Category: Joe Guzzardi

DHS Gives Low-Wage Workers Short Shrift

DHS Gives Low-Wage Workers Short Shrift

By Joe Guzzardi

Today’s headlines are about the Israel-Gaza War, pro-Palestine rallies, Democrats’ success in the Nov. 7 elections and President Donald Trump’s legal travails. But away from the bold print, permanent Washington continues its nonstop assault on American workers.

As is the Department of Homeland Security’s cowardly practice when the agency anticipates voters will wince from its announcement, it chose a late Friday afternoon to make public its decision to increase by 65,000 yearly the H-2B nonagricultural, low-skilled workers’ visa. The hike is staggering because the existing annual total is 66,000. With a stroke of the pen, DHS doubled the number of foreign nationals who will arriving to do a wide number of jobs that Americans would otherwise perform.

Every year, congressional immigration expansionists and the Chamber of Commerce along with its corporate allies repeat the same tedious stories: No workers! Bankruptcy alert! Neither side of the aisle mounts much of a challenge to the false narrative. Over the decades, the mainstream media has done little if any investigative journalism to uncover and then reveal the H-2B program’s widespread fraud and abuse.

From time-to-time, however, insightful reports, surprisingly from left-leaning sources, have dug deeply enough to disclose the distasteful truth lurking within:

  • NPR: “It’s not just about labor scarcity, it’s about employer control.”
  • New York Times: The shortage claim “does not stand up”… H-2B [is] “not an acceptable solution.”
  • The Economic Policy Institute: Their blockbuster report uncovered that over the past two decades major H-2B employers have stolen $1.8 billion from workers.

EPI’s researcher and the damning report’s author, Daniel Costa, turned out to be prescient. Costa wrote that, despite its shameless exploitation of workers, and its consistent failure to add worker protections to the program, the H-2B program is “growing.” Lo and behold, at 4:08pm, Friday, Nov. 3, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ DHS doubled the H-2B program. David North, a long-time H-2B observer and critic, broke down the new 65,000 as follows: a 20,000 set-aside for aliens from Haiti, Colombia and Central America’s Northern Triangle – El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. DHS bureaucrats slipped this outrage through even though previous work permission expansions to Haiti, for example, yielded almost no applicants. The remaining 45,000 in DHS’ harmful giveaway are retreads from recent H-2B workers who have, over the last three years, toiled for a pittance.

DHS’ unwarranted labor market expansion action is a direct slap in the face to American workers. President Joe Biden’s open borders has led to more than 5 million mostly unskilled, undereducated individuals who are perfect fits for H-2B labor in construction, landscaping, hospitality and the seafood industry. For employers, the border surge represents Christmas everyday – thousands of workers to choose from and without having to fill out the tedious paperwork that the government requires to secure an H-2B visa.

Moreover, in yet continued good news for employers, through the first eight months of 2023, nearly a quarter million migrants received parole at the Southwest border. Customs and Border Protection paroled another 221,456 foreign-born nationals who flew, compliments of U.S. taxpayers, into their preferred port of entry using Biden’s illegally concocted CBP One App. In all, nearly 475,000 parolees received work permission, further diminishing down to zero the need for more H-2B visas.

As subversive as DHS’ disregard for U.S. workers and American sovereignty is, the story just begins when illegal aliens get their employment authorization. Overwhelmingly unvetted, most quasi-legalized migrants will never return home, will add to already-unsustainable population growth and collapsing social services, and will contribute mightily to school and hospital overcrowding. Doubters who view this interpretation as overstatement should ask themselves if they think Haitian, Salvadorans, Guatemalans or Hondurans, once settled in the U.S., will return home. Such a possibility is unlikely, at best. Barring a new 2025 administration’s heroic intervention, complete with a vigorous removal plan of those who arrived through Biden’s unconstitutional and illegal scheming, the migrants are here to stay.

Here is a final thought on the long-standing, unproven claim that the nation has a worker shortage. The traditional solution to labor scarcities, when and if they exist, is offering workers higher wages.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org.

DHS Gives Low-Wage Workers Short Shrift

DHS Gives Low-Wage Workers Short Shrift

Judge Landis Winked At 1926 Baseball Gambling Scandal

Judge Landis Winked at 1926 Baseball Gambling Scandal

By Joe Guzzardi

World Series 2023 had the lowest television ratings in history. No need to belabor the whys and wherefores. Instead of listening to the ceaseless chatter of announcer John Smoltz, fans would be better off acquainting themselves with the game’s rich history. A good start: read Dan Taylor’s “Baseball at the Abyss,” which takes a deep dive into the forgotten 1926 scandal that involved Hall of Fame greats Ty Cobb and Tris Speaker, as the principal scoundrels.

Baseball has a long, unhappy gambling history with wagering playing a prominent role that dates back before the 1919 Chicago Black Sox scandal. In baseball’s early days, bookmakers plied their trade in the open, working the ballpark areas inside and outside, taking wagers. The 1919 World Series may have, in the words of F. Scott Fitzgerald, destroyed the faith of 50 million people, about half the U.S. population then, but throwing baseball games was commonplace. As Emil “Happy” Felsch, a White Sox fixer, said, “Playing rotten ain’t that hard to do.”

Author Taylor explains that the dirty deeds had their inception in 1919, when the Cleveland Indians were in Detroit to face the Tigers. Neither the Indians nor the Tigers were going to win the pennant, but the Tigers were in a tight scrum with the Yankees for third place. In the dead ball era, a third-place finish meant a small share of the post-season loot for every Tigers’ member. The Indians had second place locked up. Cobb and Speaker, the respective managers of the Tigers and Indians, huddled prior to the September 25 game to iron out the details.

Speaker assured Cobb that he “wouldn’t have to worry” about the game’s outcome. The Cleveland team preferred, Speaker insisted, that Detroit finish in third. By virtue of that finish, the Tigers were likely to make about $500 for each player. Cobb, Speaker, Tigers pitcher Dutch Leonard and Indians pitcher Smoky Joe Wood all agreed to conspire in the fix.

Years later, Leonard confessed the four had agreed that since their post-season share would be small, they might as well wager on the game. Cobb was to put up $2,000; Leonard, $1,500, and Speaker and Wood $1,000 each. Cobb suggested park attendant Fred West would be a good man to place the bets. But because Detroit was a 10–7 favorite and because the local bookmakers were unwilling to handle such large sums, West only managed to get down $600 against the bookmakers’ $420.

The Tigers won the September 25 game 9–5, plating four runs in the first two innings. The Indians committed three costly errors, and Cleveland starter Elmer Myers — perhaps tipped off to the fix or maybe acting on his own whimsy — floated pitches to the plate for the Detroit batters. Speaker banged out three hits, all of them well after the Tigers had control of the game and the outcome was clear. No one is certain whether Cobb, Speaker or anyone else actually received money from their bets. The scant remaining evidence indicates that the wrongdoers may not have been able to place all the bets they hoped to.

That winter, Cobb, Speaker, Wood and Leonard went home, but the four men exchanged letters about the incident, sharing their regret that they were unable to get their bets down in time and that their shared proposition fizzled. The letters came back to haunt the four.

Several years later, the stench from the fixing incident wafted out. A vengeful Leonard wanted to settle a score with his former teammate, Cobb, now the Tigers manager. Once, Cobb kept Leonard in a 1925 game in which the southpaw surrendered 20 runs, and the manager mocked the idea that he yank his humiliated starter. Leonard never forgot, and the memory ate at him.

Cobb released Leonard, and insiders said Ty discouraged other American League teams from signing the lefty. Dutch stewed, and in May 1926 he presented the letters he received from Cobb, Speaker and Wood — the evidence — to Tigers owner Frank Navin who turned them over to American League President Ban Johnson. To keep a lid on the percolating scandal, Johnson paid Leonard $20,000 to go back to Fresno where he owned a farm, and focus on his raisin growing. At the season’s end, Johnson forced Cobb and speaker to resign. Eventually, however, the superstars appealed their cases to Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis who, sensing that the public and the baseball writers were solidly behind the diamond, absolved Speaker and Cobb, facts be damned.

Landis read the room correctly. Baseball bugs were fed up with scandal. At least five World Series — 1905, 1912, 1914, 1918 and 1919 — were rumored to have been influenced by game-fixers. And the 1923 Teapot Dome Scandal that implicated President Warren G. Harding — considered the greatest presidential scandal until Watergate — was still reverberating among the citizenry.

Cobb and Speaker played until 1928, Speaker for one year with the Washington Senators and one year with the Philadelphia A’s, and Cobb two years with the A’s.

Better to remember Cobb as one of baseball’s all-time greats, .366 career batting average with nine consecutive titles, and Speaker, the “Gray Eagle” who holds outfielder records for assists, double plays and unassisted double plays. Balls hit to center field where Speaker patrolled were considered the place where triples go to die.

Cobb, Speaker, Wood and Leonard got off the hook, and played into their 40s. Pete Rose, however, who holds MLB career records for 4,256 career hits, 3,215 career singles, 3,562 career games played, 14,053 career at-bats and 15,890 career plate appearances, was permanently banned for his gambling infractions. In life, good timing is invaluable.

*****

Taylor’s other books include
Walking Alone: the Untold Journey of Football Pioneer Kenny Jackson and Lights, Camera, Fastball: How the Hollywood Stars Changed Baseball.

*****

Joe Guzzardi is an Internet Baseball Writers Association and Society for American Baseball Research historian. Contact him at guzzjoe@yahoo.com. 
On X @JoeGuzzardi19.

Judge Landis Winked at 1926 Baseball Gambling Scandal

Hall Of Fame War Heroes Include Kiner and Greenberg

Hall Of Fame War Heroes Include Kiner and Greenberg

By Joe Guzzardi

Legendary Pittsburgh Pirates sluggers Ralph Kiner and Hank Greenberg shared more than Hall of Fame induction. They were World War II heroes whose Buccos power-hitting careers overlapped, and led to the construction of Forbes Field’s controversial Greenberg Gardens. Over the years, Kiner and Greenberg developed an enduring friendship.

The day after Pearl Harbor, Kiner enlisted in the U.S. Navy. Kiner flew Martin PBM Mariners from Kaneohe Bay Naval Air Station in Hawaii on submarine search patrols, and accumulated 1,200 flying hours. Unlike most other major league players stationed in the Pacific, Kiner played little baseball during his Navy service. As Kiner recalled, he played at the most six games during his two and a half Navy years. Kiner considered his pilot training and defending America more valuable than baseball.

When the war ended, the Pirates had Kiner penciled in to begin the 1946 season for the Pacific Coast League’s Hollywood Stars. But during Spring Training, Kiner tore the cover off the ball, and made the Pirates active roster. The Pirates chose wisely. Despite Forbes Field’s imposing dimensions for a right-handed hitter, 365’ down the left field line, 406’ in left center and 457’ in dead center, Kiner’s 23 home runs led the league in his rookie 1946 season, and he topped the league every year thereafter through 1952. Kiner’s home run title streak for seven consecutive years is an unbreakable record.

Enter Greenberg. In the 1946 off season, the Pirates bought American League home run king and two-time MVP Hank Greenberg, who was embroiled in a bitter salary dispute with the Detroit Tigers. Like Kiner, Greenberg served in World War II. Greenberg was drafted in 1941, and he was honorably discharged when Congress released servicemen age 28 years and older. After Pearl Harbor, Sergeant Greenberg volunteered to join the U.S. Army Air Corps. “We are in trouble,” Greenberg told The Sporting News, “and there is only one thing for me to do – return to the service.” Assigned to the first Boeing B-29 Superfortresses’ group to go overseas, Greenberg spent 1944 flying in the India-China-Burma theater. Greenberg served 47 months, the longest of any major league player.

When he joined the Pirates, Greenberg befriended Kiner, corrected his swing, which during the following season helped raised his anemic batting average from .247 to .313, and increased his home run output to 51. Pirates’ management, in turn, acted swiftly to help Greenberg hit more homers; they installed an inner fence that shortened left field’s distance by 30’. Society for American Baseball Research historian Ron Backer analyzed the controversial Greenberg Gardens’ consequences, and found that the new construction benefited Kiner more than Greenberg.

In his one year with the Pirates, 1947, Greenberg hit only 25 home runs. Of that total, 18 were hit at Forbes Field, of which nine landed in the Gardens. Of the 369 home runs that Kiner hit throughout his major league career, 71 landed in Greenberg Gardens, or about 20 percent. Eventually, Greenberg Gardens became known as “Kiner’s Korner.” Greenberg Gardens and the home run barrage launched from Kiner’s bat that it facilitated made Pirates ownership the biggest winner. In 1947, for the first time in Pirates’ history, more than 1 million fans showed up at Forbes Field, a milestone that, even though the Pirates were perennial cellar-dwellers, continued throughout most of Kiner’s Corsair days.

In June 1953, General Manager Branch Rickey abruptly traded Kiner to the Chicago Cubs. Since Rickey’s arrival, the relationship between the two had been acrimonious. The next day, Rickey ordered the fence torn down and said: “I don’t believe in building artificial barriers to suit any individual.” The league intervened, ruled that parks could not be reconfigured in mid-season. The gardens remained in left field until February 1954.

After their playing days ended, Greenberg and Kiner had prosperous careers. In 1948, Greenberg became the Cleveland Indians farm director and in November 1949 was promoted to general manager. Greenberg assembled the 1954 Indians squad, which set the then-American League record for most wins in a season, 111. In his eight years as GM, the Indians finished in first or second place six times.

In 1956, Greenberg became the first Jewish ballplayer inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Greenberg died from liver cancer on September 4, 1986. Greenberg, along with Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmy Foxx and Ted Williams, is one of only five players to hit over .300, have an on-base percentage over .400, and a slugging mark above .600. In 2013, Greenberg received the Bob Feller Act of Valor Award given to 37 Baseball Hall of Fame members to recognize the courage he displayed during his World War II Army Air Force service.

Kiner, injury-plagued, was traded from the Cubs to the Indians in 1955, but was unable to produce for his old friend Greenberg. After hitting only 18 homers, Kiner retired. During the late 1940s, Kiner dated Elizabeth Taylor, Janet Leigh and Ava Gardner before marrying tennis star Nancy Chafee in 1951. Greenberg was Kiner’s best man. Then in 1962, he joined the expansion New York Mets broadcast team. Kiner joked that he was chosen “because I had a lot of experience with losing.” Kiner broadcast through 2013, and is one of the longest tenured broadcasters with a single team in MLB history. In tribute to Greenberg Gardens, Kiner’s post-game television show on WOR was called Kiner’s Korner and aired for more than 30 years. Kiner died of natural causes in February 2014. Like Greenberg, Kiner received the Bob Feller Act of Valor Award given in honor of his heroic World War II Navy service.

Kiner and Greenberg played important roles in Pittsburgh’s history and are remembered for being bright lights in an otherwise bleak chapter in the Pirates’ early 1950s Forbes Field era.

Joe Guzzardi is a Society for American Baseball Research historian. Contact him at guzzjoe@yahoo.com.

Hall Of Fame War Heroes Include Kiner and Greenberg

Hall Of Fame War Heroes Include Kiner and Greenberg

Only ‘A Fool’ Wouldn’t Expect Terrorism At Open Border Says Az Rep

Only ‘A Fool’ Wouldn’t Expect Terrorism At Open Border Says Az Rep

 By Joe Guzzardi

From the Oval Office, President Joe Biden made an impassioned mid-October address that laid out the stakes for Americans as to why they must support Israel and Ukraine in their wars against aggressors Hamas and Russia. He called the wars an American national security imperative, with victory critical to the future of democracies worldwide.

Biden spoke forcefully, but unconvincingly to many in his audience. Included in Biden’s message was an “urgent budget request” – his proposed $106 billion package which designated $64.1 billion for Ukraine. But Biden gave short shrift to Israel, a proposed $14.3 billion, and tagged on $10 billion for humanitarian assistance, a category that will give $850 million to process more illegal aliens at the border.

Since the start of Ukraine’s endless war with Russia in 2022, the U.S. has sent more than $135 billion on Ukraine. For its ally Israel, since its founding as an independent state in 1948, the U.S. has provided just over $150 billion. President Biden’s latest request would tie Israel’s $14.3 billion to Ukraine’s $61.4 billion. But Louisiana U.S. Rep. Mike Johnson’s election as House Speaker put Biden’s bid for continued Ukraine funding in doubt; Johnson is a long-time opponent to indefinite Ukraine funding. Johnson did, however, agree to $14.6 billion for Israel, slightly more than Biden requested, with the caveat that each dollar given must be offset by an equal amount in federal government spending cuts, a process called “pay for’s.”

Biden urged Americans to get behind Israel and Ukraine’s defenses because, in the president’s words, support “is vital for national security.” The president’s plea to send Ukraine more billions while the Southern border remains wide open, and exploitable to terrorists, is incomprehensible, and it is unacceptable to Johnson and millions of concerned Americans. Ukraine is a profoundly corrupt country. Transparency International, a worldwide movement that works to expose corruption and the injustice it inflicts, ranks Ukraine No. 116 out of the 180 nations it evaluated, a red flag to lenders since monies sent aren’t specifically accounted for in detail.

Biden and his administration’s like-minded, pro-war Secretaries of Defense and State, Tony Blinken and Lloyd Austin, are staunchly behind Ukraine. In September, Blinken made his fourth trip to Kyiv to give President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a message from President Biden: the U.S. wants “to reaffirm strongly our support” for Ukraine. Austin, in a recent telephone call to Ukraine’s Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, reassured his Ukrainian counterpart of the U.S.’s continued support in the war against Russia.

Yet, none of the federal government’s three most powerful and influential – Biden, Blinken and Austin – have even hinted at what dangerous and possibly fatal consequences could evolve from the border invasion. In October alone, Customs and Border Protection apprehended 100 Syrians and 50 Iranians. During the one-week period from October 8 to October 14, CBP arrested six Iranians, three Lebanese, one Egyptian and one Saudi Arabian trying to cross the Rio Grande River in the Del Rio Sector, which includes besieged Eagle Pass. Because of ongoing terrorism, instability and anti-American sentiments in the region, Syria and Iran are currently listed under State Department Level Four Travel Advisories: DO NOT TRAVEL. Adding to the homeland’s risk from Middle Eastern nationals who may harbor terrorist intentions is the growing number of what CBP refers to as “known gotaways,” 23,000 during October’s first three weeks, or about 1,000 per day.

Eli Crane, an Arizona U.S. representative whose 2nd congressional district includes portions of Maricopa and Pinal counties which have experienced a steady inflow of illegal aliens, is on the invasion’s front line. Noting that about 280 people on the FBI terrorist watch list have been apprehended at the border, Crane wrote in a “Newsweek” op-ed, “If you don’t think there are any lone wolves or terrorist cells that have come in through that wide open border, you’re a fool.”

To ignore the obvious risks that open borders present, and at the same time vigorously promote and magnanimously underwrite Ukraine’s defense of its border against Russia, insults all Americans, proving Biden’s contempt for Americans.

This entry was posted in Posts, Project for Immigration Reform and tagged CB, Lloyd Austin, Mike Johnson, Tony Blinken, Ukraine.

Only ‘A Fool’ Wouldn’t Expect Terrorism At Open Border

Joe Guzzardi is an Institute for Sound Public Policy analyst who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org.

Only ‘A Fool’ Wouldn’t Expect Terrorism At Open Border

Bounty Put on Customs and Border Patrol Agents

Bounty Put on Customs and Border Patrol Agents

By Joe Guzzardi

Recently, San Diego’s Customs and Border Protection officials issued an intelligence notice alerting its agents that “Hamas and Hezbollah militants may potentially be encountered at the Southwest border.”

The memorandum added, in part: “Individuals inspired by, or reacting to, the current Israel-Hamas conflict may attempt travel to or from the area of hostilities in the Middle East via circuitous transit across the Southwest border.” The intel document showed various insignias associated with Hamas, Hezbollah and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad groups. The document also informed CBP personnel to be vigilant of young men wearing military gear and traveling alone. CBP’s alert coincides with San Diego’s latest border encounters data that show a dramatic increase; September 2023’s 26,000 encounters reflect a 67 percent increase from last year’s 15,000.

From the view of the cartels and coyotes, nothing has been better for their multibillion-dollar businesses than the Israel-Gaza war. As little attention as Biden has paid to border enforcement during his presidency’s three years, the Middle East warfare has pushed Southwest security completely out of the White House’s line of vision. Potential terrorists are well-aware that the border is open. They know that now is the ideal time to take further advantage and ratchet up crossings.

Through the 12 months ending October 21, 169 people on the FBI terror watch lists were encountered between southern border ports of entry, a number that exceeds not only fiscal year 2022’s record-setting total, 98, but the last six fiscal years combined. With encounters between ports at the northern border included, the total for fiscal year 2023 was 172.

Ample evidence exists that terrorists are already present, and plotting. U.S. Customs and Border Protection warned agents that someone who is planning to torture, if not murder, them is looking for their addresses. One text that CBP intercepted read: “We will pay for any addresses of border patrol agents!!”

The sender offered to pay $200 for an agent’s address and $1,000 for “they mommas [sic] address.” Another message read, “I’ll post us torturing any bp agent u send.” Perhaps the texts, a federal felony, are a hoax; no one knows. The FBI, as is its practice, will neither confirm nor deny that an investigation to locate the sender is in progress. But if and when a probe gets underway, the FBI should have little trouble pinpointing the source. When motivated, the FBI operates with peak efficiency. The Department of Justice has, for example, identified and charged nearly 1,200 people who participated in the January 6 protest, the largest criminal investigation in U.S. history.

With the loss of life mounting in Israel and Gaza, and hostages’ fates unknown, the Biden administration is focused exclusively on the Middle East. And on the domestic front, the administration is focused on appeasing Israeli and Palestinian supporters. But the invasion of the U.S. continues, and more migrants are on the way. In September alone, more than 75,000 migrants crossed the roadless Darién Gap jungle on foot, the second-highest monthly tally recorded by Panamanian officials, only a few thousand less than the 82,000 reported August crossings.

In total, more than 400,000 U.S.-bound migrants, many of them Venezuelans, have crossed the treacherous jungle route this year to enter Central America, a record and once-unimaginable number. Luis Gilberto Murillo, Colombia’s ambassador to the U.S., called illegal immigration through the Darién Gap “an unsustainable crisis” that poses serious safety risks to all who attempt the trip.

Murillo added, disingenuously, that Colombia and the U.S. are working together to dissuade those who contemplate the dangerous journey from taking their first step. Truth be told, Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s left-wing president, has said his government will not physically stop illegal aliens from entering the jungle. He argued instead that migration must be dealt with in a humanitarian way – translation, no impediments to the journey further north. The U.S., for its part, has imposed no deterrents to stop the invasion.

Biden’s criminal disregard for breaking immigration laws ensures either bad or tragic results. The bad – crime, bankrupt communities, a lost America – is terrible. The worst, an attack on the homeland, is unthinkable.

Joe Guzzardi is a Project for Immigration Reform analysts who has written about immigration for more than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@ifspp.org.

Bounty Put on Customs and Border Patrol Agents

Bounty Put on Customs and Border Patrol Agents

1925 World Series Mystery Went Unsolved For 50 Years

1925 World Series Mystery Went Unsolved For 50 Years

By Joe Guzzardi

It took nearly 50 years to resolve one of the World Series’ most controversial plays. For the decades between 1925 and 1974, fans debated whether Pittsburgh Pirates batter Earl Smith was out when Washington Senators outfielder Sam Rice tumbled into the left field stands to hold on to a long fly ball. Or was Smith, as some cranks in the bleachers insisted, safe when the ball fell out of Sam’s glove? The dispute was the stuff that kept hot stove leaguers buzzing for many a cold winter month.

The National League Pirates were the reigning world champions, and the Senators, the American League challengers. Both squads had several players destined for the Cooperstown Hall of Fame. From the Senators, Rice, Walter Johnson, “Goose” Goslin and boy manager, 27-year-old Bucky Harris; from the Pirates, Pie Traynor, Kiki Cuyler and Max Carey. The teams split their first two games and braced themselves for a pivotal third game that would be played in terrible weather. Griffith Stadium, the Senators’ home park, was, wrote one reporter, “swept by hurricane blasts that chilled to the marrow.” In the bottom of the eighth, with the Senators clinging to a 4–3 lead, Pirates catcher Smith sent a line drive into right field. Fleet-footed Rice snared the bulb, and his momentum carried him into the stands.

1925 World Series Mystery Went Unsolved For 50 Years
Sam Rice

As Rice re-created his dramatic catch, he jumped as high as he could, backhanded Smith’s drive, but toppled into the first row. Umpire Cy Rigler raced out from his position at second base, some 250’ away, to signal Smith, rounding third, out. But Pirates fans, first-hand witnesses to the catch, protested that the ball had fallen from Rice’s glove. Rice, the fans griped, replaced the ball in his glove before Rigler arrived on the scene. Some fans were prepared to sign sworn affidavits to back up their claims. Pirates manager Bill McKenzie and team owner Barney Dreyfuss stormed over to the box seats where Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis and President Calvin Coolidge were watching the unfolding action. McKenzie demanded that Landis overturn Rigler’s call. The commissioner, deferring, said that his baseball powers didn’t include reversing umpire’s judgment calls.

The Senators won the game, but lost the series 4–3. For the rest of his years and wherever he went, Rice was asked if he truly caught the ball or if the questioning fans had really seen sleight-of-hand. Rice had a pat response: “The umpire called Smith out.” Finally, tired of being pestered, Rice announced that he would write a letter to Hall of Fame officials describing the events that could be opened upon his death.

After Rice died in 1974 at age 84 from cancer, HOF brass began a two-week search digging through their files — no letter. Finally, Rice’s missive was found in HOF historian Lee Allen’s file. Allen died before Rice, so he couldn’t point administrators to the tell-all’s location. Finally, the moment of truth had arrived. In Rice’s testimonial, written July 26, 1965, he related that Smith’s line drive landed in his glove’s pocket, that he had “a death grip on it,” and “at no time” did he “lose possession of the ball.”

Time has diminished Rice’s skills and contributions. During his 20-year career, most of which he spent in Washington, Rice achieved a .322 lifetime batting average and fell just 13 shy of 3,000 total base hits. He missed .300 only five times, never by more than seven points, and reached 200 or more hits in a season six times, including 207 in 1930, when, at age 40, he hit .349, a single point shy of his career best.

Rice rarely struck out, averaging only once every 33 at bats, and still shares the all-time American League lead with Joe Jackson for most consecutive multi-hit games, 11, set in 1925 season, and his peers considered him to be the league’s most effective baserunner, on par with Ty Cobb.

The Hall of Fame inducted Rice in 1963, a class that included Dizzy Dean, Bill Dickey and Jimmie Foxx.

Joe Guzzardi is a Society for American Baseball Research and Internet Baseball Writers Association member. Email guzzjoe@yahoo.com or X @JoeGuzzardi19.

1925 World Series Mystery Went Unsolved For 50 Years

Remembering Sal Maglie The Demon Barber For Italian-American Heritage Month

Remembering Sal Maglie The Demon Barber For Italian-American Heritage Month

By Joe Guzzardi

When Sal Maglie was finishing his two years, 1956-1957, with the Brooklyn Dodgers, he gave advice to his two future Hall of Fame teammates, Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale. Known around baseball as “The Barber,” Sal told the future greats: “Throw that second brushback pitch right away so the batter will know you meant the first one.” Koufax and Drysdale were quick studies, and with Maglie, rank numbers 3, 4 and 8, respectively, in the Top Ten among baseball history’s most feared moundsmen. The always-intimidating St. Louis Cardinals’ Bob Gibson tops the list.

Judith Testa, in her book, “Sal Maglie, the Demon Barber,” described Maglie as “a glowering, 6-foot-2-inch, 180-pound righthander whose game-day face bristled with thick black stubble.” Although Maglie looked fearsome and his high, hard one whistled right under batters’ chins – hence his nickname – off the field, he was gentle, courteous and good-natured. 

Born Salvatore Anthony Maglie, he was his parents’ third and youngest child, and their only son. His father, Giuseppe Maglie, came from a prosperous Italian family, and he had earned a high school degree. But once in America, Giuseppe’s limited English meant he had to work as a common laborer. Sal’s mother, Maria Bleve, was from a peasant background and never attended a day of school. Despite their economic challenges, Sal’s parents worked hard. They encouraged Sal to be determined and to pursue the life that he wanted.

Sal’s first passion was baseball; he turned down a basketball scholarship that Niagara University offered him in order to play baseball at the Union Carbide plant where he worked, and also with local semi-pro teams. Along the way, Double A Buffalo Bisons’ manager Steve O’Neill, a former MLB catcher who managed four big league teams, noticed Maglie. In 1938, he added Maglie to the team’s roster.

Maglie struggled and was demoted to Class-D by 1940. In I945, he had pitched well enough to earn an invitation to join the New York Giants. After pitching in the Cuban Winter League and the short-lived Mexican League, Maglie had mastered the art of effective pitching. Banned for years from MLB because he had played for the outlaw Mexican League, Maglie returned to the Giants in 1950, where he posted an 18-4 record, followed by 23-6 and 18-8 for the next two seasons. Then, in 1955 at age 36, and plagued by back pain, Maglie was sold to the Cleveland Indians. The Indians, in 1956, sold Magie to the Brooklyn Dodgers for $100, a mistake General Manager Hank Greenberg rued for years.

Supposedly washed up, Maglie became the key figure in Brooklyn’s nail-biting 1956 pennant drive. The Dodgers edged out the Milwaukee Braves by one game, and the Cincinnati Redlegs by two. Maglie’s 13-5 record included winning two of the season’s final five games and pitching a no-hitter against the Braves. Maglie kept his hot streak going when he won the World Series opener against the New York Yankees, 6-3. In the series’ fifth game, however, Maglie faced Don Larsen, allowed only two runs over eight innings, but no pitcher could have outdueled the perfect game pitcher.

In 1957 and 1958, Maglie pitched ineffectively for the Yankees and the Cardinals before closing out his MLB career as a Boston Red Sox and Seattle Pilots pitching coach. In 1966, Maglie’s wife, Kay, died, and he became a 49-year-old widower with two young children. Sal’s life began a downward spiral. Although Sal happily remarried in 1971, his adopted son Sal Jr. became addicted to drugs and had frequent police encounters.

For a few years, putting his personal heartache aside, Maglie played golf, socialized with friends, signed autographs at card shows, and attended old timers’ games. But, Maglie’s good health ended abruptly in 1982 when he suffered a brain aneurysm. After making a remarkable recovery, Sal enjoyed several more good years. But tragedy struck again in March 1985. Sal Jr. fell from a window and died. Law enforcement, aware of the troubled young man’s drug associations, suspected foul play. After that, Sal’s physical and mental health declined rapidly, and he was placed in a nursing home in 1987 where, for five years, he struggled with dementia. “The Barber” died on December 28, 1992, at the age of 75.

Maglie is one of the most recognizable players in baseball history. He is the last to hold the distinction shared by seven others of having pitched for the New York Giants, the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Yankees. Few remember, however, how dominant Maglie was. His won-lost record was 119-62; a .657 winning percentage which ranks him 22nd on the all-time list just below Randy Johnson and just above Koufax.

The last chapter of Roger Kahn’s book, “The Head Game: Baseball Seen from the Pitcher’s Mound,” is titled “A Golden Dozen: a Listing of Armed Men.” Along with Bob Feller, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson is Maglie’s name with Kahn’s observation: “No one on any mound was any meaner. Like Iago, he didn’t know the meaning of remorse.”

Joe Guzzardi is a Society for American Baseball Research and Internet Baseball Writers Association member. Contact him at guzzjoe@yahoo.com.

Remembering Sal Maglie The Demon Barber

Remembering Sal Maglie The Demon Barber

Biden Urgent Address Omits Border Crisis

Biden Urgent Address Omits Border Crisis

By Joe Guzzardi

During his Oval Office address to the nation about Russia’s invasion into the Ukraine and Israel’s offensive against Gaza, President Biden quoted former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright who had once called America “the indispensable nation.” The reference to the U.S. as indispensable struck many viewers as curious since the president, starting on the first day he entered the White House, has worked with such determination to destroy American sovereignty.

Since Biden assumed office, about 8.6 million foreign nationals have crossed the border and settled in the interior. Their personal histories, health statuses and intentions are mostly unknown. Worth noting is that Albright is one of a long line of secretaries of state who can turn a patriotic phrase but are, at heart, devoted globalists. The line, post-Albright, includes Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Hillary Clinton and John Kerry.

As expected, Biden pleaded for more money to fund the two wars and will send a $105 billion package to Congress where it will face an uphill battle. The bulk of the funding, $61.4 billion allocated for Ukraine at a time when Americans have grown tired of sending their tax dollars, without accountability, toward what appears to be an endless, distant conflict. Within the $61.4 billion is $481 million to support Ukrainians arriving in the U.S. through the “Uniting for Ukraine” program which provides a two-year parole that includes work permission and other affirmative benefits. In other words, more immigration – another Biden policy that Americans are weary of, especially as they watch thousands of migrants cross the U.S. border unchecked daily.

Israel’s share of the $105 billion pie is a mere 25 percent of Ukraine’s – $14.3 billion. Biden’s proposed national security package will provide Israel with $10.6 billion in assistance through the Defense Department, including air and missile defense support, industrial base investments and replenishment of U.S. military stocks that have been drawn down to support Israel.

The $105 billion total also allots $10 billion for humanitarian assistance. Tucked into the $10 billion is $850 million for what’s referred to as “migration and refugee assistance” at the U.S.-Mexico border. Again, more immigration and more facilitating of immigration which voters oppose.

Biden’s address flummoxed viewers. The president passionately made the case for the U.S. to aid in defending the Ukraine and Israel, and few dispute that both embattled nations need U.S. aid. But Biden has created a U.S. border crisis and then continuously ignored the calamities that an unprotected border spawned; among them, migrant deaths, drug smuggling, human trafficking, sex trafficking and environmental damage. Key administration officials like Vice President Kamala Harris and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas have rubbed salt into concerned citizens’ wounds by, in defiance of ample evidence, insisting that the border is secure.

While Biden, imploring Congress and the Americans it represents, to act as the “agents of democracy,” he never in his 15-minute address mentioned the border and the terrorism threats that leaving it unprotected represents.

Maybe – but only maybe – the latest Customs and Border Protect report will awaken Biden, et al, to the homeland dangers percolating. Border officials arrested 18 people on the FBI’s terror watchlist in September, making fiscal year 2023 a record year for such encounters at the southern border. The watchlist, now officially called the Terrorist Screening Dataset, is the U.S. database that contains information on terrorist identities and includes not only known or suspected terrorists, but also affiliates of watch-listed individuals.

CBP statistics released Saturday showed that 169 people on the FBI terror watchlist were encountered between ports of entry at the Southern border in the past 12 months, a number that exceeds not only FY 22’s record-setting total, 98, but the last six fiscal years combined.

Including encounters between northern border entry ports, the total for FY 23 rose to 172. Thousands of “special interest aliens” from numerous countries, including the Middle East, have been arrested by Border Patrol agents while attempting to cross the U.S. southern border illegally over the last two years. Special interest aliens are people from countries the federal government identifies as having conditions that promote or protect terrorism or potentially pose some sort of national security threat. Iranians, Syrians, Pakistanis, Iraqis, Afghans, Egyptians, Chinese and other nationalities have been stopped.

If the administration wants to avert what looks like the inevitable – a major terrorist attack on the homeland – it will have to get immediately busy shutting the border and deporting illegally present aliens.

Biden Urgent Address Omits Border Crisis

Biden Urgent Address Omits Border Crisis

Green Cards Given To Migrants From Terrorist Sponsoring Nations

Green Cards Given To Migrants From Terrorist Sponsoring Nations

By Joe Guzzardi

Speaking in San Diego on October 14 to the International Association of Chiefs of Police, FBI Director Christopher Wray said that, after the Islamic terrorist group Hamas attacked Israel, the U.S. needed to remain on high alert.

Wray said that the FBI has seen an increase in reported threats. He advised citizens “to be on the lookout,” especially from lone actors who may be inspired by the Middle East warfare to commit violence on their own initiative. Online anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim posts have increaseddramatically. New York, home to 1.3 million Jews – the largest Jewish population outside of Israel – has emerged as an epicenter for hate.

The following Sunday evening, during a “60 Minutes” interview, President Joe Biden concurred with Wray that the Hamas war against Israel precipitates a greater likelihood of a terrorist attack on the homeland. Biden said after conferring with Department of Homeland Security and FBI officials, he was confident that a major effort has been made to deter terrorists and to dismantle plots against America that they may have developed. For the Americans taken hostage, Biden vowed to find those still alive and free them.

Neither Wray nor Biden’s words comfort Americans. The threat to the homeland is real, and Biden’s three-year welcome-the-world agenda has put citizens directly in harm’s way. Since October’s first week, two Iranians were apprehended at the Southwest Border. U.S. Customs and Border Protection found they had terrorism ties. Both were on the Terrorist Screening Database. In fiscal 2023, 659 known or suspected terrorists (KSTs) were apprehended attempting to illegally enter the U.S., according to CBP data.

Even countries listed on the State Department’s “State Sponsors of Terrorism” are welcome. During fiscal year 2022, nationals from Iran, which has been accused of aiding Hamas in its recent attacks on Israel, and is listed on the State Department’s State Sponsors of Terrorism, secured 9,400 green cards. More than 1,600 arrived as chain migrants, and more than 980 arrived through the Diversity Visa Lottery (DV). Syria, also on the State Department’s list, is another recipient of Biden’s largess. Syrian nationals received 3,200 green cards. About 720 came to the U.S. as chain migrants, and more than 150 arrived through the DV.

In all, in FY 2022, the Biden administration invited about 63,000 legal immigrants from nations previously travel-banned from the U.S. and rewarded them with permanent residency green cards. About 7,300 arrived as chain migrants, while more than 4,300 arrived through the DV. Chain migration, which allows permanent residents to petition nuclear and nonnuclear family members to join them in the U.S., and the annual DV are heavily criticized immigration policies that their opponents claim serve no national interest. Other banned countries included Libya, Yemen, Somalia, Venezuela, North Korea, Nigeria, Myanmar, Eritrea, Sudan, Tanzania and Kyrgyzstan.

With the historically high number of KST encounters, the president and the FBI director warn, correctly, that the likelihood of a major terrorist act committed on U.S. soil is high. Nationwide, heightened security measures have been taken, including around the U.S. Capitol where metal barriers were installed.

Alarmed realists who have watched the border crisis devolve into a free-for-all aren’t surprised that panic is setting in. The Secretary of State during the Nixon administration, Henry Kissinger, 100, commented on rioting Palestinian supporters living in Germany cheering for Hamas’ assault on Israel. Kissinger: “It [mass immigration] was a grave mistake to let in so many people of totally different culture and religion and concepts.”

Kissinger’s words come too late to spare the U.S. from an inevitable assault. Too many legally present Middle Eastern immigrants, and too many unlawful border crossers, have already infiltrated the U.S. interior.

But Kissinger’s cautionary words shouldn’t be too late to fend off a congressional push to grant refugee status to Palestinians, a total that could reach 1 million. Since President Jimmy Carter’s Refugee Act of 1980, both sides of the political aisle have supported higher refugee admissions, and more than 140,000 Palestinians already live in the U.S. Although Republicans insist that no such plan to bring in Palestinians is afoot, don’t be surprised if it happens.

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Green Cards Given To Migrants From Terrorist Sponsoring Nations

US Depending On Luck To Avoid Terror Catastrophe

US Depending On Luck To Avoid Terror Catastrophe

By Joe Guzzardi

The U.S. has been lucky since 9/11. Despite the nation’s open borders, the country has so far avoided another major attack on the homeland. The operative words are “so far.”

Look at the large number of unvetted people flooding into America, and the surprising reality is that the nation has, at least to date, avoided an attack. August numbers from the Department of Homeland Security are the latest publicly available monthly data and show an all-time record number of illegal alien border encounters. August encounters totaled 304,162, up from July’s 245,286. During fiscal year 2023, more than 2.9 million illegal aliens were encountered; most were processed and released into the interior.

In all, the number of known aliens who entered unlawfully and are still living in the U.S. under temporary or conditional status is a record 3.6 million. President Joe Biden’s administration, in violation of established immigration law, uses humanitarian parole as a major component of its lawless border abuse. Parole, which includes work authorization, is intended for emergency case-by-case bases, and not for collectively green-lighting thousands of illegal immigrants.

The 3.6 million paroled migrants is exclusive of gotaways which since January 2021 totaled nearly 1.6 million. Also excluded are the thousands who have arrived through the CBP One app, an entry-facilitating mechanism outside of immigration law, but nevertheless illegally implemented by the Biden White House.

In January, DHS promised that the newly created app would be limited to (unlawfully) admit 360,000 foreign nationals; in July, CBP announced that the program would be expanded to 522,000 admissions. The administration originally designed the app to minimize bad optics and the critical press that border overcrowding generated during the Haitian surge of 2021 at Del Rio, Texas. Because of technical malfunctions and user unfamiliarity, however, migrants often disregard the app in favor of illegal immigration’s traditional crossing method — they wade across the Rio Grande unimpeded.

No checklist of how aliens arrive is complete without mentioning the middle-of-the-night flights from the border into major hubs like New York City or to less populated cities like Scranton, Pa. Those destinations may or may not be jumping-off points to join relatives, also often illegal immigrants. At taxpayer expense, and using a transportation system described as a “breathtakingly complex network,” Boeing 737s flew as many as 240 passengers per journey under cover of darkness.

When analyzing the unprotected border, and the terrorism threat it represents, add “no one knows” to “so far.” Since the arriving aliens are unvetted — their past histories, their intentions and current locations unknown — “no one knows” sums up what the future may bring. The migrant-sending nations include countries that have unbending anti-American sentiments. Arrivals, mostly single adult males, originate in China, Syria, Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Egypt, Pakistan, Mauritania, Uzbekistan, Venezuela and Turkey.

Terrorists determined to perpetrate death and destruction on U.S. soil play the long game, undeterred when their early efforts fail. After 9/11:

· On 5 November 2009, the Fort Hood, Texas, shooting: U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, 39, who served as a psychiatrist at Fort Hood and was the son of Palestinian immigrants, opened fire on his fellow service members, leaving 13 dead and 29 wounded.

· On 15 April 2013, the Boston Marathon bombing: Dzhokhar, 19, and Tamerlan, 26, Tsarnaev planted two bombs near the Boston Marathon’s finish line. The explosion killed three and injured more than 180 people.

· On 2 December 2015, the San Bernardino Attack: Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and his wife Tashfeen Malik, 29, shot off more than 100 rounds during a holiday event. The Islamic-inspired terrorists killed 14 and wounded 22.

· On 31 October 2017, the NYC truck attack: ISIS-inspired Sayfullo Saipov, 29, used a rented Home Depot flatbed pickup truck to drive down a bike path which killed eight and injured 11.

As of July, Homeland Threat Assessment alarmingly reported that immigration officials encountered what they described as a “growing number of individuals” who appear on the FBI’s terrorist watchlist and were detained while trying to enter via the U.S. southern border. Compared to fiscal year 2022 when CBP apprehended 100 individuals whose identities matched those on the Terrorist Screening Dataset, as of 30 Sept. 2023, the total had increased to 160.

Given the sovereignty-breaking reality about alien arrivals, their numerical totals, their countries of origin and the always-welcoming Biden administration, the odds are increasingly high that, as long as the border remains unguarded, terrorism attacks against U.S. citizens are a near-certainty.

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US Depending On Luck To Avoid Terror Catastrophe

US Depending On Luck To Avoid Terror Catastrophe