HispanicVista Columnists & Guest Columns

Week of August 22, 2005

Business Section

Commentary & News

Week of August 22, 2005

When business is a pleasure

By Patrick Osio, Jr./HispanicVista.com

   August 22, 2005

 

The U.S., or any nation, has to be able to control its borders; has to know who enters and can demand that those entering must be by permission. And it follows that if there are illegal entries into a sovereign nation’s territory, the nation has the right, indeed the obligation, to arrest and deport those entrants, and to seal its borders to prevent reoccurrences. There are those who suggest that the US Hispanic community does not agree. In fact, according to a recent Pew Hispanic Center survey report, a significant majority of US Hispanic citizens agree with these principles.

The friction and seeming disparity of opinion attributed to the Hispanic community on these issues have and continue to be the inflammatory and insulting rhetoric and accusations aimed at Mexicans and Central Americans in an effort to force public opinion against, not their acts of illegal entry, but against them as human beings.

 

By Karen Mahabir/The Herald Mexico

 How does Larry Rubin at age 30 become CEO of the American Chamber of Commerce of Mexico, charged with representing foreign companies who have invested US100 billion here?

He starts off, at age 9, by racing through airports, collecting and renting pushcarts to travelers. At 18, he's running a network of 1,000 clients for Amway, a direct sales company. Years later, while in college, he's tapped as general manager of a major U.S. commercial airline's operations in Mexico.

"I always knew I wanted to go into business," says Rubin, from a windowed office at the chamber's building on Lucerna, in Col. Juárez. In fact, he said, he found his calling as sophomore class president at the American School, when he organized a prom that actually earned a profit.

By Richard N. Baldwin T. /HispanicVista.com

   August 22, 2005

 

FROM MEXICO

 

   First, let's start with a few premises. Most clear thinking people on both sides of the México/US border feel that the present border control system is not only out of whack, but does not protect either country. There are differences in outlook to be sure, but both sides feel change is vital for both countries.

We note two proposed US congressional bills designed to put more order in the migration system. There are differences between the two, some good things and some erroneous things. The odd thing is that President Bush, at the beginning of this year voiced his support for some sort of "guest worker" program. Now that these bills are being worked out in committee, the White House suddenly removed its participation in the compromise process. But it was the White House that suggested reform in the first place.

By Lisa Hoffman
Scripps Howard News Service

The son of a migrant farmworker, Henry Vega is now a successful figure in Ventura County, Calif., where he is first vice president of the local farm bureau.

That is no small post in a county that hosts a $1 billion agricultural industry. Vega, 43, owns a 65-acre lemon orchard and a farmworker-contracting company in Santa Paula.

As such, he is representative of the rise of Hispanic farmers in America, where they now make up the fastest-growing segment of farm and ranch operators across the land.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, their numbers have more than doubled in the last decade. Every state has registered an increase, with New England seeing the biggest jump. States with the most Hispanic farmers are Texas, California, New Mexico, Florida and Colorado.

By Raoul Lowery Contreras/HispanicVista.com

   August 22, 2005

 

"This country is not worth fighting for,” says American left-wing "iconnette," Cindy Sheehan. Further, she has been recorded as saying that the United States is in Iraq fighting Israel’s illegitimate war. 

In Texas, she prances in front of cameras surrounded by others like her spouting anti-Bush chants, anti-war bromides and taking left wing whining to a new level, a very low level. She demonstrated in support of a homegrown terrorist lawyer when she was convicted of supporting terrorism.

Cindy Sheehan’s son, Casey, died in Iraq.  This is the only reason we know who Cindy Sheehan is.

Casey wasn’t a draftee, he was not drafted to fight a war against his will; he volunteered.  He didn’t seek his mother’s approval, he volunteered for the Army totally on his own and, probably, against his mother’s wishes. Further, he re-enlisted while in Iraq for another three years in the United States Army. He was, according to all reports, a good American soldier.

Scripps Howard News Service

A state-by-state list of the number of Hispanic-owned farms, and the percentage change from 1997 to 2002. Source: 2002 U.S. Department of Agriculture statistics.

State Farms                Percent increase

Alabama                                               451                 97

Alaska                                                  8                     33

Arizona                                                761                  54

Arkansas                                              586                  80

California                                              7,711               44

Colorado                                              1,747               77

Connecticut                                           72                  100

Delaware                                              35                   133

Florida                                                 2,588                 95

Georgia                                                406                     4

(More)

Gap Between Income and Buying Power for Latinos

By Domingo Ivan  Casañas/HispanicVista.com

   August 22, 2005

  

   

Since there is a larger base when it comes to the population increase of Hispanics especially in California we would think that the economy would be getting a big boost from the Latino/Hispanic population.  

A recent study by the Selig Center for Economic Growth at the University of Georgia did find that the Latinos’ buying power is almost double the rate of the non-Latinos.  It estimated that the buying power just in California would reach an estimated $260 billion in four years.  The growth is certainly there.   However, what we need to realize is that the census data of 2000 showed nearly 54 percent of Hispanic households.

By Voice Of America News

A trade delegation from a midwestern U.S. state is in Cuba to negotiate a deal to sell some agricultural products to the communist island.

The governor of Nebraska, Dave Heineman, is leading the state's trade mission.  The team, which arrived in Havana Sunday to start a four-day visit, is hoping to sell beans and Nebraska-grown wheat and corn to Cuba.

A 40-year-old U.S. embargo against Cuba prevents most trade between the two countries, and the Bush administration has moved to tighten travel and commercial restrictions against Havana.  But a 2000 U.S. law allows for some food, agricultural and medical products to be sold to Cuba on a cash-only basis.

By Manuel Hernandez/HispanicVista.com

              The numbers speak for themselves. According to U.S. Census Bureau statistics, Latinos are now about 14 percent of the Nation’s population. The total Latino population is approximately 41 million, an increase of close to three million from just five years ago. Now that one of America’s most important cities has a Latino mayor, both political parties have realized that the projections are part of the past and a reality of today. The issues are the same: immigration, health, employment, security, home ownership and education. But the education of Latinos is without a doubt the determining factor in America’s future.

            A lot has been said about the Latino high school dropout rate but very little done on how to tackle it. In the United States, there is a twenty-seven percent Latino high-school dropout rate...

California employers are steering Latinos to Mexico, where care is less costly but uneven.

By Richard Marosi, Times Staff Writer

Thousands of Latinos who live near the border are taking advantage of a benefit increasingly offered by their U.S. employers: cheaper healthcare in Mexico.
About 160,000 California workers — farm laborers as well as working-class Latinos employed at hotels, casinos, restaurants and local governments in San Diego and Imperial counties — are getting their annual checkups and having surgeries through health networks south of the border, insurers say.

The arrangement is cheaper for both employers and employees. In Mexico, healthcare costs are about 40% to 50% lower than in California, freeing some employers to offer services that they couldn't otherwise afford.

History

By John P. Schmal/HispanicVista.com

From 1962 to 1985, the Chicano community of California had witnessed a revival of its political representation, this following a period of many decades during which Hispanic Americans had little or no representation anywhere in the State. In 1985, seven Chicanos were seated California State Legislature, making up 6% of the total membership of that political body: Chacón, Alatorre, Calderon and Molina served in the Assembly, while Montoya, Ayala and Torres occupied seats in the Senate. At the same time, three Chicano Congressman continued to serve as delegates from California in the House of Representatives.

Arthur K. Snyder and the 14^th Council  District

The most important events affecting Chicano representation in California during the mid-1980s were taking place in Los Angeles. Between 1950 and 1980, the Hispanic population of Los Angeles County had increased dramatically from 6.9% to 27.6% of the total county...

Mexico's dependence on assembling cars for U.S. automakers puts pressure on its economy as Detroit loses market share to foreign competitors.

By Marla Dickerson, Times Staff Writer

DaimlerChrysler's newest pickup is so enormous that you could fit a hockey team in the cab. Now the automaker — and the Mexican workers who build the truck — need it to be a monster hit with American consumers.
Available in U.S. dealerships by the end of this month, the 2006 Dodge Ram Mega Cab is the latest model to roll out of the company's plant in the northern Mexican city of Saltillo, where DaimlerChrysler recently invested $210 million to overhaul its assembly lines. The company hopes the six-passenger behemoth will boost U.S. sales of its Ram-series trucks, which have lost ground to competitors such as Japan's Toyota Motor Corp. and Nissan Motor Co.

GUEST

By Roberto Miranda

Milwaukee Spanish Journal

Special to HispanicVista.com

 

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan visited Milwaukee this past weekend promoting the Millions More Movement.  

Milwaukee is the first of several cities Farrakhan will be visiting to promote the Millions More Movement, scheduled for October 15 on the National Mall in Washington D.C.

Calling for racial unity and for all to take part in "something that is bigger than us all," Farrakhan said that people of other races should take part in the reunion of the "Million Man March" which drew hundreds of thousands of people to the nation's capital in October 1995.

"Why should we have a Millions More Movement? The United States is the greatest nation in the world. But today America is losing friendship all over the world," Farrakhan told the audience at Mercy Memorial Baptist Church, 2474 N. 37th St.

A new protected environmental area will not mean the loss of fish and jobs, say government authorities.

By Rosa Maria Mendez Fierros/El Universal

 The designation of the Sea of Cortes' islands as a World Heritage site by the United Nations will not negatively affect fishing operations in the area, environmental authorities said this week.

In July, the U.N. Education, Science and Culture Organization (UNESCO) named as a world natural heritage site the spread of hundreds of islands and ecologically rich waters along the northwest coast of Mexico.

However, fishermen on the coasts of Sonora and Baja California objected to the UNESCO designation. They said that an enlarged protected area would hurt their economic activities, particularly shrimp harvesting, and estimated annual losses up to US40 million.

GUEST

The rise of the Dominican immigrant community with ‘un pie aqui y un pie alla’

By Roberto Lovato

 

Jaime Mercado grew up picking coffee near bucolic streets you can’t find on most maps of the Dominican Republic. “My grandfather was an agricultor (farmer.) We grew coffee, tobacco, and bananas," recalls the corporate lawyer from his office at Simson Thacher and Bartlett LLP law firm. "Nobody knew where I was from when I first came to the U.S." Now that he puts together multi-billion dollar mergers and acquisitions everybody knows where Mercado works.

Mercado is part of a relatively new wave of highly educated, highly skilled Dominicans entering the financial sector as analysts, lawyers, and brokers. With an aggressiveness characteristic of other immigrant communities, more than a few of the 700,000 Dominicans in New York City are adding their own Quisqueyano touch to Wall Street...

Mexico will collect $20.9 million through tariffs on US goods to compensate for the Byrd Amendment in 2002

The Mexican government put US20.9 million of tariffs on U.S. products including chewing gum and red wine to compensate for dumping duties the U.S. collected from Mexican companies under the Byrd Amendment of 2000, the Economy Secretariat said in an emailed statement on Wednesday.

Mexico imposed the duties after the World Trade Organization in 2002 found the Byrd Amendment incompatible with its antidumping statutes, the Secretariat said.

Dumping duties are levied to retaliate against those companies that sell their goods below market value.

GUEST

Walking the walk: From fog of war a son emerges a soldier

By Sue Diaz

Christian Science Monitor

 

Through the wavy triple-digit heat of the Mojave in midsummer, the Humvee headed our way up the long sloping road. From the front seat of our parked car, I tracked its progress, stepping outside as it got closer.

"Think that's him?" I asked my husband. "Hard to tell," he said, peering in the same direction.

It was Saturday, late in the afternoon, at the main entrance to the Army's Fort Irwin, near Barstow, Calif. Our son, Roman, a soldier with the 101st Airborne in Kentucky, was there with his unit for three weeks of desert training. When it was finished, they'd be flying back to Kentucky to prepare for deployment to Iraq next month. It would be Roman's second 15-month tour of duty there.

Mexican government will complete sale of AeroMexico and Mexicana by year end

August 18, 2005

The government plans to complete the sale of the nation's two biggest airlines by mid-November, said Andrés Conesa, chairman of both carriers on Wednesday.

Conesa said in a radio interview that 30 percent of the companies that formally expressed interest in Aeromexico and Mexicana are foreign. Under Mexican legislation, foreigners are limited to a 25 percent stake in airlines, so they must team up with Mexican partners, he said.

"We are very confident that we're going to end up with a good number of solid investor groups at the end of the process in November," Conesa told Mexico City-based Radio Formula.

SPANISH – GUEST

CDP_NY  for sale
Por Miriam Ventura

Nueva York.- A partir de los atentados contra  las Torres Gemelas del 11 de Septiembre del 2001, el terrorismo y la guerra contra el terrorismo han entrado  desde entonces  en el debate sobre la Libertad de Prensa.
La Federacion Latinoamericana de Prensa -Felap_ en un documento rechazando la guerra de Irak, considero que "la guerra y otras acciones de fuerza se llevan ahora en dos frentes: El militar y el mediático. "Poderes públicos y privados  con el control financiero y tecnológico han estrechado sus controles sobre la información".En el 2003 ya la Felap se había sumado a los colegios, entidades, y organizaciones de profesionales de la comunicación en condena contra la guerra de Irak. Las Felap exigio garantías para los periodistas y congratulo la posición de México y Chile, opuestos a la guerra...

Mexican Maquiladora Industry fears CAFTA will hurt – textiles the most

Mexico's assembly-for-export industry, which has struggled to compete with China, will likely be hurt further by the proposed Central American Free Trade Agreement, officials said Wednesday.

Enrique Castro, president of Mexico's maquiladora association, said the new trade agreement still awaiting final approval would likely affect Mexico's textile industry the most.

Some companies may prefer to move their factories to Central America, which generally has cheaper labor than Mexico and a growing clothing industry, he said at a news conference.

"These are emerging nations that have a great need to develop," Castro said.

GUEST

For South Americans, War on Terror Looks Like 'Dirty War'

By Marcelo Ballvé

Commentary/Pacific News Service

 

Editor's Note: The treatment of terror suspects in the West -- the summary deportations, "renderings" and detainment in extralegal gulags -- looks eerily familiar to many in South America who survived the region's "dirty wars."
The recent turns in the war on terror look, to South American eyes, eerily like the Dirty Wars of the 1970s, when thousands of dissidents and rebels were imprisoned, tortured and often "disappeared."
Plan Condor was the name South America's allied military dictatorships gave to their policy of sharing intelligence and access to detainees during the Dirty Wars. Now, via indefinite detentions, summary deportations, "renderings" and the creation of extralegal gulags, the West is institutionalizing a similar system.

Mexico's Foreign Direct Investment Falls
Mexico's Foreign Direct Investment Falls During First Half of 2005

MEXICO CITY (AP) - August 19, 2005 - Foreign direct investment in Mexico was US$7.46 billion (euro6.13 billion) in the first half of this year, the Economy Department said Friday.

The amount was below the US$10.29 billion (euro12.73 billion) reported in the like 2004 period, when the equity buyouts of local bank BBVA-Bancomer and cement company Holcim Apasco by their parent companies boosted investment.

By excluding those inflows from the comparison, FDI was 8.3 percent higher than in the first six months of 2004, the Economy Ministry said in a statement.

GUEST

America, stop fighting it! Open the border!  

By Glenn Disney

 

Middle-East problems can't be discussed, nor are they, without including its religious history, ethnicity, and wars. Why then is the Mexican illegal immigration issue, when in media hands, void of historical mention? The facts are voluminous supporting the case that the U.S., marauding on the 1800's spirit of  'Manifest Destiny', essentially stole several of its states from a newly independent Mexico. That should be the basis for any discussion on illegal Mexican immigration.

Americans are angered by Hispanic intrusions upon their soccer-momish lifestyle of new cars, Starbucks, Cinema 30s, malls, and plenitude of restaurants. They can't afford to be guilt-ridden about the very people landscaping their mortgaged lawns, washing their bank-owned SUVs, or changing their credit-card-vacation motel sheets. Forget Mexican history!

 

Mexican growth forecast lowered after report second quarter did not meet expectations

JPMorgan Chase & Co., Credit Suisse First Boston, Santander Central Hispano SA and ING Groep NV cut their forecasts for Mexican growth this year after a government report showed the economy expanded less than expected in the second quarter.

JPMorgan reduced its growth forecast to 2.4 percent from 3.2 percent while Credit Suisse First Boston cut its forecast to 3 percent from 4 percent and Santander lowered its estimate to 3.2 percent from 3.5 percent. ING cut its estimate to 2.8 percent from 3.6 percent.

Latin America's largest economy expanded 3.1 percent in the second quarter from a year ago, below the 4 percent median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of 12 economists, as the agricultural industry...

GUEST

Bush's Millennium Challenge Corporation: A New Approach to Overseas Development, or the Same Old Strategy?

By Jessica Davidson and Cate Johnston.

Council on Hemispheric Affairs

 

In 2000, the United Nations launched an effort to eradicate worldwide poverty by 2015, adopting eight objectives called the Millennium Development Goals. In 2004, President Bush, in attempting to address these goals, founded the Millennium Challenge Corporation, which is in charge of allocating grants to a list of carefully selected developing nations. However, after almost two years of operation, the MCC has accomplished surprisingly little. Founding CEO, Paul Applegarth, who suddenly announced his resignation on June 15, left the post on August 8, and only a temporary replacement, Charles O. Sethness, has so far been selected. Although Applegarth’s reasons for departing...

 

Negocio/Business de Mexico/from Mexico

Importación creciente de Gasolina

Por Miguel Ángel Reta Martínez

Diario Monitor

En el primer cuatrimestre del año, la gasolina se colocó como uno de los principales productos que Estados Unidos exporto a México al registrar un monto de 1 mil 4 millones de dólares de enero a abril. De acuerdo con datos del Banco de México, durante el 2004 la suma llegó a 1 mil 427 millones de dólares, cifra que de mantenerse la tendencia actual crecerá más del doble.

Desde 1979 Pemex no ha podido construir una nueva refinería en México, ni siquiera sustituir la que cerró en 1991 en Azcapotzalco. Sin embargo, en 1993 invirtió 600 millones de dólares en un proyecto para procesar crudo maya (tipo pesado) y obtener gasolina en una refinería establecida en Deer Park, Texas.

COMMENTARY

THE BEST FROM THE NET

August 22, 2005

Immigration protesters joined by neo-Nazis in California

Intelligence Project

Southern Poverty Law Center

August 16, 2005

Anti-immigration activist Joe Turner may be one of the best things to happen to the Southern California white power community in years — a man whose group is seen as a "Trojan horse" allowing radical infiltration of mainstream politics.

Turner, a Ventura, Calif., man who founded the immigrant-bashing Save Our State organization in late 2004, insists that he's no racist, even though his self-described "aggressive activism" includes claims that undocumented Mexican workers are turning California into "a third world cesspool" and his Web site vilifies a variety of prominent Hispanic officials in a "Racialist Hall of Fame."

But neo-Nazis have found in Turner a tolerant master of ceremonies. In rally after rally this year, Turner and other SOS officials have failed to turn away racist Skinheads and likeminded white supremacists who have joined their protests.

Border 'emergency'? Yes. But what's the answer?

USA Today

August 18, 2005

In the past week, two Democratic governors, Bill Richardson of New Mexico and Janet Napolitano of Arizona, have declared states of emergency as a result of lawlessness connected to illegal immigration.

By themselves, these declarations are unlikely to have a dramatic impact. They make only about $3.25 million available for additional law enforcement efforts.

But, as with the vigilante-like activities of the "Minutemen" volunteer guards who have taken to patrolling the U.S. border with Mexico, the declarations do highlight the state of denial the country is in over immigration. The problems along the border - which include theft, kidnapping and drug trafficking - are not likely to be solved until the nation reconciles its concerns over large-scale immigration with its dependency on the cheap labor those immigrants provide.

Anti-immigration forces have thwarted President Bush's sensible proposal for a guest worker program…

A race-baiter falls from grace

By Michael Fumento
Scripps Howard News Service
August 18, 2005

Will inner-city blacks ever throw off the yoke of self-victimization imposed by "leaders" like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton? Perhaps, judging by the brief fame of race-baiting Hispanic demagogue Nativo Lopez, who went muy pronto from media darling to pathetic buffoon.

Lopez was elected to the Santa Ana school board in southern California in 1996, vowing to fight for legal immigrants, illegals and Hispanics. Never mind that the vast majority of Hispanics aren't immigrants, that about a third of Hispanics favor tightening immigration laws, that many immigrants aren't Hispanic, and that the majority of immigrants are here legally. The white media are always looking for somebody they can designate as a mouthpiece to make complex issues seem simple, and for a while using Lopez worked fine.

Border Control with Songs?

By Domenico Maceri

Commentary /La Oferta,

Aug 16, 2005

Last year the Mexican government published a comic book-style manual that aimed to discourage people from crossing the border illegally while providing survival tips to those determined to attempt the dangerous journey. Now the U.S. Border Patrol is trying a similar tactic as it attempts to keep Mexicans from crossing north illegally.
An advertising campaign in Spanish that includes songs and videos will be broadcast primarily in Zacatecas and Michoacan, two states that have historically had a high migration rates.
The ads that the U.S. Border Patrol plans to run include music videos that aim to plant a seed of doubt about making the journey. The lyrics focus is on the dangers: the story of one of the songs even includes “voices” of dead migrants and their vanished dreams.

Tainted 'justice' at the EPA

A proposed policy ignores pollution's effects on low-income and minority communities in deciding which areas need help.

By Manuel Pastor, Bill Gallegos and Michele Prichard

Los Angeles Times

August 18, 2005

THE ENVIRONMENTAL Protection Agency quietly released a draft plan in July on "environmental justice" — how to deal equitably with the effects of environmental problems on communities of people. But, in fact, the proposed policy ignores race and income — two main factors — in identifying areas that need help. The EPA instead takes a sort of "colorblind" approach. That might not be an issue if all communities were equally affected. But they are not.

The disproportionate exposure of minority and low-income communities to environmental hazards has been amply documented, particularly in Southern California.

In Los Angeles County, for instance…

Coming to grips with U.S. imperialism

By Michael A. Babcock
The Providence Journal
August 19, 2005

President Bush's basic vocabulary _ good and evil, war and victory _ has always made his liberal critics uncomfortable. But the other week Bush seemed to be speaking to members of his own administration when he made it crystal-clear to the world that we're fighting a "war" against terrorism. It's not, as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has recently been nuancing it, a "global struggle against violent extremism."

It's a war: plain and simple. Of course, wars are neither plain nor simple.

They're messy and unpredictable. But to his credit, the president seems to recognize _ in his gut _ that a shift in vocabulary will change nothing. A policy is either right or wrong.

So what are we to make of Rumsfeld's re-labeling project, and the president's very public rejection of the new vocabulary? It has settled one thing, for sure:

Diploma Scandal at the University of Panama Further Mires the Torrijos Government in Corruption Charges

By Jessie Gaskell

Council on Hemispheric Affairs

In early May, hopes to contain spiraling corruption levels were dealt an incapacitating blow as charges were levied against the University of Panama’s (UP) administration that illuminated an embarrassing scandal involving, at the very least, the distribution of over 1,000 irregular diplomas. Although presently it remains a relatively obscure issue, the scandalous state of affairs at the country’s leading education institution includes such anomalies as the issuance of multiple diplomas as well as the handing out of such documents to students who had not completed their full course work, thus failing to meet their degree requirements…

The man who would be president 

By Kelly Arthur Garrett

Herald Mexico/El Universal

August 15, 2005

Amusement is a forgivable first reaction to the emergence of Arturo Montiel as the top alternative to party leader Roberto Madrazo for the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) presidential nomination. Not often do the stars align themselves to promote a candidate so true to a stereotype that he serves as a caricature of all that's wrong with electoral politics.

Or so one might think. The consensus criticism of the pre-campaign to date is the dominion of image over substance, of self-promotion over achievement, and of unseemly amounts of cold, hard cash over anything resembling a program.

NEWS  

Of interest you may have missed for

Week of August 22, 2005

Attitudes toward Immigrants and Immigration Policy

Surveys among US Latinos and in Mexico

By Roberto Suro

Pew Hispanic Center

Although an overwhelming majority of Hispanics expresses positive attitudes toward immigrants, relatively few Hispanics favor increasing the flow of legal immigration from Latin America and a significant minority, concentrated among native-born Latinos, is concerned that unauthorized migrants are hurting the economy. One hotly-debated means to discourage unauthorized migration--laws that deny drivers licenses to people who are in the country illegally--draws support from a majority of the native born.

Study: Most Latinos oppose driver's licenses for illegal immigrants
By: William Finn Bennett - Staff Writer
North County Times (San Diego, CA

 A majority of U.S. Latinos surveyed in a recent study oppose the idea of granting driver's licenses to undocumented residents, according to data released by the Pew Hispanic Center.
Most Latinos interviewed also said they favored granting illegal aliens permanent legal status and eventual citizenship.
The mix of attitudes among U.S. Latinos toward illegal immigrants showed up in a June study by the center, a Washington-based think tank.

Study Finds Latino Immigrants are Best Commuters

EGP News Service, News Report, Staff,

LOS ANGELES -- Aug 17, 2005 - The next time you are trying to find a scapegoat for the terrible traffic problems that plague the state of California, the immigrant Latino community should be the last place you look.
According to a new study from the UCLA Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture, the state's roads would be far less congested if more people adopted recent Latino immigrants' commuting habits.
The study shows that recent immigrants to the United States are seven times more likely to use public transportation to go to work, and five times likelier to carpool to work, than are non-Hispanic whites. If everyone adopted these same patterns, the number of single-occupant vehicles congesting the state's roads could be slashed by nearly half.

Successful Mexican immigrant to US, returns to run for mayor of his hometown

By Alonso Soto

 

Former Chicago businessman and Mexican immigrant Timoteo Manjarrez recently decided to run for mayor in his hometown of Teloloapan, a poor city in the South of Mexico where he returned to live six years ago.

"I always dreamed of coming back to my roots. Now we are going to get this city out of the backwardness it is submerged in," the 42-year-old Manjarrez said in a telephone interview.

In July, eager to raise support for his election effort, the successful restaurateur turned to an unlikely group of people who could have a big influence on how his constituents vote -- his former neighbors in Chicago's Little Village and Pilsen neighborhoods.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

1. Network of Executive Women  Summit Sept 26-27

2. Orange County Hispanic Education Endowment Fund 12th Anniversary

3. Apple of Gold Awards Gala Dinner 

Garza didn’t mean to say what he said – apologizes for “punish” remark

The U.S. ambassador to Mexico now says he should have used "different phrasing" rather than saying he closed a border town consulate partly to punish the Mexican government for not stopping violence there, according to the State Department.

The department's spokesman Sean McCormack said Thursday that Ambassador Tony Garza's real reason for closing it was to protect Americans working there.

US Ambassador Garza married wealthiest woman in Mexico and is now accused of being a Mexico basher.

By Alistair Bell

 

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – August 18, 2005 - He married Mexico's richest woman, is an old pal of President Bush and now Washington's envoy south of the Rio Grande is stirring up controversy in a dispute over crime and immigration on the U.S.-Mexican border.

U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza upset Mexico this week by boasting he had shut a consular office in a border city to "punish" the country for failing to halt a drug war there.

Government riled by Garza's remarks – Closing consulate was punishment.

August 18, 2005

 

U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza's comment that he briefly closed a consulate partly to punish Mexico's government for border violence drew a sharp response Wednesday from Mexican officials.

Deputy Foreign Relations Secretary Gerónimo Gutiérrez issued a news release saying Garza's statements "have not been well received."

Gutiérrez said Mexico's government agrees Garza has to work for the security of U.S. citizens, but said, "His selection of words was frankly unfortunate and does not correspond to the role of an ambassador."

Students Gain, but Still Lag

Test scores rise again, but not enough to bring public schools in line with federal standards.

By Duke Helfand and Joel Rubin,

Los Angeles Times Staff Writers

August 16, 2005

Although California public school students showed promising gains on math and English tests last spring, less than half were proficient in the two subjects and unable to meet the achievement goals set by the federal No Child Left Behind education law, the state Education Department reported Monday.
Students in grades two through 11 have steadily increased their test scores over the last four years, progress that officials attribute to a strong focus on academic standards in classroom instruction.

Group targets break that Texas colleges give illegal residents.
By Michelle Mittelstadt 

The Dallas Morning News

 WASHINGTON – August 14, 2005 - Nearly 4,000 Texas students would face a major tuition hike or loss of state financial aid if a conservative legal group successfully challenges a state law that has made college affordable for many illegal immigrants.
The Washington Legal Foundation has filed a complaint with the federal government charging that Texas is violating U.S. immigration law by allowing illegal immigrants living in the state to pay the same in-state tuition as Texas residents who are U.S. citizens.

Arizona and Sonora governors meet to discuss border security

BY Paul Davenport

 

NOGALES, Arizona – Associated Press – August 20, 2005 -  The governors of Arizona and Sonora on Friday announced new steps to make the border region safer and to combat border-related crime but said they want their federal governments to do more.

Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano and Sonoran Gov. Eduardo Bours spoke Friday at a news conference on a blocked off street at a border crossing point.

Napolitano announced that the state Department of Public Safety will create a new detail of officers to work with southern Arizona law enforcement agencies to target vehicle theft, a crime often linked to transporting of illegal immigrants.

California Border Debate Heats Up

By Richard Marosi,

Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

 

SAN DIEGO — August 19, 2005 - Along California's border with Mexico, the number of people caught crossing illegally has plummeted, a trickle compared to the hundreds of thousands arrested in Arizona. But to many residents and politicians in San Diego County, the international border remains a chaotic place overrun with illegal immigrants and drug smugglers.
The common complaint here is that something must be done to tighten security. But is declaring a state of emergency the answer?

The governors of New Mexico and Arizona did just that in the past week, saying their states are suffering because the federal government has failed to stem the tide of drug smuggling and illegal immigration.

Illegals dying at record rate in Arizona desert

By Dennis Wagner

USA TODAY

 

SELLS, Ariz. — August 19, 2005 - The smell of death floated on a sweltering August breeze near the Mexican border, emanating from an immigrant's corpse.

He had expired beneath a mesquite tree on the Tohono O'odham Indian nation 45 miles southwest of Tucson, apparently trying to escape the Sonoran sun, trying to get to America.

John Doe No. 130.

That's the name and number given to him by authorities in a year when Arizona has set new records for deaths among undocumented immigrants along the state's 389-mile border with Mexico.

Mexico and US to fight migrant smugglers

MONTERREY, N.L. -  August 18, 2005 -  The U.S. and Mexican governments on Wednesday announced a bilateral effort to help authorities identify and prosecute migrant smugglers working on their common border.

The program, dubbed "OASISS," will facilitate the exchange of information and evidence to assist both governments in the prosecution of migrant smugglers and help save migrant lives, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Robert C. Bonner said in a statement.

"By exchanging critical information, coordinating enforcement operations and jointly targeting cross border criminal activity we will yield a safer and more secure border," Bonner said.

Cartels recruit young killers

 

NUEVO LAREDO, Tamaulipas - August 18, 2005 - Organized crime rings are recruiting everyounger teenaged assassins, say law enforcement officials, and two groups of "hit boys" the Hawks and the Shorties are at the service of drug-traffickers gunning each other down along the U.S.-Mexico border.

The cartels have been engaged for months in a battle over drug routes into the United States, using assault rifles, grenade launchers and other heavy weapons in a turf war that has left more than 100 people dead in this city across the border from Laredo, Texas.

Earlier this month, two young men with AK-47 assault rifles shot to death in broad daylight councilman Leopoldo Ramos in the center of town.

Mexico expands campaign to eradicate organized crime

 

Mexico City – (AP) – August 19, 2005 - A campaign launched to stamp out organized crime along the border is spreading to central Mexico, federal and state officials announced on Thursday.

Federal Attorney General Daniel Cabeza de Vaca told a news conference that national police and prosecution agencies were meeting Thursday with colleagues from Mexico State to bring the "Secure Mexico" program to the country's most populous state one that wraps around three sides of Mexico City.

3 Big Drug Rings Broken, U.S. Says

In a Drug Enforcement Agency crackdown on meth, cocaine and heroin trafficking, more than 160 suspects in three nations are held.

By Cynthia H. Cho,

Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

 

WASHINGTON — August 20, 2005 - A 10-month investigation led to more than 160 arrests in four U.S. cities and two foreign countries this week, and broke up three major transportation rings that smuggled methamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and other drugs into the country, the Drug Enforcement Administration said Friday.

Drug sting nabs 160 in U.S., Dominican Republic, Colombia

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — August 19, 2005 - Drug enforcement agents have arrested some 160 people in four U.S. cities and two countries and have broken up three major drug transportation rings with international ties in a 10-month drug-trafficking sting revealed Friday.

The Drug Enforcement Administration said the people arrested were involved in 27 U.S. distribution groups that have moved enough methamphetamine into the United States to have provided the drug to more than 22,700 users a month.

US freezes assets of 30 companies accused of ties to Mexico’s largest drug cartels

 

WASHINGTON - (AP) - August 19, 2005 - The U.S. government on Thursday released a list of 30 companies and individuals it believes has ties to Mexico's largest drug cartels.

A communique issued by the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control identified nine companies and eight persons with ties to the Arriola Márquez organization and three companies and four people with links to the Arellano Félix group.

Mexican government congratulates US authorities on action against Mexican companies and individuals

August 20, 2005

 

Mexico's government congratulated U.S. authorities on Friday for action against Mexican companies and individuals alleged to be involved in laundering illegal drug profits.

President Vicente Fox's spokesman, Rubén Aguilar, told a news conference the U.S. declaration was based on investigations within the United States implying it did not violate Mexican sovereignty.

They say the House majority leader's words are 'extreme' and run counter to laws.
By Eric Hanson, Houston Chronicle

 Rosenberg, TX - August 19, 2005- At a town-hall meeting hosted by the Houston-area LULAC, several speakers disagreed sharply with comments made recently by House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who proposed a tougher stance on U.S. immigration practices.
"Mexicans, Central Americans and South Americans are not bombing anything strategic in America. They are here to work," said League of United Latin American Citizens member Joel Salazar.

Minutemen will be armed while patrolling Houston

From “nothing but video cameras” to membership dues discount for “concealed weapon” permit holders.
By Edward Hegstrom
Houston Chronicle

Leaders of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps of Texas had earlier said volunteers observing Houston's day laborers in October would carry nothing but video cameras.
But leaders now say those involved in the operations targeting local illegal immigrants will be allowed to carry arms as long as they comply with all federal and state laws.

No security emergency on Texas border, Perry says

Officials say Arizona, NM have worse situations

By Brandi Grissom

Austin Bureau

 

AUSTIN - August 18, 2005 - Gov. Rick Perry will not declare an emergency on the Mexico border as two other states have done in the past week, his spokesman said Wednesday.

"It's not a step he is prepared to take at this point, but it remains an option on the table," Perry spokesman Robert Black said.

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano both declared a crisis along their states' borders with Mexico. They have begun funneling millions of dollars to the area to beef up security.

Minutemen to spread wings

Anti-immigrant group pledges to bring 15,000 volunteers to both the Mexican and Canadian borders for month-long vigils

By Bill Berkowitz

Working Assets/Working for Change

 

Several months after their self-proclaimed success reducing the flow of immigrants across the Mexico-Arizona border, leaders of the Minutemen are pledging that come Oct. 1, 15,000 volunteers will begin a month-long vigil along both the U.S.-Mexican and U.S.-Canadian borders. 

Chris Simcox, the head of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, a network of groups and individuals, many of them armed, said in mid-July that the volunteers are signing up to "man observation posts and conduct foot and horseback patrols."

Signature Drive to Create California Border Patrol

By Manuel Ortíz,

Translated by Elena Shore

 El Mensajero,

SAN FRANCISCO – Aug 18, 2005 - Republican Assemblyman Ray Haynes has introduced a bill that would create a new Border Patrol in California, arguing that we must get rid of illegal immigrants because they “flagrantly take advantage” of taxpayers.
The bill, ACA 20, was evaluated and brought to a vote on July 5 in the State Assembly Judicial Committee where it was rejected. Now Haynes, together with a group of volunteers, is launching a signature collection campaign to put the measure on the 2006 ballot.

States' rights take center stage at NCSL
By Eric Kelderman

Stateline.org Staff Writer

August 16, 2005

SEATTLE -- State legislators kicked off their four-day national conference calling for less federal intrusion and fewer costly mandates from Washington, D.C.

 At their annual meeting, leaders of the National Conference of State Legislatures renewed criticism of new federal standards for driver's licenses as costly and unnecessary. And they brought fresh charges of congressional meddling over proposals that would limit state and local regulations on eminent domain, land use and economic development.

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