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Friday, 29 August, 2008

Stuart Denman | 17:38 UK time, Friday, 29 August 2008

Our thought-provoking series on immigration concludes tonight and after the Doric splendour of the Obama set address, it's John McCain's turn to wow the American nation. With more, here's Emily

Sarah Palin for VP:

How do you stop a youthful, multi-ethnic, charismatic speaker from becoming America's first ever black president? Well, if you're Republican rival John McCain, you think it's with the help of a woman nearly thirty years younger than you, with five children. After all the speculation over the Mitts and Mikes of the Republican primaries becoming his VP, the announcement came out of the blue. Sarah Palin - who has been the governor of Alaska for just two years - has just been confirmed as his chosen one.

Will her social conservatism, her youth and her, well, novelty value, give his campaign just the tension and the kick it needs to take him into the Republican Convention and beyond? Or will it be an own goal for the Republicans? The Democrats argue that her age, inexperience and back-story make Barack Obama look positively mature.

We'll have the latest from Peter Marshall in the United States and bring you that debate live here tonight.


Illegal Immigration:

Is it ever possible to clamp down entirely on illegal immigration? Tonight, in the last of this formidable series on the subject we focus on the ease with which forged documents can be obtained that give immigrants the right to work here. Many of the documents are convincing enough to stand up to basic scrutiny - indeed, that's why so many find work so easily. We look at the scams that are being used, and ask if you can ever make the system watertight enough to stop them.

Join us this evening at 10.30pm on Â鶹Éç2.

Emily

Comments

  • Comment number 1.

    Could we look at the limitless barminess Americans reveal, when naming their children, as highlighted by Sarah Palin's, who named hers:- Track, Bristol, Willow, Piper and Trigg. Is this a secret Republican code? We should be told!

  • Comment number 2.

    Your opener says it all.......
    "Our thought-provoking series on immigration ends tonight".... then goes on to devote several paragraphs and yet more hype on the US elections, thus placing one of this country's major problems yet again on the back boiler after a brief warming over.

    The British public have had years of being gagged about alleged 'racism' with government and the most of the media insisting that multiculturalism and diversity should be welcomed with open arms.

    Now we are finally waking up to the fact that we have been sending out the wrong message both to our own society and to all would-be economic migrants (plus many crooks).

    Is Â鶹Éç launching a major campaign against immigration, or just using it as a fill-in item?

    Other bloggers have forecast that only a huge increase in unemployment and the resulting public backlash reaction against both 'legal' and illegal immigration will change the lax attitude that has been fostered by most political parties and the media.

    It's that, or a radical swing (at the next General Election or before) away from the central ground fought over by most political parties. It's time to change the message and the messenger.


  • Comment number 3.

    PYTHONESQUE #1

    The clue is in the name Palin. If she has another it will be called: "Smoke Too Much"
    or maybe: "Dead Parrot".

  • Comment number 4.

    Sarah Palin's desicnation AsVP candidate didn"t, just come out of the blue! It came from far right field on some other planet! I find picking to be absolutely stunnining, unbelievable even for John McCain (who has messed up quite a bit lately if you are into fact checking at all).

  • Comment number 5.

    This puts energy and drilling in Alaska at the heart of the energy debate I guess?

    Oil ethics whistleblower who believes in
    oil exploitation in sensitive environments
    - and doesn't take nay prisoners either?

    Looking forward to Peter Marshall's profile.

  • Comment number 6.

    Three reports on immigration in the week yet no mention whatsoever about the route into the UK trough the Irish Republic. Illegal immigrants with the plane fare simply go to Ireland and then walk straight into the UK as at present there are no effective border controls for such. I believe that there are plans to introduce border controls from Ireland in the near future and perhaps this could catch more than currently smuggle themselves in.

    It would appear that the Â鶹Éç's attitude to illegal immigrants is that its OK to come in just so long as you are not destitute. As you portray, its easy to get forged documents to access our welfare state once you are in the UK.

  • Comment number 7.

    "barminess ".

    Surely the Goose steppers would have preferred children be named Herman or Adolf etc. Possibly Grunhilde if they were not manly.

    Presumably because of the intellectual pretensions of the far right some would like their children to have been called a little ... well ... like.... Mengele! Pseudo and totally twisted. Possibly even "TFR" or "Indigenous". Possibly even IQ?

    Barking mad is almost required of the far right and they rarely fail to disappoint.

    How about RedNeck for your children?

    On Georgia Newsnight allowed Saakashvili to get away with suggesting that the passports proved something. If I understand it correctly Russia had been offering passports for some time. Black propaganda like the "pipeline bombing"? The Â鶹Éç coverage has not been awful and I could not even comment if I had not seen it, but I think it could have been better.

    Did the Russians contact the US BEFORE the outbreak of hostilities asking them to "control" the Georgians? That is key as is the role of US advisors.

    For the record I think the Russians should give up on Chechnya as we should on Crimea.


  • Comment number 8.

    The Â鶹Éç reported "An Asian man who killed his British National Party activist neighbour in a fight has been jailed for eight years.

    Habib Khan, 50, of Stoke-on-Trent, was convicted in May of the manslaughter of 52-year-old Keith Brown who he stabbed with a kitchen knife in July 2007. ".

    It was over a border dispute not a race hate crime as the BNP suggested.

    Are human rights organisations going to take up the BNP case? Nah.

    Are the people of Stoke going to riot for a week? Nah.

    Was 8 years probably actually extremely harsh. I do not condone the killing of anybody, even the BNP. But if you were Asian, had a BNP neighbour and you saw:
    "... that in the incident last July, Khan held a knife against his neighbour 'to scare him' when he saw him trying to strangle his son Aziz" what would you do?

    He should do time and considerable time but 8 years?

    The far right are not being taken seriously enough and I do not mean intellectually.

  • Comment number 9.

    Where is jeremy??? he has not been on for months. Newsnight is not the same without him

  • Comment number 10.

    why are we getting so many comments in this section about the corrupt and futile ramblings of the gung ho society of the U.S.A. I thought that this was supposed to be about illigal immigration within the UK.


    If you yankee lovers want to start your own blogs, then don't use our precious and little awarded resources.

    let's get on with this illegal immigration!

  • Comment number 11.

    Amnesty for illegal immigrants is a bad idea as if you accept you cannot plan as a country. You are effectively at the mercy of whomever decides that they are British.

    I totally and utterly reject everything the BNP stands for and everybody associated with them.

  • Comment number 12.

    HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE TO MODERATE A SMALL POSTING????

    IS IT ONLY ENGLISH SOUNDING NAMES THAT GET THIS PREFERRENTIAL TREATMENT???

    NO WONDER THINGS ARE GETTING OUT OF CONTROL

  • Comment number 13.

    It looks as though anyone with a modecom of sense with regards to illegal immigration is watching the U.S.A. debacle.!
    I for one would like to remind the UK CITIZENS of what exactly the word "Illegal" means. It means, no rights, no right to be here and certainly no options of other actions, but to the lilly livered UK power heads in Government, it seems to mean something comepetely different.!
    Why do we have to spend billions of pounds of our hard earned and ill concieved, but yet readilly stolen taxes going on such ill conceived things as countless appeals for these "illegal" people that have no rights here, yet at the same time our health service is denying life saving drugs to our own citizens not only born in this country, but have spent 60 or 70 years paying into a system that denies them their own basic rights.???
    How many of our own people could have had an extra 6 to 12 months of life (with medication) due to the cost of the two (that I know of) brnad new detention centres that were burned down by illegal immigrants because they didn't want to be sent back where they belong???

    It's about time that we were allowed to use the word "black" without being accused of being racist, along with the concept that housing and services should come with "time served" within this country.
    If you go to America, the most liberalised state in the world, as an illegal, and fall ill without insurance, then regardless of what Black Obama says, YOU DIE!!

  • Comment number 14.

    It looks as though anyone with any interest in life has gone to bed! Probably to dream about the illegal immigrants living next door, or in their loft, (such as I experienced in the 60's), but that would be denied by the Conservatives, the party who invited them over in the first place to fill the jobs that the lazy english people didn't want to do.

    GUESS WHAT, some 40 0dd years later, we are still using the same excuse to import Poles, Checks and other ex Russians into this country for exactly the same reasons.

    Why exactly is it that our hospital cleaners, tube services, so called hospitality services etc are still using the same excuse???

    COULD IT NOT BE DOWN TO THE FACT THAT THESE GREEDY COMPANIES WILL STILL BE WANTING TO PAY THE LEAST WAGES IN ANOTHER 40 YEARS?? Why not change the
    legislation for these greedy companies, (apart from the fact that most of them have MP's, their wives or family, sitting on their boards) in order to stop this legalised form of slave labour and be honest with the electorate.

    Hell, I suppose it is some form of justice that they have all accepted the IKEA list, as opposed to the John Lewis List, but how many of them will be converting their own basements into "local pary offices" in order to use the extra allowances/fraud that they can now use, as voted by themselves.???

    HOW MANY TURKEYS VOTE FOR CHRISTMAS??

  • Comment number 15.

    IT LOOKS AS THOUGH EVERYONE HAS GONE TO BED!!!

    WHAT A SAD STATE OF AFFAIRS FOR NEWSNIGHT!!!!

  • Comment number 16.

    "Amnesty for illegals "

    Didn't Italy (2x) and Spain(1x) do Amnesty's and all that happened was more illegals came expecting another Amnesty ?

    Shame News Night did not ask Migration Watch to make a short film or two to balance out the series.

    Maybe someone to talk about the Brain Drain too ?

    "A.Darling"

    Was it a good day for bad news ?

    With all the American election hype it will get little air time.

    Darling would not say anything unless it had been ok'ed by his boss, speculation otherwise is a waste of breath.

    Oh how weak is Sterling against other currencies ?
    Show us the graph from a year ago, it's appalling !

    How about informing us of this months trade deficit ?
    Maybe you could show us a 10 year graph for that one as its also appalling !

    "American Election"

    Have I got a vote in the American Election ?
    So why do I have to listen to each election spin instead of my own countries politics ?

  • Comment number 17.

    Well said Steve, but unfortunately no one wants to listen!

    I for one am so pissed off with the time delay of these so called moderators that I am giving up the ghost.

    They are probably a bunch of illegals paid by the Â鶹Éç to do the cleaning work, but inbetween changing water (what a laff) double up as moderators in order to get either a free cup of coffee, or not to be exposed to the Immigration and Borders service.

    After all, where else could the Â鶹Éç get cheap cleaners???

    CYNICAL, WHO, ME??? NEVER!

    Goodnight from Lancashire Jim.

    ps I was hoping for some worthy competition.

  • Comment number 18.

    #17

    No one wants to listen ?
    They probably been at the BlueNun and their fingers are not working P)

    Lucky people !

  • Comment number 19.

    :-) Thankfully Jeremy should be back on air on Monday 8th September!!!!!!

  • Comment number 20.

    This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

  • Comment number 21.


    ;-)
    ed

  • Comment number 22.

    Re #7/8/11. That's right. Do all you know. No answer to points made earlier. Just more of your usual 60 year old propaganda, prejudice, and hatred for your own countrymen and women. I won't even bother to point out your utter ignorance about the killing of Keith Brown, since you're incapable of sustaining an arguement.
    Suffice to say that with the thousands abandoning the old parties, it comes as a huge relief to know that you "totally reject" the BNP. Please try to maintain this position over the next 20 years, won't you dear boy.

  • Comment number 23.

    Re #20/21.
    Reword it Ed to give us the general idea.

  • Comment number 24.

    So you're a Northern Exposure fan then Ed!

  • Comment number 25.

    Equal time for

    "The Republican Party of Alaska platform says, in its section on education: "We support giving Creation Science equal representation with other theories of the origin of life. If evolution is taught, it should be presented as only a theory.""
    Well, I'll be a Monkey's Uncle!

    ;-)
    ed

  • Comment number 26.

  • Comment number 27.

    The :

    "The hype can probably be traced to the Web site of a 21-year-old college senior majoring in political science at the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs. Adam Brickley, a political buff who will graduate in May, started a "Draft Sarah Palin for Vice President" blog last year and has relentlessly promoted the idea ever since. "


    Well, well, well!
    ;-)
  • Comment number 28.

    why do not all employers ring the immigration number. It would be then impossible for at least one class of false papers? Should it not be a legal requirement?

    should banks not flag up accounts if there are, say, more than 2 salaries going in it?

    i know people over 40 who have recently been made redundant due to the downturn who now find it impossible to find a job as employers prefer the 20 year old migrant.

    the Govt have used migrants to keep wages low. As unemployment kicks in the illegal migrant issue will froth up among the locals in the dog and duck.

  • Comment number 29.

    Re 17 etc. lancashirejim/Steve-London.
    Sorry if you boys had no-one to talk to last night. There was this bar to be propped up and Scottish Wine to be swallied.
    At any rate, I'd have been agreeing with every word you said, except where you said Jim that our leaders were 'lilly-livered'. I'd prefer the term 'corrupt'. Only corruption and pressure from sectional interests, in my view, holds the big party leaders back from gathering the political pay-off that would accrue, to whoever permits a full debate on immigration. Rather, they're all intent on preventing debate and real electoral choices, although they're finally being forced to talk about it by the growing very voter-radicalism that you display in your posts.
    They haven't promoted these decades of mass-immigration, and of oppressing and criminalising the British people, only to allow this to be stopped and reversed, IMO.

  • Comment number 30.

    I can't help speculating that McCain will win the presidential election because a significant number of the white " working class " wont vote for a black person under any circumstances.

    If McCain tries to introduce any policies which benefit ordinary people but upset the Corporate Nazis on Wall Street, I suspect that their doctors will tell him that he has got cancer again and force him to resign.

    First woman president on the cards but will the stupid democrat women who voted McCain because of a female running mate put up with the consequences of a probable ban on abortion ?

  • Comment number 31.

    Why do you keep getting the FT prices wrong it's not that difficult to read it surely

  • Comment number 32.

    POINTING OUT THE NON TOO OBVIOUS

    thegangofone (#7) Describing demographic and genetic trends is not political. We have a below replacement level indigenous birth rate. It is only what it is today because of the higher immigrant birth rate. Most of that is because of what you might call their 'rght wing' values (division of labour by sex, Islam's proscription of homosexuality, anti-usury and for many, hostility to Zionism).

    The problem is, if the UK (and more widely the EU) welcomes uncontrolled (i.e a non points/skills/IQ based) immigrantion, and if lower IQ immigrants breed at a high rate (as is the case in their home counrties, and geneal rule everywhere), in time, this country must become more like those countries they've fled from.

    Have a look at the politics of Kenya, Zimbabwe and Pakistan/Bangladesh for illusrations of what to expect here if this trend continues (think of some of the electoral scams here in recent years). The reason for the UK low indigenous birth rate is Political Correctness and Equalities including, paradoxially, the great increase since the 1960s of higher education for females.

    Note, IQ is largely heritable and can not be improved through education.

    Calling people who point out these facts nasty names won't change the facts, it will just make them even harder for some people to think through.

  • Comment number 33.

    Jean,

    "Note, IQ is largely heritable and can not be improved through education."
    Largely, yes, but its development can be inhibited by poor nutrition and other deprivation in youth, or aided by the reverse. Like all such matters, there are two vectors - Nature AND Nurture.

    Salaam etc.
    ed
  • Comment number 34.

    TIPPING POINT

    Ed Iglehart (#33) Yes Ed, you're referring to that other 20%, but note... that's largely the 20% which the 'not so genetically bright' manages to make a mess of for their progeny (through passing on their genes, and the effects of a genetic penchant for drink, drugs, clouts around the head, and much else besides), and NOBODY.........alas, absolutely NOBODY....... knows how to do anything this (cf. HEADSTART, AIMING HIGH, SURESTART, SEAL, BRAIN-GYM (ugh)). It's all practically just far too difficult (for subtlly dysgenic reasons).

    Imagine a family of 7 on benefits, where most of that's spent on junk food, drink, drugs etc because life is so desperately bleak... and you may begin to better appreciate the dark picture. This group is growing, and the others are (it should not surprise some as bright as you to appreciate), are shrinking (across Europe, Russia and beyond).... largely... I suggest... through fear of the company which their POTENTIAL progeny might have to share.

  • Comment number 35.

    [Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator] 'A senior Iranian military commander warned yesterday that any attack on Iran would start a major conflict. "Any aggression against Iran will start a world war," deputy chief of staff for defence publicity, Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri, said in a statement. "The unrestrained greed of the US leadership and global Zionism... is gradually leading the world to the edge of a precipice."' Sometimes, the world just seems to be full of crazy people doesn't it? If it isn't 'no-hope nutters' like Hitler and Stalin with their daft ideas about Jewish Bolshevism/capitalism trying to take over the world, it's equally 'paranoid losers' like Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri or those 'aggressive' Russians 'belligerently' hawking their 'tin-pot' SAMs to 'rogue nations' like Iran and Syria. Where do they get these crazy ideas from?

  • Comment number 36.

    LIFE IS SO DESPERATELY BLEAK JJ #34

    Desperately Bleak - PRECISELY Jaded Jean.

    Worth repeating: my attendance at a talk in Reading, about 10 years back, where some sort of local drug Czar said: "We have no drug problem, only a desperately bleak life problem." The irony is, that our politicians also have desperate needs (Blair to extreme) which they service with the drug of political status. When 'leaders' neither understand the needs of their flock, let alone can comprehend a way to succour them (as opposed to current suckering) then nothing improves and the default, downward spiral continues. Change of politicians for other politicians can effect nothing. A change in the manning of Westminster, from politicians to wise, competent individuals, CHOSEN FOR THEIR HUMAN ATTRIBUTES rather than trappings of party and dogma, is the only way the realities of life might be established, acknowledged and where appropriate, tackled. SPOIL PARTY GAMES.

  • Comment number 37.

    BUTTERFLY CATASTROPHY (JJs heading link)

    How apt: the butterflies are disappearing.
    Time to feel very sad - unless you are a politician with no time for anything fundamental.

  • Comment number 38.

    A SYNAPSE TOO FAR

    Never mind how it started - nobody knows really. Let's say energy organises to matter. Matter organises to The Periodic Table of elements.
    Elements inexorably combine to a range of compounds - carbon permitting exotic ones.
    Exotic carbon compounds permit replication (life).
    Selective replication permits the sequence of increasingly-capable life-forms; up to the apes - sustainable.

    Then us. Wrong turn at Albuquerque? Fallen Angel with large spanner? Self-limiting system? How do you evolve a sentient being who will play nicely, if they have to emerge from a chain of animals, and still have a horny, hungry, hierarchical one in the basement?

  • Comment number 39.

    Barrie (#38) "How do you evolve a sentient being who will play nicely, if they have to emerge from a chain of animals, and still have a horny, hungry, hierarchical one in the basement?"

    What one certainly doesn't do is legislate for equality, make 'education, education, education' one's panacea (if this means sending the brighther half of the population into education/work for longer whilst the other half breeds faster). Nor does one deregulate/de-nationalise in the name of 'freedom'. The above is a formula for misery in the long run.

    But note, it's precisely what enough of us have been voting for, and which our politicians (including the opposition) say we should be spreading throughout the world (usually to places which clearly don't want it).

    These people are not exactly 'evidence based/driven' are they? Not if they're taken as being primarily interested in the welfare of their electorates as one might expect, but then, maybe they aren't, maybe they're just interested in those who profit out of their electorates? (Which is how it looks to me, sadly, but does anyone see a U turn on the cards?).

  • Comment number 40.

    Black propaganda has much to answer for. Over the years, into what they have been told and to consider how this MAY have been used to shape 'liberal-democracy' (these days essentially Socialist Internationalist), which from what one sees about us, is not, as benign as is often made out by PR companies.

    Meanwhile, over in the they do things differently. Whilst there are perhaps more of us should look more closely, and critically, into who the critics are, how they behave themselves, and why they are s critical, just as one should look into why the Chinese, and others, argue that what they do is justified.

  • Comment number 41.

    There is definitely a problem in giving illegal immigrants amnesty after four years of hiding in this country. Not least the problem of proving this... a photo of the defendant holding a copy of the Daily Mail dated 01 September 2004 stood in front of Buckingham Palace? Each morning Police stations are inundated with foreigners slapping a yellowing soiled DM on the counter... "My name is Asif and I claim my right to a British Passport."

    The idea that not being caught for an illegal activity is somehow rewarded is just so off the mark it's untrue. • Driving for four years without passing your test gets you a free license (as long as you haven't crashed) • If you can claim benefits and work for a set period you get to keep the money?

    It wouldn't be so insulting if the previous story actually admitted that most illegals are here because they have OVERSTAYED THEIR CURRENT VISA – that means that each person has filled in a visa to come to Britain – Student, Tourist, Visit Visa to see freinds / family and have simply not returned. They then work illegally and only when caught claim Asylum. As these visas are issued if certain criteria are met – i.e enough funds to live within the time-scale of the visa without recourse to public funds the idea that people are fleeing here because they live in abject poverty (as in it's our FAULT we are so rich that people come here) is totally destroyed by this fact as the applicant has PROVED ENOUGH FUNDS to gain the visa in the first place.

    My only fear now is that if this is not sorted out... then what happens after 2012? Hundreds of thousands of tourists will come to England – and as yet we have no method of making sure they will return (the fact that they signed the visa with understanding they will return is somehow not legally enforcable in the courts) then this could be a massive factor in the sudden increase in immigration. One can only hope the FOUR YEAR amnesty is a plan by Team GB to get a fresh set of runners, jumpers and swimmers in time for 2116...

    Lastly and more personal is my own experience of Gaining UK Citizenship as follows... 2006 VISIT VISA (£60) plus flights (£1000) 2007 return to home AGAIN to make Visa application at British Embassy for marriage (£595) plus flights back to England 2007, settlement visa (£595) then to follow 2008 pay for required English course (£600) inform Council as to loss of Single persons discount on Council Tax (£350 per year) 2009 APPLY FOR FLR VISA (£795) 2009 APPLY FOR BRITISH CITIZENSHIP (£795)... as hopefully everybody can see, this LEGAL process will have taken nearly FOUR YEARS and many £1000s to get a passport when in fact there was a simpler solution...

    Lie on VISIT VISA about a holiday (£60) hide in my partners flat working illegally, while claiming tax benefits, turn up at Embassy Four years later to receive free passport thank you very much.

    As ever, in this country being lawful is a long and painful process without the crutch and support of the Liberal Nosepokers to get you everything you want. Not one programme this year will highlight how difficult it is TO ACTUALLY GET CITIZENSHIP LEGALLY and the honest hard-working folk that have jumped through all the hoops – it will always focus on the injured and desperate who will do ANYTHING to stay in this country against the evil intentions of the Border and Immigration Services.

  • Comment number 42.

    BARRIE TO JEAN

    Clearly we are condemned to live in 'interesting times'. No surprise that philosophy flowered so stongly in the far east. If only Little Boy Blair had had the wit to intone: "philosophy, philosophy, philosophy". But then, the arch Turkey would have been voting for Christmas.

  • Comment number 43.

    [Unsuitable/Broken URL removed by Moderator]

    'A senior Iranian military commander warned yesterday that any attack on Iran would start a major conflict. "Any aggression against Iran will start a world war," deputy chief of staff for defence publicity, Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri, said in a statement. "The unrestrained greed of the US leadership and global Zionism... is gradually leading the world to the edge of a precipice."'

    Now the 'aggressive' (according to Mr Brown) Russians are allegedly hawking their to Iran etc.

    Where did thay get that idea?

  • Comment number 44.

    Good to see that the EU had second thoughts.

    I wonder if the USA has the sense to follow?

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