The Hightower Lowdown

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Constitution 101

George W. Bush, who's been strutting toward the White House in his hand-tooled Gucci cowboy boots ... just stepped in a big, wet cow patty.

The cow patty in question is a constitutional mess of his own making. Last year, the governor threw a hissy fit when a group of environmentalists and other citizens picketed in front of the Governor's Mansion against the outrageous favoritism Bush has shown toward Exxon, Dow, and other major air polluters in Texas. Those corporations gave Bush half a million dollars for his gubernatorial campaign; and, in return, Bush had given them a free pass to keep on polluting the state's air.

Since the governor was about to launch his presidential campaign, he didn't want these protesting peasants embarrassing him, so suddenly there was a new rule that said no one could demonstrate on the sidewalks around the mansion. Instead, the governor consigned them to a "protest zone," which was a parking lot far away from the mansion and the media. The citizens demonstrated anyway, and Bush's security force was dispatched to arrest them.

Unfortunately for George W., the U.S. Constitution doesn't say that we citizens have the right to exercise free speech only in protest zones created by imperious governors. So, the protesters sued Bush for violating their First Amendment rights. In a political panic, Bush's lawyers tried to have the governor removed from the suit, claiming it was the state police who were responsible, not him.

But the judge refused to let Bush escape responsibility. Not wanting to continue this constitutional fiasco, Bush's team has now retreated in full defeat. In a settlement, the protesters were awarded $99,000 and the sidewalks were returned to the people, with state police agreeing not to arrest peaceful protesters around the Governor's Mansion.

Our constitutional rights are not just something we have, but something we have to use -- especially when petty political tyrants like Bush get confused on the concept.

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Whose Economy Is It, Anyway?

This is your lawmaker's brain: It's willing to fight for the American people. This is your lawmaker's brain on the drug of corrupt campaign contributions: It's willing to sell out the American people for a pot of gold. Any questions?

Any questions were answered on October 4, when both houses of Congress rammed through a bill that will help destroy the middle-class future of the American people. We're being told that our future prosperity is dependent on getting high tech jobs, right? Be a computer programmer or engineer, we're told, and the American dream is ours. Yet these are the very jobs our lawmakers sold out from under us on October 4, when they approved a bill allowing 195,000 engineers and programmers from India, Russia, and elsewhere to come into our country and take these jobs at a half to a third lower pay than what Americans get.

The rationale of the high tech royalty is that they "just can't find" qualified Americans to do this skilled work, so there's a "critical shortage" requiring low-wage foreigners to fill the gap. Horsehockey.

The industry only creates about 150,000 of these jobs a year. Our colleges graduate more than 160,000 qualified high techers annually. But Bill Gates, Michael Dell, and the boys don't want to pay the going rate for these skilled employees -- so, they figure, why not get Congress to more than double the supply with low-wage imported workers and bust the pay scale for everyone?

This high tech immigration law also lets U.S. firms fire their American workers and replace them with cheaper employees from abroad. The insurance giant AIG, for example, has already fired its entire programming staff, even requiring the discarded Americans to train their foreign replacements or lose their severance benefits.

The high tech barons pushing this treason put $22 million into the pockets of the Democrats and Republicans who conspired to pass it.