It sounds too good to be true:

The Obama administration is expanding a program initiated by President George W. Bush aimed at checking the immigration status of virtually every person booked into local jails. In four years, the measure could result in a tenfold increase in illegal immigrants who have been convicted of crimes and identified for deportation, current and former U.S. officials said.

By matching inmates’ fingerprints to federal immigration databases, authorities hope to pinpoint deportable illegal immigrants before they are released from custody.

Allahpundit is suspicious, and I have to admit it, so am I. But you never know. Maybe he’s actually doing the right thing. Time will tell.

“Drudge had as a lead item up there this morning on his page a story from the UK, Sky News: ‘Scientists Unveil Missing Link In Evolution.’ It’s all about how Darwin would be thrilled to be alive today. ‘Scientists have unveiled a 47-million-year-old fossilised skeleton of a monkey hailed as the missing link in human evolution.’ It’s a one-foot, nine-inch-tall monkey, and it’s a lemur monkey described as the eighth wonder of the world. ‘The search for a direct connection between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom has taken 200 years – but it was presented to the world today –‘ So I guess this is settled science. We now officially came from a monkey, 47 million years ago. Well, that’s how it’s being presented here. It’s settled science. You know, this is all BS, as far as I’m concerned. Cross species evolution, I don’t think anybody’s ever proven that. They’re going out of their way now to establish evolution as a mechanism for creation, which, of course, you can’t do . . .”

[Guest post by DRJ]

Barack Obama’s plan for General Motors gives new meaning to the phrase “Buy American:”

“General Motors Corp’s plan for a bankruptcy filing involves a quick sale of the company’s healthy assets to a new company initially owned by the U.S. government, a source familiar with the situation said on Tuesday.
***
The government’s plans include giving stakes in the new company to GM’s union and bondholders, although the ownership structure of the company is still being negotiated, said the source who is familiar with the company’s plans.

In addition, the government would extend a credit line to the new company and forgive the bulk of the $15.4 billion in emergency loans that the U.S. has already provided to GM, the source said.”

This sounds like a big bankruptcy party on the taxpayers’ dime. Too bad we won’t be getting any party favors.

— DRJ

[Guest post by DRJ]

Barack Obama, explaining to GOP leaders why his stimulus plan should be adopted despite their objections: “I won.”

Lindsey Graham, explaining to a Ron Paul supporter why he isn’t interested in building the GOP around libertarian ideas that he doesn’t share: “I’m a winner, pal.”

— DRJ

[Guest post by DRJ]

The AP reports that college graduates are having a hard time finding work. Obviously tough economic times are hard on everyone, but they are especially hard on blue collar males and recent graduates like this:

“Josh D**, 23, who went on food stamps two weeks after leaving Oregon State University with an economics degree that he hoped to use for a job as a financial analyst. He’s living with his aunt and uncle in Grants Pass, Ore., and looking for even a menial job.

“It feels like really, really bad, terrible timing,” he says. “A degree in economics doesn’t really prepare you to understand the economy very well.”

Sadly, that quote doesn’t reflect well on higher education.

Like many graduates faced with a tough job market, Josh is thinking about graduate school, specifically law school. Graduate schools often see spikes in applications during economic downturns, such as in 2002 after 9/11 and in today’s market.

But more education isn’t always a good idea, especially when it’s accompanied by more debt. An increase in graduate school attendance means the pool of job applicants will be larger in 2-3 years, and not all employers are willing to pay the salaries employees with advanced degrees expect.

Unfortunately, tough times can make for tough decisions.

— DRJ

[Posted by Karl]

Michelle Malkin correctly notes that Pres. Obama’s planned standards for tailpipe emissions from new automobiles will raise the cost of a new car by $600 to $1,300 and continue a regulatory regime that kills motorists. That is more than can be said for the Associated Press, which is trying to bury the increased upfront cost down the memory hole.

As for the increased motorist deaths, which the National Academy of Sciences once estimated at 1,300 to 2,600 in 1993 alone, even a less lethal estimate of 800 excess deaths annually is roughly the number of US troops killed annually during the peak years of the Iraq war. Indeed, the estimated cumulative death toll of 46,000 in 2001 suggests that CAFE standards inflict casualties on the magnitude of Vietnam. The lapdog media, however, does not devote time to reporting the grim milestones when people die in fuel-efficient cars.

The supposed benefits of this regulation are explained by the Washington Post:

The measures are significant steps forward for the administration’s energy agenda by cutting greenhouse-gas emissions that contribute to climate change and by easing U.S. dependence on oil, most of which is imported.

However, increasing fuel-efficiency reduces the per-mile cost of operating vehicles, which increases the number of miles driven, thus reducing or eliminating any CAFE benefit. Between 1970-2001, the US made cars almost 50% more efficient, but the average number of miles a person drives doubled.

Environmentalists claim the new standards should cut carbon dioxide from tailpipes by 30 percent by 2016. Though that is unlikely, for the reason just stated, the fact remains that cars and light trucks subject to fuel economy standards make up only 1.5 percent of all global man-made greenhouse gas emissions. Thus, Americans will be paying more for cars and continuing to die in ever-greater numbers on the road, all for less than one-half of one percent of man-made greenhouse gas emissions. It is almost as though hardcore greens want to save the planet by killing people, but are only accomplishing the killing part.

Finally, one of the entirely predictable “unintended consequences” of raising the price of new cars will be to keep poorer people driving their old, greenhouse gas-spewing cars. Thus, it should surprise no one that Congress is already considering a “cash for clunkers” program designed to encourage trade-ins. This proposal is a twofer: not only does it attempt to patch a glaring flaw in today’s plan, but it would help save the jobs of all those UAW workers Obama and the Democrats rely upon every other November. Pushing the poor into these new Obamamobiles will also kill more people at the margins, but dead people tend to vote Democratic, so there is no net loss for the Democrats.

–Karl