Posted on Sunday, 8/16/2009 - 9:47 a.m. PDT — by Ohso
Census plan would illegally redistribute House seats
Chad Groening - OneNewsNow - 8/13/2009
An immigration reform activist says she's outraged that an advocacy group for illegal immigrants is pushing for those individuals to take part in the 2010 census.
The Chicago Tribune reports that the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) has been going door-to-door in 11 Midwestern states, passing out flyers and encouraging the Latino population to participate in the upcoming census.
Susan Tully, national field director for the Federation for American Immigration Reform, says it is unfortunate that a large number of the Latinos that MALDEF is targeting are illegal aliens.
"We get this unbalance by counting people who have no legal right to be here and somehow claiming that this is their civil right to be counted. In fact, if you go on MALDEF's website, that's exactly what they're calling it," she points out. "They're actually counting people who have no legal presence, no legal right to be here, and taking representation away from American citizens in areas by counting illegal aliens."
A recent Wall Street Journal editorial pointed out that some states will gain more House seats than they deserve following the next census because illegal immigrants will be counted.
Tully agrees that it is unfair for states in much of the Midwest that do not have as high a percentage of illegal aliens.
"They can get seats taken away from states for representation in the Midwest. And these seats are given then to places where they have huge populations of illegal aliens like California, Texas, and New York," she concludes.
Tully argues that before people are counted for the census, they should be required to show proof they are citizens or legal residents of the United States.
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The 'Senseless' Bureau - is what insiders call it, at least the low paid temoporary job citizen insiders doing the actual work; meaning those who are not part of the great civil service gravy train ride at the top ranks.
Last I heard the Senseless Bureau was in excess of $600 Million Over Budget - and climibing faster than the Illegal Immigration Rate.
Perhaps we can get them to pay for the overage.
Ahem.
Ohso
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell
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Current Posts: 2436
WASHINGTON, DC - Today GAO released its report 2010 Census: Cost and Design Issues Need to Be Addressed Soon. This report, coupled with the recent report from the National Academy of Sciences, The 2000 Census: Counting Under Adversity, suggest the 2010 census may already be in jeopardy.
The National Academy cited two major problems with the 2000 census: "the error-plagued development of the Master Address File (MAF) and the poorly managed enumeration of residents of group quarters." GAO states bluntly that the modernization of the MAF/Tiger system "will not reengineer the MAF process." Planning for improved coverage of group quarters was not even mentioned in the GAO report.
The National Academy of Sciences reported, "A large postenumeration survey is an essential part of a coverage measurement for the U.S. census." The Census Bureau has not determined what, if any, coverage measurement will be done for the 2010 census, but it has determined that coverage measurement will not be used to correct census counts -- a decision GAO calls "premature."
GAO reports that the current estimate for the cost of the 2010 census is $11.3 billion. That is a cost of $72 per household compared with $56 per household in 2000, adjusted for inflation. GAO calls for greater transparency in the reporting of underlying budget data and assumptions and for annual reporting of life cycle cash flows. The Census Bureau disagreed with both of these recommendations, calling current reporting sufficient.
GAO also recommends that the Census Bureau develop a comprehensive plan that integrates milestones, performance measures, and costs; in other words, a business plan for this $11 billion dollar enterprise. The Census Bureau responded that it "strongly disagrees .that the 2010 planning process is somehow lacking because all of the key documents about goals, assumptions, and plans are not combined into a single comprehensive document."
Rep. Wm. Lacy Clay, Ranking Democrat on the House Subcommittee with jurisdiction over the census said, "I am disappointed that the Census Bureau continues to react to outside advise with denial and disagreement. Clearly, the planning for the 2010 census needs work, and we should work together not divisively. We need a census that accurately counts the minority and poor of this country, not one which substitutes whites counted twice for African-Americans who were missed."
Rep. Carolyn Maloney, who was the Ranking Member for Congressional Oversight of the 2000 census said "The Census Bureau wants to increase its spending by over 25%, but argues with the GAO recommendation that its budget should be more transparent. That makes me wonder what they are trying to hide. The National Academy did Congress a great service by honestly evaluating the 2000 census. Now the Census Bureau must get on the ball and produce both a good census and the tools to evaluate it."
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Census problems you can count on
by The Republican - March 06, 2009
Census Bureau unprepared for count.
This headline could have been written 10 years ago. Or 10 years before that. And it can be written again today.
Each decade, when the year on the calendar ends with a 9, it is reported that the U.S. Census Bureau is not prepared to count the citizenry the following year. You'd think that they'd have learned.
After all, the enumeration of the people is mandated by the Constitution of these United States. You'd think that there'd have been ample opportunity to prepare in the 222 years since the Constitution was written.
Apparently not.
Here's the real problem: Because the census is used to determine how many representatives in Congress each state gets, the count is charged and politicized beyond imagining. States that lose population could lose one or more representatives - this could well happen to Massachusetts -while those that increase their numbers will gain seats. And clout. And money.
Add this to that very hot mix: It is after the decennial census that states redraw their congressional districts, perhaps the most political process of all. Include this town or that neighborhood, and you might radically change the makeup of a particular district.
There's the background: The census has real and long-lasting implications. The count is political.
Keep that fact clearly in mind when someone offers to step forward to "fix" what's ailing the Census Bureau. Getting things right might be a bit lower on the agenda than getting things a particular way. This goes for both the White House and for the Republican leadership, though the White House happens to be holding most of the cards at present.
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Hey Oh-So-Wacko- do you have any legal authority for the proposition that including illegal aliens inthe census count is in any way illegal? Given that you are a practicing attorney (Michael McDermott of Dublin, CA), you really ought to know that you need to support such pronouncements with statutory or caselaw authorities. Do you actually have any, or is this just another one of your obsessive and tired rants?
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Current Posts: 2436
2010 CENSUS
Highlights of GAO-04-37, a report to congressional requesters (January 2004)
Cost and Design Issues Need to Be Addressed Soon
While preparations for the 2010 Census appear to be further along compared
to a similar point prior to the 2000 Census, cost and design information had
to be pieced together from various documents. The Bureau’s plans also lack
a substantial amount of supporting analysis, budgetary transparency, and
other information that made it difficult to verify the Bureau’s assertions
concerning the costs and benefits of its proposed approach. Further, unlike
in previous censuses, the Bureau does not intend to develop coverage
measurement procedures that would allow it to adjust census data for
certain purposes.
Although its experience in 2000 shows that its coverage
measurement methodology needs improvement, GAO believes the Bureau
should have researched alternative approaches more thoroughly and
disclosed the results of its research before making a decision.
In designing
the 2010 Census, the Bureau hoped to address several shortcomings of the
2000 enumeration, namely to (1) increase the relevance and timeliness of
data, (2) reduce operational risk, (3) increase coverage and accuracy, and
(4) contain costs.
To achieve these goals, three components—all new
operations—are key to the Bureau’s plans for 2010. They include enhancing
procedures for building the census address list and associated maps,
replacing the census long-form questionnaire with a more frequent sample
survey, and conducting a short-form-only census.
The Bureau’s approach has the potential to achieve the first three goals, but
reducing operational risk could prove to be more difficult as each of the
three components actually introduces new risks. The Bureau will also be
challenged to control the cost of the 2010 Census, now estimated at over
$11 billion.
The current budget reporting process masks the long-term costs
of the census, most of which will be incurred in 2010; making it difficult for
Congress to monitor the Bureau’s planned expenditures. Certain actions by
the Office of Management and Budget could produce greater fiscal
transparency, and thus help inform congressional deliberations on how to
best balance the need for an accurate census, with the need to ensure a
reasonable cost for this endeavor.
The key to a successful census is
meticulous planning as it helps
ensure greater cost-effectiveness.
However, the 2000 and previous
censuses have been marked by
poor planning, which unnecessarily
raised the costs and risks of those
efforts. GAO was asked to
(1) review the U.S. Census
Bureau’s (Bureau) current plans
for 2010 and whether they might
address shortcomings of the 2000
Census, (2) analyze the Bureau’s
cost estimates, and (3) review the
rigor of the Bureau’s 2010 planning
process.
GAO recommends that the
Secretary of Commerce direct the
Bureau to combine information on
goals, costs, and other key plannin...
gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-04-37.
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In other words, the 2010 census should be pretty much like the 2000 one, with the same shortcomings and margins of error.
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Current Posts: 2436
Latinos bank on bilingual census form to aid count
...census questionnaire, she won't have to worry about navigating another document in English..
For the first time, the decennial census will be distributed in the two languages to 13.5 million households in predominantly Spanish-speaking neighborhoods...
Latino advocates hope the bilingual forms will help show their strength in numbers to underscore their growing political influence and garner more in federal funds that are determined by population.
The cost of preparing and mailing the bilingual questionnaires is about $26 million, which is more than it would have cost to send only English forms...
Automatic mailing of the bilingual forms debuts in 2010. In addition to Spanish, census forms will be made available in Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese and Russian upon request... But none of those other languages compares to the proliferation of Spanish.
The Census Bureau has worked with Spanish-language TV giant Telemundo... network's telenovela "Mas Sabe el Diablo" (The Devil Knows Best) will feature a character who applies to be a census worker.
Adding to the challenge of getting more people to participate is a boycott of the census called by Latino Christian leaders. They want illegal immigrants to abstain from filling out the forms to pressure communities that depend on their numbers to support immigration reform.
Rob Toonkel, a spokesman for the pro-English advocacy group U.S. English, said he supports census outreach in a myriad of languages but worries that sending bilingual questionnaires only in Spanish might rub some immigrants the wrong way.
"When you start saying, well, this is our preferred immigrant group—whatever group that may be—it sends a very dangerous message," Toonkel said...
Joe Kasper, a spokesman for Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., said the forms should be sent only in English to encourage people to learn the language. "Taxpayers should not have to carry the additional expense of providing bilingual questionnaires," Kasper said.
But many say the bilingual forms make practical sense—especially since youngsters may speak English even if their parents prefer Spanish...
"For me, it's much better in Spanish because I don't know English, not enough to fill out a long form," said Ocampo, whose teenage children are bilingual...
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Crime, census, and censorship
Michelle Malkin - Syndicated Columnist - onenewsnow 10/9/2009
There are serious problems with the administration of the U.S. census. Americans have good reason to be wary of the stranger's knock on the door. Unfortunately, anything critics say about the federal census can and will be used against them in the court of left-wing opinion.
First, the disturbing news about the government's most recent census travails: According to a new General Accounting Office report, botched fingerprinting by ill-trained employees led to the hiring of some 36,000 census workers with insufficient background checks. "More than 200" of those workers may have had serious criminal records, according to the GAO. The investigators revealed that:
"...of the prints that could be processed, fingerprint results identified approximately 1,800 temporary workers (1.1 percent of total hires) with criminal records that name check alone failed to identify. Approximately 750 (42 percent) (of those) were terminated or were further reviewed because the Bureau determined their criminal records -- which included crimes such as rape, manslaughter and child abuse -- disqualified them from census employment."
Gulp. This comes on the heels of the Census Bureau's admission that it is uncertain of the final cost of the 2010 decennial census, and that it faces ongoing problems with handheld computers used to collect data. The failure of the handheld devices will increase census costs by up to $3 billion, officials told a House subcommittee last month. On top of that, NewMajority.com blogger Tim Mak points out, the Bureau is grappling with cost overruns of nearly $90 million related to verifying its address list.
Then there's the troubling alliance between the Census Bureau and the aggressively partisan Service Employees International Union -- whose many leading officials and organizing tactics are inextricably intertwined with the disgraced personnel and methods of the ACORN community organizing racket.
GOP Congressmen Peter Roskam, Patrick McHenry and Mark Kirk pointed out in a letter to Census Director Robert Groves that the SEIU donated more than $4 million to ACORN in 2006-07. ACORN founder Wade Rathke, who covered up his brother's million-dollar embezzlement of ACORN funds, is the "Founder and Chief Organizer" of SEIU Local 100. In Chicago, SEIU Locals 1 and 880 have contributed $230,000 to ACORN groups in Illinois and Texas. Many of their offices are co-located.
Given "SEIU's intimate financial relationship with ACORN," which the Census dropped from its partnership contracts after last month's prostitution sting video fiasco, "you should take action to protect the public from the corruption of the 2010 census," the GOP critics wrote. Their warning has gone unheeded.
Instead, Groves, the SEIU, and several pro-illegal amnesty groups recently launched "a historic campaign" to target "the estimated 50 million Latinos living in the United States." Inclusion of the massive illegal alien population has resulted in a radical redrawing of the electoral map. More people equals more seats. More illegal immigrants counted equals more power -- for ethnic lobbyists, Big Labor, and the Democratic Party.
Alas, watchdogs can't call attention to the politicization of the census enumeration process and its bureaucratic woes too loudly...
- This cynical move to demonize criticism of the census is part of a larger drive by the left to muzzle limited-government advocates at every opportunity. Who needs the Fairness Doctrine? The criminalization of conservative dissent is well under way.
COPYRIGHT 2009 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.
Michelle Malkin (malkinblog@gmail) is author of the forthcoming "Culture of Corruption: Obama and his Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks & Cronies" (Regnery 2009).
Opinions expressed in 'Perspectives' columns published by OneNewsNow.com are the sole responsibility of the article's author(s), or of the person(s) or organization(s) quoted therein, and do not necessarily represent those of the staff or management of, or advertisers who support the American Family News Network, OneNewsNow.com, our parent organization or its other affiliates.
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Senate blocks census citizenship question
WASHINGTON—Senate Democrats Thursday blocked a GOP attempt to require next year's census forms to ask people whether they are U.S. citizens.
The proposal by Louisiana Republican Sen. David Vitter was aimed at excluding non-citizens from the population totals that are used to figure the number of congressional representatives for each state.
Critics said Vitter's plan would discourage immigrants from responding to the census and would be hugely expensive. They also said that it's long been settled law that the apportionment of congressional seats is determined by the number of people living in each state, regardless of whether they are citizens. A separate survey already collects citizenship data.
Census data is also used to distribute billions of dollars in federal aid.
"The current plan is to reapportion House seats using that overall number, citizens and non-citizens," Vitter said. "I think that's wrong. I think that's contrary to the whole intent of the Constitution and the establishment of Congress as a democratic institution to represent citizens."
If Vitter were successful—and if non-citizens were excluded from the census count for congressional apportionment—states with fewer immigrants would fare significantly better in the upcoming allocation of House seats.
States such as California and Texas would fare worse than they would under the current way of allocating seats, which under the Constitution is based on the "whole number of persons" residing in a state.
Louisiana stands to lose one of its seven House seats in the upcoming round of reapportionment. Vitter says that if non-citizens were excluded, Louisiana and eight other states would keep or gain congressional seats that would go to California, Texas, Illinois and New York. Vitter said the other eight states were: North Carolina, South Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Mississippi, Michigan, Iowa and Indiana.
Vitter's amendment, however, would not have changed the way the congressional seats are allocated by counting citizens and non-citizens alike.
Census Director Robert Groves opposes the proposal and recently told lawmakers that it would greatly delay the decennial count.
Critics also said Vitter's plan would discourage immigrants from responding to the census and would be hugely expensive.
The GOP proposal would have blocked Census Bureau funds if it doesn't add the citizenship question to the more than 600 million forms. More than 400 million have already been printed.
"As we've said, the proposal is just not doable and we would have had to delay the census," Census Bureau spokesman Stephen Buckner said Thursday. "The 2010 census remains on track and on schedule, and we're moving forward to ensure we have an accurate count in 2010."
Critics also said that it's long been settled law that the apportionment of congressional seats is determined by the number of people living in each state, whether or not they are citizens.
Vitter's home-state colleague, Democrat Mary Landrieu, recently said in a letter to Vitter that it would take a constitutional amendment to exclude immigrants from the count.
The Vitter plan fell after a 60-39 procedural vote made it ineligible for inclusion in a bill funding the census.