Newt goes leftist on immigration

Newt is leftist on immigration. He's also into HBD denialism. He has lost my support.

Romney is the most conservative candidate on issues that really matter. Flip-flopping on abortion doesn't matter (as if we really need more low-IQ babies in this country). 9-9-9 is stupid and moronic.

Comments

[Peter A]

You are kidding yourself if you really think Romney is against immigration. Wake up. Management consultant types are almost universally for transparent borders and an "efficient labor market", Mormons love immigration because it means more potential Mormons. You really think that by some miracle Mitt "Waffle" Romney somehow somewhere developed a firm belief that immigration is a problem?

The only Republican who is truly sincere is Bachmann, the rest of them are transparent frauds, including Romney - just a bunch of shills for big business willing to say whatever the base wants to hear and do whatever it takes to make corporate America happy.

[Shawn]

Romney is calling for "MORE immigration" (his words). I'm deciding between Paul and Bachmann.

[Shawn]

Ron Paul was the only Republican candidate right on Iraq's supposed WMDs and Iraq. That's judgement.

[Camlost]

Half Sigma is so right about Romney being the only electable Republican, despite his flaws.

[Linda]

Just because Newt thinks the racial academic achievement gap is too wide, does not prove that he's into HBD denialism. Your comment suggests that you are into bad teacher denialism.

The article you link to states that by 4th grade, African Americans are 3 years behind whites academically. In other words, at age 9, African Americans are academically like white 6 year old. An academic age of 6 divided by a chronological age of 9 implies an academic achievement IQ of 67 (6/9*100=67). And yet the bulk of the data suggests African Americans average an IQ of 85. So bad teachers (unions) and bad schools have arguably lowered African American achievement by 18 points.

I'm not a fan of Newt, but he appears to be correct that there is room for great improvement in minority achievement.

[MeMyselfI]

I suggest you gain a little depth to your understanding of Newt's immigration position... here's a good blog entry - by a former Newt advisor - that is worth considering:

http://jerrypournelle.com/chaosmanor/?p=3591

Also, the post after this one comments further on the subject...

Don't dismiss Newt so easily... the one VERY important thing you can say about him is that he ACTUALLY PRODUCED A BALANCED BUDGET while in Congress. No other candidate can say that. Period. This puts him miles above any other candidiate in terms of "walkin-and-talkin".

[superdestroyer]

Romney is a cheap labor, la Raza Republican who will throw middle class whites under the bus the first time the Republican establishment tells him to throw the middle class under the bus.

The problem for the Republicans is all of the presidential candidates are totally unqualified. Maybe the Republicans would be better off without nominating someone and concentrating on retain control of the House and winning control of the Senate.

[jef]

Regarding Newt- I can't vote for someone who says "very unique".

[Eugenick]

Even Jew-haters like David Duke would get more policies right than your average HBD-denier.

[jeanne]

I'm not convinced Bachmann is sincere, but she sincerely senses that immigration is an issue and was smart enough to hammer on it earlier than the others. That's more than I can say for the others, including the Blessed Ron Paul, though Romney has jumped into the act too.

[Kiwiguy]

Mitt's poetry.

http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/11/collected-poems-willard-mitt-romney

[John]

Romney is telling the primary voters exactly what they want to hear. As soon as the primary is over, he'll swing back left.

[The Undiscovered Jew]

"Flip-flopping on abortion doesn't matter (as if we really need more low-IQ babies in this country)."

Not only is abortion a point in Romney's favor because abortion is wonderful at reducing the number of violent, stupid, racial minority children (and the only sensible reason for a non-liberal to vote Democrat) but even the conservative Evangelical states wouldn't ban abortion if SCOTUS threw the issue back to the states.

As I argued before, abortion will never be banned even if Roe is overturned because not even "pro-life" states like South Dakota and Mississippi vote against referendums restricting abortion at the state level.

Just recently, pro-life Mississippi voted down a "personhood" ballot initiative":

Mississippi's "Personhood Amendment" fails at polls - CBS News

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57321126/mississippis-personhood-amendment-fails-at-polls/

[The Undiscovered Jew]

Why wouldn't HBDers and secular conservatives vote for Mitt Romney?

If Romney is the only candidate other than Bachmann who is good on illegal immigration, then "one issue" immigration voters have no excuse but to vote for Romney.

It's not like Romney would be much more liberal on other non-illegal immigration policies than the other candidates.

Aside from supporting a fence and attriting the illegal population, Romney's economic and energy policies will be no different than any other GOP candidate's would.

He probably will be more liberal on social policies, but, in his defense, there's little a president can do to enforce sexual morality. Even if Romney wanted to roll back the sexual revolution, nobody would listen to him. The used condom of the sexual revolution is out of the wrapper and there's no way to put it back in short of voting the Taliban into power, and I doubt even a Taliban military Junta could roll back sexual libertinism at this point.

[The Undiscovered Jew]

"9-9-9 is stupid and moronic."

I agree flat taxes are dumb, but, since you have a background in tax law, what do you think of my idea of replacing 50% of the payroll tax (both employee and employer) with a non-VAT national sales tax?

[Black Death]

Glad you saw the light on Newt. I can't stand Romney either. It's not just his change on abortion - he's changed his mind on just about everything - the stimulus package, payroll tax holiday, health care, gay marriage, climate change - the list goes on and on. Here's a handy guide, backed up with Romney quotes: http://mittromneyflipflops.com/.

Romney's positions are like the weather - if you don't like it, just wait, it will change. He seems like the Republican Slick Willy, on both sides of every issue, saying whatever he thinks he needs to say at the moment to get elected. No thanks.

[SDS]

Oh he's into HBD denialism, you mean just like every other mainstream politician or anybody who wants to be taken seriously ? And you're kidding yourself if you think Romney isn't pro immigration. Were you watching the debate. All the candidate except for Paul was tripping over themselves about who was the most pro immigration.

[ANewHypothesis]

"An academic age of 6 divided by a chronological age of 9 implies an academic achievement IQ of 67 (6/9*100=67)."

I'm sorry, I can't tell if this reasoning is supposed to be a joke or not.

[E]

Posted by: Linda
"I'm not a fan of Newt, but he appears to be correct that there is room for great improvement in minority achievement."

Why should white people care if "minorities" never improve upon their condition? Why should white people be burdened with this herculean task of trying to lift minorities up?

[Feh]

Bachmann is the most conservative candidate, period. ACU gave her a perfect 100 rating for 2010.

[D]

"...implies an academic achievement IQ of 67 (6/9*100=67). And yet the bulk of the data suggests African Americans average an IQ of 85."

Some have pointed out that the tested pool who score 85, measured later in life, never includes drop outs and criminals, who are likely to pull that number down by a bit and make up a larger portion of blacks compared to any other group. So maybe it's lower than 85.

[Anon]

"Barely half of all black and Latino students graduate from high school, while nearly 80 percent of white students do."

That is about one standard deviation isn't it?

[Jack]

There's potential for better white achievement too.

It's not Newt's position on immigration that's the problem, it's how he decided to couch it. I have no idea what his strategy is, but Romney is, while not perfect, AS GOOD AS WE CAN GET on the issue. And much, much better than Obama.

[jtollison78]

" In other words, at age 9, African Americans are academically like white 6 year old. An academic age of 6 divided by a chronological age of 9 implies an academic achievement IQ of 67 (6/9*100=67)."

This is particularly interesting since I would expect african americans to mature faster. otoh, I would be surprised if the 3 yr gap is stable over different spans. Note the Flynn effect was supposedly in effect even while they recentered the SAT in '95. The simplest answer is faster maturation rates, and different test populations (wrt age).

Also, I'm slowly coming to believe that the quality of education has is suffering across the board independent of student quality.

[lcs]

Get off this Tea Party immigrant kick. We've always imported illegals to pick our crops because it is the only efficient, cheap labor we can get. How can you not get your head around this basic fact?

[Feh]

"Romney is, while not perfect, AS GOOD AS WE CAN GET on the issue."

No, Bachmann is.

[Commander Shepard]

"Why should white people care if "minorities" never improve upon their condition? Why should white people be burdened with this herculean task of trying to lift minorities up?" - E

Haven't you heard of the white man's burden?

[JHB]

Romney isn't a conservative. Nor is he a liberal -- he isn't anything at all. Those who believe otherwise delude themselves.

President Romney would look very much like President Obama. If we take Romney's experience into consideration, the policies will be close to identical. The differences will be whiter skin, and a cheesy gee-willickers tone replacing the somber, inwardly Puritanism of the current White House occupant.

And of course, under the Romney administration, we'd witness the predictable David Brooks-style "I'm a sap" comments from those who can't tell the difference between sentences and realities. This wouldn't even be unfortunate. It isn't like figuring out Mitt Romney is a huge mystery, given his considerable time in public life. No -- it would be another deliberate instance of human self-delusion, a baroque exercise in rationalization that reached beyond the capacity of those with limited IQs.

Let us hope simple minds prevail.

[Mark]

"Get off this Tea Party immigrant kick. We've always imported illegals to pick our crops because it is the only efficient, cheap labor we can get. How can you not get your head around this basic fact?"

We had previously brought in another minority group from Africa to pick our crops but then we gave them all welfare and affirmative action jobs and now they won't pick our crops. The problem with bringing in another minority group is what will keep the same thing from happening with them, especially once they have children who automatically become citizens by being born here? The welfare costs are already bankrupting some states with high levels of illegal immigrants like California. We could afford welfare and affirmative action for the black ten percent of the population when we were a wealthy country but we won't be able to afford it in the future when we're poorer and blacks plus Hispanics make up a lot larger share of our population. And we won't be able to repeal welfare and affirmative action at that point because politicians elected by the black and Hispanic voting blocs will prevent it.

[Eggwhite]

It's over. Romney will be forced on us as the nominee and then it will be a Dole redux (or McCain if you prefer). Put the boring moderate establishment guy in, knowing he will lose. How many times do we have to see this movie? It will be Oba through 2016.

[Allerious]

"Mormons love immigration because it means more potential Mormons."

Why stop at Mormonism? Your statement is true of Christianity in general. This is precisely why the creed is anti-white and how it fostered the secular, open-borders, one-world "humanitarianism" of the liberal elites. Long after the external rituals of a religion have fallen away, the core morality remains.

What sort of morality lies at the core of the Christ cult? Slave morality, of course. The origin of white guilt and egalitarianism.

[Prof. Woland]

Newt is right where he has always been on immigration, the shill from the cheap labor lobby. He is just finally openly declaring it.

[Huh?]

"We've always imported illegals to pick our crops because it is the only efficient, cheap labor we can get."

Always? The number of illegal immigrants was trivial before 1980.

[ErisGuy]

I agree: Romney is the candidate who will work the hardest to conserve Obama's bold advances: more bureaucracy, more taxes, more regulations, more centralization, where our betters (Bill, Barak, Michelle, Kai, Larry, Peter, Timmy, etc.) can rule us our benefit! All hail Romney and the rule of the intellectual elite!

[Paul]

Quite right on the low IQ babies.

[Peter A]

"Why stop at Mormonism? Your statement is true of Christianity in general. This is precisely why the creed is anti-white and how it fostered the secular, open-borders, one-world "humanitarianism" of the liberal elites."

You have a point. Even if most lay Christians don't want immigrants, the hierarchies of most Christian churches (the Catholic Church in particular) do see more immigrants as more potential bodies in the seats. Christian traditional conservatives mostly fail to recognize this.

[The Undiscovered Jew]

"This is precisely why the creed is anti-white and how it fostered the secular, open-borders, one-world "humanitarianism" of the liberal elites."

Um, no.

1) The elites are overwhelmingly secular.

2) Christianity has proven to be compatible with European civilization when the elites were Christian monarchs.

Do you think Louis XIV (or any French King) would allow North African Muslims and Sub Saharan Africans to gang rape French (ACTUAL French) women, collect welfare, and otherwise run wild?

[The Undiscovered Jew]

"All the candidate except for Paul was tripping over themselves about who was the most pro immigration."

?

Paul stinks on HBD issues.

First of all, Paul also supports amnesty for illegals. Just check out his website. The only two candidates who support a fence and immigration enforcement are Romney and Michelle Bachmann.

And not only does Paul support amnesty, during this exchange with Rick Santorum Paul also came out swinging against racial and religious profiling of muslim "American" immigrants during this exchange with Rick Santorum:

http://dailycaller.com/2011/11/22/santorum-ron-paul-spar-over-profiling/

Steering the conversation back to profiling, Blitzer then asked Santorum who, exactly, he believes security professionals should be on the lookout for.

“Well, the folks who are most likely to be committing these crimes,” he replied. “Obviously Muslims would be someone you’d look at, absolutely. Those are the folks — the radical Muslims have been people committing these crimes by and large, as well as younger males. Not exclusively, but these are the things you profile to find your most likely candidate.”

Paul, standing next to Santorum and clearly perturbed by his answer, took the follow up.

“That’s digging a hole for ourselves!” Paul said. “What if they look like [Oklahoma city bomber] Timothy McVeigh? You know, he was a pretty tough criminal. I think we’re using too much carelessness in the use of words. We’re at war? I don’t remember voting on a declaration of war. Oh, we’re against terrorism? Terrorism is a tactic. It isn’t a person, it isn’t a people, so this is a very careless use of words.”

“What about this?” he continued. “Sacrifice liberties because they’re terrorists? You’re the judge and the jury? No, they’re suspects. and they have changed in the [Department of Defense] budget, they have changed the wording of the definition of al-Qaida and Taliban. It’s anybody associated with organizations which means almost anybody can be loosely associated. So, that makes all Americans vulnerable, and now we know American citizens are vulnerable to assassination.”

“It will be a sacrifice that you’ll be sorry for,” he said.

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/11/22/santorum-ron-paul-spar-over-profiling/#ixzz1er4yXGQY

[The Undiscovered Jew]

"Romney isn't a conservative. Nor is he a liberal --"

I agree with this part.

Romney doesn't strike me as particularly ideological, he's more of a "get a good result" business minded sort.

Where exactly he falls on the political spectrum is less important than what Romney will actually DO as president.

As long as he improves the economy with free market policies, builds a fence, and deports illegals, there is no reason not to vote for Romney.

[Anon]

"Haven't you heard of the white man's burden?"

It is deader than a doornail these days.

[Bernie]

Newt is the worst of both worlds. Pro-amnesty and pro-affirmative action:

http://www.vdare.com/articles/newt-gingrich-gop-s-anti-white-quota-king

Better Romney.

[noko]

Oh come on.

Every politician needs to publicly agree with closing the gap.

[Sheila Tone]

Newt's always been a closet SWPL. You're usually so astute when it comes to guys, Half Sigma.

[JHB]

{ Where exactly he falls on the political spectrum is less important than what Romney will actually DO as president. }

It is like Romney discovered crazy Jedi powers over the last year or something. You don't need to see his identification. These aren't the droids you're looking for. He can go about his business. Move along.

Look -- Romney's current language is precisely that -- language. If Romney's record is of any relevance, we can expect Romney to govern like a progressive, both with respect to creating new entitlements, and with respect to illegal immigrants.

[Huh?]

"As long as he improves the economy with free market policies, builds a fence, and deports illegals, there is no reason not to vote for Romney."

Has he actually promised to do this?

[anon]

lets face it have do not have a quality option this election. IMO its better for us to have no win in the presidency,and to solifify gains in the house and senate. that way the congress can block any legislation that the liberals attempt. obama is useful in electrifying the base, once hes out the republicans will then simply sell us out to the pro-business pro illegal immigration side of the party.

[Jack]

He has promised to build a fence and to not give incentives to them. That's something that neither Gingrich or Perry can argue.

He's the only immigration conservative with any chance to be the nominee or president.

As for his record, he vetoed illegal alien tuition benefits in Mass. That's his record.

[The Undiscovered Jew]

"Look -- Romney's current language is precisely that -- language. If Romney's record is of any relevance, we can expect Romney to govern like a progressive,"

Romney's record indicates he will be decent on immigration because he vetoed in state tuition for illegal aliens when he was governor.

Yes, it's possible he would go back on his word if elected POTUS, but that's always a risk of any presidential candidate.

In fact, I could see how the conservative base's mistrust of Romney could lead to him pushing more conservative policies on immigration because Romney, as an upper crust Northeastern businessman, won't automatically get support from right wing peanut gallery like a Gawwd fearing, open borders Evangelical redneck like Rick "In State Tuition" Perry or Georgie "Islam is Peace" Dumbya who luuuvs them sum cheap labor Mehicans and Muslim Imahhms.

Because the base will be watching a POTUS Romney for any deviations from GOP Orthodoxy, Romney will be under more pressure to deliver on non-social issues than a Perry or Bush would be because he needs to gain GOP trust in office.

"As long as he improves the economy with free market policies, builds a fence, and deports illegals, there is no reason not to vote for Romney."

Has he actually promised to do this?

Posted by: Huh? | November 27, 2011 at 02:15 PM"

Uhm, yeah Romney has promised to do so.

Did you not know Romney destroyed Perry's candidacy and took back the lead from Perry by attacking him on immigration?

Didn't you see Romney endorse building the fence during the debate where Perry defended in state tuition for illegals?

Is anyone paying attention to what the candidates actually stand for?

There seems to be quite a bit of confusion over where the candidates stand on basic issues. Some of you think Paul is anti-immigration when in fact he supports amnesty and opposes racially profiling muslim "Americans" at airports.

[Huh?]

"Did you not know Romney destroyed Perry's candidacy and took back the lead from Perry by attacking him on immigration?"

I know that Romney attacked Perry because illegal immigrants pay in-state tuition at Texas universities. I do NOT know that Romney promised to build a fence and deport illegals.

NumbersUSA gives Romney a C- on immigration, which is hardly a reason to be excited about him and hardly a reason to consider him an "immigration conservative".

Notably, Perry and Romney get EXACTLY the same rating - excellent - from NumbersUSA on "securing the borders". While Perry downplays the role of the fence, he emphasizes "boots on the ground" (more border patrol) as well as aviation assets.

So yeah, I am paying attention to what the candidates stand for, and in my view Romney's advantage on immigration is marginal at best. And that assumes he will actually do what he says he will do. There is a lot more reason to believe that if elected, Romney will cave in to liberal pressure and refuse to do anything effective to control the border and deport illegals.

[HS: The NumbersUSA guy wrote recently that Romney's score increased and he was the second-best on immigration issues after Bachmann, and Bachmann has no hope of winning so you should all forget about her.]

[Huh?]

Meh, I'd rather vote for Bachmann and retain my self respect than vote for another disastrous RINO like Romney, who is cast from exactly the same mold as Dubya and McCain.

The one thing I am NOT going to do is pretend that Romney is somehow a "conservative" choice, and I know I'm going to hear a lot of that baloney between now and next November.

[Georgia Resident]

The Newt was always terrible on immigration. This is, after all, the same man who, not satisfied with the insane system of given Puerto Ricans automatic citizenship and voting rights when they set foot on American soil, wanted to turn that welfare drain of an island into a US state. The only reason he wasn't more prominent in the McCain-Bush amnesty attempt was that he was too busy collecting a generous compensation package from a failing GSE.

[Wes]

If Romeny, by some miracle can win, it might be better specifically because the Right does not trust him. It is imperative that we don't have some guy that fools the conservatives (like Bush did). So, I still suspect he will lose, but he may be the best choice in this deeply sad Republican field.

[The Undiscovered Jew]

"And that assumes he will actually do what he says he will do."

As I wrote before, while it's always possible a candidate can go back on his word, the fact Romney isn't automatically trusted by the GOP base the way they would trust a Southern Evangelical like Dumbya or Perry or a combat veteran like McCain actually makes it more likely Romney will not go back on his immigration (and economic) promises because he's going to be watched more closely by the base.

"The one thing I am NOT going to do is pretend that Romney is somehow a "conservative" choice,"

I don't care about ideological definitions over what does or does not constitute a conservative.

What I care about is what a candidate will do in office to address my main concerns, and Romney is, albeit not perfect, good enough on the economy and immigration to have my tacit endorsement.

[Doug1]

Yeah I'm for Romney too. Have been from the beginning.

Somehow I think he's gonna win.

Newt will probably win Iowa though. Romney was hurt lots by NH's Manchester Union Leader editorially backing Newt though. If Romney doesn't win NH he's in trouble.

[Doug1]

For one thing Newt doesn't have any money, whereas Romney does. Newt will start getting a bunch after winning Iowa but that's a very late start on money.

Both Perry and Cain are too stupid and too ignorant about national and international affairs to be elected President. It's definitely looking to me that Cain was named head of Godfather's pizza, which is only a division within a food giant after all, for window dressing reasons.

Unlike the great majority of Republican presidential primary races, this one could go down to the wire, between Romney and Gingrich. Big state late voting republicans like Cali and New York and Penn are probably gonna go for Romney, since they don't give a rip about his Mormonism, think he has a better shot at beating Obama, and prefer his stance on illegal dumb unskilled Hispanic immigration.

[Doug1]

Romney is more conservative on the issues that matter than Newt is, Half Sigma is right.

[Doug1]

The article you link to states that by 4th grade, African Americans are 3 years behind whites academically. In other words, at age 9, African Americans are academically like white 6 year old. An academic age of 6 divided by a chronological age of 9 implies an academic achievement IQ of 67 (6/9*100=67). And yet the bulk of the data suggests African Americans average an IQ of 85. So bad teachers (unions) and bad schools have arguably lowered African American achievement by 18 points.

Unions aren't the only reason for bad teachers teaching black kids. Another is affirmative action. Public schools hire a lot more black teachers than the should due to AA.

As well black kids a harmed a lot more than white ones by the trend further and further away from enforcing school discipline that began in the 1970s and got really bad in the 90s. Black kids need strong discipline. More of the disruptive ones should simply be thrown out or sent to quasi reform schools.

[Doug1]

The fact that Gingrich has become the MSM's favorite Republican candidate (well other than Huntsman but now even they have to concede he has zero chance) is reason enough to oppose him.