A vitória ambígua dos democratas
Por Olavo de Carvalho, de Washington DC

Jason Reed/Reuters A deputada Nancy Pelosi, futura presidente da Câmara, saúda militantes do Partido Democrata na festa da vitória, em Washington.


O marquês de Sader diz que a esquerda é "responsável pelos melhores momentos da história da humanidade". Vou lhes dar um exemplo entre outros inumeráveis. Em 1975, os soldados americanos se retiraram do Vietnã, deixando o campo livre para os comunistas, que então promoveram a matança de três milhões de civis vietnamitas e cambojanos, o mais hediondo episódio de genocídio da segunda metade do século XX, superando em mais de três vezes o total de mortos da guerra. O resultado era mais que previsível, mas os amorosos pacifistas que se esforçaram para torná-lo realidade jamais foram cobrados na grande mídia pelo crime imensurável que ajudaram a praticar. Alguns, como Noam Chomsky, ainda fizeram o possível para ocultá-lo, e por isso são honrados até hoje como exemplos de honestidade intelectual.
Outro belo momento, que poderá levar o marquês ao êxtase, anuncia-se para breve no Iraque, caso os radicais de esquerda do Partido Democrata americano, embriagados pela vitória fácil na Câmara e no Senado, se deixem levar pelo entusiasmo pacifista de John Murtha, Nancy Pelosi e outros que tais.

É difícil que isso chegue a acontecer, pois, quando tiveram a chance de levar à prática a proposta de retirada imediata que advogavam da boca para fora, os democratas recuaram mais que depressa. Eles sabem perfeitamente que o Irã, atualmente já o maior fornecedor de recrutas para o terrorismo iraquiano, está pronto para ocupar o território do país vizinho ou pelo menos para realizar ali uma matança sem precedentes tão logo veja os soldados americanos pelas costas. E uma coisa é falar mal do governo, outra é compartilhar das responsabilidades de governo. Uma dessas responsabilidades, que George W. Bush agora se sente aliviado de poder dividir com seus críticos mais ferozes, é a de decidir o que fazer com Kim Il-Jung. Mais provável e mais iminente do que uma retirada do Iraque é um ataque à Coréia do Norte. Neste momento, os EUA estão reforçando suas tropas na Ásia e dando os retoques finais ao plano de bombardear com mísseis Tomahawk as instalações coreanas de processamento de plutônio em Yongbyon. Há outras opções militares menos devastadoras, mas alguma delas terá de ser levada à prática em breve, a não ser na hipótese de que Kim volte atrás nos seus planos já anunciados de atacar os EUA. Entre os democratas, alguns esperam ou dizem esperar que ele seja induzido a isso pelas pressões da Coréia do Sul e sobretudo da China. Mas aí a coisa se complica espetacularmente, porque, segundo o relatório em preparo pela U.S.-China Economic Security Review Commission (Comissão de Revisão da Segurança EUA-China), cuja versão oficial deverá ser divulgada ainda este mês, a China, ao mesmo tempo que fingia apoio aos EUA, ajudava secretamente o programa norte-coreano de armas nucleares. O relatório baseia-se em informações de testemunhas diretas. Partes do documento foram passadas ao jornalista Bill Gertz por assessores parlamentares, de modo que ninguém no Congresso pode verossimilmente alegar completa ignorância a respeito. No tempo em que os democratas eram apenas oposição, informações como essa os ajudavam a espremer o pobre George W. Bush na parede, obrigando-o a escolher entre o risco de ignorar a ameaça e o de tomar sozinho uma decisão impopular. Agora, quem está na parede são eles.

Esse é só um dos motivos por que, nos círculos conservadores, ninguém está lamentando muito a derrota republicana. É verdade que os jornalistas brasileiros nem falam disso. Apanhar de petistas enragés não há de tê-los tornado mais inteligentes, nem extinguido em seus corações as afeições esquerdistas que já se tornaram a sua segunda natureza. A esta altura, eles estão comemorando a dupla vitória democrata nos EUA como se fosse o começo do fim da “direita religiosa”, se não do abominável Império americano inteiro.

Mas, se é verdade que o povo americano está mesmo cansado da guerra no Iraque, nunca a política internacional, sozinha, decidiu uma eleição nos EUA. Ninguém duvida de que o Partido Republicano pagou pelos pecados de George W. Bush, mas a rejeição nacional ao presidente tem muito menos a ver com a guerra do que com as atitudes dele com relação a gastos públicos, imigração e legislação eleitoral – e, nessas três áreas, ele não errou contra os democratas, e sim com o apoio entusiástico deles. Deles e dos chamados Rinos ( republicans in name only , “republicanos só no nome”), como John McCain e Lincoln Chafee.

O exemplo mais notório foi a lei de imigração. Enquanto o país inteiro clamava por medidas drásticas contra a imigração ilegal, o presidente tramava com os rinos e os democratas um plano ridículo que não só anistiava os invasores mas lhes dava mais direitos do que os imigrantes legais jamais tiveram. A proposta despertou tanta revolta que os republicanos conservadores na Câmara dos Deputados frustraram o esquema, trabalhando contra seu próprio presidente e suprimindo da lei contra a imigração ilegal o dispositivo de anistia. Isso foi em dezembro. Então já havia conservadores chamando Bush abertamente de “traidor”.

Bush complicou muito sua própria situação quando deu apoio a uma nova legislação eleitoral que limitava severamente a ação das ONGs não-partidárias. Ora, essas ONGs como por exemplo a National Rifle Association, a American Family Foundation e sobretudo os think tanks como a Heritage Foundation ou a Claremont Foundation, são a principal força do movimento conservador americano. É claro que os democratas, que nunca conseguiram montar um think tank que funcionasse, adoraram a nova regra e os conservadores viram nela uma traição explícita de Bush à causa que professou defender.

Mais motivo ainda para revolta o presidente deu quando violou ao mesmo tempo duas leis sagradas do conservadorismo, gastando um dinheirão do governo para aumentar a interferência estatal na educação infantil, com a ajuda, é claro, dos democratas. A repugnância dos conservadores ao excesso nos gastos públicos é tradicional, mas sua resistência à educação estatal, que era apenas moderada, se transformou em ódio ostensivo quando ficou claro que as escolas americanas estavam se tornando centros de doutrinação politicamente correta orientados... pela ONU.

O pior de tudo foi a súbita revelação dos planos secretos do Council on Foreign Relations para dissolver as fronteiras entre os EUA, o Canadá e o México, praticamente eliminando a nação americana como unidade política independente. A idéia já era antiga, mas quando alguém levantou a lebre e um cidadão apelou ao FOIA (Freedom of Information Act), obrigando o governo a divulgar os documentos sobre o assunto, o que se descobriu foi que Bush já estava formalmente comprometido com os governos do Canadá e do México a realizar o plano. O Partido Republicano, onde há tantos membros do CFR quando no Democrata, não podia nem aprovar uma coisa dessas nem romper abertamente com o presidente. Confuso e indeciso, optou por fazer-se de morto, o que era o mesmo que pedir aos eleitores que o sepultassem.

Mas é claro que nem toda a justa irritação dos conservadores contra Bush poderia transformá-los em esquerdistas. O que eles fizeram foi o que havia de mais inteligente a fazer: escolheram os mais conservadores entre os candidatos democratas, e votaram neles. Deste modo, o sucesso do Partido Democrata não foi nem uma vitória da esquerda nem uma derrota do conservadorismo. Foi uma derrota de um presidente ambiguamente “tucano” e de seus aliados rinos.

Entre os republicanos, o comentário geral é que o partido tem de abandonar o bushismo e voltar à boa e velha linha conservadora de Goldwater e Reagan, que Bush, por momentos, fingiu representar.

Eleitor americano envia voto pelo correio usando selo raro de 200 mil dólares

FORT LAUDERDALE, EUA, 14 nov (AFP) - Um eleitor da Flórida enviou para uma seção eleitoral de Broward County, em Fort Lauderdale, sua justificativa de ausência num envelope cujo selo, segundo o funcionário eleitoral que só se deu conta disso mais tarde, era o chamado e raro "Inverted Jenny", avaliado em cerca de 200 mil dólares.

O selo mostra a imagem de um avião da Primeira Guerra Mundial, conhecido como Jenny, e faz parte de um lote que, em 1918, foi impresso de cabeça para baixo. O selo chegou a chamar a atenção do funcionário da repartição eleitoral, que já foi colecionador, mas ele deixou o envelope passar e só algum tempo depois se deu conta do fato.

Um lote com quatro selos "Inverted Jenny" foi arrematado no ano passado por 2,9 milhões de dólares num leilão.

Taking wheel, son saves troubled mom

By Matt Smith/Staff Writer
Staff Writer

A drive down U.S. 67 almost turned tragic Wednesday night for a Keene woman and her three children. Fortunately, Latisha Stevens’ 9-year-old son, Jimmy, sprang into action and remained calm under pressure. Latisha passed out while driving, but Jimmy climbed from the passenger seat to take control of the family’s KIA Sportage. He drove it off the road and on to the shoulder of U.S. 67 just outside of Keene.

Unable to revive his mother, Jimmy called his father and then dialed 911. On the 911 tape, Jimmy speaks with a maturity and calmness that belies his age. He tries to inform the 911 operator where the car is located and soothe the anxieties of his 7-year-old brother, Mitchell, and 5-year-old sister, Amberly.

“I just always paid attention to what my mom and dad were doing when they were driving,” Jimmy said when asked how he learned to steer a car off the road and bring it safely to a stop.

Cleburne police and fire personnel arrived at the scene, and a CareFlite ambulance transported Latisha to Harris Methodist Walls Regional Hospital. Latisha said she was released from the hospital about 1 a.m. Thursday, having suffered a very severe anxiety attack. No one was injured and the vehicle was not damaged in the incident.

“I’m feeling a little better today,” Latisha said Friday morning. “The other day was kind of rough. [Thursday] I found out a whole lot I didn’t know. I don’t really remember the last few days too well.”

Latisha said she hadn’t felt well Wednesday and had passed out briefly earlier in the day.

“I don’t know why I didn’t call 911 then,” Latisha said. “I just remember driving to Walls and, after that, the next thing I remember is waking up in the hospital.”

Latisha said Jimmy later told her he noticed her breathing was shallow and her eyes looked like she was falling asleep just before the car began to swerve and Latisha passed out.

“I’m so glad we didn’t get run over,” Latisha said. “I asked Jimmy later how fast we were going and he said, ‘The big thing with numbers said 35 mph.’”

Latisha credited Jimmy with avoiding a tragedy.

“Absolutely, he took total control,” Latisha said. “When I heard the 911 tape later I was blown away and impressed by how calm and in control he was and how clear-headed his thinking was. Actually, he’s always pretty mature and calm, which has always surprised me.”

Jimmy was more modest when asked about his actions.

“I don’t know,” Jimmy said. “I didn’t really think about it; I just kind of did it.”

Although Jimmy may not think his actions warrant such a fuss, others certainly do.

“We think these actions are responsible for avoiding a possible severe collision or roll over, and may have saved the lives of all four passengers,” Cleburne Fire Chief Clint Ishmael said. “This is remarkable and should be recognized.”

Cleburne police officers were similarly impressed and amazed how well Jimmy handled the situation.

“I’m just so thankful he was there, because that situation could have turned out so tragically if not for his quick thinking” Cleburne Police Chief Terry Powell said.

Powell also singled out 911 operator Connie Taylor for her professionalism and reassuring tone with Jimmy while rescue personnel were en route.

“We’re going to do something to recognize both of them for their heroism and courage,” Powell said.

o pior é que essa praga de esquerdistas caetânicos existe no mundo inteiro, odara

O melhor é o "tofurkey"

Conheci váááá´´aááááários bichos desse tipo em Hanover jajajajajaja

Latin America and the United States

Snubs and opportunities

Nov 23rd 2006 | LIMA AND MIAMI
From The Economist print edition








The new United States Congress seems poised to strike a blow for Hugo Chávez by killing trade deals in Latin America

LATIN Americans dislike George Bush because of the war in Iraq and what they perceive, fairly or not, to be his high-handed neglect of their region. But Latin American governments have mixed feelings about the capture of both houses of Congress by the opposition Democrats in this month's mid-term election. On many matters, from immigration to Cuba, American policy might change in ways that are to their liking. The big exception is trade.

Nowhere is the change of political control on Capitol Hill viewed with more disquiet than in Peru and Colombia. Under a 1991 law aimed at stimulating alternatives to drug production, the two countries, together with Bolivia and Ecuador, enjoyed duty-free access to the American market for ten years for their “non-traditional” exports. This law, temporarily renewed in 2001, expires on December 31st.

Peru and the United States signed a permanent Free-Trade Agreement (FTA) earlier this year. It has since been ratified by Peru's Congress. Officials from the United States and Colombia signed a similar agreement on November 22nd. Peru's new president, Alan García, has swallowed earlier doubts about the FTA and is lobbying hard for the United States Congress to approve it before the end of the year. That was always unlikely.

Now both deals look dead on arrival. A group of senior Democrats this week called on Susan Schwab, the United States Trade Representative, to re-open negotiations with both countries and insert new clauses that would toughen labour and union rights. Mr Bush's “fast-track” authority, under which trade deals must be accepted or rejected in their entirety by the Congress, expires in June. New talks would be tantamount to killing the deals.

Peru's exports to the United States which benefited from the trade preferences totalled $2 billion last year, involving some 500,000 jobs according to the exporters' association. Colombia's preferential exports are worth a similar amount. The administration has sent to Congress a measure to extend the existing trade preferences for up to two years.

This is likely to be approved, and will be welcomed in Bolivia and Ecuador. But the governments in Peru and Colombia see it as a poor substitute. They worry that investment in businesses ranging from textiles and clothing in both countries, to asparagus and avocados in Peru and flowers in Colombia will switch to Central America, the Dominican Republic, Chile or Mexico, which already have FTAs with the United States.

Hernando de Soto, an economist who is acting as Peru's chief lobbyist for the FTA, has pointed out that rejection of the agreements would send a negative message to Latin America as a whole. Hugo Chávez, Venezuela's anti-American president, has campaigned noisily against FTAs with the United States (although his country in effect has one, sending 1.5m barrels per day of oil tariff-free).

On the other hand, Peru and Colombia have bent over backwards to accommodate special interests in the United States. Peru recently agreed to lift a sanitary ban on certain cuts of American beef to satisfy Max Baucus, who will chair the Senate Finance Committee in the new Congress. To be snubbed regardless may encourage these countries to seek closer ties with Asia and China in particular.

Colombia's president, Álvaro Uribe, may face other difficulties with the new Congress. His government is battling left-wing guerrillas and drug-traffickers but faces criticism over its alleged links to right-wing paramilitaries. The Democrats are likely to be more critical of Colombia's failure to prevent horrors such as killings of trade-unionists.

According to Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue, a think-tank in Washington, DC, the Democrats are unlikely to halt the $600m or so of mainly military aid that Colombia gets each year since they will not want to be seen as soft on either drugs and terror ahead of the 2008 presidential campaign. Mr Shifter adds that the election has strengthened the State Department's role in dealing with Mr Chávez, reducing the scope for impromptu interventions from hardliners elsewhere in the administration.

Policy towards Cuba may change, especially if Fidel Castro, the country's communist president, were to die (see article). The Bush administration has hitherto fought off efforts by a growing bipartisan group in Congress to pass legislation to soften the trade embargo against Cuba. That will become harder. In particular, a measure approved in 2004 which restricted family visits and remittances to the island may be repealed. It has gone down poorly in Miami, where Cuban-American political leaders have long been the main promoters of the embargo.

The Democrats plan to hold hearings into a new report by the Government Accountability Office that criticised the poor management and lack of oversight of a programme to aid dissidents in Cuba. In one case, a Cuban exile group in Miami used taxpayers' money to send cashmere sweaters, chocolates and computer games to supposed dissidents.

The issue on which Latin Americans, and especially Mexicans, have highest hopes of change is immigration policy. Most Democrats opposed the plan to fence long stretches of the southern border approved by the outgoing Republican Congress. Like Mr Bush, they support a proposal, drafted in the Senate with bipartisan support, which would combine tighter border security with increased legal migration and steps to regularise the status of undocumented migrants. Mexico's president-elect, Felipe Calderón, visiting Washington, DC, earlier this month, said that the outcome of the election held out the possibility of “improvement” in bilateral ties. Several of his colleagues further south will not share that view.

A Disabled Son
Imperils Family's
Immigration Hope
Igor's Parents Pay Medical Bills
But What If They Die?
Becoming 'Public Charge'
Learning to Love the Beatles
By MIRIAM JORDAN
December 27, 2006; Page A1

MARTHA'S VINEYARD, Mass. -- Zandro Souza, an immigrant from Brazil, rose in six years from being a restaurant dishwasher who barely spoke English to a successful chef in upscale restaurants here on Martha's Vineyard. Last year, after a long bureaucratic journey, Mr. Souza and his wife, Fernanda, were tantalizingly close to winning green cards that would let them remain in the U.S.

WALL STREET JOURNAL VIDEO



See video of Zandro Souza and other immigrants speaking at a Thanksgiving luncheon hosted by the Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy coalition. Mr. Souza begins speaking about two minutes into the clip.But during a final interview with a U.S. immigration official in Providence, R.I., the Souzas' five-year effort to win legal status hit a wall. "I have no problem approving you and your wife," Mr. Souza says the official told him. "But I need more information about your son."

The Souzas' 11-year-old son, Igor, is blind and developmentally delayed. His condition requires countless doctor visits, frequent runs to the emergency room and more than $1,000 a month in medication. Mr. Souza says he has paid almost all of Igor's medical bills -- about $20,000 annually -- out of pocket, without insurance or help from government programs. He feared accepting aid would jeopardize his family's attempt to gain permanent U.S. residency.

According to Mr. Souza, the immigration official told him that if Mr. Souza and his wife died, their son could become a "public charge." Although the family tried to prove that Igor would be cared for if his parents passed away, the U.S. government earlier this year denied green cards to the couple and their son and placed them in deportation proceedings. This time the government cited another reason for rejection -- that they applied for and entered on tourist visas but intended to stay permanently.

"If this were only about me, I would throw in the towel" and return to Brazil, says Mr. Souza, 30 years old. "But I want the best for my son."

The Souzas' story shows how compassion can collide with hard-nosed financial considerations as the U.S. decides which immigrants should be admitted and which should be turned back. The Souzas rose through hard work and paying their own way. Yet they also hurt their case by entering the country on a false pretext, although many immigrants who later gain U.S. citizenship do the same.

Admitting productive, self-reliant people has long been a goal of U.S. immigration policy. The Immigration Act of 1891, one of the country's first efforts to regulate immigration, allowed the exclusion or deportation of any individual deemed to be a burden on the public purse, referring to "idiots, insane persons, paupers, or persons likely to become a public charge."

At Ellis Island, newcomers inspected by public-health officials and deemed unfit were returned to their country of origin. Steamship lines were often fined for having ferried them to the U.S. Later, legal immigrants from Mexico and Asia faced similar scrutiny on entering from the West.

A 1996 federal law says immigrants must be legal U.S. residents for five years before they qualify for Medicaid, which pays medical expenses for the poor. However illegal immigrants cannot be refused emergency medical care.


Between 1921 and 1930, 10,703 foreigners were deported on public-charge grounds. In more recent years, the government has cited other more basic reasons for forcing someone to leave, such as having entered the country illegally.

In 2005, 75,532 foreigners were deported for entering the U.S. without proper documents or through fraud or misrepresentation. Public charge was the official reason for only 824 out of the total 208,521 deportations that year.

Illegal-immigrant children are entitled to attend public schools, and special-needs children receive the same services as other students. In recent years, however, the escalating cost of providing education to children with special needs has fueled clashes between advocates for disabled students and those concerned that they are draining already-limited school budgets.

In Massachusetts about 16.5% of the state's student population receives special education. The cost of educating these children is increasing faster than for mainstream students and placing a financial burden on many school districts, according to school administrators.

Shawn Saucier, a spokesman for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, says privacy laws prevent the agency from commenting on the Souzas' case. "However, if we were talking to a couple who had a son with disabilities, we would have to be satisfied that the child would not become a public charge," he says.

James R. Edwards Jr., an adjunct fellow with the Hudson Institute, a conservative Washington think tank, says the public-charge concept is rooted in this country's emphasis on self-sufficiency. "We aren't interested in taking foreign countries' criminals ... and certainly not those unable to support themselves," says Mr. Edwards, who favors restricting immigration.

As for the Souzas, he says, "My heart goes out to the family and the kid." However, he says, the U.S. already contends with "native-born Americans who face the same kind of crisis, with their children being ill and suffering disease."

Mr. Souza and his wife met as teenagers in 1990 in Cuparaque, a small Brazilian town. In 1994, Fernanda, then 17, became pregnant and the couple decided to marry.

Igor was born on March 1, 1995. At seven months, he was diagnosed with congenital toxoplasmosis, caused by a parasite that is present in uncooked meat and the fecal matter of cats. Transmission to the fetus can cause severe problems, including mental retardation, seizures, blindness, and even death. Doctors believe that Ms. Souza was infected by the cats in her grandmother's home, and Igor contracted the condition from his mother during pregnancy.

The couple soon realized that Igor's condition would require careful management and virtually around-the-clock monitoring, not to mention a panoply of special drugs. The Souzas had access to free care through Brazil's vast public health-care network, but the large hospitals and long waiting lists were difficult to navigate. To get Igor to the doctor, Fernanda rose at 4 a.m., taking two buses to line up just to make an appointment for a month later. The family couldn't afford private care on Mr. Souza's $300 a month salary working in a restaurant.

The Souzas saw an answer thousands of miles to the north, on Martha's Vineyard where Brazilian immigrants are the backbone of the local tourism industry. In 1989, Mr. Souza's father, José, found summer work in a restaurant called the Navigator, eventually settling here in 1997.


Fernanda and Zandro Souza (left) with their son, Igor, who is blind, in Boston.
In 2000, Mr. Souza arrived in the U.S. on a six-month tourist visa. He joined his father at the restaurant, rising to become daytime chef. His hourly wage doubled to $17. At night, he worked a second job up the street at the Harbor View Hotel's Coach House, one of Martha's Vineyard's finest restaurants. Mr. Souza moved swiftly from dishwasher to sauté cook to lead line cook, overseeing all the workstations in the kitchen. "He has a passion," says Jim Moore, the restaurant's food and beverage director, who took Mr. Souza to demonstrate his cooking -- including his mini lobster rolls -- at the upscale Tribeca Grill in New York City.

In early 2001, Mr. Souza brought his wife and son to the U.S. The two took an overnight van to Rio de Janeiro, where an official at the U.S. consulate issued them tourist visas.

Igor started kindergarten at the Oak Bluffs School, where he was assigned a special assistant, as well as occupational and physical therapy. About 400 students attend Oak Bluffs School, where Igor today is in the fifth grade. About 20% of them require special-education services. However, "only three or four have the level of need requiring a one-on-one assistant" such as Igor, says James Weiss, Martha's Vineyard school superintendent. Mr. Weiss estimates it costs more than $40,000 to educate Igor annually compared with $15,000 for "regular" students.

"He certainly is a youngster who impacts our budget in a significant way," says Dr. Weiss. However, "it's both our legal and moral obligation to help students who have identified needs."

As Igor mastered English, story time and music became his favorite classes. He began singing Beatles songs. A poem he wrote in Braille with the help of his teacher reads, "My favorite song is 'Yesterday.'" A lanky, curly-haired boy, Igor recently entertained teachers and classmates in the hallway with a rendition of "Hey Jude."

Initially, the family relied on friends to drive them to Boston for appointments with Blaise Bourgeois, a neurologist at Children's Hospital Boston. The consultations, every four or five months, cost the couple about $350 each, which they paid out of pocket according to bills and receipts reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

Igor also required a special dentist, nutritionist, endocrinologist and frequent visits to his pediatrician. Every three months or so, Igor suffered a seizure that landed the Souzas in the emergency room of the Martha's Vineyard Hospital. One of his worst episodes, Christmas Eve in 2003, lasted 45 minutes. The emergency-room visits have cost between $1,500 and $2,500 each. Mr. Souza says Igor's medical bills this year are about $16,000; in previous years they have risen as high as $20,000.

Mr. Souza says he pays for his son's doctor visits and prescription medication on the spot. Mr. Souza says he still owes $4,000 to the hospital for emergency-care visits. "If I can't pay in one lump sum, I make sure and send a check in every month -- even if it's just for $100 or $300," says Mr. Souza.

Mr. Souza, his wife and son live with Mr. Souza's parents and other relatives in a three-bedroom house owned by Mr. Souza's father. Mr. Souza earns $5,000 to $6,000 a month; about 27% of that is deducted in taxes from his weekly paycheck. He contributes $600 a month to his parents' mortgage.

In 2001, Mr. Souza sought to take advantage of a temporary immigration law, known as Section 245i, to apply for an employer-sponsored green card for himself and his family. The bill allowed immigrants to adjust their status from within the U.S., even if they had overstayed their visas or entered the country illegally. Employers regarded the program as an opportunity to legalize their work force, while critics said it was tantamount to amnesty.

Alan Counsell, then manager of the Navigator restaurant, had previously agreed to sponsor Mr. Souza's father and mother. He agreed to sponsor the Souza family as well. "It was a small repayment" for their dedication, he says. "Anything I asked of them they gave me."

Mr. Counsell followed the requirement to place advertisements in the newspaper, to show that qualified chefs -- like Mr. Souza -- weren't readily available on the Vineyard. Mr. Souza paid for the ads -- and over the next few years paid almost $10,000 in fees to lawyers and the U.S. government.

In July 2003, the Souzas received notification that their employment authorization was being processed. Mr. Souza was thriving professionally, earning a reputation as a fine seafood cook and collecting employee awards. He acquired hundreds of cookbooks, which he says helped him improve his English. His favorite chef is the well-known New York restaurateur Mario Batali, whose picture on the cover of a 2002 edition of Gourmet Magazine Mr. Souza pinned to a wall.

Mr. Souza's son, who shares a bedroom with his parents, refuses to go to sleep before his father arrives home from work each night. On Mondays, Mr. Souza's only day off, the father picks up his son from school and treats him to pizza. On Sundays, the family dresses up for evening services at the local Brazilian evangelical church, where Igor sways and chants spiritual songs.

In 2004, the Souza family was fingerprinted and issued Social Security numbers and work permits, "I felt like the gates to freedom were opening," recalls Mr. Souza. "The only thing missing was the interview." The family was summoned to Providence for an 8 a.m. interview on May 13, 2005, the final step in the process.

Mr. Souza was nervous but hopeful. He and his wife took an oath to tell the truth, he recalls. They began answering questions from the adjudicator. Among them was the question of why the family had come to the U.S. Mr. and Mrs. Souza told the official that they had come here to make a better life.

As Igor squirmed in his chair and babbled in Portuguese, the immigration adjudicator turned to Mr. Souza and asked whether he relied on the U.S. government for the child's care. Mr. Souza answered without hesitation: "No."

Mr. Souza recalls the adjudicator then asking: "So you pay for his schooling?"

Mr. Souza answered hastily -- failing to explain that while his son attended public school, he paid for Igor's health care himself.

Then the immigration official voiced concern that the son would become a public charge if his parents passed away, Mr. Souza recalls. The Souzas left the room clutching a form letter with Igor's name filled in at the top. In the space next to 5, "PLEASE SUBMIT THE FOLLOWING," the official had written: "I-864 from your father Zandro Souza showing evidence you will not become a public charge." They had 12 weeks to supply the documentation.

"I can't even remember driving home," says Mr. Souza.

According to U.S. immigration policy, an applicant can overcome a public-charge inadmissibility issue by providing sufficient evidence that he or she is unlikely to become a public charge. This evidence can be a posted as a bond, an "affidavit of support" from friends or family, personal funds, or an offer of employment.

The Souzas set out to prove that, in the event of a tragedy, Igor would be cared for by their family, not the government. Mr. Souza sent evidence that his father's house on Martha's Vineyard -- bought for $265,000 several years earlier and now worth about $500,000 -- could be put in a trust in Igor's name if his parents died. It could then be sold, if necessary, to cover his health expenses. Some immigration attorneys question why the government requested an affidavit of support in the Souzas' case, because the family was being sponsored by an employer who already serves as a financial guarantor.

But this soon became a moot point. In January 2006, immigration authorities denied green cards to each member of the Souza family and ordered them to appear in court for deportation proceedings. The government was no longer raising the "public charge" issue. Rather, the government notice stated that Mr. Souza, his wife and Igor had come to the U.S. on six-month tourist visas in violation of U.S. law because their actual intention was to stay in the U.S. for good.

"I felt an empty feeling, like everything had been in vain," recalls Mr. Souza.

Mr. Saucier, the spokesman for immigration, says: "We don't look for one reason and deny the case. We issue it for all reasons applicable to the application."

While they wait for their deportation hearing in February, Mr. Souza continues to pay for Igor's health care. Early this month, the family paid $643.98 for two antiseizure drugs, according to receipts reviewed by the Journal.

Mr. Souza says that if his family receives their green cards, he will continue to pay for his son's medical costs. As new legal residents, the Souzas won't qualify for Medicaid for five years under current immigration law. And Mr. Souza's current income level already puts the family well above the poverty limit for Medicaid.

That's why Mr. Souza says he wants to cook for a larger restaurant or one owned by a chain. Those restaurants, he notes, offer health insurance.

Write to Miriam Jordan at miriam.jordan@wsj.com

President Ford
December 28, 2006; Page A14
The abiding cliché about Gerald Ford -- who died Tuesday at age 93 -- is that he was a decent man who steadied the country but held the White House too briefly to leave a major imprint. We've always thought that view of his Presidency is too diminishing, not least because he led the nation at a dangerous time and resisted political furies that could have done the U.S. far more harm.

"America's Suicide Attempt" is how the historian Paul Johnson describes the 1970s. And it is important to recall the bad temper of the times that Ford inherited in becoming the 38th President. He succeeded Richard Nixon, who had resigned over the Watergate coverup and amid an unpopular war in Vietnam. He faced large liberal majorities in Congress that were emboldened by their ouster of Nixon and set to revive the Great Society. And he had to clean up the financial problems caused by a burst of inflation and wage and price controls. Ford navigated all of these traumas better than he gets credit for.

* * *
It is true that Ford was something of an accidental President, the only one in U.S. history never elected as either President or Vice President. Before Nixon picked him to replace the disgraced Spiro Agnew as his Vice President, Ford had been contemplating retirement from his Grand Rapids, Michigan, House seat. But like another unlikely President from the Midwest, Harry Truman, he had reserves of honesty and fortitude that served him well.


He made a particular contribution in pardoning Nixon, though he knew Nixon's enemies would accuse him of a quid pro quo. The decision cost him dearly in the polls and may have cost him the election in 1976, but it also spared the country from years of division over a criminal trial that special prosecutor Leon Jaworski seemed determined to pursue.

Congress had trampled over a weakened Nixon, and another Ford contribution was restoring some measure of executive authority. Far more than Nixon, he used his veto pen (66 times in 895 days), blunting liberal excesses after Democrats picked up 46 House seats in 1974. He also deserves credit for resisting the isolationism that was rampant as the Vietnam War wound down. It was a rare period in postwar U.S. history when the public favored spending less on defense.

Democrats exploited the mood in early 1975 to block Ford's funding request for our allies in South Vietnam, as the North began its offensive. Ford pleaded with Congress that "American unwillingness to provide adequate assistance to allies fighting for their lives could seriously affect our credibility throughout the world as an ally," but to no avail. Saigon fell by April, and the boat people and massacres in Southeast Asia soon followed. Thus one irony of this week's praise for Ford as a unifying President: At the time, he was mocked as clumsy and dull, and he was vilified for blocking Congressional priorities. Any of this sound familiar?

Vietnam was a scarring American defeat, but it could have been worse had Ford capitulated to the Congressional stampede. Instead, he fortified U.S. relations with the rest of free Asia, and he sent in the Marines despite liberal howls when the U.S. ship the Mayaguez was taken hostage by Cambodia's Khmer Rouge.

Given the weak hand he inherited, it is perhaps understandable that Ford continued the Nixon policy of pursuing détente and arms control with the Soviet Union. But that strategy was already beginning to fail due to growing Soviet adventurism abroad and conservative skepticism at home. Ford also joined Leonid Brezhnev in signing the Helsinki Accords guaranteeing civil liberties in the Soviet bloc; while criticized by conservatives, the Helsinki pact probably helped to undermine Soviet moral authority over the years.

The Ford Administration's economic record is also better than its reputation, sandwiched as it was between two of the three worst economic Presidencies of the 20th century. Hoover's was the worst, then Nixon's followed by Jimmy Carter's.

Ford is famous for having initially rebuffed New York City's bid for a financial bailout, but New York's trouble was merely one symptom of the financial woes caused by Federal Reserve Chairman Arthur Burns's monetary blunder. Burns opened the easy-money spigots in Nixon's first term, leading to 12% inflation, a spike in interest rates and wage and price controls, and setting the stage for financial crises from Mexico to Britain, among other places. Despite such early follies as the WIN program -- "whip inflation now" -- and a failed proposal to raise taxes, Ford ran a strong Treasury under Secretary William Simon, adopted sounder policies and left the economy better than he found it.

* * *
In historical political terms, Ford was something of a transition figure -- from the traditional Republicanism of Eisenhower, with which Ford identified, to the more energetic reform conservatism that would triumph with Reagan. Arguably Ford's biggest political mistake was choosing Nelson Rockefeller as his vice president over Reagan. The New York Governor was deeply unpopular with the GOP base, and the selection left Ford vulnerable to Reagan's primary challenge in 1976.

The Gipper came within a handful of delegates of taking the nomination, a challenge that weakened Ford for the autumn race against Democrat Jimmy Carter. In the event, Ford ran one of the better Presidential campaigns of the modern era and came close to beating the former Georgia governor who had run as a conservative himself.

Perhaps President Ford's greatest achievement was in demonstrating to a nation angry and dispirited over Watergate and Vietnam that its political system was resilient and the Office of the Presidency still worthy of respect. In that sense his Presidency was a triumph of Ford's personal character -- not the first, or last, time America has been fortunate in the leaders our democracy has produced.

Cadeia de negócios
O mercado bilionário que lucra com a maior população carcerária do planeta

Publicidade

Por Gustavo Poloni
EXAME Uma das maiores forças do capitalismo americano é a capacidade empreendedora dos executivos, que são permanentemente encorajados a investir e a competir nas mais diferentes áreas da economia. A crença irrefreável dos americanos nas virtudes do setor privado faz com que alguns negócios assumam por lá proporções inéditas. Um exemplo é o mundo bilionário que se formou ao redor do sistema penitenciário -- um setor delegado, em quase todos os países do mundo, à gestão pública. Os Estados Unidos têm a maior população carcerária do planeta, 2,2 milhões de pessoas. Como a legislação possibilita a ampla participação das empresas privadas, as companhias estão aproveitando a oportunidade para obter bons lucros. Hoje, elas são contratadas pelo governo para projetar e construir presídios, vigiar e reabilitar detentos e prestar serviços gerais, como limpeza das celas e alimentação dos presos. O resultado é um mercado de 37 bilhões de dólares, que deve continuar em expansão, pois o número de presos cresce à taxa de 3,4% ao ano desde 1995.

As leis que regulamentam o sistema carcerário variam de um estado para outro. Mas, em linhas gerais, elas dão autonomia para que empresas assumam o controle de uma casa de detenção (no Brasil, elas podem trabalhar em presídios servindo quentinhas e lavando roupas, por exemplo). Uma das gigantes americanas do setor é a Corrections Corporation of America (CCA). Quando foi fundada, em 1983, ganhou do governo do Texas o direito de cuidar de 650 presos. Duas décadas depois, a CCA faz negócios com 65 presídios americanos em 19 estados e vigia 72 500 condenados. Pelo serviço, recebe 1,2 bilhão de dólares por ano. As cifras impressionam mesmo quando alguns filões do mercado são analisados separadamente. A conta dos telefonemas feitos pelos detentos chega a 1 bilhão de dólares ao ano. A gastança despertou a atenção de gigantes como a AT&T, que fechou parcerias para instalar telefones fixos nos presídios. O nicho de novos serviços também vem crescendo. Exemplo disso é o personal trainer Steven Oberfest, perito em dar aulas de defesa corporal para condenados por crimes do colarinho-branco. Beneficiado pela recente onda de escândalos corporativos, Oberfest conquistou uma clientela de 30 pessoas, que lhe renderam em 2006 um faturamento de 600 000 dólares.


O mercado do cárcere
Números do sistema penitenciário americano
37 bilhões de dólares
Total de dinheiro movimentado em 2005 pelas empresas que atuam na área nos Estados Unidos
125000 presos
Cumprem pena em presídios privados
1,2 bilhão de dólares
Faturamento da Corrections Corporation America,a maior empresa do mercado de cárcere nos Estados Unidos

A privatização do sistema carcerário nos Estados Unidos teve início nos anos 80. Como o governo não conseguia construir presídios na mesma velocidade em que prendia bandidos, a iniciativa privada entrou em cena para oferecer segurança. Os críticos da privatização acusam as empresas de fazer lobby por sentenças mais longas e batem na tecla de que a segurança pública é dever do Estado. Já os defensores insistem que os presídios privados são um mal necessário. Segundo a Association of Private Correctional & Treatment Organizations (APCTO), associação que representa o setor, a construção de uma casa de detenção pública pode demorar até cinco vezes mais e custar 25% mais caro. "Infelizmente, a população carcerária no país está crescendo", afirmou a EXAME Paul Doucette, diretor da APCTO. "Mas as empresas estão animadas com a demanda por novas vagas."

16/01/2007 - 21h17
Democrata negro dá 1º passo para candidatura presidencial nos EUA
Publicidade
da Folha Online

O senador Barack Obama, 45, tido como "estrela em ascensão" do Partido Democrata nos Estados Unidos, deu nesta terça-feira o primeiro passo formal em sua intenção de se converter no primeiro presidente negro dos EUA. Com isso, Obama se tornou um dos principais competidores da senadora Hillary Clinton pela candidatura dos democratas.

Obama anunciou a seus partidários hoje a formação de um "comitê exploratório", organização que lhe permitirá avaliar o terreno antes de fazer um anúncio oficial de candidatura interna no próximo dia 10 de fevereiro no Estado de Illinois (norte).

O senador, que só está no Senado há dois anos (de um mandato de seis), é considerado o primeiro político negro com possibilidade real de competir nas eleições presidenciais americanas.

Depois de oficializar sua decisão, Obama deverá enfrentar a prova das eleições primárias, que permitirão designar no começo de 2008 o candidato democrata para a eleição presidencial do próximo ano.

Adversária

A principal adversária no caminho das ambições do senador é a ex-primeira-dama Hillary Clinton, senadora por Nova York.

Ao contrário de Obama, Clinton não tomou nenhuma medida oficial para confirmar uma intenção de concorrer nas próximas eleições presidenciais.

Ainda assim, a senadora já dispõe de um considerável apoio e de uma equipe de conselheiros experiente, entre eles muitos ex-funcionários de seu marido, o ex-presidente Bill Clinton (1993-2001).

Imagem da América

O cientista político Larry Sabato, da Universidade de Virgínia, disse estar surpreso pelo anúncio de Obama, dada sua juventude e falta de experiência. Sabato afirmou, no entanto, que acredita que o senador tem vantagens claras com relação a Hillary Clinton.

"Ele tem um contato com o povo que Clinton não possui", disse. Além disso, segundo o cientista político, Barack Obama "corresponde à imagem que os EUA têm de si mesmos: jovem, carismático, otimista, mestiço". O senador é filho de um queniano e de uma americana branca do Kansas.

Um terceiro possível candidato do Partido Democrata é John Edwards, que participou da campanha de John Kerry na eleição presidencial de 2004.

Já no Partido Republicano, três possíveis candidatos já formaram seus próprios "comitês exploratórios": o influente senador John McCain, o executivo mórmon e ex-governador de Massachusetts Mitt Romney, e o ex-prefeito de Nova York Rudolph Giuliani.

democratas são ruins para o mundo, em essência

pergunta: um presidente "negro", porém rico de nascença, chamado BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, advogado por Harvard? Ou uma negra "self made woman", nascida no Alabama, formada em Stanford? Eu prefiro a Rice.

ah, os esquerdistas...lá como cá, estúpidos...

Educating Democrats
January 17, 2007; Page A18
House Democrats have scheduled a vote for today on a proposal that would reduce the interest rate on student loans. The ostensible goal is to make college more affordable, but such a move could well wind up having the opposite effect.

Democrats campaigned last fall on a pledge to lower the interest rate on subsidized student loans to 3.4% from the current 6.8%. "We will broaden college opportunity," says Nancy Pelosi, the new House Speaker, "and we will begin by cutting interest rates for student loans in half." It makes for a good sound bite, but on closer inspection the connection between lower interest rates and "college opportunity" is far from clear.

The interest rate doesn't affect whether a student can pay his or her tuition bill, which means that no one unable to afford college today will suddenly be able to do so because of a reduction in the rate. Rather, lowering the rate will simply boost the federal subsidy for loan repayments after graduation. That's because the financial institutions that handle these loans are guaranteed a rate of return, regardless of the interest rate. Halving the rate that lenders can charge borrowers means larger government (read: taxpayer) subsidies for the banks.

In other words, the Democratic loan proposal isn't really about making college more affordable for low-income families. It's about expanding federal subsidies for college grads, including millions of middle-class men and women who will go on to do very well in life and hardly need such a government handout.

"The average college graduate leaves school with a debt of $17,500, which after consolidation and tax breaks comes to about $102 a month," says Brian Riedl of the Heritage Foundation. "If a college degree adds about a million dollars to your lifetime income, 102 bucks a month is manageable." Democrats know that subsidizing college graduates doesn't sound all that great as a political theme, so instead they pretend that cutting student-loan interest rates will somehow make higher education more "accessible."

The Democrat proposal also has the potential to exacerbate perverse incentives already associated with the government student loan programs. Since 1992, tuition at public and private colleges has risen 86% and 52%, respectively. The only other segment of the economy where costs have outpaced inflation by similar leaps and bounds is health care. And it's no coincidence that third parties foot the bill for big chunks of both higher ed and health care spending; this has predictably increased demand relative to supply and resulted in prices rising faster than they would otherwise.

Like any business, colleges will charge as much as their customers are willing to pay. And you can be sure that, as quickly as student aid increases, colleges will raise tuition to capture the additional funds. In the absence of all this subsidization, colleges would have to be more cautious about raising tuition because their customers would be affected more directly. So the biggest winners from this latest subsidy will be the relatively well off professors and administrators who run higher education.

Rather than scaling back these interest rate subsidies, Democrats want to make them more generous. This can only have the effect of further distorting the true cost of a college education by pushing more and more of that cost on to taxpayers. Ultimately, increasing the government's role is a recipe for making college less affordable.

The evil weed

Obama's secret vice

Jan 18th 2007 | WASHINGTON, DC
From The Economist print edition


A human in the White House?

IN HIS 1995 memoir, “Dreams from My Father”, Barack Obama confessed to youthful dabbling with pot, booze and “maybe a little blow”. These admissions have not hurt his cause. If anything, they have been taken as a sign of candour. But the senator has at least one more vice. He smokes cigarettes. “It's not something I'm proud of,” he said last year. He is trying to quit. If he fails, some voters may hold it against him.

In the past American presidents have not had to be shy about smoking. When Ulysses Grant told a reporter he liked cigars, well-wishers sent him more than 20,000. FDR used an elegant cigarette holder. Gerald Ford smoked a pipe, and everyone says he was a nice man. Andrew Jackson also had a pipe, made from a corncob. Even First Ladies indulge. Laura Bush reportedly sneaks a cigarette now and then between rounds with “The Brothers Karamazov”.

Still, the modern presidential candidate has little room for error. According to a 2006 Gallup poll, only a quarter of Americans now smoke. Many of those who abstain consider smoking a sign of weakness or intemperance.

Of course, honeymoons have to end. But as habits go, Mr Obama's smoking is less annoying than John Kerry's poetry-writing and less odd than George Bush's obsessive brush-clearing. Americans will have to resign themselves to the fact that no one is perfect, not even Mr Obama. It has also emerged that his middle name is Hussein, and that his ears stick out. If this is the worst that can be said, so much the better for him.

It has also emerged that his middle name is Hussein, and that his ears stick out. If this is the worst that can be said, so much the better for him.

Sem dúvida!!

um presidente "negro", porém rico de nascença, chamado BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, advogado por Harvard? Ou uma negra "self made woman", nascida no Alabama, formada em Stanford? Eu prefiro a Rice.

Alguém nascido no Alabama já tende a ser conservador de mais pro meu gosto... E essa coisa de "self made" não me parece ter muito que ver... O Lula é "self-made", o Vicentinho...

Democratas neles, por favor, seja a Hillary ou Hussein!

O Lula é "self-made", o Vicentinho...

Tá louco? O Lula self made?

conservador demais

E o que tem de errado em ser "conservador"? O maior revolucionário e progressita do século XX foi Hitler...

Democratas neles, por favor, seja a Hillary ou Hussein!

Pelamordedeus!! Democratas significam intervenção econômica, trade protecionism, esquerdices que, num quadro bem menos próspero que os anos Clinton, podem levar o mundo bem mais pra baixo. Me diga UM presidente democrata que conseguiu guiar os EUA (e o Mundo) em anos de vacas magras - tirando Roosevelt, que teve a segunda guerra pra ajudar