immique
07-14 11:07 PM
I think EB3 India may be the unintended beneficiary of the appropriate interpretation of the spill over of visa into retrogressed EB2 countries. I suspect that once EB2 India and China are current, the remaining visas will spill over into EB3. Thay do NOT spill over into EB3 ROW only but will spill over into EB3 as a whole. the reason for this is as both EB3 ROW and EB3 India are retrogressed, both these categories will advance equally as EB2 I and EB2 China are doing currently. I strongly think this will be the likely outcome next year and so EB3 India should see the PD movement approximately the same as EB3 ROW- but this will happen only when EB2 is current and the spill over reaches EB3 (this will likely happen in the final quarter of 2009)
but you are not correct about this. please look it up. The vertical spillover was going to EB3 ROW, had that not been so, EB2 I would not have become U, even though (you are right about that) USCIS was actually allocating a little too fast.
The bottom line is this: before the "system changed" the spillover went to EB3 ROW (country quota more important that category preference)
Now with revised interpretation spillover goes first to EB2 retrogressed countries (preference category precedent over country quota- use of soft quota provison from AC21). Either way Eb3 I was last on the totem pole.
There would have been no spillover to EB3 I in either situation. I'm not saying this to either to justify it or to argue for it's fairness. Just trying to make a point about the root issues.
Therefore, the "change" leaves EB3 I exactly where it was before- which of course is an insane place to be. Frankly, in your place, I would be freaking going out of my mind. But if your only reason for this action is that "change", you have to sit back a moment and understand what the change has doen (or in this case not done) to you.
The ONLY way to solve the EB3I problem is increased GC numbers. That is why recapture has been the first and foremost thing we have always pursued. Last time there was a recapture, GC numbers went to every single category. Anyway you look at it, if with a recapture, EB2 became current, every bit of spillover in every quarter would go to EB3. Eventually, there will be more long lasting reform. For now we desperately need the extra numbers in any form or shape.
Just my 2c. not trying to trying to "stop your voice from being heard". One piece of friendly and well meaning advice. Target letters and measures at those that have the power to make the changes you want. Otherwise the effort is pointless from the start.
but you are not correct about this. please look it up. The vertical spillover was going to EB3 ROW, had that not been so, EB2 I would not have become U, even though (you are right about that) USCIS was actually allocating a little too fast.
The bottom line is this: before the "system changed" the spillover went to EB3 ROW (country quota more important that category preference)
Now with revised interpretation spillover goes first to EB2 retrogressed countries (preference category precedent over country quota- use of soft quota provison from AC21). Either way Eb3 I was last on the totem pole.
There would have been no spillover to EB3 I in either situation. I'm not saying this to either to justify it or to argue for it's fairness. Just trying to make a point about the root issues.
Therefore, the "change" leaves EB3 I exactly where it was before- which of course is an insane place to be. Frankly, in your place, I would be freaking going out of my mind. But if your only reason for this action is that "change", you have to sit back a moment and understand what the change has doen (or in this case not done) to you.
The ONLY way to solve the EB3I problem is increased GC numbers. That is why recapture has been the first and foremost thing we have always pursued. Last time there was a recapture, GC numbers went to every single category. Anyway you look at it, if with a recapture, EB2 became current, every bit of spillover in every quarter would go to EB3. Eventually, there will be more long lasting reform. For now we desperately need the extra numbers in any form or shape.
Just my 2c. not trying to trying to "stop your voice from being heard". One piece of friendly and well meaning advice. Target letters and measures at those that have the power to make the changes you want. Otherwise the effort is pointless from the start.
wallpaper hot wallpaper Go Green
Macaca
10-02 11:02 AM
As China Opens, U.S. Lobbyists Get Ready to Move In (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/01/AR2007100101672.html?hpid=sec-business) By Ariana Eunjung Cha | Washington Post Foreign Service, October 2, 2007
BEIJING -- It's almost 8 a.m., and former U.S. commerce secretary Donald L. Evans and his team are standing in front of the St. Regis Hotel, preparing for their day of meetings with Chinese finance officials.
Small but meaningful gifts in Tiffany's signature baby-blue boxes? Check. Briefing books with the pronunciation of everyone's names? Check. Black Audi A6s to whisk the group to the meetings? Check.
Evans was in town representing the Financial Services Forum, which is made up of chief executives of 20 multinational banks. His goal was to convince Chinese regulators that opening their financial sector to more foreign investment would be good for China's economy.
Armies of lobbyists are descending on the Chinese capital in anticipation of the 17th Communist Party Congress beginning in mid-October. The gathering will choose a new generation of leaders, setting the political agenda for the next five years.
But the dark-suited Western lobbyists are an odd spectacle given that in China, policy and legislative decisions are still made behind closed doors. Lobbying exists in a gray area; because there are no laws specifically pertaining to it, it isn't even supposed to exist.
Nevertheless, some of Washington's marquee lobbying firms -- including Jones Day, Hogan & Hartson, DLA Piper and Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld -- have set up offices in China. Officially, they are just investment advisory and communications firms. Chinese companies mostly work through government-affiliated industry associations, although some have also hired Western-style lobbying firms.
In June, foreign companies successfully lobbied Chinese officials to remove conditions on hiring temporary workers in a new labor law that they said would make it prohibitively expensive to do business in China. Likewise in August, they were able persuade China to remove some language in early drafts of the anti-monopoly law that seemed to discriminate against foreign companies, according to Chinese and foreign academics.
The Chinese government has said it took input from domestic and foreign interests into account but has not been specific.
Foreign companies are interested in what happens in China, as its economy is becoming the world's third-largest as well as a capitalist instead of planned one. There's concern that the legal framework for business that China's legislators are writing today could affect the fate of multinational businesses for decades.
Evans said that the degree to which Chinese officials are interested in hearing foreign perspectives on business issues has increased dramatically. In the past, he said, he would go into government meetings and recite a set of bullet points, and the meeting would end. These days, he said, there's real discussion and debate.
"They are very proactive in wanting to engage and share with the business community," Evans said.
Scott Kennedy, director of the Research Center for Chinese Politics and Business at Indiana University and author of "The Business of Lobbying in China," said that as recently as a few years ago foreign companies would grumble that they heard about new policies only after they were announced.
"That is increasingly no longer the case. Today, even if they don't agree with the final result, they know it's on the horizon," Kennedy said.
But China's laws have been slow to respond to the influx of lobbyists seeking to take advantage of the closer ties. Zhao Kejin, an associate professor at Shanghai's Fudan University who studies government-business relations and has written a book on lobbying in China, argues that because lobbyists do not need to register or file disclosure forms, the system is vulnerable to abuse.
"There is lots of lobbying money flowing to individual officials' pockets," Zhao said. In addition to straight-up bribery, some lobbying firms keep friends of high-placed officials on the payroll or pay for officials to take luxury "training" trips abroad.
In 2004, Lucent Technologies fired four executives who were part of its Chinese operations for violating the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits bribing foreign government officials and politicians. Last November, a U.S. software maker, Fidelity National Information Services, was accused of paying for luxury vacations for Chinese banking officials and their families in places such as Rome and Las Vegas. Fidelity has denied the charges.
Lobbying is not only less of an institution in China than it is in the United States, but the people being lobbied are different.
For instance, Murray King, head of the Shanghai office of APCO Worldwide, one of the oldest government relations firms operating in China, said that Chinese academics are among the key players that companies should reach out to. The most important members of that group are those who work with the think tanks affiliated with various state ministries, because they play an important role in the drafting of legislation.
Another crucial part of high-profile lobbying efforts are "guanxi brokers," well-connected individuals who can give introductions to important officials, or "rainmakers," people who are so famous that many Chinese officials might be happy to meet and shake hands.
"Because China is a country that respects authority, former politicians of the United States, when they come to China, can always play a very important role," said Steven Dong, a Tsinghua University public relations professor who studies the reputations of corporations.
A former U.S. official will almost always be greeted by a Chinese official of the same rank, Dong said.
Former officials with star power in China include Henry Kissinger, probably the most sought-after because of the role he played in establishing diplomatic relations with the Communist Party during the Nixon administration. Former Federal Communications Commission chairman Reed Hundt, who routinely visits China on behalf of Silicon Valley companies to talk about opening up China's Internet and telecommunications sector, is also a regular in the halls of Chinese ministries. Gary Locke, a former governor of Washington whose consulting firm represents Microsoft and Starbucks, is celebrated for being the first Chinese American governor and is so well known that school girls run up to him to take his picture.
Evans, who was commerce secretary from 2001 to 2004, has been working for the Financial Services Forum since 2005. This was his second trip to China on behalf of the group.
Evans was received by the Chinese government this month with all the pomp and circumstance of a state visit.
His schedule, which included all key financial ministries and regulators, was almost identical to that of Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. during his visit in July. Evans even had a private diner with Vice Premier Wu Yi.
There was lobbying on both sides.
Jiang Jianqing, chairman of the state-owned Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, a rank similar to that of minister, pummeled Evans with questions about the subprime lending crisis and trade protectionism in Congress. ICBC has recently been ranked the second- or third-largest bank in the world by market capitalization.
Evans said the Chinese must make sure that U.S. legislators understand they are open to foreign investment. He said it's important for the Chinese to make sure the U.S. government understands "your view as an important trader, to make sure they understand your commitment to moving your economy toward an ultimate market economy."
The total foreign ownership in a Chinese bank cannot exceed 25 percent. But even as Evans began to lay out his case for why China should raise or do away with foreign ownership caps for banking, securities and insurance firms, Jiang took the opportunity to point out his frustration that his bank's application to open a single branch in the United States has not been approved, while U.S. banks, including some that Evans represents, already have significant operations in China.
Evans said he'd be happy to look into the holdup.
Near the end of the one-hour meeting, the two turned to a less-tense topic: the development of China's countryside. Evans talked about his visits to western China, where he met two blind brothers with whom he has kept in touch, and how much their lives had changed over the years. Jiang said he, too, was concerned about bridging the gap between the rich and the poor in China.
The two men smiled and shook hands. That was considered progress.
BEIJING -- It's almost 8 a.m., and former U.S. commerce secretary Donald L. Evans and his team are standing in front of the St. Regis Hotel, preparing for their day of meetings with Chinese finance officials.
Small but meaningful gifts in Tiffany's signature baby-blue boxes? Check. Briefing books with the pronunciation of everyone's names? Check. Black Audi A6s to whisk the group to the meetings? Check.
Evans was in town representing the Financial Services Forum, which is made up of chief executives of 20 multinational banks. His goal was to convince Chinese regulators that opening their financial sector to more foreign investment would be good for China's economy.
Armies of lobbyists are descending on the Chinese capital in anticipation of the 17th Communist Party Congress beginning in mid-October. The gathering will choose a new generation of leaders, setting the political agenda for the next five years.
But the dark-suited Western lobbyists are an odd spectacle given that in China, policy and legislative decisions are still made behind closed doors. Lobbying exists in a gray area; because there are no laws specifically pertaining to it, it isn't even supposed to exist.
Nevertheless, some of Washington's marquee lobbying firms -- including Jones Day, Hogan & Hartson, DLA Piper and Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld -- have set up offices in China. Officially, they are just investment advisory and communications firms. Chinese companies mostly work through government-affiliated industry associations, although some have also hired Western-style lobbying firms.
In June, foreign companies successfully lobbied Chinese officials to remove conditions on hiring temporary workers in a new labor law that they said would make it prohibitively expensive to do business in China. Likewise in August, they were able persuade China to remove some language in early drafts of the anti-monopoly law that seemed to discriminate against foreign companies, according to Chinese and foreign academics.
The Chinese government has said it took input from domestic and foreign interests into account but has not been specific.
Foreign companies are interested in what happens in China, as its economy is becoming the world's third-largest as well as a capitalist instead of planned one. There's concern that the legal framework for business that China's legislators are writing today could affect the fate of multinational businesses for decades.
Evans said that the degree to which Chinese officials are interested in hearing foreign perspectives on business issues has increased dramatically. In the past, he said, he would go into government meetings and recite a set of bullet points, and the meeting would end. These days, he said, there's real discussion and debate.
"They are very proactive in wanting to engage and share with the business community," Evans said.
Scott Kennedy, director of the Research Center for Chinese Politics and Business at Indiana University and author of "The Business of Lobbying in China," said that as recently as a few years ago foreign companies would grumble that they heard about new policies only after they were announced.
"That is increasingly no longer the case. Today, even if they don't agree with the final result, they know it's on the horizon," Kennedy said.
But China's laws have been slow to respond to the influx of lobbyists seeking to take advantage of the closer ties. Zhao Kejin, an associate professor at Shanghai's Fudan University who studies government-business relations and has written a book on lobbying in China, argues that because lobbyists do not need to register or file disclosure forms, the system is vulnerable to abuse.
"There is lots of lobbying money flowing to individual officials' pockets," Zhao said. In addition to straight-up bribery, some lobbying firms keep friends of high-placed officials on the payroll or pay for officials to take luxury "training" trips abroad.
In 2004, Lucent Technologies fired four executives who were part of its Chinese operations for violating the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which prohibits bribing foreign government officials and politicians. Last November, a U.S. software maker, Fidelity National Information Services, was accused of paying for luxury vacations for Chinese banking officials and their families in places such as Rome and Las Vegas. Fidelity has denied the charges.
Lobbying is not only less of an institution in China than it is in the United States, but the people being lobbied are different.
For instance, Murray King, head of the Shanghai office of APCO Worldwide, one of the oldest government relations firms operating in China, said that Chinese academics are among the key players that companies should reach out to. The most important members of that group are those who work with the think tanks affiliated with various state ministries, because they play an important role in the drafting of legislation.
Another crucial part of high-profile lobbying efforts are "guanxi brokers," well-connected individuals who can give introductions to important officials, or "rainmakers," people who are so famous that many Chinese officials might be happy to meet and shake hands.
"Because China is a country that respects authority, former politicians of the United States, when they come to China, can always play a very important role," said Steven Dong, a Tsinghua University public relations professor who studies the reputations of corporations.
A former U.S. official will almost always be greeted by a Chinese official of the same rank, Dong said.
Former officials with star power in China include Henry Kissinger, probably the most sought-after because of the role he played in establishing diplomatic relations with the Communist Party during the Nixon administration. Former Federal Communications Commission chairman Reed Hundt, who routinely visits China on behalf of Silicon Valley companies to talk about opening up China's Internet and telecommunications sector, is also a regular in the halls of Chinese ministries. Gary Locke, a former governor of Washington whose consulting firm represents Microsoft and Starbucks, is celebrated for being the first Chinese American governor and is so well known that school girls run up to him to take his picture.
Evans, who was commerce secretary from 2001 to 2004, has been working for the Financial Services Forum since 2005. This was his second trip to China on behalf of the group.
Evans was received by the Chinese government this month with all the pomp and circumstance of a state visit.
His schedule, which included all key financial ministries and regulators, was almost identical to that of Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. during his visit in July. Evans even had a private diner with Vice Premier Wu Yi.
There was lobbying on both sides.
Jiang Jianqing, chairman of the state-owned Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, a rank similar to that of minister, pummeled Evans with questions about the subprime lending crisis and trade protectionism in Congress. ICBC has recently been ranked the second- or third-largest bank in the world by market capitalization.
Evans said the Chinese must make sure that U.S. legislators understand they are open to foreign investment. He said it's important for the Chinese to make sure the U.S. government understands "your view as an important trader, to make sure they understand your commitment to moving your economy toward an ultimate market economy."
The total foreign ownership in a Chinese bank cannot exceed 25 percent. But even as Evans began to lay out his case for why China should raise or do away with foreign ownership caps for banking, securities and insurance firms, Jiang took the opportunity to point out his frustration that his bank's application to open a single branch in the United States has not been approved, while U.S. banks, including some that Evans represents, already have significant operations in China.
Evans said he'd be happy to look into the holdup.
Near the end of the one-hour meeting, the two turned to a less-tense topic: the development of China's countryside. Evans talked about his visits to western China, where he met two blind brothers with whom he has kept in touch, and how much their lives had changed over the years. Jiang said he, too, was concerned about bridging the gap between the rich and the poor in China.
The two men smiled and shook hands. That was considered progress.
Sakthisagar
07-29 03:27 PM
A little touchy here are we. I thought we were skilled immigrants and could hold a mature conversation.
First of all, the President doesn't create policy, the Congress does. And please answer my question of why he should focus on a few hundred thousands when millions are out of their jobs, economy is in crisis and a couple of wars to fight. I'm just saying in terms of priorities we don't fit and I'm fine with that even though from a selfish perspective it hurts us. With regard to the unemployment rate:
1. Not all EB immigrants are tech sector employees (esp in EB3)
2. Even if we consider the population of tech EB employees, some in the American Congress and public *could* argue that lots of these jobs could indeed be done by Americans if they are trained. If you look at the trend of outsourcing you know that it's really not that hard to find somebody who can code in Java/C++ etc. I'm not saying that's true but just saying that's an argument that could be given forward by people who say that the nation's overall unemployment rate could be helped by training people for tech oriented jobs where unemployment rate is low. This is already happening with science and tech initiatives at the middle/higher education level.
What immaturity you have seen in saying that do not compare USA & India. may be your immature mind to understand.
We people will only argue and discuss and never do anything solid that is the Nature unfortunately. How do you know The President's Priority? Why do you want to use "coulds "and "can" and "may be???? just for argument sake and that is what they call "IMMATURITY "in superlative Degree
First of all, the President doesn't create policy, the Congress does. And please answer my question of why he should focus on a few hundred thousands when millions are out of their jobs, economy is in crisis and a couple of wars to fight. I'm just saying in terms of priorities we don't fit and I'm fine with that even though from a selfish perspective it hurts us. With regard to the unemployment rate:
1. Not all EB immigrants are tech sector employees (esp in EB3)
2. Even if we consider the population of tech EB employees, some in the American Congress and public *could* argue that lots of these jobs could indeed be done by Americans if they are trained. If you look at the trend of outsourcing you know that it's really not that hard to find somebody who can code in Java/C++ etc. I'm not saying that's true but just saying that's an argument that could be given forward by people who say that the nation's overall unemployment rate could be helped by training people for tech oriented jobs where unemployment rate is low. This is already happening with science and tech initiatives at the middle/higher education level.
What immaturity you have seen in saying that do not compare USA & India. may be your immature mind to understand.
We people will only argue and discuss and never do anything solid that is the Nature unfortunately. How do you know The President's Priority? Why do you want to use "coulds "and "can" and "may be???? just for argument sake and that is what they call "IMMATURITY "in superlative Degree
2011 Pattern Matalic Green
AGC4ME
04-07 07:24 PM
But congress needs to find some solution for H1b mess like applying 150k H1b in one day. If no alternative solution is suggested some part/all part of this bill may be considered. US companies will not be impacted as they are not h1b dependent and they are hiring more than 50% US workers so they may not oppose that much. If Microsoft lobby for 200k H1b but still if they could not get any h1b why will they lobby it? American companies will either ask unlimited H1b or restrictions for bodyshopping so that everyone will get fair share of H1b. Lottery is shame as many deserving candidates will be rejected but many lower grade people may enter there is no merrit in selection of H1b. If IV is opposing this they need to give some solution for H1b mess. Otherwise no point. Also the bill was introduced by both Democrat and Republican. So Whether it is passed or not it is going to be considered
And with a posting like this u think you are higher grade....
And with a posting like this u think you are higher grade....
more...
zxcvb
07-17 10:37 PM
Hi UN,
What if the employee gets paid less than what is mentioned on the LCA on H1. Is that considered Out of Status?
Thanks in advance
What if the employee gets paid less than what is mentioned on the LCA on H1. Is that considered Out of Status?
Thanks in advance
Macaca
12-29 08:01 PM
Why we must reclaim religion from the right-wing (http://www.rediff.com/news/column/column-why-we-must-reclaim-religion-from-the-right-wing/20101229.htm) By Yoginder Sikand | Rediff
Decades after the two States came into being, relations between India and Pakistan continue to be, to put it mildly, hostile. This owes largely to the vast, and continuously mounting, influence of the Hindu religious right-wing in India and its Muslim counterpart in Pakistan.
Seemingly irreconcilable foes, the two speak the same language -- of unending hatred between Hindus and Muslims -- each seeking to define itself by building, stressing and constantly reinforcing boundaries between the two religiously-defined imagined communities.
Much has been written on the ideology and politics of right-wing Hindu and Islamic movements and organisations in both India and Pakistan, by academics and journalists alike. Yet, almost no attention has been given to how individual Hindu and Muslim religious activists at the local level, as distinct from key ideologues and leaders at the national-level, imagine and articulate notions of the religious and national 'other'.
Understanding this issue is crucial, for such activists exercise an enormous clout among their following.
The Lahore-based Mashal Books, one of Pakistan's few progressive, left-leaning publishing houses, recently launched a unique experiment: Of recording and making publicly accessible speeches delivered by maulvis or Muslim clerics at mosque congregations across Pakistan's Punjab province, including some located in small towns and obscure villages.
These speeches deal with a host of issues, ranging from women's status and scientific education, to jihad and anti-Indianism, all these linked to an amazingly diverse set of understandings of Islam.
Hosted on the Mashal Books Web site MASHAL BOOKS (http://www.mashalbooks.org), these speeches reflect the worldviews of a large majority of Pakistani maulvis, representing a range of sectarian backgrounds, who now exercise a major influence on the country's politics and in shaping Pakistani public opinion and discourse.
Of the dozens of speeches hosted on the Web site, only two are classified as relating particularly to India, but these may still be taken to be representative of how a great many Pakistani maulvis conceive of India and of relations between India and Pakistan. Predictably, in both speeches India is depicted in lurid colours, as an implacable foe of Pakistan, of Muslims, and of Islam.
Not surprisingly, then, efforts to improve relations between India and Pakistan or to work towards rapprochement between Hindus and Muslims are vociferously denounced. The two maulvis appear to insist that Islam, as they understand it, itself requires that Pakistani Muslims must never cool off their anti-Hindu and anti-Indian zeal.
The first of these two speeches, by the Deobandi Maulana Muhammad Hafeez of the Jamia Masjid Umar Farooq, Rawalpindi, refers to India only in passing. He presents Muslims the world over as besieged by a host of powerful non-Muslim enemies.
It is almost as if their 'disbelief' (kufr) in Islam goads all non-Muslims, wherever they may be, to engage in a relentless conspiracy against Islam and its adherents, a war, like Samuel Huntington's infamous 'Clash of Civilisations', in which compromise and reconciliation are simply impossible because Islam and 'non-Islam' can, in this worldview, never comfortably coexist.
It is also as if Muslims have a monopoly on virtue and non-Muslims on vice. 'Islam will rise,' Maulana Hafeez thunders, 'and America and India will fall,' conveniently forgetting (assuming he knew of the fact) that India probably has more Muslims than Pakistan and that if India falls, it will drag its tens of millions of Muslims along with it, too.
The second speech is by a certain Maulana Mufti Saeed Ahmed of Jamia Masjid Mittranwali, Sialkot, who belongs to the Ahl-e Hadith sect, which closely resembles the Saudi Wahhabis.
Pakistani Ahl-e Hadith groups, most notoriously the Lashkar-e Tayiba, have been heavily involved in fomenting violence across Pakistan, Kashmir and in India as well.
Hatred for India and the Hindus seems to be an article of faith for many Pakistani Ahl-e Hadith, as Maulana Ahmed's speech clearly indicates.
At the same time, it must also be recognised, as is evident from instances that the Maulana cites, that these deep-rooted anti-Indian and anti-Hindu sentiments are constantly fuelled by brutalities inflicted by non-Muslim powers, including the United States and fiercely anti-Muslim Hindu chauvinists in India, on Muslim peoples.
These brutalities need not always be physical. They can also take the form of assaults on and insults to cherished Islamic beliefs, which inevitably provoke Muslim anger. The appeal of people like Maulana Ahmed lies in their practiced ability to use these instances of brutality directed against Muslims to craft a frighteningly Manichaean world, where all Muslims are pitted against all non-Muslims in a ceaseless war of cosmic proportions that shall carry on until Muslims, it is fervently believed, will finally triumph.
Recounting a long list of anti-Muslim brutalities (but conveniently ignoring similar outrages committed by Muslims on others), Maulana Ahmed exhorts his listeners to unite and take revenge. 'O Muslims!,' he shrilly appeals, 'get up and take in hand your arrows, pick up your Kalashnikovs, train yourselves in explosives and bombs, organise yourselves into armies, prepare nuclear attacks and destroy every part of the body of the enemy.'
His speech is peppered with fervent calls for what he terms as 'jihad' against both America and India, these being projected as inveterate foes of Islam and of all Muslims.
He prays for America to 'be destroyed', and ecstatically celebrates the recent devastating terrorist assault on Mumbai by a self-styled Islamist group that left vast numbers of people dead, unapologetically hailing the dastardly act as a 'big slap on the cheek of the Hindus'.
Not stopping at this, he calls for continuous terrorist violence against India, including, he advises, unleashing 'bloodbath to (sic) Indian and American diplomats in Kabul and Kandahar'. Only then, he argues, can Pakistan's rulers 'relieve the pressure' on them and being peace to their country.
The 'enemy', as Maulana Ahmed constructs the notion, could be any and every non-Muslim, particularly Americans, Jews and Hindus or Indians. It is as if every non-Muslim is, by definition, irredeemably opposed to Islam and is necessarily engaged in a grand global conspiracy to wipe Islam from off the face of the earth. It is as if non-Muslims have no other preoccupation at all.
All non-Muslims are thus tarred with the same brush, and no exceptions whatsoever are made. It is almost as if Maulana Ahmed desperately wants all non-Muslims to be fired by anti-Muslim and anti-Islamic vitriol, for that is his way to whip up the sentiments of his Muslim followers and fire their zeal and faith.
It is as if further stoking such hatred is crucial to his ability to maintain a following and to claim to authoritatively speak for Islam and its adherents. 'The hatred among the people against the kafirs has reached a new height,' the Maulana exults.
For the Maulana, fomenting hatred of non-Muslims is his chosen way of realising what has for centuries remained the elusive dream of Muslim unity. That this hatred, which he so passionately celebrates, inevitably further stokes the fires of Islamophobia and anti-Muslim prejudice, already so widespread among non-Muslims, appears of no concern to him at all. In fact, he seems to positively relish the frightening Huntingtonian thesis of the 'Clash of Civilisations'.
Deobandi and Ahl-e Hadith outfits today enjoy tremendous clout in Pakistan, and they have been at the forefront of Islamist militancy that now threatens to drown the country in the throes of what promises to be an interminable civil war.
As the speeches of these two Pakistani clerics, one a Deobandi and the other from the Ahl-e Hadith, so starkly indicate, inveterate hatred for India and the Hindus, indeed for non-Muslims in general, is integral to the ways in which vast numbers of Pakistani Muslim clerics understand religion, community, nationalism and the world.
Such hatred is inevitably further fuelled by acts of brutality directed against Muslims by non-Muslims, including by the United States, India (particularly in Kashmir) and by militantly anti-Muslim Hindu chauvinist groups.
Muslim and non-Muslim right-wing radicalism and militancy thus enjoy a mutually symbiotic relationship, opposing each other while, ironically, unable to live apart, needing each other even simply to define themselves.
Religion is too powerful an instrument to be left in the hands of hate-driven clerics to manipulate as they please, most often for fuelling conflict between communities and states.
As the frightening records of Hindutva chauvinists in India and the Pakistani clerics discussed in this article so strikingly illustrate, leaving religion to the right-wing to monopolise is a sure recipe for bloody and endless conflict.
Decades after the two States came into being, relations between India and Pakistan continue to be, to put it mildly, hostile. This owes largely to the vast, and continuously mounting, influence of the Hindu religious right-wing in India and its Muslim counterpart in Pakistan.
Seemingly irreconcilable foes, the two speak the same language -- of unending hatred between Hindus and Muslims -- each seeking to define itself by building, stressing and constantly reinforcing boundaries between the two religiously-defined imagined communities.
Much has been written on the ideology and politics of right-wing Hindu and Islamic movements and organisations in both India and Pakistan, by academics and journalists alike. Yet, almost no attention has been given to how individual Hindu and Muslim religious activists at the local level, as distinct from key ideologues and leaders at the national-level, imagine and articulate notions of the religious and national 'other'.
Understanding this issue is crucial, for such activists exercise an enormous clout among their following.
The Lahore-based Mashal Books, one of Pakistan's few progressive, left-leaning publishing houses, recently launched a unique experiment: Of recording and making publicly accessible speeches delivered by maulvis or Muslim clerics at mosque congregations across Pakistan's Punjab province, including some located in small towns and obscure villages.
These speeches deal with a host of issues, ranging from women's status and scientific education, to jihad and anti-Indianism, all these linked to an amazingly diverse set of understandings of Islam.
Hosted on the Mashal Books Web site MASHAL BOOKS (http://www.mashalbooks.org), these speeches reflect the worldviews of a large majority of Pakistani maulvis, representing a range of sectarian backgrounds, who now exercise a major influence on the country's politics and in shaping Pakistani public opinion and discourse.
Of the dozens of speeches hosted on the Web site, only two are classified as relating particularly to India, but these may still be taken to be representative of how a great many Pakistani maulvis conceive of India and of relations between India and Pakistan. Predictably, in both speeches India is depicted in lurid colours, as an implacable foe of Pakistan, of Muslims, and of Islam.
Not surprisingly, then, efforts to improve relations between India and Pakistan or to work towards rapprochement between Hindus and Muslims are vociferously denounced. The two maulvis appear to insist that Islam, as they understand it, itself requires that Pakistani Muslims must never cool off their anti-Hindu and anti-Indian zeal.
The first of these two speeches, by the Deobandi Maulana Muhammad Hafeez of the Jamia Masjid Umar Farooq, Rawalpindi, refers to India only in passing. He presents Muslims the world over as besieged by a host of powerful non-Muslim enemies.
It is almost as if their 'disbelief' (kufr) in Islam goads all non-Muslims, wherever they may be, to engage in a relentless conspiracy against Islam and its adherents, a war, like Samuel Huntington's infamous 'Clash of Civilisations', in which compromise and reconciliation are simply impossible because Islam and 'non-Islam' can, in this worldview, never comfortably coexist.
It is also as if Muslims have a monopoly on virtue and non-Muslims on vice. 'Islam will rise,' Maulana Hafeez thunders, 'and America and India will fall,' conveniently forgetting (assuming he knew of the fact) that India probably has more Muslims than Pakistan and that if India falls, it will drag its tens of millions of Muslims along with it, too.
The second speech is by a certain Maulana Mufti Saeed Ahmed of Jamia Masjid Mittranwali, Sialkot, who belongs to the Ahl-e Hadith sect, which closely resembles the Saudi Wahhabis.
Pakistani Ahl-e Hadith groups, most notoriously the Lashkar-e Tayiba, have been heavily involved in fomenting violence across Pakistan, Kashmir and in India as well.
Hatred for India and the Hindus seems to be an article of faith for many Pakistani Ahl-e Hadith, as Maulana Ahmed's speech clearly indicates.
At the same time, it must also be recognised, as is evident from instances that the Maulana cites, that these deep-rooted anti-Indian and anti-Hindu sentiments are constantly fuelled by brutalities inflicted by non-Muslim powers, including the United States and fiercely anti-Muslim Hindu chauvinists in India, on Muslim peoples.
These brutalities need not always be physical. They can also take the form of assaults on and insults to cherished Islamic beliefs, which inevitably provoke Muslim anger. The appeal of people like Maulana Ahmed lies in their practiced ability to use these instances of brutality directed against Muslims to craft a frighteningly Manichaean world, where all Muslims are pitted against all non-Muslims in a ceaseless war of cosmic proportions that shall carry on until Muslims, it is fervently believed, will finally triumph.
Recounting a long list of anti-Muslim brutalities (but conveniently ignoring similar outrages committed by Muslims on others), Maulana Ahmed exhorts his listeners to unite and take revenge. 'O Muslims!,' he shrilly appeals, 'get up and take in hand your arrows, pick up your Kalashnikovs, train yourselves in explosives and bombs, organise yourselves into armies, prepare nuclear attacks and destroy every part of the body of the enemy.'
His speech is peppered with fervent calls for what he terms as 'jihad' against both America and India, these being projected as inveterate foes of Islam and of all Muslims.
He prays for America to 'be destroyed', and ecstatically celebrates the recent devastating terrorist assault on Mumbai by a self-styled Islamist group that left vast numbers of people dead, unapologetically hailing the dastardly act as a 'big slap on the cheek of the Hindus'.
Not stopping at this, he calls for continuous terrorist violence against India, including, he advises, unleashing 'bloodbath to (sic) Indian and American diplomats in Kabul and Kandahar'. Only then, he argues, can Pakistan's rulers 'relieve the pressure' on them and being peace to their country.
The 'enemy', as Maulana Ahmed constructs the notion, could be any and every non-Muslim, particularly Americans, Jews and Hindus or Indians. It is as if every non-Muslim is, by definition, irredeemably opposed to Islam and is necessarily engaged in a grand global conspiracy to wipe Islam from off the face of the earth. It is as if non-Muslims have no other preoccupation at all.
All non-Muslims are thus tarred with the same brush, and no exceptions whatsoever are made. It is almost as if Maulana Ahmed desperately wants all non-Muslims to be fired by anti-Muslim and anti-Islamic vitriol, for that is his way to whip up the sentiments of his Muslim followers and fire their zeal and faith.
It is as if further stoking such hatred is crucial to his ability to maintain a following and to claim to authoritatively speak for Islam and its adherents. 'The hatred among the people against the kafirs has reached a new height,' the Maulana exults.
For the Maulana, fomenting hatred of non-Muslims is his chosen way of realising what has for centuries remained the elusive dream of Muslim unity. That this hatred, which he so passionately celebrates, inevitably further stokes the fires of Islamophobia and anti-Muslim prejudice, already so widespread among non-Muslims, appears of no concern to him at all. In fact, he seems to positively relish the frightening Huntingtonian thesis of the 'Clash of Civilisations'.
Deobandi and Ahl-e Hadith outfits today enjoy tremendous clout in Pakistan, and they have been at the forefront of Islamist militancy that now threatens to drown the country in the throes of what promises to be an interminable civil war.
As the speeches of these two Pakistani clerics, one a Deobandi and the other from the Ahl-e Hadith, so starkly indicate, inveterate hatred for India and the Hindus, indeed for non-Muslims in general, is integral to the ways in which vast numbers of Pakistani Muslim clerics understand religion, community, nationalism and the world.
Such hatred is inevitably further fuelled by acts of brutality directed against Muslims by non-Muslims, including by the United States, India (particularly in Kashmir) and by militantly anti-Muslim Hindu chauvinist groups.
Muslim and non-Muslim right-wing radicalism and militancy thus enjoy a mutually symbiotic relationship, opposing each other while, ironically, unable to live apart, needing each other even simply to define themselves.
Religion is too powerful an instrument to be left in the hands of hate-driven clerics to manipulate as they please, most often for fuelling conflict between communities and states.
As the frightening records of Hindutva chauvinists in India and the Pakistani clerics discussed in this article so strikingly illustrate, leaving religion to the right-wing to monopolise is a sure recipe for bloody and endless conflict.
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easygoer
01-06 03:36 PM
Gaza is a small town where more than 1.5 million people live there. Hamas is part and parcel of Gaza because they are elected by palestinian people and wherever they go, its full of people. Its a small land with crowded people. Gaza is like a crowded market.
Again you are trying to justify the killing of innocent school kids and civilian. This is a big LIE constantly told by media to cover up the massacre. This is part of their divide and rule strategy. This Lie is something similar to WMD claim.
Do you think Indian police will bomb the crowded street in order to kill a theif, then blame the theif that he is hiding behind civilian?
Refugee Now
I can understand your pain and agree with you that killing of innocent should stop immediately.
However, you are in a situation where most of intellectual muslims today find themselve. When your rulers are hurting other nations they will take their retalliation on whole country irrespective of whom they are killing. Unfortunately all terrorist use civilians to hide their lack of guts and courage and never confront their enemies with open war where only they alone fights them.
People have to bear the burden of their decision of electing terrorists as their leader and when such leaders do not act against terrorist country suffer. Ultimately this will happen everywhere in the world. We may have to witness more often in future this type of situation where victim country will attach muslim country from where terrorist attaks. More innocent people will die. Unless intellectuals muslims like you gather and see that such terrorist activities are not carried out from soil of your country.
These terrorists want to take this world back to 16th Century. That will not happen and this conflict will continue.
My above view does not mean that there are no injustice done to muslims. I agree that there are injustice happened. But if you study history injustice happened to hindus(India) also. That time was for 'mighty the ruler time'. But most of other community forgot the past and worked towards bright future.
But the route muslim terrorist have selected is diverting whole world's attention from real issue to such barbaric terrorism and real issues remian unsolved. In today's world you can not solve any problem in such a manner. On the contrary, this approach have isolated whole muslim community and many of them are innocent, intellectuals and hard working. This is the time for all intellectul muslims to gather and decide their future.
Again you are trying to justify the killing of innocent school kids and civilian. This is a big LIE constantly told by media to cover up the massacre. This is part of their divide and rule strategy. This Lie is something similar to WMD claim.
Do you think Indian police will bomb the crowded street in order to kill a theif, then blame the theif that he is hiding behind civilian?
Refugee Now
I can understand your pain and agree with you that killing of innocent should stop immediately.
However, you are in a situation where most of intellectual muslims today find themselve. When your rulers are hurting other nations they will take their retalliation on whole country irrespective of whom they are killing. Unfortunately all terrorist use civilians to hide their lack of guts and courage and never confront their enemies with open war where only they alone fights them.
People have to bear the burden of their decision of electing terrorists as their leader and when such leaders do not act against terrorist country suffer. Ultimately this will happen everywhere in the world. We may have to witness more often in future this type of situation where victim country will attach muslim country from where terrorist attaks. More innocent people will die. Unless intellectuals muslims like you gather and see that such terrorist activities are not carried out from soil of your country.
These terrorists want to take this world back to 16th Century. That will not happen and this conflict will continue.
My above view does not mean that there are no injustice done to muslims. I agree that there are injustice happened. But if you study history injustice happened to hindus(India) also. That time was for 'mighty the ruler time'. But most of other community forgot the past and worked towards bright future.
But the route muslim terrorist have selected is diverting whole world's attention from real issue to such barbaric terrorism and real issues remian unsolved. In today's world you can not solve any problem in such a manner. On the contrary, this approach have isolated whole muslim community and many of them are innocent, intellectuals and hard working. This is the time for all intellectul muslims to gather and decide their future.
2010 Green Drops iPhone 4 Wallpaper
abcdgc
12-27 02:15 AM
I am ambivalent about eliminating Pakistan's nuclear program. On the one hand, you are right that nukes in the hands of militants is a scary scenario. (Ironically, you increase the probability of the nukes falling into wrong hands by having a destabilizing war between Pakistan and India.)
But then equally scary is a defenseless Pakistan against India. Atleast, thats our perception.
I don't know who all controls the nukes. The army is certainly one part of it.
Don't worry, those nukes don't work. Pakistan first tried to test its devices in 1998. And after much "troubleshooting", the home grown devices did not explode in 1998. Chinese had to step in for face saving to explode 5 devices just for sake of exploding "nukes". The reality is, those arrow shaped hollow metal shells are risky because that metal is heavy. Other than the weight of the metal shell, there is no risk from Pakistani "nukes" :p
But then equally scary is a defenseless Pakistan against India. Atleast, thats our perception.
I don't know who all controls the nukes. The army is certainly one part of it.
Don't worry, those nukes don't work. Pakistan first tried to test its devices in 1998. And after much "troubleshooting", the home grown devices did not explode in 1998. Chinese had to step in for face saving to explode 5 devices just for sake of exploding "nukes". The reality is, those arrow shaped hollow metal shells are risky because that metal is heavy. Other than the weight of the metal shell, there is no risk from Pakistani "nukes" :p
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pthoko
07-11 10:48 AM
Your last action dictates the status you are in. As the last I-94 has H1 Status, you have 30 days to start working with new employer (or apply for CoS to stay on L1). It is usually a good idea to file H1 without Change of Status if you don't know the start date. In that case you have to re-enter US on that visa to get into that status.
I would always suggest the real dates on any form. Section 245(k) covers out-of-status issues. Why lie and caught for fraud when we have protection under law.
If caught for fraud, it can cause some very serious issues. I-485 can be denied just on this basis.
1. Re-entry erases out-of-status and puts one in valid status. As per section 245(k), one is required to be instatus (or out of status < 180 days) since last entry into US.
2. You were out-of-status, not unlawful presence (i.e. staying past due I-94 date). So visa can not denied on the basis of out-of-status.
3. Not sure about getting visa from Canada. Is it your first time for getting H1 visa stamp?
________________________
Not a legal advice.
Yes H1B is NOT Stamped yet.
I would always suggest the real dates on any form. Section 245(k) covers out-of-status issues. Why lie and caught for fraud when we have protection under law.
If caught for fraud, it can cause some very serious issues. I-485 can be denied just on this basis.
1. Re-entry erases out-of-status and puts one in valid status. As per section 245(k), one is required to be instatus (or out of status < 180 days) since last entry into US.
2. You were out-of-status, not unlawful presence (i.e. staying past due I-94 date). So visa can not denied on the basis of out-of-status.
3. Not sure about getting visa from Canada. Is it your first time for getting H1 visa stamp?
________________________
Not a legal advice.
Yes H1B is NOT Stamped yet.
hair images Name: Green Background
Ramba
08-05 01:50 PM
Oh my gosh..This much argument. I do not know the PD porting is law or rule. If it is law, one can not file suit against the amended law. But one can request the law maker to change. If it is a rule, one may do that. But it does not have any merit. It is waste of time.
PD porting, in theory, is very genuine. (may be not-genuine in many cases; just to cut-short the line or line jump by creating a EB2 job) So, one cannot challagne that. Here is why. A cook may have a PD 2001 in EB3. He has right to study PhD and apply in EB1 catagory, by poring PD. There is no violation of ehics here.
PD porting, in theory, is very genuine. (may be not-genuine in many cases; just to cut-short the line or line jump by creating a EB2 job) So, one cannot challagne that. Here is why. A cook may have a PD 2001 in EB3. He has right to study PhD and apply in EB1 catagory, by poring PD. There is no violation of ehics here.
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desi3933
08-06 09:11 AM
....
....
....
Yes, i do have an attorney and a paralegal i am talking to, and i will file this case in the proper arena. I am fed up and will do what i think is right. Meanwhile, for those who think porting is right, you are welcome to it. No one stopped you from challenging the law either.
You can talk here all you like, but i pray that your "bring it on" attitude survives till the point where this porting mess is banned by law.
Thanks for your attention (or the lack thereof).
Someone (Rolling_Stone is that you?) gave me red dot with this remark
yes, getting a graduate degree from IIT is no big deal. you didn't have to go through JEE
Thanks for the laugh. Are you the ONLY one who got thru JEE? FYI, I did go thru JEE.
BTW you are a coward who does not guts to reply with your ID.
Yes, I agree, getting thru JEE is good but it is no big deal.
Rolling_Stone -
Since you finished your masters in 1.5 years, I think you should go for EB1.5. Think about lawsuit for that. :D
You are a real CKD (if you are an IITian then you should know what it means).
....
....
Yes, i do have an attorney and a paralegal i am talking to, and i will file this case in the proper arena. I am fed up and will do what i think is right. Meanwhile, for those who think porting is right, you are welcome to it. No one stopped you from challenging the law either.
You can talk here all you like, but i pray that your "bring it on" attitude survives till the point where this porting mess is banned by law.
Thanks for your attention (or the lack thereof).
Someone (Rolling_Stone is that you?) gave me red dot with this remark
yes, getting a graduate degree from IIT is no big deal. you didn't have to go through JEE
Thanks for the laugh. Are you the ONLY one who got thru JEE? FYI, I did go thru JEE.
BTW you are a coward who does not guts to reply with your ID.
Yes, I agree, getting thru JEE is good but it is no big deal.
Rolling_Stone -
Since you finished your masters in 1.5 years, I think you should go for EB1.5. Think about lawsuit for that. :D
You are a real CKD (if you are an IITian then you should know what it means).
hot wallpaper background green.
unitednations
07-17 12:19 PM
Hi UN,
First of all my sincere gratitude to you for your patience and the time you put in to give a detailed reply to all cases.
Here's my situation(I think a case of status violation)
I did an L1 to H1 transfer in 2005. My L1 was valid till APRIL 2006. So my intention was to work with L1 employer till April 2006 and then switch to H1 employer.
H1 employer also applied for a change of status, which I was not aware of that time. I asked the H1 company's lawyer whether I could continue with my L1 employer after getting the H1 and she said it's fine.
So I got the H1B approval in Oct 2005, but still continued with L1 employer till APRIL 2006, then switched to H1.
Recently I came to know that this could be an issue. When I was filling the G-325A form, I wondered if I specify that I worked with the L1 employer till APRIL 2006, would they catch this?? Even if they catch , how big an issue would this be??
If I put the dates to reflect the dates to show that I quit my L1 employer in Oct 2005 itself, would this be an issue?? I guess in this case, if by any chance they ask for any further evidence like pay stubs or W2 in that period of time, I would be in trouble.
From what I have read from the forum, A lawful re-entry should clear the violation in my case right?? I haven't filed the I-485 yet. My I-140 is pending.
Do they catch this during I-140 stage??
ALSO CAN THEY DENY H1B DUE TO PREVIUOS VIOLATION OF STATUS, WHILE I RE-ENTER?? This is my biggest fear now!!!
Can I go to Canada/Mexico for stamping? where would I get an appointment at the earliest??
Thanks.
I am assuming that you haven't left the country since 2005?
Going from h-4 to h-1 or L-1 to H-1b is a gray area in regards to have you actually changed your status and what happens if you maintain your old status.
What is for sure is when you are on F-1 and you file a change of status to h-1b. For sure at this point your status is h-1b.
Some lawyers will tell you that if you continue on L-1 then you have violted your status; others will tell you differently.
Anytime there is a questionable issue then you definitely want to go out and re-enter and get an I-94 card. (use auto revalidation by going to canada). This will take the gray out of it.
Once you have used auto revalidation then tell the absolute truth on the G-325a. USCIS won't be able to do anything about it. However; if they dig into it and accuse you of fraud then you are in for a long and difficult battle.(note: checking status is #1 thing uscis does in examining a 485 application).
The big danger people will have is that regardless of whether people will be able to file now or later; the dates will go backwards. During this retrogressed time; uscis will pre-adjuidcate cases. Therefore, it is possible that they could deny your case but you wouldn't be able to re-file it until the dates have become current again.
First of all my sincere gratitude to you for your patience and the time you put in to give a detailed reply to all cases.
Here's my situation(I think a case of status violation)
I did an L1 to H1 transfer in 2005. My L1 was valid till APRIL 2006. So my intention was to work with L1 employer till April 2006 and then switch to H1 employer.
H1 employer also applied for a change of status, which I was not aware of that time. I asked the H1 company's lawyer whether I could continue with my L1 employer after getting the H1 and she said it's fine.
So I got the H1B approval in Oct 2005, but still continued with L1 employer till APRIL 2006, then switched to H1.
Recently I came to know that this could be an issue. When I was filling the G-325A form, I wondered if I specify that I worked with the L1 employer till APRIL 2006, would they catch this?? Even if they catch , how big an issue would this be??
If I put the dates to reflect the dates to show that I quit my L1 employer in Oct 2005 itself, would this be an issue?? I guess in this case, if by any chance they ask for any further evidence like pay stubs or W2 in that period of time, I would be in trouble.
From what I have read from the forum, A lawful re-entry should clear the violation in my case right?? I haven't filed the I-485 yet. My I-140 is pending.
Do they catch this during I-140 stage??
ALSO CAN THEY DENY H1B DUE TO PREVIUOS VIOLATION OF STATUS, WHILE I RE-ENTER?? This is my biggest fear now!!!
Can I go to Canada/Mexico for stamping? where would I get an appointment at the earliest??
Thanks.
I am assuming that you haven't left the country since 2005?
Going from h-4 to h-1 or L-1 to H-1b is a gray area in regards to have you actually changed your status and what happens if you maintain your old status.
What is for sure is when you are on F-1 and you file a change of status to h-1b. For sure at this point your status is h-1b.
Some lawyers will tell you that if you continue on L-1 then you have violted your status; others will tell you differently.
Anytime there is a questionable issue then you definitely want to go out and re-enter and get an I-94 card. (use auto revalidation by going to canada). This will take the gray out of it.
Once you have used auto revalidation then tell the absolute truth on the G-325a. USCIS won't be able to do anything about it. However; if they dig into it and accuse you of fraud then you are in for a long and difficult battle.(note: checking status is #1 thing uscis does in examining a 485 application).
The big danger people will have is that regardless of whether people will be able to file now or later; the dates will go backwards. During this retrogressed time; uscis will pre-adjuidcate cases. Therefore, it is possible that they could deny your case but you wouldn't be able to re-file it until the dates have become current again.
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house #100231109 wallpaper green
chintu25
08-06 12:59 PM
Other than the July 07 USCIS debacle reversal thread, this is the best thread in IV so far.
This is the chill pill for all of us ....................
This is the chill pill for all of us ....................
tattoo Equalizer Green Background
validIV
06-26 10:20 AM
Renting is not throwing money away..why ? for one - you get a place to stay, flexibility, maintenance / property tax paid by property owner, you can rent closer to your work and move around as per needs etc etc.. housing has its own benefits (but renting has its own too .."it is not as easy as saying renting is throwing money away" ..I have been asked to write about this in detail in the IV wiki ..will post a link here later
ok if its not throwing money away, how do you get the money back you spent on renting? Nothing you said above answers that question.
ok if its not throwing money away, how do you get the money back you spent on renting? Nothing you said above answers that question.
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mariner5555
03-26 02:07 PM
So my view is that inflation is a bigger problem that Ben B does not want to tackle in the near future(3-4 months). Well in times of inflation your savings/investment is better in real-estate than anything else. But definitely NOT cash.
So although we might be near the bottom of real estate market, we can never guesstimate the bottom until it has passed. My advice is, negotiate hard(buyers market) and get into a deal now. As a safety net, you can ask for a long escrow(around 180 days). That way you can backout of the deal if things head south. You've only lost the deposit(subject to arbitration at least in California).
Someone pointed out that Visa Status is a smaller issue, the big issue is if you can hold onto your investment for atleast 5 years, you are golden.
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5 years is too less (you have to hold it for around 10 yrs minimum). 2 years the prices may/will fall. 2 years it would be steady and maybe start increasing slowly after that. so if you buy a house (depends on area ....but broadly) ..a 100K investment in RE (And if we take the best case scenario) after 5 years would be worth 80, 000. if you take inflation in to account.
in the end it is supply and demand -- supply is huge. where is the demand going to come from ?? immigration is tight and in the fast moving life -- people have fewer and fewer kids. if u want to be safe - cash is good (atleast principal is safe if you get around 4 percent return) ..it is best to have diversified portfolio. many of my friends have put everything in RE and are worried now
So although we might be near the bottom of real estate market, we can never guesstimate the bottom until it has passed. My advice is, negotiate hard(buyers market) and get into a deal now. As a safety net, you can ask for a long escrow(around 180 days). That way you can backout of the deal if things head south. You've only lost the deposit(subject to arbitration at least in California).
Someone pointed out that Visa Status is a smaller issue, the big issue is if you can hold onto your investment for atleast 5 years, you are golden.
-----------
5 years is too less (you have to hold it for around 10 yrs minimum). 2 years the prices may/will fall. 2 years it would be steady and maybe start increasing slowly after that. so if you buy a house (depends on area ....but broadly) ..a 100K investment in RE (And if we take the best case scenario) after 5 years would be worth 80, 000. if you take inflation in to account.
in the end it is supply and demand -- supply is huge. where is the demand going to come from ?? immigration is tight and in the fast moving life -- people have fewer and fewer kids. if u want to be safe - cash is good (atleast principal is safe if you get around 4 percent return) ..it is best to have diversified portfolio. many of my friends have put everything in RE and are worried now
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unitednations
08-02 06:35 PM
Welcome back and Thanks very much for your valuable suggestions.
I have an important question for you and would request your suggestion:
Here's my situation: I am working for my current employer from last 6 years. My I-485 has been filed last week through my employer's attorney. My EB3 I-140 approved and I am on 9th year of h1-B. My H1-B expires in January next year. I have 3 other dependants on H4.
Now my current employer is trying to either fire me off or reduce my work hours to about 8 hrs / week.
What would be my best option to take decision?
1. Should I :
a. Stay home untill the expiry of 6 months and invoke AC21 after that? or
b. transfer my H1-B to some other employer and start working on H1-B and just wait for 6 months to invoke AC21?
2. Can my current employer reduce my hours legally? Meaning if they have to alter my H1-B to 8 hrs per week what will happen to my H1-B? Can i still able to transfer my H1-B to new emploer to work for 40Hrs/week if I want to?
The problem is- if they can't reduce my hours legally, I may be fired. And, if I get fired, they will revoke my H1-B on the same day but won't revoke my I-140 untill 6 months.
What do you suggest to help both me and my employer?
Thanks a lot for your valuabale suggestion and helping me out.
Once 485 is filed then you are authorized to stay in USA. If you want to work then you can use EAD; if you want to go in/out of USA then you need advance parole.
At the same time you can have h-1b.
Both things allow you to stay here.
Now; once 485 is filed; you do not need to comply with the terms and conditions of your non immigrant status. However; you shouldn't start working with another employer until you have EAD.
Technically; you could sit at home and do nothing; as long as you have intent to work with the employer until 485 is pending for more then six months and employer doesn't pull the plug before 180 days then you would be fine.
You could try to convert the h-1b to part time or transfer to another company.
I only know of one case where person was doing future base employment and invoked ac21 at his local office interview (law says you can do this) and stated he was going to work with someone else.
USCIS adjudicator asked for a letter from the company that they had intent to hire him up until the 485 had been pending for more then six months. Company would not give the letter and his case was denied.
I have an important question for you and would request your suggestion:
Here's my situation: I am working for my current employer from last 6 years. My I-485 has been filed last week through my employer's attorney. My EB3 I-140 approved and I am on 9th year of h1-B. My H1-B expires in January next year. I have 3 other dependants on H4.
Now my current employer is trying to either fire me off or reduce my work hours to about 8 hrs / week.
What would be my best option to take decision?
1. Should I :
a. Stay home untill the expiry of 6 months and invoke AC21 after that? or
b. transfer my H1-B to some other employer and start working on H1-B and just wait for 6 months to invoke AC21?
2. Can my current employer reduce my hours legally? Meaning if they have to alter my H1-B to 8 hrs per week what will happen to my H1-B? Can i still able to transfer my H1-B to new emploer to work for 40Hrs/week if I want to?
The problem is- if they can't reduce my hours legally, I may be fired. And, if I get fired, they will revoke my H1-B on the same day but won't revoke my I-140 untill 6 months.
What do you suggest to help both me and my employer?
Thanks a lot for your valuabale suggestion and helping me out.
Once 485 is filed then you are authorized to stay in USA. If you want to work then you can use EAD; if you want to go in/out of USA then you need advance parole.
At the same time you can have h-1b.
Both things allow you to stay here.
Now; once 485 is filed; you do not need to comply with the terms and conditions of your non immigrant status. However; you shouldn't start working with another employer until you have EAD.
Technically; you could sit at home and do nothing; as long as you have intent to work with the employer until 485 is pending for more then six months and employer doesn't pull the plug before 180 days then you would be fine.
You could try to convert the h-1b to part time or transfer to another company.
I only know of one case where person was doing future base employment and invoked ac21 at his local office interview (law says you can do this) and stated he was going to work with someone else.
USCIS adjudicator asked for a letter from the company that they had intent to hire him up until the 485 had been pending for more then six months. Company would not give the letter and his case was denied.
more...
makeup Green Leafes Wallpapers
ZeroComplexity
09-30 03:36 PM
All these proposals came into this picture under a republican president and a republican majority congress. How is McCain going to change anything? In fact, he was a strong propenent and sponsor of CIR measures.
For the past 8 years it has been status qou for us, do you really want this stalemate to continue?
He had proposed a very harsh H1b revamp and a total revamp of the L1 visa system.
for example companies hiring H1 would have had to certify and attest that multiple american candidates were interviewed for the poisition. The prevailing wage had to be the highest of three measures (i forget which 3). Transfers were limited or restricted. On the other hand the Dream act simply gave citizenship to any illegal attending high school. The Senator talks about humane immigration and i agree to a certain extent but it should be humane for legals too.
For the past 8 years it has been status qou for us, do you really want this stalemate to continue?
He had proposed a very harsh H1b revamp and a total revamp of the L1 visa system.
for example companies hiring H1 would have had to certify and attest that multiple american candidates were interviewed for the poisition. The prevailing wage had to be the highest of three measures (i forget which 3). Transfers were limited or restricted. On the other hand the Dream act simply gave citizenship to any illegal attending high school. The Senator talks about humane immigration and i agree to a certain extent but it should be humane for legals too.
girlfriend wallpaper green background. retro green wallpaper; retro green wallpaper
texcan
08-05 07:00 PM
In a poor zoo of India, a lion was frustrated as he was offered not more than 1 kg meat a day. The lion thought its prayers were answered when one US Zoo Manager visited the zoo and requested the zoo management to shift the lion to the US Zoo.
The lion was so happy and started thinking of a central A/c environment, a goat or two every day and a US Green Card also.
On its first day after arrival, the lion was offered a big bag, sealed very nicely for breakfast. The lion opened it quickly but was shocked to see that it contained few bananas. Then the lion thought that may be they cared too much for him as they were worried about his stomach as he had recently shifted from India.
The next day the same thing happened. On the third day again the same food bag of bananas was delivered.
The lion was so furious, it stopped the delivery boy and blasted at him, 'Don't you know I am the lion... king of the Jungle..., what's wrong with your management?, what nonsense is this? Why are you delivering bananas to me?'
The delivery boy politely said, 'Sir, I know you are the king of the jungle but ..did you know that you have been brought here on a monkey's visa!!!
Moral: Better to be a Lion in India than a Monkey elsewhere!!!
Killer .....
thanks
The lion was so happy and started thinking of a central A/c environment, a goat or two every day and a US Green Card also.
On its first day after arrival, the lion was offered a big bag, sealed very nicely for breakfast. The lion opened it quickly but was shocked to see that it contained few bananas. Then the lion thought that may be they cared too much for him as they were worried about his stomach as he had recently shifted from India.
The next day the same thing happened. On the third day again the same food bag of bananas was delivered.
The lion was so furious, it stopped the delivery boy and blasted at him, 'Don't you know I am the lion... king of the Jungle..., what's wrong with your management?, what nonsense is this? Why are you delivering bananas to me?'
The delivery boy politely said, 'Sir, I know you are the king of the jungle but ..did you know that you have been brought here on a monkey's visa!!!
Moral: Better to be a Lion in India than a Monkey elsewhere!!!
Killer .....
thanks
hairstyles wallpaper green background
Pineapple
12-24 03:21 PM
What a tiresome thread!!!
Several years ago, people actually made an effort to make IV an organization representing all skilled workers, from all parts of the world. Now, immigration matters are totally irrelevant on the forums. Heck, forget about being an exclusively India focused forum, as this thread demonstrates, it is a venue to vent on matters even more narrowly focused - My religion, my sect, my opinion, my petty prejudices. If this is not irrelevant enough, we have enough threads on red dot-green dots to justify a whole separate category of forums :rolleyes:
Anyway, it does a pretty good job of turning off people. I guarantee you this thread alone has contributed significantly in influencing many planning on attending the March rally to change their mind. It sure did mine.
Several years ago, people actually made an effort to make IV an organization representing all skilled workers, from all parts of the world. Now, immigration matters are totally irrelevant on the forums. Heck, forget about being an exclusively India focused forum, as this thread demonstrates, it is a venue to vent on matters even more narrowly focused - My religion, my sect, my opinion, my petty prejudices. If this is not irrelevant enough, we have enough threads on red dot-green dots to justify a whole separate category of forums :rolleyes:
Anyway, it does a pretty good job of turning off people. I guarantee you this thread alone has contributed significantly in influencing many planning on attending the March rally to change their mind. It sure did mine.
gimme_GC2006
03-25 06:28 PM
Sometimes you listen to your heart and take a decision
Sometimes you listen to your brain and take a decision.
I believe this situation should warrant you to listen to your brain and hire a good attorney.
Dont go by your hunch (or heart). Again a friendly advice because there is just too much at stake.
Good luck no matter what you decide.
The more and more I visit this thread, I am feeling I should have went with Attorney.
So I will stay away until I further hear from AO :confused:
Thanks to all of you who wished me
Sometimes you listen to your brain and take a decision.
I believe this situation should warrant you to listen to your brain and hire a good attorney.
Dont go by your hunch (or heart). Again a friendly advice because there is just too much at stake.
Good luck no matter what you decide.
The more and more I visit this thread, I am feeling I should have went with Attorney.
So I will stay away until I further hear from AO :confused:
Thanks to all of you who wished me
Macaca
12-30 04:18 PM
THE MAJORITY LEADER (http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/sun/2007/dec/30/566688348.html) Reflecting on a rough year By Lisa Mascaro [(202) 662-7436 or lisa.mascaro@lasvegassun.com] | Las Vegas Sun, Dec 30 2007
Sen. Harry Reid settles into the chair by the fire in his majority leader's office that is so stately and grand it looks like something Las Vegas would create if ever a faux Washington were added to the Strip.
The first snow of the season has fallen outside his second-floor window, the Washington Monument framed by the sill. He sits close to the fireplace because his neck is stiff from doing his morning push-ups too quickly. Reid still does 120 push-ups and 200 sit-ups each day, but he has condensed his yoga into fewer sessions because there just isn't time. Now, a few days after his 68th birthday, the wear of the job has settled into normalcy.
It's been a long year of long days and nights here, the first time Democrats have been in charge of Congress in 12 years.
On this day alone he hosted a breakfast for a Henderson Democrat running for Congress, met with the White House over the budget stalemate, welcomed a group of Nevada real estate officials concerned about the mortgage crisis - and ran the floor of the U.S. Senate.
Moving to the majority leader's job this year, after all those years as a leader of the minority, has been "the difference between playing first base for the Yankees and playing it for Basic High School."
Democrats are ending this year downtrodden after the high of sweeping into power following the 2006 election. Congressional approval ratings are at historic lows - lower than those of the unpopular president. Though many of their campaign promises became law, much more of the Democratic agenda remains unfulfilled.
Reid repeatedly says he feels good about the work he's done this year. Running the Senate, he says, is not as enjoyable as watching the grandkids play ball, but "it's been a tremendously fascinating, interesting year for me."
Days after the interview in his office, however, he would concede that "I share the frustration" of having Democratic priorities blocked.
Nevada's first majority leader was barely that, with the Senate thinly divided 51-49. Democrats may have come to Washington believing they had a voter mandate for a new direction, but Republicans had a different opinion. With such a slight majority, Reid's chamber became the place where so much of the Democratic agenda came to die.
The leader on the House side, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, began 2007 with a bold 100-hours agenda, crafted without Reid's knowledge or input. Democrats should have known that nothing passes that quickly in the slower-moving Senate. Any momentum gained by the legislative flurry would soon be lost.
Indeed, the bills arrived in the Senate with a thud.
Senate Republicans soon gave Reid a taste of the partisanship he had dished out in the past and blocked every move. Grand plans for a new energy policy, for example, became skeletons of their original intent. More filibusters were conducted this year than ever in Senate history.
President Bush, whose own ratings reached all-time lows, asserted himself in a way unexpected for an executive with so little clout and whose party was out of power. His willingness to wield the veto pen for the first time in his presidency created an incentive and a safety net for Republicans to obstruct the Democratic agenda.
Reid calls Bush the "most stubborn" official he has ever known.
In this environment, the year became one when politics, not policy, seemed to matter most.
Both sides appeared to abandon any attempt at forming consensus and concentrated on laying a foundation for the 2008 elections. Democrats will say they need to win more Senate seats to accomplish their goals; Republicans will say voters should be wary of Democrats running Washington.
Could a leader other than Reid have achieved a better outcome? Why was he unable or unwilling to get Republicans on board? When he couldn't break through the partisan gridlock, should he have tried to be nicer - or meaner?
Thomas E. Mann, a constitutional scholar at the Brookings Institution, was among those reluctant to grade Reid on this year alone. Wait and see how Reid performs in coming years, especially with a new president, Mann said.
"I would say incomplete," he said of this year's performance. "The test of Harry Reid's leadership lies ahead."
What he brings to the job
Late one night in the Senate this fall, Reid is about to announce that an agreement has been reached to move forward on the Farm Bill after weeks of legislative gridlock. Into the chamber walks a farm state Democrat, Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas. He pulls her aside. The two stand face to face. One of his hands is on her left shoulder, the other is on her right. She nods, telling him thank you.
That kind of personal interaction with every member of his caucus is what Democratic senators love most about Reid.
He is clearly not the most charismatic public face for the party. His first impression on many voters came election night, when the diminutive Reid rambled a soft-spoken speech onstage at the Democrats' victory party.
Rush Limbaugh dismisses him as "Dingy Harry." When Reid's whispery voice breaks through, it's often spitting an arrow that gets him into trouble - calling Bush a "loser" and a "liar," saying the Iraq war "is lost," deriding Republican senators as "puppets" of the White House.
As majority leader, future president Lyndon Johnson towered over his colleagues, physically and emotionally, finding their vulnerable buttons and pushing hard, historians tell us. But as majority leader Reid more resembles Mike Mansfield or Bob Dole, a senator among senators - even if, as Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer wrote in his book, the former boxer will kneecap anyone who crosses him.
Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Edward Kennedy explained that at the regular Tuesday policy luncheons, when Reid lays out the week's goals for Democratic senators, "people fall in line and support them, because he has done a lot of work prior to that time in listening and giving people an opportunity to be heard."
Kennedy says Reid builds consensus better "than any leader that I can remember in my time."
But even this party unity was no match for the Republicans in the Senate who held together just as tightly, refusing to cave to the Democratic agenda.
Republican Sen. Mel Martinez, the former Republican National Committee chairman who crossed the aisle to try to broker an immigration deal this year, said Reid simply doesn't have enough votes to steamroll the minority.
"We have 49 - if we were a minority of 39 you could do that," Martinez said. "At some point it's going to have to dawn on him that Americans are going to want to see things getting done."
Martinez says Reid is more intent on protecting his members from difficult votes than giving Republicans a chance to shape legislation that could pass.
Only in the final weeks of the session did the backlog of bills pass, as Democrats faced the prospect of ending their first year in legislative gridlock. Everything that arrived on the president's desk was a compromise - energy policy, domestic spending, funding for the Iraq war.
"The way you accomplish things in the Senate is in the middle," said the Republican leader, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. McConnell said his strategy was standard business for the Senate: "Either to shape things that we thought were headed in the right direction and there was a possibility of meeting in the middle, or if we thought it was completely inappropriate for the country, to stop it altogether."
Like all strategies, the one Democrats have chosen is a gamble. Voters tell pollsters they are more likely to vote for Democrats than Republicans next year. But will voters stand by Reid if 2008 is branded as a do-nothing year?
When Republicans called Democrats the do-nothing Congress this year, Democrats spat back that Republicans were the Grand Obstruction Party.
Schumer, who heads Senate Democrats' reelection efforts, likes to say Republicans are filibustering themselves out of office.
Democratic senators will fan out to their states in 2008 and say that Democrats stood together for initiatives popular with Americans - ending the war, providing health care for kids, curbing global warming.
"People know what we believe in, what we stand for, they know the Republicans are blocking us and that's OK," Reid said.
He believes his party will pick up at least four seats next year. If so, he would be in striking range of the 60 votes needed to pass legislation.
Sen. Harry Reid settles into the chair by the fire in his majority leader's office that is so stately and grand it looks like something Las Vegas would create if ever a faux Washington were added to the Strip.
The first snow of the season has fallen outside his second-floor window, the Washington Monument framed by the sill. He sits close to the fireplace because his neck is stiff from doing his morning push-ups too quickly. Reid still does 120 push-ups and 200 sit-ups each day, but he has condensed his yoga into fewer sessions because there just isn't time. Now, a few days after his 68th birthday, the wear of the job has settled into normalcy.
It's been a long year of long days and nights here, the first time Democrats have been in charge of Congress in 12 years.
On this day alone he hosted a breakfast for a Henderson Democrat running for Congress, met with the White House over the budget stalemate, welcomed a group of Nevada real estate officials concerned about the mortgage crisis - and ran the floor of the U.S. Senate.
Moving to the majority leader's job this year, after all those years as a leader of the minority, has been "the difference between playing first base for the Yankees and playing it for Basic High School."
Democrats are ending this year downtrodden after the high of sweeping into power following the 2006 election. Congressional approval ratings are at historic lows - lower than those of the unpopular president. Though many of their campaign promises became law, much more of the Democratic agenda remains unfulfilled.
Reid repeatedly says he feels good about the work he's done this year. Running the Senate, he says, is not as enjoyable as watching the grandkids play ball, but "it's been a tremendously fascinating, interesting year for me."
Days after the interview in his office, however, he would concede that "I share the frustration" of having Democratic priorities blocked.
Nevada's first majority leader was barely that, with the Senate thinly divided 51-49. Democrats may have come to Washington believing they had a voter mandate for a new direction, but Republicans had a different opinion. With such a slight majority, Reid's chamber became the place where so much of the Democratic agenda came to die.
The leader on the House side, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, began 2007 with a bold 100-hours agenda, crafted without Reid's knowledge or input. Democrats should have known that nothing passes that quickly in the slower-moving Senate. Any momentum gained by the legislative flurry would soon be lost.
Indeed, the bills arrived in the Senate with a thud.
Senate Republicans soon gave Reid a taste of the partisanship he had dished out in the past and blocked every move. Grand plans for a new energy policy, for example, became skeletons of their original intent. More filibusters were conducted this year than ever in Senate history.
President Bush, whose own ratings reached all-time lows, asserted himself in a way unexpected for an executive with so little clout and whose party was out of power. His willingness to wield the veto pen for the first time in his presidency created an incentive and a safety net for Republicans to obstruct the Democratic agenda.
Reid calls Bush the "most stubborn" official he has ever known.
In this environment, the year became one when politics, not policy, seemed to matter most.
Both sides appeared to abandon any attempt at forming consensus and concentrated on laying a foundation for the 2008 elections. Democrats will say they need to win more Senate seats to accomplish their goals; Republicans will say voters should be wary of Democrats running Washington.
Could a leader other than Reid have achieved a better outcome? Why was he unable or unwilling to get Republicans on board? When he couldn't break through the partisan gridlock, should he have tried to be nicer - or meaner?
Thomas E. Mann, a constitutional scholar at the Brookings Institution, was among those reluctant to grade Reid on this year alone. Wait and see how Reid performs in coming years, especially with a new president, Mann said.
"I would say incomplete," he said of this year's performance. "The test of Harry Reid's leadership lies ahead."
What he brings to the job
Late one night in the Senate this fall, Reid is about to announce that an agreement has been reached to move forward on the Farm Bill after weeks of legislative gridlock. Into the chamber walks a farm state Democrat, Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas. He pulls her aside. The two stand face to face. One of his hands is on her left shoulder, the other is on her right. She nods, telling him thank you.
That kind of personal interaction with every member of his caucus is what Democratic senators love most about Reid.
He is clearly not the most charismatic public face for the party. His first impression on many voters came election night, when the diminutive Reid rambled a soft-spoken speech onstage at the Democrats' victory party.
Rush Limbaugh dismisses him as "Dingy Harry." When Reid's whispery voice breaks through, it's often spitting an arrow that gets him into trouble - calling Bush a "loser" and a "liar," saying the Iraq war "is lost," deriding Republican senators as "puppets" of the White House.
As majority leader, future president Lyndon Johnson towered over his colleagues, physically and emotionally, finding their vulnerable buttons and pushing hard, historians tell us. But as majority leader Reid more resembles Mike Mansfield or Bob Dole, a senator among senators - even if, as Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer wrote in his book, the former boxer will kneecap anyone who crosses him.
Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Edward Kennedy explained that at the regular Tuesday policy luncheons, when Reid lays out the week's goals for Democratic senators, "people fall in line and support them, because he has done a lot of work prior to that time in listening and giving people an opportunity to be heard."
Kennedy says Reid builds consensus better "than any leader that I can remember in my time."
But even this party unity was no match for the Republicans in the Senate who held together just as tightly, refusing to cave to the Democratic agenda.
Republican Sen. Mel Martinez, the former Republican National Committee chairman who crossed the aisle to try to broker an immigration deal this year, said Reid simply doesn't have enough votes to steamroll the minority.
"We have 49 - if we were a minority of 39 you could do that," Martinez said. "At some point it's going to have to dawn on him that Americans are going to want to see things getting done."
Martinez says Reid is more intent on protecting his members from difficult votes than giving Republicans a chance to shape legislation that could pass.
Only in the final weeks of the session did the backlog of bills pass, as Democrats faced the prospect of ending their first year in legislative gridlock. Everything that arrived on the president's desk was a compromise - energy policy, domestic spending, funding for the Iraq war.
"The way you accomplish things in the Senate is in the middle," said the Republican leader, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. McConnell said his strategy was standard business for the Senate: "Either to shape things that we thought were headed in the right direction and there was a possibility of meeting in the middle, or if we thought it was completely inappropriate for the country, to stop it altogether."
Like all strategies, the one Democrats have chosen is a gamble. Voters tell pollsters they are more likely to vote for Democrats than Republicans next year. But will voters stand by Reid if 2008 is branded as a do-nothing year?
When Republicans called Democrats the do-nothing Congress this year, Democrats spat back that Republicans were the Grand Obstruction Party.
Schumer, who heads Senate Democrats' reelection efforts, likes to say Republicans are filibustering themselves out of office.
Democratic senators will fan out to their states in 2008 and say that Democrats stood together for initiatives popular with Americans - ending the war, providing health care for kids, curbing global warming.
"People know what we believe in, what we stand for, they know the Republicans are blocking us and that's OK," Reid said.
He believes his party will pick up at least four seats next year. If so, he would be in striking range of the 60 votes needed to pass legislation.
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