ALL businesses and Government Social Services. EVERY employee must be checked! If they are illegal, they are to be dismissed!
I believe it is time for all 50 States to pass a State law, like Arizona, Oklahoma, Mississippi, Missouri, South Carolina and a few others. It is time for these ILLEGAL ALIENS to go back to their home Country and get out of this Country. The problems they are causing will not go away until the ILLEGAL ALIENS are out of this Country. I think that is plain to see.
It’s time for ZERO TOLERENCE with these ILLEGAL ALIENS. It’s time for them to get back to their own country where they belong. If they truly want to be part of America, let them apply and wait their turn like the millions of others who want to come to America LEGALLY. They will then be welcomed with open arms.
NO ILLEGAL ALIEN HAS A RIGHT TO BE IN THIS COUNTRY FOR ANY REASON!
So FAIR is a hate group according to SPLC…right…OK. Last I looked, any organization that isn’t a radical leftist organization is a hate group according to SPLC. It’s as if Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton or Jeremiah Wright called FAIR a hate group. The SPLC’s whole reason for existing is to label other organizations hate groups. Here, how’s this sound? SPLC hates hate-groups, therefore, they are a hate group themselves. I like that!
The SPLC correctly identified the Holocaust museum shooter as a white supremacist…..OMG, they’re BRILLIANT! All that required was a primitive hindbrain! But oh, their insight is laser-sharp!
WHWN, If running on the issue of illegal immigration hurts the republicans so badly, then why dosent it hurt the democrats. Both my state delegate (Nicols) and my state senator (Barker) ran a strong campaign on cracking down on illegal immigrants – and voted accordingly in Richmond.
Im not trying to make a point here. Seriously, just wondering why democrats dont get much criticism when they are tough on the illegal immigration issue.
I thought that was funny too Slowpoke – anyone with even a small amount of intelligence could have identified the holocaust museum shooter as a white supremacist. I laughed out loud when I read that one!
“We are mad as hell, and we aren’t going to take take this anymore!!!”
That is the basic theme of the 2009 Tea Parties. This is America –
conservatives have as much right to rant and rave as liberals.
That is one of the many gifts we celebrate on July 4th.
(With a nod to the late Oscar winning Peter Finch who played
Howard Beale in the 1976 movie classic “Network”).
On the other hand, has ADL said anything about FAIR? (not a rhetorical ? I don’t know)
SPLC came along long before Sharpton and Wright had any notoriety.
So let’s put it another way, who should be in charge of labeling questionable groups? Is there a clearing house?
The arguments that I’ve heard against the Southern Poverty Law Center usually are two fold. One is that they are a left leaning organization, and the second is that the founder accepts too large of a paycheck. All I’m saying is that the Southern Poverty Law Center correctly identified the Holocaust shooter, they have also identified Federation for American Immigration Reform as a ‘Hate Group’ and Greg Letiecq as a ‘Nativist’. I believe they are correct on all counts.
Great ‘anybody’ could have identified him. What other organization did? The Southern Poverty Law Center is being used by law enforcement agencies as a source of information on these individuals and organizations, so that lends them credibility in my book.
In my book, a man is judged by the company he keeps and for O’Brien and Marshall to accept a speaking engagement alongside FAIR, in my opinion, taints them.
Delaware Bob,
Prince William County has tried what you are suggesting. And guess what, it didn’t turn out so well.
Additionally, there’s nothing to suggest that another amnesty would cause an increase in future illegal immigration. It’s the lack of enforcement, combined with a booming economy, and an immigration system that is broken to its core that is to blame. Personally, I preferred when we had the booming economy and the high demand for labor.
But tell me, how did the feds adjust their immigration numbers to account for the high job creation numbers? Hmmm.. They didn’t. The market of supply and demand took over and the jobs were filled because of the need for labor. The fault lies solely with the federal government. They could have enforced the laws but chose not to. They could have increased temporary work visas to account for the historically low unemployment and the high demand for labor, but they didn’t.
In my opinion, the social and economic costs of an enforcement only policy are too costly. I favor e-verify as a component of an overall comprehensive reform package that takes into account our responsibility in the illegal immigration situation.
I don’t think that FAIR is a hate group. I think it’s the liberal fascism to label them so.
One of the reasons FAIR is so tarnished Citizen Tom, is their past relationship with the Pioneer Fund,a staunch supporter of the “science” of eugenics. You know, that silly old thing that gave rise to the murder of millions based on the notion of “superior” vs “inferior” races. Alanna isn’t suggesting that FAIR is the same as the neo nazi nut whose intention was to kill many more than one brave security guard at the Holocaust museum, her point is that the SPLC had identified him some time ago, through his writings, as being a hate blogger.
If you don’t know the history of either organization, FAIR or SPLC, you may want to do some independent research. Are you familiar with the Anti defamation League http://www.adl.org. They also have their own negative commentary on FAIR. FAIR is opposed to all immigration. Were it up to them, immigration would halt this instant.
Strike that “the” and I have what I mean to say.
http://fairimmigration.wordpress.com/2007/12/13/southern-poverty-law-center-lists-fair-as-hate-group/
The same logic could be used to label the Republican party as a hate group. Or any particular denomination of the Christian Church.
“The most terrifying number in all of this? A 35% increase in hate crimes against latinos. ” Over what time frame? What was the population growth of Latinos in that time frame? And what was the increase in hate crimes BY Latinos during that time frame? I’m not trying to minimize hate crimes, but I’m saying this statement is so simplistic that I would asume that it masks the fact that hate crimes against Latinos are probably growing less dramatically then it tries to imply.
http://www.adl.org/civil_rights/is_fair_unfair.pdf
I believe these numbers are based on a report by the FBI Rick. Uh oh, is the FBI now a facist liberal group?!
Citizen Tom,
There’s no accounting that takes into consideration the contributions of the nearly 40% of legal immigrants today that were once undocumented. Where in the cost analysis reports are there credits for their economic input? Does the simple fact that they are now legal mean that they are not a ‘drain’ on society? Where are the credits for those people like Twinad’s husband or mine that could offset some of the debts incurred by the undocumented population? Because without that accounting mechanism there is no way to calculate whether they are are actually an overall net negative on the economy. These ‘pie in the sky’ numbers associated with undocumented people by organizations like FAIR are at the core incomplete and faulted.
And what about the fact that the ‘illegals’ contributed their labor to one of the greatest economic boom cycles in our history. Is that to be ignored? Would it have been possible without the labor for the construction market and all the related supporting industries to experience their success without this influx?
“FAIR is opposed to all immigration. ” Temporarily, as I understand it.
I have sympathy with FAIR. I think that on the subject of legal immigration, some is a good thing, but we have allowed our ruling elites, through their political mouthpieces, to import labor to the detriment of American wages. This Bill Gates arguement that we need to allow him and his cronies to bring in every Engineer they may possibly have use for is nonsense. I’ve seen for myself office-fuls of underemployed engineers on H-1 Visas, doing hardly any work. I’ve seen for myself the game of “we’re going to post this ad in the lunch room corner about an open position, please don’t encourage anyone to respond to it because we really just want to use it to justify bringing in another foreign worker”. It’s frequently a sham undertaken by companies to lower wages.
I also have a pet peeve about us letting, say, half of El Salvador in here for no particular reason that I can discern except because some of them are good gardeners and nannies for the Ted Kennedys of the world. I’d like some public discussion about that. I’d like to talk about what that is doing to inner cities, most notably DC.
Some is good, and I’m not saying I agree with FAIR about this or that. But it seems to me they are making a civil arguement, about a highly relevant subject, that bears discussion rather than trusting our highly corrupt leadership to “do the right thing”.
I guess Elena you accuse FAIR of “hate crime by thought” or some such thing and by the Orwell Act of 1984 sentence them to eternal silence.
Rick,
You might want to take another look at the founder, he accepted money from a eugenics group. His concerns are very clearly expressed concerning a non-white society ie a brown/black takeover. The immigration or illegal immigration issue is a means to an end. Once they address “illegals”, then it will become immigration which we are already witnessing, then what?
I hear you Alanna. I still don’t think that, even if we stipulate that the leadership contains racists (I don’t know enough to make that judgementy personally) that it makes FAIR a hate group.
I share skepticism about what they’re doing at the “tea party” also. I just object to using the term hate group.
Even a blind dog finds a bone and even a white supremecist is occasionally right …
I listen to Daniel Carver of the KKK on Stern’s show once in a while – I’m kind of struck by how elements of his world view parallel mine. His line is “cheap labor is the white man’s kryptonite”. The slavery which caused the African-American precense in America that he hates/fears was indeed caused, as was much human suffering and misery, by desire for cheap labor. He sees tolerance of “Mexicans” as a continuation of that, and in a way it is.
Whether or not they are a hate group, I guess depends on the Southern Poverty Law Centers’ research and designation. One thing though is for sure FAIR is very clearly for severely restricting legal immigration.
That can’t bode well for those who believe America is a country of immigrants and that immigration has strengthened us. It’s a slap in the face, it’s as if saying that my Irish grandparents shouldn’t have been allowed to immigrate to the US after WWII. My guess is that FAIR will not openly address their anti-immigrant position but will attempt to focus on ‘illegals’.
I believe though that the levels of current immigration aren’t being calibrated in the interest of average Americans, but are being calibrated by our politicians so as to maximize profit for the bueinessholders they are beholden to. I think we need public debate on this issue and sunlight on what’s done in our names.
Rick,
I can’t argue with you statement ” I think we need public debate on this issue and sulight on what’s being done in our names”. Let’s also not forget how the history of immigration tends to repeat itself with the same arguments, and yet, somehow, we have thrived as a nation.
I thought “Tea Parties” were about taxes and government spending. How did immigration creep in to this? Perhaps the old adage ” What if you throw a party and nobody comes” can explain this.
Point taken Elena.
It appears to me the “Tea Parties” are starting to become a form of protest about anything one does not like about the current government. Kind of does go against the original purpose, to be something like the historical Boston Tea Party protest against taxes.
Rick has a point about the importing of skilled technical workers from other countries, which is indeed what Bill Gates and people like him are fighting to increase those amounts. At the same time they export jobs overseas where they hire cheap labor. In my field of software engineering, it is a real problem. The only slight protection you have, is if you work on DOD contracts – where one has to be a US Citizen to gain a clearance. Those jobs are at least safe from that sort of thing, although they aren’t safe from cutbacks in defense spending, which has happened in certain administrations. But for the software industry as a whole, this is a huge problem, that people like Bill Gates aren’t helping when they do this while many software engineers find themselves out of work due to outsourcing. IBM is a big culprit with the outsourcing thing too and actually has had some sofware engineers train their foreign counterparts, and when the training is finished, lay off those engineers!
Anyway, that’s a topic for a separate debate, but it is something most American high tech workers have a right to be concerned about.
Agree with GR.
Gates is my pet peeve. He’s an internationalist and that’s fine for him. He’s currently engaged in giving away most of his ill-gotten gains, to impoverished countries. Okay. But don’t use him as a poster child in front of Congress pretending that he’s representing America or Americans when he makes his phony pleas for more worker visas.
We could go round and round about what qualifies as a hate group. The majority of people in America are uncomfortable with things like eugenics and white supremacist attitudes. FAIR does a good job of sanitizing their wording but the lies they concoct are clearly designed to harvest hatred for a political agenda. And that political agenda is clearly stated on their website: ever since they started allowing darker skinned people to immigrate in larger numbers, FAIR has been opposed to immigration in general.
I may have said this before, I think that one’s vision of SPLC depends on whose ox is being gored. I didn’t care much for them designating UDC as a hate group or whatever it was that they designated them as. I have known too many little old ladies who kept graves cleaned and deweeded for me to say that the Daughters of the Confederacy is a hate group.
On the other hand, the Holocaust Museum wacko was identified by them long before he went on his rampage. They have been around for a long time. Law enforcement seems to feel they are good enough to use as a resource.
FAIR daddy Tanton certainly has tried to recruit people from many walks of life, political persuassion, etc under different banners, all for the same end purpose.
So can we agree that both SPLC and ADL both do definite good in identifying groups that are targeting groups of people? Can we give them an 80%?
“A 1997 study by the National Academy of Sciences found that
the fiscal impact of an immigrant with less than a high school
education drains the U.S. economy of $13,000 over their lifetime,
and most immigrants tend to fall into this category.”
Los Angeles Times (5-21-2003)
The National Academy of Sciences – another hate group?
Poor Richard,
The hate group designation probably originates from the acceptance of funding by the Pioneer Group and memos written by FAIR’s founder.
Immigrants to this country have not typically been well educated or well off. Remember the writing on the Statue of Liberty?
And, again, those numbers apply to legal immigrants? Geez, have immigrants positively contributed to this country or not? Based on those figures, it sounds as if immigrants regardless of status are a drain on this country. Maybe that is what they can blame the national debt on, all our ancestors being such a tremendous burden on the country. At what point in history did this negative impact start? Was it the pilgrims arrived at Jamestown? or when the Cubans fled Castro?
Frankly, listening to those doom and gloom forecasts it’s amazing that this country has been able to survive with all these negative impacts of immigrants.
Does anyone else see the irony here? Some of our regulars are complaining that nationally recognized civil rights organizations research, find evidence to support, and then announce certain classifications that marginalizes anti-immigrant, white-supremacist, and other racial separatist groups. They call this an unfair label. Then they turn around, and without any research and without any evidence in support, they accuse everyone on this blog of being in favor of illegal immigration.
I would say that SPLC and ADL have earned the right to make these determinations, and those who sympathize with certain groups that are marginalized by such classifications are free to complain. However, it might be wise to first complain about an unfair label slapped on a group you sympathize with, and then wait at least a little while before slapping an unfair label on others.
“nobody comes?” Whose coverage of the Tea Parties were you watching? Let me guess, PMSNBC, right?
Actually, I would say the same thing is true of some posters on the blog in terms of accusing various people not in favor of illegal immigration, of being “anti-immigration”. It seems to pretty much equal out – as far as the number of posters claiming people on the blog are in favor of illegal immigration, and the number of posters on the blog claiming some other people are ‘anti-immigration’. I’d call it a draw as far as those two things go, from seeing posts on this blog over time. Both sides have posters on this blog who do one of the two things. So there isn’t that much irony after all, if you ask me.
@Witness Too
Well, I seem to recall one or your ilk labeling the Rasmussen polling organization a hate group, so I guess it works both ways, doesn’t it?
Of course, Witness Too might not have been around when terms like racist and Nazi were slung around unfairly.
@Alanna
Alanna – Illegal immigration is illegal. Our government has Constitutional authority to regulate immigration and to punish people who cross our border without permission. Regulating immigration is part of what comes with sovereignty.
I have heard all kinds of excuses for illegal immigrants. Illegals are hard workers. Our economy cannot survive without illegals. We cannot control the border no matter what we do. And so forth. These complaints are hogwash. Consider what is common knowledge. Our government makes no serious effort find, punish, and deport illegals. Immigration laws have been deliberately weaken, and those they remain are weakly enforced.
Illegal immigration is symptomatic of larger problems. Because the citizens of this nation will not control their greed, we have lost control of our government. Look at what our government is doing. It has become an agent for income redistribution. In fact, we elected a president who said to Joe the Plumber that government should redistribute the wealth.
What does redistributing the wealth mean in practice? Have you ever heard of a daisy chain? We have become a nation of people sneaking up behind each other and reaching into each others pockets and purses. Instead of apologizing for and being ashamed of thievery, we now look for excuses.
Illegal immigration is just another form of national thievery. Where is the thievery in illegal immigration? Illegals sneak across the border, stealing access and trespassing. Employers abuse our welfare programs, “free” health care, “free” public education, and so forth to attract illegal immigrants.
As to your Admin Comment on my first comment. I don’t set myself up as judge and jury. I don’t like the content of this post. I think it borders on libelous, but I did not judge you. I said this post strikes me as hateful. I did not say you should be ostracized or restrained from speaking your mind. Instead, I defended people I know from what I considered your imprudent and ill advised words.
Because I know many of the people organizing and participating in the Prince William County Tea Party, I have no problem promoting the event. In fact, I appreciate you letting me know about it, but I am not going to try to investigate everyone involved. That task would serve no real purpose, and it would be beyond my means.
Consider the weakness of your own investigation, and you want me to investigate every party involve. And what if I did not find a closet skeleton I supposedly should have found, what then? Is God going to let someone into heaven who does not belong there? 😉
I think I will stick to discussing issues and facts I can prove. I will leave the judgment of my fellow human beings to a higher authority.