Once again, today, I had someone try to tell me that the President’s proposal to grant amnesty to the millions of criminal aliens here in America is actually NOT amnesty.

According to the latest White House propaganda sheet on the Bush/Kennedy package, they make the following case as to why the proposal is not amnesty:

This Proposal Is Not Amnesty Because Illegal Workers Must Acknowledge That They Broke The Law, Pay A $1,000 Fine, And Undergo Criminal Background Checks To Obtain A Z Visa. To apply for a green card at a date years into the future, Z visa workers must wait in line behind those who applied lawfully, pay an additional $4,000 fine, complete accelerated English and civics requirements, and compete in the merit system based on the skills and attributes they will bring to the United States.

Apparently the folks at the White House aren’t familiar with the term proportional justice, which essential says, "Let the punishment fit the crime."

It would seem that the President and supporters of… Read More

Just wanted to verify Jubal’s (Matt Cunningham) scoop – the CRP Board of Directors just voted unanimously to confirm Bill Christiansen as an interim Chief Operating Officer of the party. Bill has agreed to serve until he is replaced.

I caught up with Steve Schmidt, formerly the campaign manager for Governor Schwarzenegger last year, who worked extremely closely with Bill, and he was very pleased with the quick, decisive action of bringing Bill onboard, adding, "The selection of Bill to be the CRP’s new interim COO is an outstanding one. He was the director of our party-based Victory Operations last election cycle, and I was one of a great many who were impressed with him. He is experienced and well qualified."… Read More

Readers will know I have been covering progress of the Wisconsin Right to Life case, which challenges the portion of the McCain-Feingold campaign reform law that bans late election issue advocacy communications that mention a candidate’s name, but do not contain words of express advocacy of election/defeat of a candidate. The Supreme Court today decided the case in favor of the First Amendment rights of Wisconsin Right to Life, an Internal Revenue CodeSection 501(c)(4) advocacy organization. This is a big win for issue advocacy speech in an election context and couldchange the way issues are addressed in an election context — it means nonprofit advocacy groups funded by unions and corporations will not be afraid to speak out during election periods on the records of legislators and candidates, as long as their underlyingintent is to address their issue, and not the election itself. The court, in a 5-4 vote, upheld an appeals court ruling thatthe anti-abortion group should have been allowed to air ads during the final two months before the 2004 elections. The ads asked voters to contact the state’s two senators, Democrats… Read More

Attached is former GOP COO Michael Kamburowski’s 2005 lawsuit filed in United States District Court (New York) against U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement.… Read More

I am participating in a national conference call right now with election lawyers and professors, and am concluding that the consensus view is that the Supreme Court’s decision today in Wisconsin Right to Life does gut McCain-Feingold, but also establishes a new standard for regulated electorial speech: express advocacy of a candidate PLUS words about candidate character/qualifications/fitness for office. And interestingly this is anEXPANSION of the old Buckley v. Valeo case. Nevertheless, the sum is less regulation of speech in elections. If a policy-oriented communication from a nonprofit, corporation or union avoids the types of words mentioned above,it can mention candidates and be outside the realm of FEC/FPPC regulation. This is a big win for the First Amendment, because McCain-Feingold banned such communications based on timing, regardless of content. Thus, the new analysis is content-based, ad-by-ad, so political consultants: careful review of text is critical.… Read More

Jubal at the Red County/OC Blog has the news. This is a great move by the CRP to aggressively and quickly address yesterday’s fallout:

Bill Christiansen To Be Interim COO of the CRP

I’ve learned Bill Christiansen, former long-time executive director of the Republican Party of Orange County, will be tapped as the interim COO of the California Republican Party.Read it all here. … Read More

From the SDUT News Blog…..

Note as well that Cal-PERS, Cal-STRS and the CTA continue to argue that the legislation infringes on their fiduciary responsibility to invest in terrorist states.

Senate Committee Approves Iran Divestment Bill

A key Senate panel approved a bill on Monday afternoon that would require the state’s huge pension funds for teachers and government workers to divest from companies that do business in Iran.

Assembly Bill 221, sponsored by Assemblyman Joel Anderson, R-El Cajon, won unanimous bipartisan support from the Senate Public Employment and Retirement Committee. The bill would require the funds… Read More

I admit it. I was and am embarrassed about revelations yesterday that Michael Kamburowksi, the now-former Chief Operating Officer of the California Republican Party, apparently failed to disclose some rather significant items about his past when applying for the State GOP’s top staff job. Especially since I learned of these items on a visit to the San Francisco Chronicle early yesterday morning, while preparing yesterday’s FR main page. It led to me immediately asking, "Is our COO suing America?" A few months ago, I had a chance, along with CRP Treasurer Keith Carlson, to meet this potential new COO before he was hired, and I think it would be fair to say that we both found him to be a smart, engaged and savvy person. He was brought to us by CRP Chairman Ron Nehring as the person that he would like to have as his right hand, handling day-to-day operations. Having served as Executive… Read More