Jan 24, 2016 Democratic presidential debate tonight

The latest Rasmussen Reports monthly Hillary Meter finds that 83% of Likely Democratic Voters think Clinton is likely to be their party’s presidential nominee in 2016. That now includes 43% who say it is Very Likely, down from 56% in December and 58% in November. Still, just 14% feel the former secretary of State and first lady is not very or Not At All Likely to win the nomination. This is why the State Department doesn't want to release the rest of Clinton's last batch of emails "The Caucuses"

What the pundit media (Fox, CNN, RNC, Establishment, Rinos) are doing!

Capitalism, Socialism, Communism, Explained

Dr. Lawrence Quill, chairman and professor of political science at San Jose State University. Explained the difference between communism, socialism, capitalism and democratic socialism -- in very professorial terms.

Capitalism — or really the concept of "liberalism" — arose in the 17th century, and centers on the right to private property. In Adam Smith's foundational "Wealth of Nations," Quill notes, "is recognition that capitalism is going to make the lives of a good majority of the population miserable, and that there will be a need for government intervention in society and the economy to offset the worse effects."

Socialism was in part a response to capitalism, largely through the writings of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Socialism focuses on the inequalities that arise within capitalism through a number of possible responses. Quill outlined some possibilities: "[T]he state might 'wither away' or collapse altogether, in others it would regulate the production of goods and services, in yet others it would become thoroughly democratic" -- all with the aim of reducing that inequality.

You can see that's where democratic socialism arises. That philosophy, Quill writes, seeks "democratic control of sectors of society and economy in order to avoid the pitfalls of an unregulated market and -- this is most important -- the kind of terrible authoritarian government that emerged in the Soviet Union."


Socialism was in part a response to capitalism, largely through the writings of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Socialism focuses on the inequalities that arise within capitalism through a number of possible responses. Quill outlined some possibilities: "[T]he state might 'wither away' or collapse altogether, in others it would regulate the production of goods and services, in yet others it would become thoroughly democratic" -- all with the aim of reducing that inequality.

You can see that's where democratic socialism arises. That philosophy, Quill writes, seeks "democratic control of sectors of society and economy in order to avoid the pitfalls of an unregulated market and -- this is most important -- the kind of terrible authoritarian government that emerged in the Soviet Union."
What you need to know about socialism

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) has been making waves as the only democratic socialist running for president. Here's what you need to know about being a democratic socialist and how it's different from socialism. (Alice Li/The Washington Post)

Communism "was the endpoint of Marx's ideas," Quill writes, though Marx didn't delineate what it would look like, exactly. "We find hints in works like 'The German Ideology" (1846) where there is a description of working life that is unalienated, i.e. creative and various -- we hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, and become opera critics in the evening." During the Cold War, though, the idea came to be inextricably and pejoratively associated with the Soviet Union and with the elimination of private property. The term, in Quill's words, "served as a shorthand for all things un-American" -- which was the way that Trump used it.

Quill's most important point is that "all of these terms are 'umbrella concepts'; in other words, they are host to a family of related ideas, not all of them compatible with one another." We tend to use the terms concretely, which necessarily introduces inaccuracies. Or, as Quill put it, "they [can] serve as excuses not to think, as belief systems that discourage explorations of the mismatch between theory and practice and the inconsistencies of any grand theory."

So that's the college-level curriculum. Next, I scaled it back a bit and talked to Tori Waite, who teaches high school history at Del Mar High School in San Jose. After all, since most of us were first introduced to these ideas in high school, perhaps we just need a refresher.

"When we teach about the different types of economies," Waite said, "the first thing we do is we talk about economic questions. How is it made? Who makes it? Who gets to buy it? Based on the economy, different people answer those questions."

Simplifying Quill's explanation: "In a communist country, the government answers those questions. There's no private business. There's no private property. The government decides."

"In a capitalist society, the people make those decisions. The businesses, the market decides how much products will cost, how many there are, where it will be made."

"In the socialist system, there's a mix of both. The government operates the system to help all, but there is opportunity for private property and private wealth. That's generally how we talk about it." Back to Quill's point: A socialist government could control all of the means of production -- or it could, for example, use taxes to redistribute resources among the population.

Both Quill and Waite note that the United States is not a purely capitalist society. There are and have long been socialist aspects to how the government makes decisions and applies its power, while still striving to keep the marketplace as free as possible. And, of course, while allowing democratic decisions to guide what it does.

That's the nature of thing, and why college students spend so much time at coffee houses arguing over nonsense.)

Unions, you are fools. Obama's latest plans....

The Obama administration is about to power up a massive new executive action on immigration and it’s far scarier than anyone could have imagined. Last November, when Homeland Security released its ten memos commandeering immigration policy from Congress, Secretary Johnson included a vague plan aimed at benefiting the tech industry, innocuously titled “Modernizing the Employment-Based Immigrant Visa System.” But a secret memo recently leaked on an immigration law blog now reveals that this ‘modernization’ plan will not only fast-track hundreds of thousands of work permits to employment visa-applicants in violation of longstanding U.S. worker protection laws, but will enable hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens to also receive work permits despite their unlawful status. As the full details leak out from the narrow clique of immigration lawyers and lobbyists advising the President, labor advocates are scrambling to warn the public.

Under our current system, most guest workers wishing to remain permanently in the U.S. must arrange for their employer to “sponsor” them by filing an I-140 application, putting them in a queue for a green card. When a temporary (“non-immigrant”) guest worker reaches the front of the immigrant visa queue, they are allowed to submit an application to “adjust” their “status” to that of permanent resident alien. Getting to this stage is key. By regulation an adjustment-of-status applicant automatically receives a coveted work permit or “EAD”. An EAD allows the alien to work anywhere in the country and apply for welfare. It’s the central reason foreigners line up to come here and it’s what Obama’s attempting to distribute to illegal aliens under the DACA and DAPA programs. And for those on guest-worker visas, EADs allow them to stay in the country even when their “temporary” visa (like an H-1b) runs out.

The wait-time between filing an I-140 application and being allowed to file for adjustment-of-status (getting you the golden EAD) is regulated by the State Department and depends not only on one’s filing date, but also on one’s country of origin. But for the millions of aspiring alien workers from overpopulated countries like India, per nation visa quotas have meant a typical wait of 8 to 10 years to get their EADs—Non-skilled workers from any country are also given lengthy wait-times, as there has never been a shortage of poor Americans who need employment. This per-country wait-time is now what Obama’s unilaterally arranging to slash. From now on, filing an adjustment-of-status application won’t be necessary to receive an EAD and any alien who merely has an I-140 petition that’s been approved for a year can obtain the prized work permit.

The new executive action will cut the line of people waiting to get an EAD dramatically, a backlog of hundreds of thousands of people who would otherwise have to wait patiently in line. This action will be a major encouragement to come here by any means possible, with a likely surge of thousands of EAD applications hitting an already backlogged USCIS in the first week alone. For the weak labor market faced by most American workers, it’ll be like a dam bursting.

This is a major coup for the axis of open immigration and Big Tech lobbyists. Big Tech would prefer to hire millions of temporary workers on H-1Bs over American workers because their visas are tied to their employer making them docile and unlikely to unionize. But flooding the labor market with current and future computer technicians, even with workers who’ll have greater flexibility, is much more important—it also gets rid of H-1B renewal and administrative costs.

Perhaps the most striking part of Obama’s move: illegal aliens will also be able to get EADs. All one needs to file an I-140 petition is an official ID; proving lawful presence isn’t required. The thousands of business-owners around the country who knowingly hire illegal aliens can cynically sponsor petitions whether or not the underlying applicant is legal. Ultimately, the USCIS bureaucrats will reject his or her adjustment-of-status application (after 10 plus years), but they’ll still be able to get that golden EAD.

Generally, I-140 petitions require aliens to submit a so-called Labor Certification showing that the petitioning employer has advertised for the position in a newspaper. This is meant to ensure that foreigners are not hired over American workers. As immigration attorneys have admitted, however, they show employers how “to do exactly the opposite”, for instance, by creating deceiving advertisements or disqualifying American interviewees on false pretences.



Filing costs for I-140 visa petitions are not cheap; with attorney costs, they can be several thousand dollars. But petitioning for an illegal alien-employee, with a promise to take the cost off his wages, could create a beneficial indentured servant relationship for employers. Larger employers may also file the petitions en masse if they feel a big crackdown coming (highly unlikely, of course). Furthermore, what’s to stop open-borders advocates, like La Raza, MALDEF, or LatinoJustice (where Justice Sotomayor was a board member) from creating a fund to finance the petition costs on behalf of employers? What about those groups’ billionaire-backers, like George Soros, Paul Singer, or the Ford Foundation?

The legal authority proffered by DHS in the leaked memo is predictably a deliberate misinterpretation of the law. These are the same DHS attorneys of course who, with help from immigration attorneys, produced the 2010 memo “justifying” the DACA executive amnesty program. They claim that two provisions of the Immigration & Naturalization Act, §205 and §274A(h)(3), give DHS Secretary Johnson discretion to issue unlimited numbers of EADs. Note that this is the same argument they’re employing in an attack against Texas’s amnesty injunction. The organization I work for, the Immigration Reform Law Institute, has eviscerated this argument in briefs submitted in support of Texas. Additionally, DHS has claimed the same authority for a separate move that would give work permits to spouses of H-1B-holders. We’re in the process of litigating against that rulemaking, which, if we’re successful, will be utterly disastrous for Obama’s amnesty as well as this new rule change.

Unlike the DACA executive amnesty program being challenged in the courts, USCIS is apparently opting to go through the normal regulatory process (although no details are up yet), complete with an opportunity for the public to submit comments. If enough patriotic American workers and their families flood the comment database, the agency may react like the ATF did when their proposed rule banning “green tipped” bullets was deluged with angry comments forcing them to rescind the proposal. If Americans care about their sovereignty like they do about their guns, Obama’s new immigration re-write won’t see the light of day.