Thread: Feinstein's Failed Backdoor Amnesty Effort Had A Bodyguard O

Feinstein's Failed Backdoor Amnesty Effort Had A Bodyguard Of Lies
By Joe Guzzardi

Mindful of the timeless advice our mothers gave us, that if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all, I have this comment about California Senator Dianne Feinstein: "She’s great for my job security!"

After considering Feinstein for several hours (a profoundly unpleasant task), that’s the best I can come up with.

Of course, if you don’t write immigration reform columns for a living (as I do) then you most assuredly can’t think of a good thing about Feinstein.

Now that I’ve fulfilled my obligation to my mother, I can proceed to the matter at hand: Feinstein and her perverse dedication to guest worker programs and the temporary (ha!) legal status she wants to include in them.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, no day at the beach either, shot Feinstein down when he stripped Feinstein’s ag worker provision from the Senate Iraq spending bill. Score another big win for our side!

But Feinstein’s duplicity left an unusually bad stench behind that deserves a close look.

Feinstein sank to lower than pond scum levels on her latest effort to pass a completely unnecessary agricultural worker bill. She’s worse than Barack Obama or John McCain.

At least with Obama and McCain, you know where they’re coming from and they go straight at you with their immigration advocacy.

But Feinstein reduced herself to stealth measures when she attached late in the evening of May 16th a100 page-illegal alien farm worker amnesty for approximately 3 million illegal aliens to a Senate Appropriations Committee Iraq spending measure.

Once considered a moderate on immigration, Feinstein further debased herself by joining ranks with Idaho Senator Larry Craig. What possible credibility could Craig have on any issue?

Feinstein’s passion for guest worker programs, in light of massive evidence that none are necessary, is truly breathtaking. She is not embarrassed or ashamed to boldly lie about what is really going on in the fields and farms.

Here, according to a San Francisco Chronicle story written by Carolyn Lochhead, is what Feinstein hopes she can get you to believe:

"It's an emergency. If you can't get people to prune, to plant, to pick, to pack, you can't run a farm." [Feinstein, Lofgren push for immigrant workers, May 16, 2008]

I count five lies in two short sentences.

Or, if you prefer to look at it another way, in a twenty-one-word statement, Feinstein lied five times.

First lie, no "emergency" exists because, second and third lies, workers finished pruning and planting months ago. Lies number four and five: picking and packing are in progress.

How exactly do I know that Feinstein is trying to foist off a pack of lies? As a resident of California’s San Joaquin Valley, I drive past cherry orchards and strawberry fields daily.

I am literally surrounded by orchards with substantial acreage located directly to my north, south, east and west.

What I see—all day, every day—are workers hard at the task of picking fruit in the middle of what promises to be a banner harvest. (If you want, you can come to Lodi and pick some yourself at a local farm.)

If Feinstein were to offer an opinion about conditions in California’s fields that we may not agree with, that’s one thing.

But to stand up on the Senate floor and deliver a series of completely transparent lies (transparent, that is, to anyone who makes the slightest effort to learn the truth) is an altogether different—and disgusting—matter.

You can be sure that if Feinstein had tangible evidence that "an emergency" existed, we’d see photographs of the proverbial "rotting crops."

Feinstein maintains offices in San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego and my San Joaquin County neighbor, Fresno.

Let her send one of her eager staffers from any of those cities—plenty of agriculture in and around all of them—into the fields to produce the "shocking photos" that she could then wave around to her Senate colleagues.

But on-the-scene pictures would hurt Feinstein’s cause so don’t expect to see any.

What more can I say about Feinstein that I haven’t written before?

I could speculate that Feinstein is a born liar.

Just last year, she predicted that the labor shortage "would cost California’s economy $3 billion in the short term and as much as $4.1 billion over the long- term."

But, as it turned out, no one lost ten cents. It turns out that the only thing that can make crops rot in the San Joaquin Valley is rain.

Read my complete accounting of the 2007 cherry crop here. And if you don’t believe me, then read this report from the USDA confirming that in 2007 California cherry growers produced 92,000 tons, a 119 percent increase over 2006.

Or I could say that a millionaire like Feinstein who is married to the billionaire Richard C. Blum shouldn’t be spending her golden years in the back pocket of the grower’s lobby in exchange for campaign chump change.[Richard Blum, the Man Behind URS, Next to Sen. Feinstein, By Tom Abate, San Francisco Chronicle, May 13, 2008]

That sort of behavior strikes me as unseemly, to say the least.

I suppose that I could summarize Feinstein by observing that at 75 she’s an old witch who is long past her retirement age and may be losing her marbles.

But since some readers may consider those remarks harsh, unkind and therefore unworthy of me, I’ll simply return to proving you with more facts.

Simply put, there’s no excuse for hiring illegal aliens or importing more foreign-born workers.

North Carolina growers have recently set up an association that meets all its ag labor needs through local workers and legal foreign workers brought through the existing H-2A visa, the provisions of which ensure—or try to— that the seasonal guest workers go home.

Why shouldn't California growers play by the same rules as law-abiding farmers in other states like North Carolina?

Finally, this important point made to me during an exchange by California rancher Cindy Woods:

"Being a cattle rancher and having friends and family in 4-H and Future Farmers of America, I have a lot to say about Feinstein and her pack of lies.

"There are no emergency or any crops rotting. Millions of legal immigrants work in our nation’s fields.

"Feinstein should think for a moment about our California children who are getting ready for our state fairs right now.

"They are America’s future farmers. Our children have worked their hearts out to show their animals and their ag produce. They deserve a chance.

"Shame on Feinstein!"

Feinstein knows all about Future Farmers of America with its 500,00 young members and 7,000 chapters.

The program is a prominent and exciting part of many California high school curriculums.

But why would Feinstein care about that? She sits in her mansion overlooking the San Francisco Bay with nary a thought about non-voting age kids and their dreams.

What, after all, what can young Californians do for Feinstein?
http://www. vdare. com/guzzardi /080521_amnesty.htm

Big smile

Read the Dobbs transcript with Sessions about the discussion about her. Fascinating... She resents Dobbs for catching her basically...

OK, I am no longer in California, but I know from talking to friends of mine who still live in Lodi (San Joaquin Valley, California) that this man is absolutely correct. I lived in Lodi from 1999-2004 before moving to the East Bay. The only observation my friends have noticed is that the number seem to be smaller.

Originally Posted by fedupinwaukegan

Big smile

Read the Dobbs transcript with Sessions about the discussion about her. Fascinating... She resents Dobbs for catching her basically...

do you have a link?

Always remember corporate America basically runs our government so any bills will always be written to benefit them and anything that is passed will seldom harm corporations but certainly hurt average Joe.

The more Feinstein is exposed the better. We are crippled here in California having her as one of our Senators. The sooner shes' gone, the better. She's a traitor , anti- America and anti- California. Career politicians are the downfall of this country. We need shorter term limits for all elected representatives. One term and then out the door.

DOBBS: Well, after considerable objection, the Senate leadership late last night removed a farm worker AG bill illegal amnesty amendment that had been attached to the Iraq war funding bill. But not before Senator Dianne Feinstein added her name to those, a growing list I might say, who want to stop me from speaking out on the issue of illegal immigration and border security all across the country. Senator Feinstein in a letter to me blasted me for reporting on her AG jobs amendment to the war funding bill, an amendment that would have provided amnesty for as many as three million illegal alien farm workers and their families.

In her letter, the senator said, "The legislation was not approved by the Appropriations Committee 'in the dark of night' as you said. The legislation was offered during an open meeting of the Senate Appropriations Committee in the early afternoon, with hundreds of people in attendance."

Well, Senator, the dark of night is a metaphor, regardless of the time of day, most of the senators didn't know what you were doing and the discussion of the amendment was not on any public calendar that I'm aware of. An issue of this importance to the nation deserves full public hearings, full debate on the floor of the Senate, not an attachment that I described as dishonorable to Iraq war funding bill.

Your letter states that legislation is not amnesty. It could provide legal status to millions of illegal aliens. If that's not amnesty, what is it? Fortunately Senator, your colleagues on the other side of the aisle and the voices of outraged Americans helped your leadership understand that it was time to reconsider and to remove that ill conceived amendment from the Iraq war funding legislation.

Senator Feinstein declined our offer to join me here. We understand that. We hope she'll reconsider. It's a subject that we believe really deserves all the illumination we can bring to it. We'll continue to do our very best to bring light to this subject.

Senator Jeff Sessions was on this program Monday night expressing his outrage at the AG jobs amendment and Senator Sessions, a leader in the fight to defeat the amendment, joining us here tonight.

First I want to say to you Senator, we all are grateful for your efforts and we commend you for it. Thank you for doing that and I just can't imagine how the Democratic leader ship, the leadership that participated in this would permit to it be attached to an appropriations bill, the Iraq war funding bill.

SEN. JEFF SESSIONS (R), ALABAMA: Thank you for sounding the alarm. When we found out it had been added on, there was no notice on it. They had no hearings on the implications of the legislation. I'm confident that no member of the appropriations committee read that 110 page bill language. It has some very terrible things in it and it was not as stated fundamentally.

Senator Feinstein is a great person. I really admire her and like her. But we disagree fundamentally on this. This cannot be sneaked through without debate and the consideration of the American people. No form of legalization of millions of people, or any kind of legislation for that matter needs to be passed until we have the opportunity to put language in that tightens up the illegality in the current system. You said a little earlier the question is do we want a legal system or not.

How do you amend a system that's lawless already in people don't obey the law at all?

DOBBS: You know the reality is whether we're talking about the background checks that would have been required, the rather sort of list that went out there but there's no discussion that citizenship and immigration services, the agency that would be required to do all that, they are overwhelmed now. They can't function in support of and processing of legal immigrants into this country. It's a shame.

For Senator Feinstein and Senator Craig to sponsor such legislation with as far as I know, maybe you can correct me. I'm unaware by any research done by the Congressional Budget Office or Congressional Research Services on the issue of illegal aliens working in agriculture, where they're need most, at what price they would be paid. I know of none of that done.

SESSIONS: I couldn't agree more. Fundamentally this is a huge issue that impacts America in a whole lot of ways. We need a serious on objective analysis of what's needed. They've been listening to some very aggressive groups, special advocacy groups, and some very aggressive western growers who really, whose interests are not the same necessarily as the American interests.

DOBBS: They're sure not. At a time when this country is in an economic slowdown, people are going to talk honestly here. As somebody that has worked with illegal aliens working in fields, you know, many years ago, I can still remember the heat and the sweat and the hard work. If anybody wants to do something for those people immediately, I would hope they would attach to the legislation reasonable pay. Doubling the wages, the last research I saw would add about ten cents to a head of lettuce.

We need to pay the people in those fields more money. They deserve living wages. I don't care whether it's $20, or $25 an hour. They deserve it and that's what we should be paying. That might get the western growers' attention. Nothing should be passed without mandating a significant increase in pay for the people doing that absolutely essential work.

How do you feel?

SESSIONS: I think that's right.

We're not allowing the free market to work. If it were working, wages would go up. But it's undercut because huge flows of illegal labor keep flooding in and alleviate the need for the businesses to pay higher wages. I don't think that's healthy. I agree with you.

DOBBS: Senator, where do we go from here? There are still some H2B provisions in this amendment some of those pages that are still attached to the Iraq funding bill. What will be the disposition there?

SESSIONS: A lot of us want to do some improvements to the H2B. But I don't think anybody that voted for us and a lot of people that have heard about it fully understand that it goes up five times the current law rate of unskilled workers that come under that program. Take the highest rate, 120-some odd thousand; it's two and a half times that at a time our economy is slowing down. I don't think it's smart to go that far.

DOBBS: Great when a genius gets a hold of legislation, isn't it? Senator, thank you. I won't ask you to respond to that, Senator.

Senator Jeff Sessions, again congratulations on your successful efforts to forestall the horrible decision. Our thanks.

SESSIONS: Thank you.
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/ ... dt.01.html

I put the transcript with the part about Feinstein and then later the interview with Sen. Sessions over here on this thread - FWIW:

http://www.alipac.us/ftopict-116400.html

Please join in to get all the immigration language OFF the BILL!


ACTION ALERT:
http://www.alipac.us/ftopic-116344-days ... asc-0.html

OK, I am no longer in California,

Oh no, are numbers are dwindling as ALIPAC members are seeking asylum in other states.