Archive for February 2009

This is a pretty incredible report by CNET:

Microsoft said Monday it had no plans to change its position on H-1Bs.

Last year, when Bill Gates appeared before Congress, BusinessWeek reported that Microsoft had received 959 visa petition approvals, roughly “one fifth as many as Infosys (Technologies, the top participant), while Intel got 369.”

When it reported its quarterly earnings last week, Microsoft announced plans to fire about 5,000 employees. A spokesman said that some of the employees let go held H-1B visas but declined to get more specific.

Intel, which last week announced plans to close two plants in the U.S., similarly said that layoffs resulting from the economic slowdown would not factor into the company’s H-1B plans.

I also have to include this line, which should be geek quote of the week:

technology companies are less keen on hiring hard-to-fill spots than on creating a cyber lumpenproletariat willing to work for cheaper wages

Citizen Moore, a biography of film-maker and gadfly Michael Moore penned by Roger Rapoport, includes a chapter entitled, “Who is Mike Westfall and Why is he saying these terrible things about me?” While Flint Michigan-native Moore has acquired a measure of success in doing cookie-cutter films, which has given him the luxury of becoming a matinee idol by ridiculing people and making fun of important issues, just what is the real story on him? What did Moore base his career on? Does he have any genuine credentials and, if so, what are they? Has he really been on the side of the common man?

What are his credentials to make him an expert on every issue from politics to health care to the financial bailout now going on? In Flint, was he really not much more then just a talking head, observer and opportunist who made a cheap movie and fooled the world? Did Moore actually build the foundation of his dubious career on Flint, Michigan, quicksand?

From the start with his hoax movie Roger & Me, where he pretended that General Motors’ CEO Roger Smith wouldn’t communicate with him, he spent the next twenty years asserting to the world that he was Flint’s lone Don Quixote and the unequivocal champion of the common worker. In Roger & Me, he miscast himself because he was not the one leading the Flint fight.
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About six weeks ago, I received an e-mail from my California reader-friend Bob who wanted to know how I was enjoying Pittsburgh’s December weather.

For his part, Bob told me that he had spent his day biking along Newport Beach, sipping iced tea and making new friends of the opposite sex.

Of course, Bob was giving me a hard time. He knew full well that Pittsburgh temperatures hadn’t been out of the single digits in days.

But Bob’s e-mail reminded me of another one that I received while I still lived in Lodi.

Reader Nancy wondered how much time elapsed on any given day between the moment I left home and the instant I first set eyes on an illegal alien.

Here was my reply to Nancy:

“Well, it depends what the season is. During the winter months as long as three minutes may go by. I drive off, make a few loops out of my neighborhood, and turn into the Mini-Mart where I’ll see several illegal immigrants filling up.

“But in the summer, I may spot one in less than three seconds. I’ll open the door and right down the street someone is mowing a lawn or tearing down a roof.”

Although I didn’t quote my answer to Nancy verbatim to Bob, I did remind him that climate is only one ingredient in the quality of life. And I added that as much as I miss California’s beaches and what they symbolize, during the seven months that I’ve resided in Pittsburgh, I’ve only seen a handful of individuals who may be living here illegally.

Days—perhaps weeks—pass without sighting a single alien.
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The Arab world’s most populous nation is reviving a birth-control programme to encourage parents to consider having fewer children.

Egypt’s population growth rate is two and a half times that of China, and about the same as of India.
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Police are to scrap controversial race ‘diversity’ targets that made it harder for white men to win jobs.

The decision could end the positive discrimination which has seen ethnic minority applicants selected where white rivals were at least as well qualified.

The targets were imposed after police were labelled institutionally racist in the 1999 Macpherson Report into the murder of Stephen Lawrence.

Forces were told to recruit ethnic minority officers in direct proportion to the make-up of their local community.

The targets, dictated by Whitehall, left many forces under severe pressure to employ thousands of black and other minority groups as soon as possible.
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The growing number of applications to South African medical schools and the entrance criteria have come under strong criticism from top matriculants who have failed to make the cut.

The government now regulates the number of places offered to first-year medical students, making it highly competitive.

Raeesah Suleman, 18, a former student at Crawford College in Sandton who obtained seven distinctions and an average of 88%, failed to secure one of the 160 seats offered to first-year medical students at the University of the Witwatersrand this year.

Suleman said she was told only a week before registration last month that she had not been accepted.

“Our country is desperate for doctors, and yet our top students are not allowed to study medicine,” said Suleman’s uncle, Nazeer Mahomed.
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“The situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating,” said President Obama, as he announced deployment of 17,000 more U.S. troops.

“I’m absolutely convinced that you cannot solve the problem of Afghanistan, the Taliban, the spread of extremism in that region, solely through military means.” [Obama orders 17,000 U.S. troops to Afghanistan, Reuters, February 18, 2009]

“(T)here is no military solution in Afghanistan,” says Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. Said U.S. Commander Gen. David McKiernan yesterday, U.S. and NATO forces are “stalemated.”

Such admissions by our military and political leadership in a time of war call to mind other words heard back in 1951, when Gen. Douglas MacArthur delivered his farewell address to the Congress:

“(O)nce war is forced upon us,” said MacArthur, “there is no other alternative than to apply every available means to bring it to a swift end. War’s very object is victory, not prolonged indecision.
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Essay Competition
$1,000 prize

For an Essay on the Topic:
Secession and Racial Nationalism

One of the goals of TOQ is to encourage the exploration of concrete and workable alternatives to multiracial and multicultural societies. To that end, we are sponsoring an essay contest on the topic of “Secession and Racial Nationalism.” Submissions may explore this topic from any perspective: philosophical, economic, historical, political, psychological, biological, ecological, etc. One can defend or attack the desirability of secession; examine and criticize past or present secessionist movements from a racial nationalist perspective; evaluate existing secessionist and partition proposals (e.g., Wilmot Robertson’s The Ethnostate, Harold Covington’s Northwest Quartet, the proposals of Michael Hart, Edgar Steele, and others); address specific problems that secessionist movements must solve, etc. One can focus on any form of racial nationalism, so long as it is relevant to TOQ’s specific concern with white racial nationalism.

* Essays must be in English.

* Essays must be at least 2,000 and no more than 5,000 words.

* Essays must be submitted electronically in Word or RTF format.

* Authors may use pen names.

* Only one entry per author.

* Essays must not have previously appeared in print.

* The winning essay will be chosen by the Editor of TOQ. All decisions will be final.

* The contest is open to anyone worldwide, except the Editor of TOQ.

* The winning essay and other worthy entries will be published in TOQ. (Each Runner Up will receive a standard TOQ honorarium.)

* The deadline for submissions is June 1, 2009.

* Winners and Runners Up will be informed by July 1, 2009.

Address submissions and inquiries to:
EditorTOQ@TheOccidentalQuarterly.com

Explaining that he is determined to “prevent scandal,” Bishop of Scranton Joseph Martino has said that he will cancel Masses for St. Patrick’s Day or for the St. Patrick’s Day Parade if any pro-abortion officials are honored at the holiday events.

The bishop said that scandal could arise if the Catholic Church is seen to be involved in honoring such officials.

John M. Dougherty, the Auxiliary Bishop of Scranton, explained Bishop Martino’s views in a Feb. 6 letter to John Keeler, President of the Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick of Lackawanna County.

Saying that St. Peter’s Cathedral plays “no small role” in the local observance of St. Patrick’s Day, Bishop Dougherty noted that local celebrations often honor elected public officials. This honoring takes place when they are given parade positions or dais opportunities.

“While some of the officials have merited the pride our local people take in them, others have positions and voting records that have contributed to the daily killing of the unborn by abortion,” Bishop Dougherty wrote.
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Paul Golding was in a sunny mood yesterday. The 27-year-old unemployed lorry driver got dressed in his sharpest suit, donned an astonishingly bright British National Party rosette and took a tour around the streets of Swanley that he now represents as a councillor. Walking through the ward of St Mary’s, the town’s newest representative was relishing the limelight brought by his surprise victory in Thursday’s council by-election.

Not even a passing motorist rolling down his window to shout the word “wanker” put him off his stride. “You know why we won this area?” he said. “Because people round here are sick to death of the mainstream parties. Labour have held this area for 40 years but they treat the people like second-class citizens. This is not about racism – we never campaigned on race issues here – it is just about putting British people first.”

Gary Hillier, 56, was one of several locals in Swanley’s high street who took the time to congratulate their new councillor on his victory. “I swear on my life this is the first time I’ve ever voted,” he said. “I’m not racist by a long shot, but we’ve got to start looking out for our own. People wait for years on the housing list round here, but as soon as a foreigner comes along they get sent straight to the front of the queue.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, both Mr Golding and the BNP leadership were keen to portray their victory in Swanley this week as proof that their party can offer an alternative to mainstream politics without having to resort to race.
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